Bible Study
 

 “ The Arrest”

John 17:1…….”Father the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You.

Only a few hours before Christ is arrested He is praying to Father not only to give Him strength to go through the ordeal, but for His disciples as well. Can you imagine this? He is fully aware of what is going on, He knows that only a few hours, possibly even minutes, before they arrest Him and take Him to trial; and yet He has the time to pray for the disciples!

John 17: 6,20 I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your world.……….I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word.

He is talking about the disciples, the ones that the Father gave Him, but on John 6: 70 Jesus says: “Did I not choose you, the twelve………

Some one might think that there is a contradictory here. Was the Father that choose the disciples, or was it the Son! Is it really a contradiction though? The Bible has no contradictions. In fact, here we have one more (of  virtually hundred verses) that shows that the Father and the Son are one and the same.

After all it was Christ that said to Philip: (John 14:9) ….He who has seen Me has seen the Father.

We have a lot to talk about Christ deity but today this is not our subject. Maybe in the Future we might devote a study on this subject.

Let us return back to our study.

John 18:1 When Jesus had spoken these words (after He had preyed for His disciples and all the people that would believe through them), He went out with His disciples over the Brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which He and His disciples entered.

This is the place known as the garden of Gesthimane. That is the place that He will be arrested by the solders sent by the high priest and the road to Golgotha will start from there.

What an irony. It was another garden, the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve had disobeyed God. Here, in another garden and the new Adam, Jesus Christ, with His obedience to the Father will bring back the human race to paradise.

As they go along the way He took with Him, Peter, James and John, the three disciples He always had with Him on all the miracles that He had performed and they go deeper, farther away from the rest of the group.

Matthew 26:38 Then He said to them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.”

Only a few hours ago not only Peter but also all of the disciples had promised not to betray Him. Peter was the one that was willing to die for Him. Now is the fist test, will he pass?

Jesus is asking them to stay there while he goes farther on to pray to the Father.

Matthew 26:39 ….O my Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.

Christ is not only God but also human. As God, he knows what is going to happen. He had told His disciples, not once but three times.

Matthew 20: 18-19. “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and to the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death, and deliver Him to the Gentiles to mock and to scourge and to crucify. And the third day He will rise again.

As human he is scared, yes, scared. There is one thing to imagine what is going to happen and another thing to know every detail. The spiting on the face, the beating, the swearing, and finally the crucifixion. He knows all this and for a moment He is weak. Father if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me. If He was not afraid, He would not have been human. But He was 100% human like you and me. With one exemption He never committed a sin. Even now at the most vulnerable moment of His life. Before even he has finished the sentence He is asking the Father, nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.

We should stay here for a while and try to understand the pain he is going through, the pain that causes his sweat to became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. (Luke 22:44.)

Unfortunately the time is limited and we must go on.

Mark 14:37-38 Then He came back and found them sleeping, and said to Peter. “Simon, are you sleeping? Could you not watch one hour? “Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak.

Peter, are you forgetting something? You said you are willing to die for me and you can’t even stay awake for one hour? John, James what about you! Didn’t you say too that you would follow me wherever I go? You two wanted to stay on my left and my right on my time of glory, what about on my time of need!  Couldn’t you stay awake for one hour? But the master knows that the flesh is truly weak. Yes all three said that they will follow Him anywhere and they meant every word they said. But it is pass midnight and the day was long. You know something. All three of them did follow on His footsteps. But not now, later on

Three times Christ went  to pray and the Bible says, all three times He said the same thing. Yes it was very hard for Him. He knows that it is a matter of time. He is hearting and the people that were so close to Him the three years He preached,  cannot give him a helping hand.

Mark 14: 43 And immediately, while He was speaking, Judas one of the twelve, with a great multitude with swords and clubs, came from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders

John 18:4-8 “Whom are you seeking?” They answered Him, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus said to them “I am He.” And Judas who betrayed Him also stood with them. Then when He said to them “I am He” they drew back and fell on the ground. Then He asked them again. Whom are you seeking? And they said “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus answered.

 “I have told you that I am He; therefore, if you seek Me let these go their way”.

They were a lot of them. They came to arrest Him. They are ready to beat, even kill Him if he resisted and yet when He said to them “I am He” they fell to the ground.

St. Augustine, one of our church forefathers, explaining this verse says:

Only His voice saying, “I am He” was enough to throw them on the ground. What will happen when He comes for the second time to judge the leaving and the dead?

 He could have killed them with one word. He could have open the ground they were on and burry them alive. Instead He wands to give them a chance to change their mind, but they are so corrupted they can’t even see the chance.

The disciples are stunt. They don’t believe their own eyes. What is going on? Are they for real? Are they arresting the one that gave the sight to the blinds that healed the sick, the one that cleansed the lepers? And suddenly Peter is catching on.

John 18: 10 Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus.

I am sure Peter did not mean to cut only his right ear. He was ready to fight any one that was trying to hurt Jesus; even if they were a lot and he was only one. He is not pretending, he is really ready to forfeit his own life for Jesus. He is probably asking the rest to give him and helping hand and stop this arrest. And what is happening?

John 18:11 Then Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into the sheath. Shall I not drink the cup, which My Father has given Me?

Now we see how Christ obeys the will of the Father. Only a few minutes ago He was asking not to go through the ordeal. But as He said then, not His will but the Father’s.

Matthew 26:52 Then Jesus said to him. “Put your sword in its place, for all who take a sword will perish by the sword. Or do you think that I cannot pray to My Father and He will provide Me with more than twelve legions of angels?” How then could the Scriptures be fulfilled, that it must happened thus?”

Matthew is giving us the scene with more details. He is even explain that it is not the high priest’s and the scribe’s servants that arrested Jesus, but it was Jesus himself that is giving Himself up, so the Scriptures can be fulfilled. That is why Paul in his letter to Galatians says:

Galatians 2:20…..I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

I am sure Peter is completely lost. Wasn’t Christ complaining that he would deny him to night? He wands to help. He wands to prove to the master that he is really ready to die for him, but the master stops him on his tracks. He does not understand it, but he does as he is told. If the master says so, then he has to obey.

Did you ever had that experience? Did you ever question the Bible because you don’t understand it? After all it is Christ talking to us through the Bible. Even if we don’t understand it we must obey. If it is in the Bible it is true. We cannot pick and choose what we lilke. Maybe in time we will get to understand it, but until then we have to obey what ever it is. Don’t we do the same to our children?

Did you ever asked your kids if they wand to go to the doctor, if they would like to take their medicine. What about the tetanus shot! Have we ever wandered that because they cry we should not go ahead with it? Not really. In fact we probably hold them down for the doctor to administer the shot. Why, because we know what is best for them and they don’t. Later on, when they grow up, they will understand. They will do the same thing to their kids.

Most of the time we are the same, babies in the eyes of God. Maybe we don’t understand it now, but one day we will. Paul says:

A Corithinans 13:12…. for now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now in part, but then I shall know as I also am known.

Yes there will be time that we will understand everything, until then, we are call to obey, not to question.

Matthew 26:57 and those who had laid hold of Jesus let Him away to Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled.

They are taking Him to the high pries where they will accuse Him of blasphemy, betrayal, impersonating a King and so may more lies to justify to the people that he had to die.

The real reason? They were jealous, because the people were following Him instead of them. Christ is along, not even one disciple, not a friend to defend Him.

He had helped so many people, some of them, only a few days ago, when He was entering Jerusalem riding on a donkey, they were shouting: Hosanna, the king of the Jews, the son of David. How soon they forgot! The same crowd will shout the next day. Crucify Him, Crucify Him.

But Christ is going through this judgment even today. What are we doing about it? When they are mocking Him to day, are we there to defend Him, or deny Him. To call Him our king, or to showed with the rest Crucify Him, Crucify Him. To declare that He is our Lord and savoir, or turn our back to Him and pretend that we never knew Him.

For our sake, I hope and pray that we will stay by Him, because He is really our Lord and Savoir. With Him we have everything, without Him we are nothing. Only then we will hear him on judgment day:

 “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world”

Amen

St. Constantine and Helen

1 Brookhaven Dr.
Toronto, Ontario   M6M 4N61

Attention: Bible Study

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