The Prisoner Judging All Parties

Hugh Martin - The Shadow of Calvary (Chp 7)

“And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, came, and with him a great multitude with swords and staces, from the chief priests and elders of the people. Now he that betrayed him gave them a sign, saying, Whomsoever I shall kiss, that same is he; hold him fast. And forthwith he came to Jesus, and said, Hail, Master; and kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, and took him. And behold, one of them which were with Jesus stretched out his hand, and drew his sword, and struck a servant of the high priest’s, and smote off his ear. Then Jesus said unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place; for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be? In that same hour said Jesus to the multitudes, Are ye come out, as against a thief, with swords and staves for to take me? I sat daily with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hand on me.”  Matt 26: 47-55

Gleams of glory may be seen ever and anon flashing through the dark shadows of Calvary. Strange transitions - marvellous contrasts - that take us by surprise! An argument for the divine authorship of the narrative might be periled on them.

The grandest instance was on Calvary itself. The last was the grandest, when Jesus, hanging on the cross, turned that shameful cross into a throne and, himself in the hour and article of death - death with all its curse and woe - dispensed from that strange throne, divine forgiveness and eternal life to a dying malefactor, his fellow sufferer at his side.

We have an illustrious and somewhat similar case in the narrative of the arrest in Gethsemane. For while “numbered with the transgressors” and captured as a criminal, he does, nevertheless, in reality, himself ascend the tribunal, and bringing all the parties on the scene in turn to his bar, he pronounces judgment on the conduct of each. And it may give unity to our reflections on this amazing drama if we examine it from this point of view.

The arrested prisoner has turned judge, and his sentence goes forth and takes range over all around him. He has a cunning traitor; a little band of true but weak and erring friends; and the host of open foes to deal with. These are on the stage before him, and there are no more. They all act the different parts. Jesus has his opinion concerning each of them. And with ineffable discrimination and dignity, he constrains them in their order to hear it.

I.  THE TRAITOR

And first he sets aside the traitor. “Friend, wherefore art thou come?” “Judas! Betrayest thou the Son of man with a kiss?” (Matt 26:50; Luke 22:48).

We all know the fearful part which he enacted, and on which Jesus animadverted in these emphatic questions. It was he who had projected the scheme of this arrest, and procured the warlike band of agents who were now putting it in execution. It was under his direction that the soldiers, and their officers - men of an honourable profession and usually making a strong point of their honour - had basely consented to act. It was the man who had sold his friend for thirty pieces of silver by whom they had agreed to be guided. And not thinking his past treachery enough, nor leaving it entirely to himself as his own matter, they join with him in a new exhibition of it as calculated to save them perhaps a little trouble and enable them to put through the business more quietly, they consent to a secret sign by which the traitor purposes to guide them to their object; for Judas “had given them a token, saying, Whomsoever I shall kiss that same is he,” “hold him fast” - “take him and lead him away safely” ( Matt 26:48, Mark 14:44). And then, when it is all arranged, see how the traitor draws near, as if shocked by the threatened danger to his master’s person and, affecting at once total ignorance, surprise, and sorrow in reference to it, offers the last salutation of faithful love, and pathetically laments his master! For he “goeth straightway to him and saith, Master, master, and kissed him” (Mark 14:45).

But Jesus quietly and quickly despatches his case. “Friend, wherefore art thou come?” (Matt 16:50). “Judas, betrayest thou the Son of man with a kiss?” (Luke 12:48).

Why indeed should Jesus dwell at any length on such a case? There is no hope of bringing such a one to penitence. The Son of perdition has already sealed himself as lost. Already he has passed his day of grace. The dealings which infinite compassion had taken with him to turn him from his purpose, he had resisted and rendered unavailing. Infinite righteousness and infinite wisdom have resolved to leave him now alone. Why should Jesus dwell on his case? It is already ripe for the Eternal Judgment, when the Son of man shall sit on the throne of his glory and all the nations shall be gathered before him. It can stand over till then. The very briefest mention of it may be sufficient now!

Hence the curtness with which Jesus deals with him. He does not at all expostulate. He does not show him the source of his sin, as when he deals with Peter: Peter is true at heart and shall be restored. He does not tell him that the power of darkness and of Satan has swept over him, and he tells the rude soldiery: the rude soldiery do it very much ignorantly in unbelief. He does not even demand him to abstain. He does not even command him to depart. He says enough to reveal his knowledge of the traitor’s treachery, and has nothing more to say to Judas - till the great white throne shall be set!

Yes, it is the very brevity that is the lesson here: the terrifically short and easy method with the sealed for hell! Mark you this: that if you put away the discipline of Christ in grace and providence, in forbearance and affliction, as he seeks to probe your evil heart and show you all its treachery to him and its love for the world and the sin which crucified him - if you set your face against his efforts to emancipate you from the carnal mind which is treachery and enmity to God - then these efforts will become more and more brief, till at last the Saviour, who once yearned to pluck you as a brand from the burning, shall treat you with the utmost brevity and most perfect coolness, scarce even condescending to express in this life his indignation at your crimes. Ah! how many, by resisting the Spirit of the Lord, bring themselves to this dread experience! The time was when God’s dealings with them in providence and on their consciences exhibited on his part a prolonged and warm interest in their spiritual condition: such manifestations of his gracious disposition towards them have been slighted and perverted; till gradually diminishing they are at length withdrawn, and the final expression of his mind towards them - terrifically brief, scarcely indicating whether wrath or compassion - seems designed for little more than to remit the case to the eternal tribunal. Ah! What fresh force and meaning this gives to that blessed sentence, so full of mingled tenderness and terror, but so often heard in vain - “Seek ye the Lord while he may be found; call ye upon him while he is near.”

And especially when you see the one design of such a final and brief and unimpassioned utterance to the traitor. What is it, in the essence of it, but just a disclosure of his guilt? It serves the purpose, and is intended to serve no more - to paint the crime as with the blaze of a lightening flash upon the dark cloud. “Friend!” professed friendship and its opportunities now turned by thee to serve the devil! Treachery! “Betrayest thou?” “The Son of man,” who came to call sinners to repentance and save the lost, whom thou hast known well for years as going about doing good and nothing else. “With a kiss”? - the last token of affection! And this lightening flash, bursting in upon his black soul, unlike the lightening of the skies, which the darkness devours immediately, dwells there in permanence, making his guilt to glare on his conscience for ever! Ah! That is the object of the Lord’s last dealing with the impenitent: brief in other respects, it shall be long enough and full enough for that His sin shall be forced upon his view, and burned in upon his soul in letters of fire that cannot be quenched. And with this terrible engraving upon his soul, the man disappears, remitted to the throne of judgment - to the left hand, among the lost!

Are there any whose ungodliness, amidst a life of Christian profession, of apparent friendship, is ripening them for this? - as it ever must be ripening them, till the heart be changed and made true. Ah! better to be anything than a church-going, communicating, professing “friend,” ripening for the judgment of the lost. Better be a rude Roman soldier, in heathen baseness and blindness. Awake and flee. Flee to Jesus himself in truth. Confess thy sins and want of love. Seek forgiveness in his blood: ask if he will still be reconciled. If thou do this in truth, he will be found of thee. Thy converse with him shall not be cool and brief, but long, and full, and loving. Repent truly of all thy wickedness, and turn to him as all thy desire: confess to him full, even all the treachery and enmity that are in thine heart: deplore it as thy grief and burden - and appeal at once to ransom and renew thee. Then will he put the best robe on thee as his child that was dead and is alive again; he will kiss thee with the sweet kiss of reconciliation complete and irreversible; and suffer thee to kiss him with that of true faithfulness and love. Yea, do thou thus “kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and,” like the Son of Perdition, “ye perish from the way, when once his wrath is kindled but a little” (Ps 2:12).

II.  THE DISCIPLES

Jesus judges the conduct of the disciples. And there is great need for the expression of his opinion here, for the eleven by their violence have well nigh banished from this wondrous scene all its moral grandeur and turned it into an unseemly broil. “For when they saw what would follow,” even that their beloved master, made prisoner, should be separated from them, “they said unto him, Lord, shall we smite with the sword?” (Luke 22:49). And not waiting for their Lord’s reply, they rush forward to oppose his apprehension, under the hot and hasty championship of Peter - of Peter, of course, as usual. “And Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it, and smote the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear.” (John 18:10). Now this looks friendly, zealous, noble, daring. On Peter’s part this looks very much like redeeming his animated promise of faithful and devoted constancy: “Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee.” Is it not hard that Peter should be blamed? Would you have him to stand aside, and quietly and basely see his beloved Lord fall into the hands of his unfeeling foes? And when Peter sees Judas, one of the twelve, betraying him - when that infinitely scandalous fact bursts on his view - above all, when he thinks how he himself failed to watch as his Lord had bidden him, and how if he had done so, he might have given timely warning as he saw the many gleams of torchlight indicating the approach of a multitude striking down into the valley and nearing the fated garden; burning with true love to Jesus, with speechless indignation against Judas, and torturing reproach of himself, what wonder if he throws discretion and wisdom and calmness to the winds, and drawing his sword rushes forward to the rescue? But then he does throw everything like judgment and prudence to the winds and interposes in a manner fitted to increase and complicate the evil. And it is thus also that you will do, if you fail in commanded duty as he had failed, and attempt to resume the work of serving the Lord without a due humiliation and forgiveness. Conscious disobedience, or neglect of duty, has involved the name or cause of Christ in your hands in difficulties from which you long to extricate it. You see the bitter fruits of negligence. Oh, that you had watched and prayed! You might have given, you might have taken, warning in time, before the band of the enemy had got such advantage against you. But now, they are at hand that will betray your master’s name, or your own Christian character or peace. You have entered into temptation. You are almost in the grasp of spiritual wickedness in high places, if not of the rulers of the darkness of this world. You make a convulsive rush against them. You stretch out a rash hand to save the ark. The sword flies from its scabbard, or the hot flashing temper pours out its indignation. Or you call down fire from heaven. Your self-reproach hurries you to do something, if by any means yet the threatened evil may be averted or the evil done be reversed.

Ah! But there is no meekness, and no wisdom, and no life divine in your purpose, and no strength divine in your execution of it. What you do in this spirit only complicates the difficulty: you do not walk safely in the midst of trouble. Nor will you ever do so till there be true repentance and true restoration, till you go and weep bitterly, till in secret you confess your sin and be forgiven. Till before the Lord you feel that you are a fool and a weakling. Then will you reappear before men, wise in the light of the Lord and strong in the glory of his power. Yes, and this course had better be taken at once, else the past unwatchful ness will work onward unto greater sin, till you deny the Lord as Peter did and your weeping be the more bitter in the end.

But let us listen to the judgment and opinion of Jesus. It is given with instant promptitude, and is supported by rich and overflowing reason. “Put up thy sword into his place: for they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me twelve legions of angels? But how then shall the Scripture be fulfilled that so it must be? Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath; the cup that my Father hath given me to drink shall I not drink it?” (Matt 26:52-54; John 18:11).

Now this throws a flood of light upon the subject. For in these words Jesus presents the question of Peter’s conduct in four convincing aspects; placing it in its true relation to four different parties: the authorities of earth; the angels of heaven; the Scriptures of God; and the will of the Father. He introduces as parties variously interested in the case this splendid gradation: the powers that be; the angels; the Scripture; the Father. And he shows that the various relations in which they stand to the presently enacting scene Peter’s conduct violates.

1.  The Powers that be

And first, “the powers that be which are ordained of God,” are interested parties in this case. It is by their authority, by their warrant, most unrighteously extorted, or put forth, but still in itself competent and inviolable, that he is now arrested; and resistance in such a case by a private party is simply rebellion.

For such is undoubtedly our Lord’s meaning when he says, “Put up thy sword into his place, for they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” It is ridiculous to profess to find in this a decision of Christ on the subject of war; far more so to find in it a decision against even defensive war as sinful or against the profession of a soldier as in itself unlawful. It is equally absurd to plead this text in support of what used to be called the divine right of kings, in virtue of which it was held that they might be guilty of extortion and oppression towards their subjects to any extent, while their victims were forbidden by Scripture to rise and resent the tyranny, or rise and throw off the tyrant. The words of Jesus give no countenance to the notion that all war is sinful; and as little to the equally unfounded idea that all revolutions must be rebellions. We live, as Britons, under a constitution guaranteed to us by a revolution settlement, which was righteous and good, and which banished from the throne a dynasty whom the nation declared, most justly, had forfeited its love and its submission, and whom the judgment of God upon their wickedness has since pursued into extinction. And as we live in internal tranquillity under God, in virtue of a settlement secured by a just revolution, we ought to be prepared in like manner to guard our external relations by readiness, when necessary, for defensive war.. The righteousness, in certain cases, of revolution within; and the righteousness, in certain cases also, of war without, are principles indeed absolutely necessary to the maintenance of peace within the nation itself and of peace with those around us. And these are principles sanctioned in many passages of Scripture, and certainly not condemned by the words before us.

We venture also very strongly to assert that the admirable historian of the Reformation has done deep injustice to one of the finest portraits in his noble picture gallery - we mean Zwingle - whom, simply because he died in the field, sword in hand, he represents as having forgotten that the “weapons of our warfare are not carnal,” and as having violated the command which Jesus here gives to Peter. We are persuaded that the lawfulness of the battle in which the great Swiss reformer fell is not to be settled by the offhand quotation of this or any other text. The fact that they were religious men in Switzerland was no reason why they should see, without a struggle, their fatherland overrun and devastated by the wild troops of their allied persecuting foes. Apart from their love to the gospel, it will be no easy matter for any historian to show that the Swiss did wrong in risking their liberties on the issue of battle; and most certainly the introduction into the question of their religious rights as Christians, which they loved and sought to guard even more than their liberties as men, will not make it any easier to prove that they sinned in fighting to defend and retain them. We feel interested in the question, for the memory of our covenanted forefathers in one period of their history stands in the same position, and must share the same fate, as the memory of Zwingle.

But passing from this: observe the extremely limited judgment which Jesus really gives in the text and which cannot properly be applied save to circumstances similar to those which called it forth. A thoroughly competent warrant for his apprehension had been issued by the civil authorities of Jerusalem, and was now being served upon him, very rudely, no doubt, but still by the competent and appointed agents. What is duty in such a case? Manifestly to yield obedience to the powers which be, and which are ordained of God; for “whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God; and they that resist shall receive to themselves condemnation. We must needs, therefore, be subject, not only for wrath, but for conscience sake” (Rom 13:3-5). The duty manifestly is to respect the authoritative warrant; to yield and permit the case to go to proof and judgment. It is not the case of a whole capital or kingdom put under arrest, or in a state of siege, by a bloodthirsty and ambitious tyrant. But it is a competent warrant executed on a private party. For such, in relation to the state or civil power, Jesus was simply a private person, “made under the law,” refusing most properly to be accounted “a judge or a divider.” Hence the duty of the blessed Saviour was clear: it was submission. And the resistance which he could not consistently with duty offer himself, he could not permit his friend to offer in defence: he commanded him to “put his sword into his sheath”; for any loss of life he might cause in such circumstances would be, not manslaughter, as in lawful war or righteous self-defence, but murder, an iniquity to be punished by the judge according to the primeval sentence, “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood by man shall his blood be shed.” Hence both the meaning and the strict applicability of the Saviour’s words in the circumstances: They that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Peter than was forgetting his calling and position as a private man and as a subject, when he rushed forward sword in hand to defend his master.

It was far otherwise when Abraham took up arms to rescue his friend Lot from captivity. Abraham was in reality, and by the word of God, no private person, but the very king and heir of Canaan, though his inheritance was held in reversion. And what is even more in point than that: it was not by competent and lawful authority that Lot had been made a prisoner, but by a wild marauding band of robber border chieftains, to whom neither Lot nor Abraham owed the least allegiance or submission. Very different is the position of Peter when Jesus, his friend, is arrested. Peter is no prince in disguise as Abraham was; no heir by covenant of the land in which he is a sojourner. And Jesus is not exempted from allegiance, as Lot was, to the parties concerned in arresting him. To draw the sword therefore in these circumstances is rebellion, and the bloodshed which Peter might cause would be murder.

This is the first light in which Jesus puts the case, and though it stood alone, it is a very serious one.

2.  The Angels

But, secondly: Jesus introduced a far nobler party in the case when he refers to the spectatorship and possible interposition of the angels. “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?” There is great beauty and sublimity in this. The military legion was of Roman origin and peculiar to the Roman army, and the introduction of this idea at this moment when Jesus is confronted by a band of Roman soldiers is singularly apposite and happy. And then the number twelve is that of the disciples, including alike the eleven rash and unhelpful friends and the false-hearted and exposed betrayer. Jesus gathers up, as it were from all sides, the references suggested by the scene before him, and embodies them in one of the most exalted utterances of which the case was susceptible: “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he should presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?”

Thus was Peter rebuked for his sin and folly in fleeing to an unlawful method of defence. This Jesus, whom he would defend by his rash sword, is the head of all principality and power. When God bringeth in his only begotten into the world he saith, Let all the angels of God worship him. Even Satan knew that God had given his angels charge over him lest he should dash his foot against a stone. Jesus reminds Peter of this. He tells him he could at once obtain a resistless phalanx - more than seventy thousand strong - of heavenly angelic beings; that he has only to call upon his Father, “who maketh his angels spirits and his ministers a flame of fire,” and presently this Peter, this New Testament Elisha, looking up after the blinding glory of the chariots of fire and horses of fire, might mourn his safely ascended Lord crying, “My Father, my Father, the chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof!” But it is not thus that Jesus shall ascend, without tasting death. He must “taste death” for Peter himself, and “for every one” who like him loveth the appearing of the Lord the second time. And hence if the Father sends not such an angelic guard of honour and of safety to the Son, and if indeed the Son abstains from asking it, ought not Peter to see that it is because the united will of the Father and the Son is otherwise; and how vain, therefore, and fruitless, must be the interposition of Peter’s sword.!

Is the Christian at any time in great distress and danger? And is he tempted to flee to an unlawful mode of relief from the distress, or of averting the danger? Remember this consolation concerning the angels, and possess your soul in patience. “You are complete in Christ, who is the head of all principality and power.” You are complete in him because he is so. He is exalted above all principalities and powers, both good and evil, that he may guard you safely from the evil; that he may minister to your salvation by the good. Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister to them that shall be heirs of salvation? Never flee to sinful schemes of self-protection and defence while there are legions of angels at your Father’s disposal to entrust with the charge of your safety and deliverance. If it be for your good, they will surround you invisibly, and suffer not a hair of your head to fall. Ah! How often may these holy beings acts as a wall of fire round about a child of God. Have faith in God. Take not one step aside from the path of strict integrity and truth to procure a quicker return of peace and comfort. And suffer no friend of yours to aid you by any scheme in which unrighteousness enters even by an hairsbreadth. If thy Father in heaven, who consults thy good, and could give thee twelve legions of angels immediately to free thee from all that troubles thee, is pleased still to leave thee for a while wrestling with spiritual evils or exposed to temporal danger, then how vain must be thine own unauthorised remedies prove! Buy not exemption from danger at the price of sin: that is a bargain which Satan often counsels, but which never really stands. Wait till the angels bring it thee, a free donation from thy Father, without money and without price: thine, then, by high authority than can never be questioned, by safe deed of gift which can never be reversed.

Wait patiently and do not fret. If the vision tarry wait for it: it will come and will not tarry; and in the meantime the just shall live by faith. Have faith in thy Father, and it will emancipate thee from the bondage of carnal policy. It is never time to cease your faith in him and flee to sinful or unauthorised methods of your own. His angels are innumerable; his resources are inexhaustible: it is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes; it is better to trust in the Lord than put confidence in any fleshly wisdom or any arm of flesh. For while you do this, nothing, absolutely nothing, can do you any real evil. “Because thou hast made the Lord which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall give his angels charge over thee to keep thee in all thy ways” (Ps 91:9-11).

3.  The Scriptures of God

But, thirdly: in judging Peter, Jesus brings in another, a still nobler party, to this singularly interesting case. He introduces now the Scriptures of God. They, too, have interest in this matter: all their truth and faithfulness, all their divine origin and accuracy, are at stake. For says Jesus, “How then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled, that so it must be?” If I evade this warrant of arrest, which shall now lead me as a lamb to the slaughter; if this their purpose so to lead me away be defeated, whether by thy sword or by legions of angels, in either case “How shall the Scriptures be fulfilled?” Here is the honour due to Scripture - a party in the case, higher, we have said, even than the angels, since to the living oracles of God’s written word even they must defer, for by the Scriptures their office must be guided, by the Scriptures must their visits be controlled or restrained. It is the Scriptures that withhold them now from pouring forth in thousands to defend their arrested Lord. We may well be in subjection to the Scriptures, when we see them taking rank as higher than the angels.

Yes! But there is a higher honour put upon these Scriptures still, when we see Jesus in subjection to them. It is he that pleads their authority - it is he that yields himself up to that which they require. “Lo, I come to do thy will, O my God: thy law also is within my heart; in the volume of the book it is written of me: yea, also, thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee.” How grand and exalted the position of the Scriptures! They must control the zeal of Peter. They must withhold the visits of angels. They inspire the soul of Jesus, the Son of God.

1.Are you in the position of Jesus? Your cause, or person, or character, or comfort is attacked and endangered? Defend it scripturally; in the spirit of the Scripture. Defend it so that the Scriptures may be honoured and fulfilled. Though you walk in the midst of trouble, you shall walk in safety while you walk in the leadings and in the line of the Scriptures. It is there that Jesus walks; and there you walk therefore humbly with him - in the participation both of his company and safety. “Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest; where thou causest thy flock to rest at noon?” Under the burning sun, where do thy flock seek the shade and the safety. Follow the Scripture which is the Shepherd’s voice, and thou shalt find rest unto thy soul. How readest thou? Let the Scripture be fulfilled.

2.Are you in the position of Peter? It is not your own, but your friend’s person, or character, or comfort that is imperilled. Defend him scripturally - in the spirit of the Scriptures: as one who considers well the question, How must I act that the Scripture may be fulfilled? If you do not so; if you act on the hot impulse of mere passionate sentiment, and not on the calm, clear judgment of Christian principle, you may give him cause full soon to long to be saved from his friends. Your good will to help him may only complicate his danger. Ah! It is the service of Christian friendship that is truly valuable; the interposition of him who aids me, invisibly, by the effectual fervent prayer which availeth much; who aids me, outwardly, by movements in my cause prompted not by mere natural affection, but by spiritual love, and guided by, not the rash impulse of his own mind, but the wisdom of God which he hath received liberally from him who upbraideth not. Would you really help your friend? Let the Scriptures of the Lord be your councillors. As in the friendship of Jonathan and David, these loving ones exclaimed mutually, “The Lord be between thee and me,” the Lord as indicating his will by the oracle anent the throne of Israel, so let the Lord as speaking in his own written word be between you and your friend. And this will be the source and secret of effectual aid rendered on your part, and of the highest possible enjoyment in receiving it on his.

3.Or, again, is it still more exactly the position of Peter that you occupy, in that the friend you are called to defend is actually the same, Peter’s Lord and yours? The name of Jesus is dishonoured among those in whose company you are often thrown, or his cause reviled, or his servants abused. Ah! let this friend, if any friend, be defended scripturally. Seek the meekness and wisdom which the Scriptures enjoin: avoid the wrath of man which the Scriptures forbid, and which never worketh the righteousness of God. Inquire at the living oracle, “Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?” Lord, how wilt thou have me to confess and defend thy name? Labour to live so blameless and without offence that if Christ in you be hated, or you for the sake of Christ, the Scripture may be seen to be fulfilled which saith, “They hated me without a cause.”

4.  The Father

But, fourthly; Jesus ultimately carries the matter to the highest court of all. “The cup that my Father hath given me to drink, shall I not drink it?” He now makes his Father a party in the case. Hence this noble series of gradations by which Jesus brings this matter into relation with successive rights and agencies: the authorities on earth; the angels of heaven; the Scriptures of God, till he places it in immediate connection with the will of the Holy One of Israel - it is like that mystic ladder which the pilgrim father saw, which was “set upon the earth and the top of it reached to heaven, and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it; and, behold! Jehovah stood above it.”

Thus ultimately the case in hand is carried up to Jehovah, submitted to the Father’s will. This brings out the chiefest aggravation of Peter’s sin. He would have interposed to frustrate the will of God; yea, the will of God for the redemption of the Church. Strange that this should have been so often the temptation under which Peter fell, the temptation also which he so often brought to bear, though in vain, upon his master! What else was it than an undisguised attempt to bring to nought the whole scheme of salvation when, Jesus having “begun to show them how he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed and raised again the third day, Peter took him and began to rebuke him and say unto him, This be far from thee, Lord: this shall no be unto thee” (Matt 16:21-23)? What was this but an effort to undo the whole plan of redemption and forbid the work of the Redeemer? “Jesus turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan; thou art an offence unto me: thou savourest not the things that be of God but those that be of men.” Did Peter learn wisdom? How read we? “After six days Jesus taketh Peter, and James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into a high mountain apart, and was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light. And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him; they spake of the decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. Then answered Peter, and said, Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt let us make here three tabernacles: one for thee, one for Moses, and one for Elias.” What! Simon Peter; no more shame; no cross; no sacrifice for sin; no death; not even the decease thou hast heard the visitants from heaven talking of? Still savouring not the things which be of God but those that be of men?

And now again the third time; when the Father’s sword of awful righteousness awakes against the shepherd, must thy puny sword be ready to dispute it? Oh! thine infinite folly! What! in thy blindness measuring swords with the supreme God! And all to prevent the salvation of the elect and thine own! Go thy way. We shall never call thee, nor thy successor, the Father of the Church; thou canst not even feed one lamb till thy Master’s death which thou wouldst again forbid has taken place; yea, till the crucified One shall rise again and forgive thee, and restore thee from thy sin. Thou art a loving and an earnest man; and worthy in much of our esteem and imitation; but in this thou art walking by the wisdom which is from beneath. Thou shalt be in no sense the Church’s head. Her salvation is far from safe in thy hands. It is not thy fault that she is saved at all. Yet thou art truly loved by all the faithful, for Jesus hath prayed for thee that thy faith may not fail.

How gloriously does Christ’s constancy shine forth in the contrast! How safe is our salvation in his hands! How unsafe would it be in Peter’s or our own!

Now this is the very essence of the contrast between faith and unbelief. Unbelief shrinks from being contented with having my eternal salvation entirely in the hands of another. Unbelief searches diligently for somewhat to trust to in myself, and would look upon it with complacency, and rest upon it with peace and delight, could it but succeed in the search. The search is vain. In me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. But faith looks out. Faith looks to Jesus. Faith says, Jesus is sufficient; Jesus is infallible and true. Faith sees salvation safe in his hand and says, “My Lord and my God,” I am thine: and we so are one, that thy will to save me is as good to me as my own willingness to be saved; yea, better, brighter, steadier, unlimbering, unflagging, changeless. And then thy power is all-sufficient. Thou art all my salvation; thou art all my desire. None but Christ: none but Christ.

Hearken, then, to the great Councillor as he sets his erring follower right, pointing out to him the true aspects of the case in all its glorious breadth: telling Peter his sin, and showing him his Master’s duty and his own. Behold how safely Jesus walks: surrendering to the powers that be; believing in the guardianship of angels, but forbearing for the time their aid; fulfilling the Scriptures of God; yielding submission and obedience to his Father’s will. Thus also would he have Peter to walk; and thus also thee, O believer, as thou takest up thy cross and followest Jesus. Abide in thy calling and observe every ordinance of God. Pray in faith to thy Father, refusing the aid of fleshly wisdom and sinful policy; for multitudes of angels at the last moment can rescue thee; and at the worst even, as thou thinkest, it shall be the best, when they carry thee to Abraham’s bosom. Fulfil the Scriptures, being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the word, and blessed in thy deed. And finally receive all appointments of God as from your Father’s hand; that hand in which you must be for ever safe. So shalt thou walk in safety, amidst all adversaries whatsoever, thine eye being single and thy whole body full of light.

III.  THE CAPTORS

But there is another party standing at the bar of this singular arrested judge. He judges not the traitor only, and his own rash friends, but his captors even must hear his judgment concerning themselves. “Then said Jesus to the chief priests and captains of the temple and the elders which were come to him, Be ye come out as against a thief with swords and staves? When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me. But this is your hour and the power of darkness.”

Now the point of this address turns on the fact that Jesus complains of their attempt to place him in a false position, and raise against him a groundless prejudice. They come against him with swords and staves as if he were a thief, a malefactor, a felon. No doubt this was done that the Scripture might be fulfilled which saith, “And he was numbered with the transgressors”; and in this light Jesus willingly submitted. But then it was not with the will and the view to fulfil the Scriptures that his captors acted; neither came it into their heart. And on this ground, in addressing them, Jesus was entitled to complain. This was an act of low cunning, and discreditable trickery, on their part. They might have taken him at any time in the temple, but they feared the people. They must affect to regard him as a felon before they dare to arrest him. But they get the length even of doing that. For it is “their hour and the power of darkness.”

Now here is the principle on which all persecution against the godly is conducted. It is not for being godly that the world professedly persecutes them. The world feels that decency forbids to touch them till a semblance of some other charge is raised to cover and, if possible, conceal the real ground of hatred. It is not as a holy and benevolent teacher, winning the esteem of the nation, that Jesus is arrested: it is as a felon. It is not as holy and heavenly minded men that primitive Christians are persecuted. It is as disturbers of the peace of the Roman empire; as setters forth of strange gods; enemies of the imperial authority, as it prescribes the imperial religion. It is in that character they are given to the wild beasts at Ephesus or at Rome.

It is the same principle or policy in all cases, great or small. Look into the family, the field, the workshop, where the ungodly scorn and ridicule the righteous. It is not under the character of righteous that they persecute him. That would be too obviously and visibly the very spirit of hell. It must be a little masked and hidden from the view of others; ay, they seek even to hide it from themselves. It is not because he is a Christian, righteous, godly man they hate him. They cannot condemn him under that which is the true aspect of his character. They must misrepresent him first.

Did you ever thus ridicule the strict godly? And do you not remember that you first called him hypocrite and tried to make yourself believe him a hypocrite before you spoke against him? Who is among you that dislikes the prayerful, bible-reading, righteous child of God? You dare not do it till you have attempted to believe him hypocritically and uselessly precise. It is under that false aspect you feel at liberty to ridicule the godly, and ridicule them accordingly you do. Then know that you have entered on an “hour of the power of darkness”; for this is a very special device of Satan to seal your impenitence and harden your heart. What! this godly man whom you despise is a hypocrite, is he? You come out strong against him as a poor hypocrite? And yet he is “daily with you in the temple.” At least he is weekly with you in the sanctuary, and you “lay no hands on him” there; you lift not up your voice of ridicule against him there. He and you both are there - both there on the Lord’s day; coming as the Lord’s people come; sitting before him as his people ; both, with your lips, showing much love unto him. And the difference is that when gone from the temple he prays to his Father in secret and glorifies his Father in public, while you are prayerless at home and godless abroad. Who is the hypocrite?

Beware! When you scorn the righteous you may succeed in injuring, you may succeed in paining them. But the hour in which you do so coincides with the hour of the power of the devil. How horrible! if your opportunity and Satan’s coincide! How far may they carry you when thus combined! They carried these men the length of crucifying the Lord of glory. May they not carry you the length of crucifying him afresh?

Despise not, then, the children of the Lord: rather join their ranks. Say to any of them with whom you stand related, “Entreat me not to leave thee; nor to return from following after thee: we will go with thee; for we have heard that God is with thee. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” The blessed time which sees this holy resolution, far from being the hour or the power of darkness, shall be thy day of gracious visitation and the day of thy Saviour’s power; and like his people, whom you once despised, you also “shall be willing in the day of his power.”

We close by calling your attention once more to the glory of Christ as a judge, even in the midst of his shame as an arrested malefactor. With his vesture dipped in the blood of his agony and stained with the soil of earth, he still gives pledge and prelude of his victory, when he shall come with dyed garments from Bozrah, glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength. Above all, he gives pledge and prelude of that awful final assize when we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.

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