The Lord now warns the disciples not only of what was about to befall Him, but how it would affect them. “All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the Shepherd and the sheep shall be scattered.” The cross has its side of shame and pain and danger for us, as well as of salvation through Him who bore our sins there. But here it is the way in which it would prove, not deliver them, of which the Savior speaks. Does that mighty work of suffering for our sins, does the atonement “scatter” the sheep? Is it not on the contrary the only righteous foundation on which they are gathered? In virtue of Christ's death for our sins, the sheep, instead of being dispersed are gathered together into one, even other sheep beyond those which Christ had in the Jewish fold; so that there might be one flock and one Shepherd. (John 10; 11) But the smiting of the Shepherd expresses His utter humiliation as Messiah, cut off and having nothing. “I will smite,” &c., refers to God's giving the Lord up to feel the reality of His rejection and death. No doubt atonement was therein wrought out. Smiting is a more general term; and though Christ takes it from God, it was literally His enemies who did the deed, and so became objects of divine vengeance, as in Psa. 69 Smiting was the loss, so to speak; atonement was the gain of all. Now that which was properly expiation or atonement was not the pure, however precious, act of Christ's death. Of course death was necessary for this as for other objects in the counsels of God; but it is what Jesus went through from and with God, when made sin, it is what He suffered for our sins not only in body but in soul under divine wrath, that the atonement depends on. Many beside Jesus have been crucified; but atonement was in no way wrought there. Many have suffered horrors of torment for the truth's sake in life and up to death; but they would have been the first to abhor the falsehood that their sufferings atoned for themselves any more than for others. Many saints have known what it was to be “smitten,” and wounded of God, as the same Psalm testifies. In fact, this was more or less the place of God's servants, the prophets, and of righteous men from time to time in Israel, who accepted their affliction and persecution, whatever it was, from God and not man. This place the Lord Himself tested to the full; for in all things He must have the pre-eminence. He only wrought atonement; but He knew every sorrow which it was possible for man perfect, the Son of God, to take. The smiting of Him who was the shepherd, chief not only of the sheep but of the very prophets whom the Lord had raised up for Israel, refers to that utter cutting off which befell Him on the cross, but the sense of this not only He felt anticipatively, but it was that which was called forth before the cross. There was far more than atonement there. He realized in His soul all the condition in which God's people were, and His own total rejection, through man's sin and folly and Satan's maliciousness. The effect, then, of all this humiliation of the Savior, even before it was complete on the cross, was the scattering of the disciples; “the sheep shall be scattered.” They stumbled and fled the night before the blow actually fell on their Master. They did not understand the thing, any more than some do now the scriptures which speak of it, though the ground of the difficulty be wholly different. They could not make out why the Messiah should be thus treated, and how God should allow it. For it is plain that Christ took all from God (not man), and imputed all to Him. Faith never considers that afflictions spring out of the dust, but owns our Father's hand in everything, however in itself shameful and cruel if one looks at the secondary agents.
“But after that I am risen, I will go before you into Galilee.” The Lord assumes in resurrection His place of lowly service with the disciples. Peter, however, confident in his own strength and love to Christ, assures the Lord that although all should be stumbled, not so with him.
Alas! in divine things there is no more certain forerunner of a fall than self-reliance. And our Lord tells him, “Verily I say unto thee, that this day, even in this night, before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice.” So careful and minute is the record of the Lord's warning given in Mark—much more so than anywhere else. “But he spake the more vehemently, If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in anywise.” However, it was not Peter alone who pledged his faithfulness thus vainly; for it is added, “Likewise also said they all.” They knew not their weakness; they knew not what it was to have the power of death pressing upon them. They had not faced the sense of total rejection by the world. Whatever there is of nature yet alive in our hearts is brought out by this. Man as such winces and refuses the trial. It is ever so till by the power of the Holy Ghost we realize our total separation from the world by and in the death of Christ. But to be dead with Him was not yet the known portion of the disciples; consequently, not one of them was able to stand. Afterward it was their privilege; but they had not gone that way heretofore. Jesus must go first. The sheep might follow after His cross in the Spirit. But Jesus must needs be the first. In due time, strengthened of His grace through His death, they too might glorify God by their death—death really for the sake of Christ.
The Lord, having all the closing scene before His soul, gives Himself to prayer. Now the effect of prayer is, in the face of deep trial, to make the trial more acutely felt. The presence of God does not make us feel less the wickedness of man; and certainly it does not make us feel less the failures, dangers, and ruin of His people. There could be no question of the smallest short-coming, no grief on any such score as this in the case of the Lord Jesus; but He realized the more the condition in which those were who belonged to God. Did He not feel the treachery of Judas, the denials of Peter, the flight of all? Even with, the apostates in Israel there was no hard indifference: how much more for the saints, the disciples, so shrinking at sue!) a time? He realized the awful crisis that awaited the people of God; He felt too what it was for Him the Messiah to be utterly refused by the people to their own hurt and destruction. What it was not only for Him who was life to go through death, and such a death, as could be known adequately only by Him! When the One that loved Him best hid His face from Him, when He was the object of divine judgment, when all that was in God of indignation and horror against evil concentrated itself against Christ! Then, again, what feelings of pity for the people who were forsaking their own mercies and the light of God for thick darkness and sorrow, through which they must pass retributively for that which they were about to perpetrate against Himself! All this, yea, infinitely more, was before the Lord, felt and weighed by Him as One whose grace associated Him with the condition of God's people, not substitutionally alone but in association of heart and in all affliction with them. In atonement He is absolutely alone. He asks no one to pray then, looks then for no comfort from them; nor does an angel come to strengthen Him then. He says, “My God” then, because it was what God felt against sin that He was enduring. “He might and did say “Father” too, because He did not cease to be the Son, any more than He ceased to be the blessed and perfect and obedient man. Thus He said “Father” both before and after that upon the cross. But He cried, “My God, my God” alone that time, as far as New Testament scripture speaks of His addressing Him: because then for the first time all that God was in hatred of evil, burst upon Him without the slightest mitigation or consideration of weakness. Nothing blunted its force. He was competent to bear, and He alone bore, the whole unbroken and unsparing judgment of God, and that without looking for the sympathy of the creature, whether of man or angel.
It was a question between God and Him alone when, on the cross made sin and retrieving the glory of God that had been compromised by all the world, He alone endured all in His own person. This is the difference between the cross and Gethsemane. At Gethsemane our Lord was, as it is written, sore amazed and very heavy. He had taken with Him three chosen witnesses, and He “saith unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death; tarry ye here and watch.” So even these chosen ones He leaves behind; “he went forward a little and fell on the ground, and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him.” It would not have been perfection if He had not thus felt it. It was impossible that He who was life could desire such a death from His Father—from God in wrath against Him. It would have been hardness, not love; but although He felt it perfectly according to God His Father, yet He entirely submits His human will to the Father's. “Abba, Father,” He says, “All things are possible unto thee. Take away this cup from me; nevertheless, not what I will, but what thou wilt.” He had a real soul, what is dogmatically called a reasonable soul, not a mere principle of vitality. He could not have said this, had it been true, as some have asserted, that the divine nature in our Lord took the place of a soul. He would not have been perfect man, had He not taken a soul as well as a body. Therefore could He say, “Not what I will, but what thou wilt.”
There was the most entire subjection to the Father even in the bitterest possible trial that could be conceived. This cup was the cup of wrath on account of sin; not to say, “let this cup pass from me,” would have shown insensibility to its character. But our Lord was perfect in everything. He therefore said, “Take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt.” He comes and finds the disciples sleeping instead of watching. It grieved Him; and it was right that it should. He warned them however for their own sake: “Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.” They did enter into it and they fell, Peter especially, to whom indeed it was that our Lord uttered it. He called them all to watch and pray; but Peter was the one to whom He said, “Sleepest thou? couldest thou not watch one hour?” He had particularly warned Peter before. He adds, “The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak; and again he went away and prayed and spake the same words, and when he returned, he found them asleep again (for their eyes were heavy), neither wist they what to answer him. And he cometh the third time, and saith unto them, Sleep on now and take your rest, it is enough. The hour is come; behold the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.” He was as one given up to be cut off from the last passover. From that the hour WAS come. “Rise up, let us go; lo he that betrayeth me is at hand.” It was not atonement only, but the Shepherd was about to be smitten, and the sheep felt it and shrank away before the actual blow fell.
“And immediately, while he yet spake, cometh Judas one of the twelve, and with him a great multitude, with swords and staves from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders.” The traitor had given the sign of a kiss, and told them to apprehend Him whom he kissed. And he went straight up to Jesus, and saith, “Master, master, and kissed him; and they laid their hands on him and took him.” Peter, ready enough to fight though not to pray, draws his sword and smites the high priest's servant, and cut off his ear. The healing is not mentioned in this Gospel; for here the Lord is simply the suffering or of man, the rejected prophet of Israel, the smitten Shepherd. What proves His unabated power is not the point here; but His bowing to all shame, and the key is, “the Scripture must be fulfilled.” He had never been one to call for such treatment from their hands, coming out against Him as against a thief, but the Scripture must be fulfilled.
“And they all forsook him and fled.” Power would have kept them, but to yield to suffering began to take effect upon them. “The sheep were scattered.” “And there followed him a certain young man having a linen cloth cast about his naked body, and the young men laid hold on him, and be left the linen cloth and fled from them naked.” Vigor fails: so does shame. The first assault was enough to drive him away. Man is powerless to face death. The only reason why believers are able to face it, nay, even to welcome it and rejoice in it, is because of Christ Himself and His death. He has taken out the sting; but it was not yet done. Consequently the disciples forsook Him and fled, young man and all. In Christ alone who suffered for us we stand.
“And they led Jesus away to the high priest: and with him were assembled all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes.” There we find a fresh trial. Peter follows, afar off it is true, into the palace of the high priest and seats himself with the servants. “And the chief priests and all the council sought for witness against Jesus to put him to death; and found none.” They found the will, but not the power; readiness to testify, but even in that they could not succeed. Man fails in everything, except in malice against Jesus. Even with all the suborned testimony on the part of the witnesses, and all the readiness to condemn on the part of the judges, everything failed. The testimony did not agree. As required by law, there must be two or three witnesses agreed; but these agreed not. The consequence was that Jesus was rejected not for the false testimony of man, but on the true testimony of God. It was for His own testimony that they condemned Him. He came witnessing to the truth, and He witnessed to it unto death. The high priest astonished, perplexed, and failing to condemn Him on the witness of others, demands, “Art thou the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” We are told elsewhere that he puts the oath to Him or adjures Him; but here it is simply the question without the oath Mark names. The Lord answers “I am.” He witnesses a good confession, not only before Pontius Pilate, but before the high priest. “And ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.” He could not, would not deny the truth about Himself. He might refrain from noticing the false charges of others; but He would not when challenged, shut up in His own breast the truth of His personal glory. He was the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed. But He was the Son of man also, and was going to take His place above, as well as to come in the clouds of heaven, according to the sure oracles of God. “Then the high priest rent his clothes and saith, What need we any further witnesses? Ye have heard the blasphemy.” To him the truth was no better; so completely sealed in darkness was the head of religion among the Jews. “What think ye? And they all condemned him to be guilty of death. And some began to spit on him, and to cover his face and to buffet him and to say unto him, Prophesy: and the servants did strike him with the palms of their hands.”
The Shepherd thus must be smitten every way. “I will smite the shepherd and the sheep shall be scattered.” And so we find that Peter, having ventured thus far into the palace of the high priest, yet more feels the effect immediately. “As Peter was beneath in the palace, there cometh one of the maids of the high priest: and when she saw Peter warming himself, she looked upon him and said, And thou also wast with Jesus of Nazareth. But he denied, saying, I know not, neither understand I what thou sayest.” Still he could not remain in presence of his own falsehood, he goes out into the porch: “and the cock crew,” this was the Lord's warning to him. A maid sees him again. It must be so. There was nothing apparently to cause terror; but so utterly powerless was even this most devoted of the disciples, at least most ardent in his love and most energetic in his demonstrations, so powerless was he to face even the nearness of death, that it suffices for a servant maid's word to bring out his denial of the Lord! “A little after they that stood by said again to Peter, Surely thou art one of them: for thou art a Galilean, and thy speech agreeth thereto.” But the more they pressed the truth upon him, the more he retreated and, in his abject fear, began to curse and to swear.
Such was Peter and such was the process through which he was soon to come out the chief of the apostles. He had to be broken down to learn the good-for-nothingness of flesh. How entirely thenceforth it must be Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost! “I know not this man of whom ye speak.” Yet “this man” was his Savior; and he knew it—too well—too ill. “Thou art the Christ” he had said before. What a contrast now! “Whom say ye that I am?” Jesus had said to him long before: and his answer was “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” “We believe and are sure.” Now he says, “I know not this man.” Jesus to him now was a mere man, unknown of Peter. Yet flesh and blood had not revealed the truth about Christ to him, but the Father which was in heaven. Peter, therefore, was near enough, when the rest were scattered, to add a sharper blow to the many which fell upon Jesus. One of the little number of disciples was a traitor—another, and be the chief of the apostles, a denier of his Lord.
“And the second time the cock crew. And Peter called to mind the word that Jesus said unto him, Before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice. And when he thought thereon he wept.” I do not say that his repentance was complete: you will find that the Lord touched him to the quick some time after. Nevertheless there was genuine feeling of his sin, shame, and anguish of spirit, though he had not yet been probed to the bottom. He wept as he thought thereon. It is always the word of the Lord that produces real repentance whether in a saint or a sinner. It is not human feeling, nor shame, nor the fear of being found out; the word wrought within that Jesus spike. It is the washing of water by the word. The word of the Lord does two things; it convicts and it heals; it cleanses as well as detects our evil after a divine sort. Had Peter believed Christ's word as to his own entire weakness, he would have been kept. But he believed it not. “Though all,” he said, “shall be offended, yet will not I.” He was ready to die with Him. Whereas in truth the mere surface of the scene of Christ's death frightened him so that, the more urgently the truth of his relation to Jesus was brought before him, the more he swore that he knew Him not. Such is flesh even in the saint of God—good for nothing everywhere.