The Lord had concluded His words to the disciples and to His Father. His work on earth now about to close had been before Him, as well as His departure on high, and contingent on both the approaching mission of the Holy Spirit to abide with His own apart from the world. That rejection of the Savior which has been in view throughout our Gospel was now to reach its extreme in the cross; but its dark shadow, far from obscuring, only serves to bring out the True Light more distinctly. He is man, but a divine person, the Son throughout wherever He moves.
“Having said these things Jesus went out with His disciples beyond the torrent-bed of Kedron, where was a garden, into which he entered himself and his disciples. And Judas also that was betraying him knew the place, because Jesus often met there with his disciples. Judas then, having received the guard and officers from the high priests and from [the] Pharisees, cometh there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Jesus then, knowing all things that were coming on him, went out and saith to them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus the Nazarean. He saith to them, I am [he]. And Judas that was betraying him was standing with them. When then he said to them, I am [he], they went backward and fell to the ground. Again then he asked them, Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus the Nazarean. Jesus answered, I told you that I am [he]: if then ye seek me, leave these to go away; that the word might be fulfilled which he said, Of those whom thou hast given me, I have lost not one of them. Simon Peter then, having a sword, drew it, and smote the bondman of the high priest, and cut off his right ear. Now the bondsman's name was Malchus. Jesus said then to Peter, Put the sword into the scabbard: the cup which the Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” (Vers. 1-11.)
It was the same orchard or garden which in the other Gospels is called Gethsemane (a word formed from the Hebrew words meaning a winepress and oil), but giving no real ground to say, as some after the patristic and medieval style, that here emphatically were fulfilled those dark words, “I have trodden the winepress alone,” as Isaiah has foretold, and as the name imports. For the treading of the winefat is when the Lord comes to judge, not to suffer, as the connected text, Rev. 14:20, ought to have been plain. Indeed no reader save one perverted by theological tradition could mistake the earlier prophet any more than the latest. For what is described in these prophecies is not agony but vengeance, not His bloody sweat with strong crying and tears, but His treading the peoples in His anger and their blood sprinkled on His garments.
But an intelligent and thoughtful reader would remark the striking absence of that wondrous scene where even those who loved the Lord, yea Peter, James, and John, could not watch with Him one hour. For His soul was exceeding sorrowful even unto death, and though He asked them to tarry and watch, whilst He went a little farther to pray, He found them sleeping for sorrow, and this repeatedly. I am aware that some left out of their copies of Luke the verses which record the angel which appeared from heaven strengthening Him, and the conflict such that His sweat became as great drops of blood falling down on the earth; as if the Lord were lowered by such an expression of real humanity and unspeakable grief, instead of seeing how characteristic the facts are of that Evangelist and adoring Himself who could so love and suffer as there portrayed. Yet John, who alone of all four writers of the Gospels was near the Lord, nearer than Matthew-John is the only one who does not describe that conflict at all: and this, not because it was not infinitely precious to his spirit, nor because the others had given it to us, but because what he gave, as they also, was by inspiration and in no way a question of human judgment or feeling. John records, no less than Matthew and Mark and Luke, the miracle of the five barley loaves; and this because it was as essential to the work given him to do as for the others in theirs. For the same reason he, led by the Holy Spirit, does not give the agony in the garden, as not falling within his assigned province. He knew it of course, and must have often dwelt on it in his spirit deeply meditative beyond all the others, yet is silent.
Can anything more attest the overruling wisdom and power of the inspiring Spirit? Yes, in every part and every detail, one almost as much as another, were we not so dull of hearing; not only in what is omitted, but in what is inserted by infinite grace. Witness what our evangelist tells us next. He brings before us, no doubt, the appalling spectacle of Judas availing himself of his intimate knowledge of the Savior's habit and haunt to guide those who wished to take and slay Him. With the guard and officers from His enemies, Judas guides them to the spot of nightly prayer, with lanterns and torches and weapons to make sure of their prey, though full moon shone and He had never struck a blow in self-defense. But Judas really knew not Him any more than his companions did. How terrible the sight of a soul blinded to the deadly malice at work, no less than to the Savior's glory and His love! How surely Satan had entered, when we look at him as he stood with them and betrayed Him!
Jesus, knowing all that was coming on Him, goes out to them saying, Whom seek ye? and at His confession of Himself in reply to their answer of Jesus the Nazarean, they went backward and fell to the ground. How manifest the proof of His intrinsic divine glory! A Man sent and come in love, yet the true God, and this the constant and special testimony of John, the true key to what he does not say, no less than to what he does say. Yet is there no effort, but the most charming simplicity along with this deep and divine under-current. Not all the treachery of Judas, not all the hatred and enmity of the Jews, not all the power of Rome could have seized the Lord, had not the time arrived to give Himself up. His hour was now come. He could have destroyed the company which sought to apprehend Him as easily as He caused them to fall prostrate before His name; as by-and-by in virtue of His name every knee shall bow, of beings in heaven and beings on earth and beings under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
But when He asked them again, Whom seek ye? and they said, Jesus the Nazarean, grace shone out, not power: the former now, as the latter before, expressing the true God who was now manifesting Himself on earth in His own person. “If then ye seek me, leave these to go away; that the word might be fulfilled which he said, Of those whom thou hast given me, I have lost not one of them.” (Vers. 8, 9.) Like the ark in Jordan He would go alone into the waters of death, and His own pass over dry-shod. He gives Himself up freely for them. The great salvation which is infallible includes every lesser one which suits and serves the glory of God meanwhile. And blessed it is to trace to the same spring of gracious power in Christ all the passing mercies we experience, where His hand shields us from the enemy's malice. He puts Himself forward to endure all. His people go free; His word is fulfilled in every way. Where the Father gives, the Son loses none. What comfort and assurance before a hostile world!
But even His most honored servants fail, and are apt to fail most where they push forward in natural zeal and their own wisdom, too self-confident to watch His ways and heed His word and thus learn of Him. So Simon Peter then displays his haste in total discord with the grace of Christ; for having a sword he drew it and struck Malchus the servitor of the high priest, maiming him of his right ear. Had Peter watched and prayed instead of sleeping, it might have been otherwise; when we fail to pray, we enter into temptation.
Luke alone, true to his testimony to God's grace, tolls us of the Lord's answer, “Suffer ye thus far,” and of His touching the ear to heal the wounded man. Matthew alone, in harmony with the rejected Messiah but true King of Israel, gives the reproof which warned His servant of what it is for saints to resist carnally. Mark mentions the fact, but no more. John, agreeably to the purpose of God in his work, presents the Lord in unfaltering obedience to His Father, as before in divine power and grace. Nothing more calm than His correction of Peter's energy; nothing more distinct than His submission to the Father's will, whatever it cost. “The cup which the Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” It is the same Jesus as in Luke and the other Gospels, yet what a difference! Everywhere worthy, never a word or way beneath the Holy One of God, but here above all the Son with perfect dignity and withal perfect subjection of heart in suffering as in work. It was His drink now in doing His will, as before His meat in doing it. As the living Father sent Him and He lived on account of the Father, so He lays down His life that He may take it again; but if He says, I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it again, He adds, This commandment I received of my Father. Never was such deep and holy conflict as the second Man knew in the garden; but none of this appears in John: it is all the power and grace and calm of the Son with no motive but the Father's will. Never was there an approach to such glorifying of God the Father.