Jesus Betrayed and Arrested
John 18:1-11
Turn in your Bibles to the eighteenth chapter of John in our continuing study of John's gospel. We come this morning to the eighteenth chapter and this is one of the really thrilling chapters because it is, in a sense, a narrative that is historical and could be easily passed over and yet when looked at in depth reveals the excellencies of Jesus Christ in a way that few other, if any, passage in the entire gospel of John does. This is rich and powerful and insightful in terms of Jesus Christ.
Now, we have been studying the gospel of John and I think somewhere around the seventieth message now, which is not bad in the eighteenth chapter, and we found that in chapter one we looked at the introduction, the prologue to the gospel, presenting the d picture that was going to unfold. In chapters 2 through 12 we saw our Lord's ministry to the world as He presented Himself to them. In chapters 13 to 17 we see Jesus in just a matter of hours really, covering all those chapters, in personal times with His own disciples, teaching them, loving them, praying for them, commending them to the Father's care. Then in chapters 18 to 21 we have the record of the death and resurrection of Christ.
So, we come now in chapter 18 to the final events of His life. This is the climax. And what has been doctrinal in chapters 13 to 17 is historic in chapters 18 to 21. What He has been saying that happened is now about to happen and we are to enter into the historic narrative of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is the climax of His life.
Now may I add, at this point, a footnote? The reason that Jesus Christ was born was to die. It greatly concerns me today that the movements that have to do with Jesus that are on a human basis, not divine, are always talking about the fact that Jesus was a wonderful person who through one or another of series of circumstances got Himself into a mess and wound up getting crucified. This is the advocation of Jesus Christ, Superstar, this is the line that's followed in the Passover Plot, the book. And this is a kind of a constant parroted thing by critics and liberals and so forth and so on. But the Word of God clearly tells us and you will understand it when we're done this morning that Jesus Christ was never trapped, He was never tricked, He was never surprised, He was never a victim, He went to the cross of His own design, of His own will because He was born for that express purpose.
In John chapter 12 we see in verses 27 and following, and I'll just pick a couple of thoughts, Jesus saying: "Now is My soul troubled and what shall I say? Father, save Me from this hour? But for this cause came I unto this hour." And then He says down in verse 32: "And I if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto Me. This He said signifying what death He should die." Jesus Christ came into the world to die. That was the purpose for which He was born. And we must understand this.
Peter picks up this very theme in his great sermon in the second chapter ofActs on the day of Pentecost. He says in verse 22: "Ye men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs which God did by Him in the midst of you as ye yourselves also know, Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified." The guilt was theirs, the plan was God's. Jesus was not shocked by the cross. He was not misguided. He directed Himself to the cross. That was the design of His existence in the incarnation.
And so, as we come to chapter 18 we come to the climax. We begin with chapter 18 ‑‑ the ascent to the cross. And, people, if you're a Christian this is your moment. This is what it's all about. For every saint, Old Testamentand New Testament, the cross is everything. It's the pinnacle and we look at it from both sides. This is the peak of history. Every man who is ever redeemed looks to this peak for his salvation.
Now as we begin this particular eighteenth chapter, I want to give you some footnotes at this point. I was talking to some of our young men that we're endeavoring to kind of teach and bring along in the ministry of the Word and we were sharing a principle that's very important to understand as a Bible student. That you always take the passage in the context. Not only the immediate context but the total context of the book. For example, you can pull verses out of the Bible at random and prove anything you want to prove. But when you really want to study the Bible accurately and be a faithful student of the Word of God, you take it in its context. In other words, you find not only what the verse says but what all the verses around it say so that you're interpreting it accurately as the writer meant it to be interpreted. But beyond that it is also very important that you interpret a passage that you look at the entire book and discern the purpose of the writer in everything.
Now, as we have come to the gospel of John, we have found that John has a single purpose and we have repeated it hundreds of times and we'll repeat it again. John's purpose is not to presentChrist as man but to present Christ as ... what? ... as God, as deity. In John's view of the life of Christ he pulls from the life of Christ all the incidents and all the occasions and all of the words that would cause us to see Christ as God in human flesh. Not majoring on the humanness of Jesus, and He was human, He was also divine. But majoring on His deity. John's whole point is to present Christ as God. And that's what he says in chapter 20 verse 31. His whole point is to see Christ as God.
So, when we come to chapter 18, as we approach the chapter, the first thing we think of in our minds is "Now this is in John's gospel." Consequently, John's desire is to present Christ as God, deity, therefore in this passage what will John try to do? He will attempt to produce evidence that Jesus Christ is God even in this particular portion. Now there could be in the life of a man no more debasing, shaming situation than to be arrested as a common criminal, to be betrayed by a friend, to be marched off, beaten and then crucified, brutalized. That is the most debasing kind of thing that a human can go through. But we know in the back of our minds that even though this is the account of the betrayal and the arrest of Jesus, John will somehow get through that debasing situation evidence conclusive that Jesus is God, will he not? Because this is his purpose. And with that in our minds we begin to study the eighteenth chapter. And guess what we discover? What should be shame, what should be pathetic, degrading, humiliating, brutal kind of narrative turns out to be a presentation of the majesty of Jesus Christ without equal. It's one of the most magnificent passages you'll ever find. And you can read it through in a narrative sense and miss it all if you did not understand the point that John is trying to get across. This is a powerful few verses. And I can promise you that when it's all done you will know things from the Spirit of God that you never knew existed through this passage.
Now, you see, Matthew, Mark and Luke had different purposes. Theirs was not so directly to present Christ as God and thus they include the agony in the garden where we see Him breaking down from the sin and the anticipation. They include the anguish and the sorrow and the crying and the sweating, as it were, great drops of blood. And they include all those things that make Jesus so humiliated. They include the things that humiliate Jesus and make Him suffer. And they make much of that because that's important. But John's purpose is to present deity so you don't find the anguish in the garden, you don't find the crying in the garden, you don't find the sweating and the great drops of blood, you don't find anything degrading or debasing or humiliating at all in John's gospel. In fact, it's just the opposite. Everything that goes on at the arrest of Jesus as John points it out glorifies Christ.
Now, if you wanted to get the total picture, you would have to put all the gospels together and get the total picture. But John has one purpose ‑‑ present Christ as God. So he picks those points and it's a dynamic presentation. And you're going to see in these verses the supremacy of Jesus Christ ... the supremacy of Jesus Christ.
There are four preeminent features in these verses that show us the supremacy of Christ. And what could be a humiliating thing as He's arrested as a common criminal turns out to be glory. The four things that I want you to see are His supreme courage, His supreme power, His supreme love and His supremeobedience. And we'll take them one at a time in a minute.
Now the wretchedness and the injustice and the hellishness of Satan's plot to kill Jesus begins to unfold here in chapter 18. But instead of downing and degrading Christ as the devil intended, we re going to see Him exalted to the highest heavens. We're going to see His unbounded, magnificent ... burst ... magnificence burst open in a series of tremendous truths concerning His incomparable person.
Now, first of all, let's look at His supreme courage. And that we find in verses 1 through 4 ‑‑ His supreme courage. Now let me just give you a footnote. His courage is going to be seen in His determination to go to the cross. Now it's very courageous when a man is willing to die for a cause ... very courageous to be martyred for a truth that youwill not reject, that's noble. But to purpose in your mind to go to a cross knowing that it means to You that all Yourpurity and sinlessness will be violated and that You will bear the sin of every man who ever lived, that You will be abandoned by the God with whom You have been face to face throughout all eternity, that kind of courage is infinite supreme courage beyond anything a human being could ever show. Jesus sets His face to go to the cross, is undaunted, without hesitation and moves directly in that way. He is not trapped. He is not tricked. He is not surprised. He purposes to do it because He is to die for those who will receive Him and believe. And so we see infinite courage. Not a cowering Christ ... not a hiding Christ, not a running Christ, but one who sets Himself to die.
Notice verse 1 and here is His supreme courage. "When Jesus had spoken these words," that is the prayer of 17 and all the other words that He's said in 13 to 16 to the disciples, "He went forth." Evidently left the upper room and also the city of Jerusalem. "With His disciples, over the brook Kidron where was a garden into which He entered and His disciples."
Concluding His prayer then in the upper room, and a time of fellowship and instruction with His disciples, the session is ended and Jesus moves out. Now watch this. He moves immediately to go to the garden of Gethsemane. Now it had been His custom throughout the years of His ministry to spend His evenings on the Mount of Olives in that garden. Gardens on the Mount of Olives belonged to rich people in the city because of the closeness of the dwellings in the city, they couldn't have gardens there, and so many rich people had private gardens over across on the little Mount of Olives. And evidently Jesus had known an individual who perhaps had given Him the key to the gate and He retired frequently at the garden of Gethsemane, over on the Mount. And it was His custom to go there. In fact, John 7 says at the end of the chapter: "Every man went to his own house, "and chapter 8 begins with the words: "And Jesus went to the Mount of Olives." That was home to Jesus. That was where He became close to the Father. That was the time He could rest from the trials and the conflicts of the people and be with God. And so He went to the Mount of Olives. And He gathered His disciples and took them with Him.
Now, many times He had done this before. It would be a common thing to leave Stephen's Gate and go down the little slope toward the little brook Kidron which is in that valley; it's a pretty sheer little slope. Then across the Kidron and up the side of the Mount of Olives. And very often He would get up the side of the Mount of Olives a little ways; He'd make a right turn, and take the little road around the hill to Bethany and spend some time with Mary, Martha and Lazarus. He had done that very often. But this time when He went up the slope He didn't go to Bethany, too late for Bethany. It was time for Gethsemane. So He turned aside from the road to Bethany and He entered the fatal garden. And as He entered the garden, He knew exactly what was going to happen. Not only did He know what was going to happen, He planned every detail of it.
Now I've thought about some interesting things at this point. As Jesus was leaving Jerusalemon this night it was Passover season. And at Passover season the pilgrims had moved into the city from all over the place ‑‑ tens and tens of thousands of them. And Jerusalem was bulging with people. And they were all there, for the most part, to do sacrifice. And so there were lambs being slain incessantly during those days. In fact, thirty years after Christ, historians tells us that there were 256 thousand lambs slain at Passover in Jerusalem, a quarter of a million. And you can imagine somewhat of the mess of just slaughtering that many lambs on one altar in the temple ... blood running everywhere.
Well, the Jews, of course, had providedfor that. And the way they had provided for that was to build a trough and a channel which ran from the temple ground which sat immediately at the top of the valley of Kidron. And the valley ... if the temple ground's here, the valley is right like that, just drops right off, they had run a little channel down there where the blood would all drain and it would run right into the brook Kidron. And undoubtedly as Jesus was leaving the city of Jerusalem on that last night and stepped across the brook, he lear ... He looked down and He saw in that brook the red blood of all the lambs that were being slain for the sins of the people. And no question about it, His mind must have become very vivid with His own sacrifice that was to come.
And so, Jesus continued up the other side and He came to the little garden called "Oil‑press," Gethsemane. Since it was the Mount of Olives that's naturally expected to be an olive Dress there and there was. A wooden olive Dress, the olives were crushed and the oil would flow into the middle and they would gather the oil and useit for the purposes of cooking and other things. And so, Jesus and His disciples gathered to a place that they had been many, many times.
And Judas also knew where it was. And Jesus knew that Judas knew. And Jesus knew that Judas knew that Jesus would go there because He went there every night for the last few nights. And that was His place of prayer and retirement. And so, Jesus enters the garden with His disciples. And Judas has already betrayed Him‑and is gathering the force to confront Him in that little garden.
This brings up a very interesting point from the Old Testament. There are two kinds of prophecy in the Old Testament. Sometime we'll go into this and we'll teach on this subject. But the two kinds of prophecy are what we call verbal predictive prophecy and typical prophecy. Verbal predictive prophecy is the prophecy that says: "For unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given," etc. etc. which gives detailed verbalization of Christ's coming, etc. What we call typical predictive prophecy is prophecy in types. In other words, every Old Testament sacrifice was a picture of Jesus Christ. It was a prophecy that a final sacrifice would come and that's typical prophecy. There are some men in the Old Testament who are types of Christ, who by their very life typified Christ. One such one was David. David had a similar account in 2 Samuel 15. David was betrayed by his own familiar friend by the name of Ahithophel. And David had to escape. And when David escaped he went out the gate of Jerusalem, down the slope, across the Kidron, up to the Mount of Olives with his faithful followers. Ahithophel and David in that little incident then become a perfect picture in the Old Testament of what is to come when the true Christ arrives, when He who is really King, David's greater Son, you see. And so, Jesus Christ fulfills the typical Old Testament prophecy seen in David and Ahithophel and Judas becomes one even more treacherous than Ahithophel.
Now you ask the question: "Why did He go there. I mean, if He knew He was going to get into this mess, why did He go there?" Well, He went there because first of all it was the place of prayer and He wanted to talk to the Father and He did, didn't he? John doesn't tell us about the agonizing in prayer the other writers do. He also went there because it was a place of rest. That was where He went to get away from the conflict all the time. And thirdly He went there because it was the place of sweet fellowship with His disciples, where they could be alone together. But all of that is secondary. The real reason He went there, and get this one, He went there because He knew Judas would be there and He knew the soldiers would be there and He wanted to be sure that it would be very easy for them to arrest Him.
You say, "You mean He didn't ... this wasn't a surprise?" It wasn't a surprise; He mapped it out before the world began. He knew those soldiers would march before those soldiers were ever conceived. The Old Testament details what Judas is going to do, not only in the typical prophecy of Ahithophel's situation, but in very, very accurate verbalization, it even tells about him selling Him and buying a potter's field. Jesus went to that garden because He was forcing the confrontation that would result in His death, you see.
Look at it in verse 2, it tells you that. "And Judas also, who betrayed Him, knew the place. For Jesus often resorted there with His disciples." Now why do you suppose it says that? It says that because that's the reason Jesus went there because Judas knew where He'd go. You say, "Why did Jesus want to make it easy for Judas?" Listen, it wasn't by any means going to be easy for Judas, forever it isn't easy for Judas. But He wanted to put it in a place where the arrest and the betrayal could take place as He wanted it to take place.
For example, if Jesus had allowed Himself to be arrested in the middle of Jerusalem, there would have been in insurrection and a revolution that would have torn the city and perhaps ended in the killing of the disciples because He was popular, you know that. Jesus wanted to make it easy. And Jesus wanted to prove to the disciples that He was not a victim. He could have gone all by Himself to the garden, the disciples stayed in Jerusalem and by word of mouth they would have heard Jesus had been captured and their faith would have gone down the drain. They would have seen Him as a victim. So Jesus says -‑ Come with me, boys, you're going to see how it really is. So He gathers them together and He takes them over there so that in the quiet and the solitude of the garden of Gethsemane the arrest can take place without any disturbance and revolution and so the disciples can stand there and in calmness watch what happens and see that this is no victim but a victor and so that they can be protected, as we shall see.
Now the leadersof Israel had wanted to get Jesus many times but they feared the people. How many times have you remembered that that was said? They were afraid of the people. And so, Jesus going to the garden eliminated the problem of the fear and made it very, very easy to arrest Him. And He took His eleven along just so they would see that it was a voluntary surrender.
Now you go back to John chapter 10 for a minute and you read this. Just listen and I'll read 17: "Therefore doth My Father love Me because I lay down My life that I might take it again." Listen to this: "No man taketh it from Me but I lay it down of Myself." I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it again. Nobody ever took Jesus' life from Him, He was never a victim. A coward would have gone anywhere but the garden because that's the most obvious place where Judas would come and find Him.
Now, on a previous occ ... some of the previous occasions He had avoided the Jews, definitely. You can go back, for example, to chapter 8, I think it's verse 59, it says ‑‑ yes, "They took up stones to cast at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple going through the midst of them and so passed by." In Nazareth they took Him to a brow of a hill to throw Him off and He just went right through the midst, and then He was ... you know ... one of those things ... was gone. In chapter 12 verse 36 just after the confrontation at that chapter in verse 36 it tells us, wrapping it up, "These