A Holy Tension
The Suffering of Christ Through the Eyes of Matthew • Sermon • Submitted
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The Scripture is filled with accounts of what I’m calling a holy tension. This tension is the one which exits between God’s providential decrees and man’s willing actions. Or stated another way, the tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility.
In the last chapter of the Book of Genesis we see this tension in the life of Joseph and his older brothers. Joseph was the obviously favored son of Jacob, and his older brothers resented this so badly that they seized their brother, sold him to a caravan of traders, who in turn sold him into slavery in Egypt. After the death of the father, having been reunited with Joseph, his brothers feared reprisal from him. They sent a messenger to Joseph to ask forgiveness. Joseph's reply illustrates the tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility.
But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God?
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God?
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
God, in His sovereign purpose used this evil action for good. It was to preserve the posterity of Israel as well as to preserve the people of Egypt.
And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
But from a human perspective, the brothers were accountable to God for their evil actions.
In the Book of Job, we get a behind the scenes look at how God allowed Satan to devastate Job. One of the ways he did so was by stirring up the Sabeans to rustle his cattle. The Sabeans were not forced to do this dirty deed, nor was the guilt expunged because God permitted it to happen.
Nowhere is the tension between the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man seen any clearer than the account of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus, which is highlighted in our passage for this morning. As we go through this passage, we will look at the predetermined preparation, the present tension, and the purposeful inauguration of the New Covenant.
Let’s read our passage together.
Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover?”
And He said, “Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, ‘The Teacher says, “My time is near; I am to keep the Passover at your house with My disciples.” ’ ”
The disciples did as Jesus had directed them; and they prepared the Passover.
Now when evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the twelve disciples.
As they were eating, He said, “Truly I say to you that one of you will betray Me.”
Being deeply grieved, they each one began to say to Him, “Surely not I, Lord?”
And He answered, “He who dipped his hand with Me in the bowl is the one who will betray Me.
The Son of Man is to go, just as it is written of Him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born.”
And Judas, who was betraying Him, said, “Surely it is not I, Rabbi?” Jesus said to him, “You have said it yourself.”
While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is My body.”
And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you;
for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.
But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.”
After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
The Predetermined Preparation
The Predetermined Preparation
Look with me again at verse 17.
Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover?”
8 day celebration in commemoration of Israel’s Exodus from Egypt
All "the congregation of Israel” was required to journey to Jerusalem for this celebration
The Passover was considered the first day of the Unleavened Bread festival
Sometimes the entire festival was referred to as Passover — other times Unleavened Bread
Historically Israel observed 7 days of eating unleavened bread immediately following the Passover
The unleavened bread represented how Israel left Egypt in haste
It also represented separation from slavery to a sinful entity, and unto the Holy God
Tradition required that between 10 and 20 people were to feast on 1 lamb
250,000 lambs were slain during a typical Passover
There could easily have been more than 2.5 million folks in Jerusalem at this time
The year round population of Jerusalem at the time of Jesus is considered to have been around 40,000
I can only imagine how crowded, hectic, and tense things must have been with the population swell for this festival
The New Manners and Customs of the Bible 26:17 Passover Guests
The Israelites who came to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover were received by the inhabitants as brothers, and apartments were gratuitously furnished them where they might eat the feast. In return the guests gave their hosts the skins of the paschal lambs and the vessels they had used in the ceremonies. According to this custom, the disciples, wishing to make arrangements for the Passover, inquired of the Lord if He had any special house where He desired to go.
One aspect of preparation, which is not mentioned in the gospels, is that 4 days prior to the Passover they were to select a lamb and bring it into their home
Presumably the apostles had already done this
Notice Jesus’ cryptic instructions in verse 18.
And He said, “Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, ‘The Teacher says, “My time is near; I am to keep the Passover at your house with My disciples.” ’ ”
Did Jesus make a prior arrangement with the homeowner? Or was this an instance of Jesus’ omniscience?
We may never know for sure:
Mark sheds some further light on the subject:
And He sent two of His disciples and said to them, “Go into the city, and a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him;
This was not a normal task for a Jewish male
This type of task was usually carried out by females
Therefore this would have been an easy thing to spot, since it was out of the ordinary
The disciples obeyed Jesus’ directive:
The disciples did as Jesus had directed them; and they prepared the Passover.
The New Manners and Customs of the Bible 26:19 Passover Preparations
In the afternoon, the two disciples, Peter and John, went to the temple with the paschal lamb. There the lamb was killed, with the nearest priest catching the blood in a gold or silver bowl, passing it to the next in the row of priests until it reached the priest nearest the altar, who instantly sprinkled it on the altar’s base. The lamb was then flayed and the entrails removed to be burnt on the altar with incense. At dark the lamb was roasted. They likewise provided bread, wine, bitter herbs, and sauce.
We’ve been looking at the predetermined preparation from man’s vantage point. From God’s vantage point Jesus was slain from the foundation of the world.
Let’s turn our attention now to:
The Present Tension
The Present Tension
Look at verse 20.
Now when evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the twelve disciples.
The famous paintings of the Last Supper usually show Jesus and the boys sitting around a rectangular table, on chairs. But this was not the way it was practiced at that point in time. Leon Morris notes that:
The Pillar New Testament Commentary: The Gospel according to Matthew 3. The Last Supper, 26:17–30
by New Testament times they had adopted the Greco-Roman habit of reclining. They would lean on the left elbow with the head toward the table and the feet away from it; the right hand was free to take the food. They used triclinia, couches for three. The tables were arranged in a U shape, with the principal couch at the junction of the two arms. In this case Jesus was in the place of the host, namely in the center of the triclinium at the head.
Something occured during this meal which must have really startled the twelve:
As they were eating, He said, “Truly I say to you that one of you will betray Me.”
Previously they had heard that Jesus would be betrayed. But, other than for Judas, the disciples did not realize that it would be one of them that betrayed Him
The faithful disciples were cut to the very core with this revelation; they eleven each responded the same way, with a question which expected a negative answer
Being deeply grieved, they each one began to say to Him, “Surely not I, Lord?”
Jesus then gave a general comment that indicated that it would, indeed, be one of the twelve
And He answered, “He who dipped his hand with Me in the bowl is the one who will betray Me.
Base on this reply, it could have been any one of them
Now we come to the verse which speaks to the holy tension that I mentioned earlier
The Son of Man is to go, just as it is written of Him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born.”
In God’s predetermined, sovereign plan, He determined that the Messiah would be betrayed by one of His closes associates
This was indicated in a couple of different passages from the psalms:
Even my close friend in whom I trusted, Who ate my bread, Has lifted up his heel against me.
Even my close friend in whom I trusted, Who ate my bread, Has lifted up his heel against me.
For it is not an enemy who reproaches me, Then I could bear it; Nor is it one who hates me who has exalted himself against me, Then I could hide myself from him.
But it is you, a man my equal, My companion and my familiar friend;
We who had sweet fellowship together Walked in the house of God in the throng.
But it is you, a man my equal, My companion and my familiar friend;
Though it was predetermined by God that Judas Iscariot would betray his Lord, God still held him accountable for his actions
He was not forced to comply — he chose on his own to do so
D. A. Carson noted:
The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Volume 8: Matthew, Mark, Luke b. Prediction of the Betrayal (26:20–25)
The divine necessity for the sacrifice of the Son of Man, grounded in the Word of God, does not excuse or mitigate the crime of betrayal (cf. Acts 1:16–18; 4:27–28). Nor is this an instance of divine “overruling” after the fact. Instead divine sovereignty and human responsibility are both involved in Judas’s treason, the one effecting salvation and bringing redemption history to its fulfillment, the other answering the promptings of an evil heart. The one results in salvation from sin for Messiah’s people (Mt 1:21), the other in personal and eternal ruin
We cannot, as some have tried, consider that Judas did a noble thing with the intention of bringing about God’s purposeful plan. He was not some sort of Martyr for a just cause. He was a murderer. But his evil deed was used by God to accomplish His divine purpose.
Paul wrote:
And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some claim that we say), “Let us do evil that good may come”? Their condemnation is just.
Commenting on this verse, Spurgeon put it this way:
“If all the good in the world could come of a single evil action, we have no right to do it. We must never do evil with the hope of advancing God’s cause. If God chooses to turn evil into good, as he often does, that is no reason we should do evil, and it is no justification of sin. The murder of Christ at Calvary has brought the greatest possible benefit to us, yet it was a high crime against God, the greatest of all crimes, when man committed deicide (de-i-cied: the killing of God) and slew the Son of God.”
Judas was the last of the twelve to respond to Jesus’ statement,
And Judas, who was betraying Him, said, “Surely it is not I, Rabbi?” Jesus said to him, “You have said it yourself.”
All of the others called Jesus “Lord,” but Judas called him “Rabbi” or teacher
I can imagine that Judas was both hesitant to ask the question, being afraid of the answer, and yet scared to not ask, which would indicate to the others that he was the culprit
In Jesus reply, “You have said it yourself” the “you” was emphatic — in other words, his own words condemned him
Without revealing the truth to the rest of the band of brothers, Jesus made it clear to Judas that he knew exactly what Judas was up to
Very often folks are afraid of the tension in Scripture between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. That is probably because our finite minds cannot fully grasp how both can be true. But God’s mind is not finite — He sees the end from the beginning and everything in between. And so we can be assured that even when we can’t figure out how two seemingly contrary things can both be true, God can. Rather than trying to figure out the secret things of God, we should allow the not-so secret things to have an impact on the way in which we live our lives.
So far we have looked at the predetermined preparation, and the present tension. Let’s turn our attention to
The Purposeful Inauguration
The Purposeful Inauguration
This next paragraph in our text deals with the institution of the Lord’s Supper. Here, Jesus takes elements that have to do with the institution of the Old Covenant, and uses them to point to the institution of the New Covenant. Look at verse 26
While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is My body.”
The other day, as Gail was getting ready to make pizza she realized that she was out of yeast. I suggested that we could try to make an unleavened pizza crust. I don’t think she like that solution.
Leaven was like our modern day yeast. It is what makes the dough rise when preparing homemade bread. The nation of Israel was instructed by God, at the time of the Exodus, to eat unleavened bread when celebrating the Passover and the feast of Unleavened Bread which was to immediately follow the Passover. This symbolized various things. First it symbolized the haste in which Israel left Egypt.
The way they made leaven for bread was to take a lump of the dough from a previous batch of bread, and save it for the next batch. When that lump of dough was added to the next batch, it would go through a fermentation process, which caused the dough to rise. Symbolically, Israel was leaving behind their old life, and entering into a covenant relationship with Yahweh, the One and Only True God.
In biblical writing leaven represents influence. Sometimes it represents a good influence. But most often it represents the negative influence of our sinful nature.
During the Passover meal, the host would take a loaf of unleavened bread, break off a piece of it, and then share the story of Israel’s redemption from Egypt. Then he would pass the loaf around, instruction the others to break of a piece and eat it.
The last part of this verse has been the source of much debate. Some groups, such as the Roman Catholic Church, use this verse to teach that the bread literally becomes the body of Christ. But that is certainly not how the twelve would have understood it on this night. It had always been a symbolic gesture as a part of their Passover celebration. It’s just that Jesus gave new meaning to the symbolism. Look at verses 27-28 for a moment.
And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you;
for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.
During the Passover meal there were four cups which were shared. This was the third cup which represented Israel’s redemption from Egypt.
The phrase “blood of the covenant” would have reminded the twelve of how when God brought their forefathers out of Egypt, and He instituted His covenant with them, He had Moses sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice on the congregation of Israel, to indicate that they were His people.
So Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”
Jesus understood the violent and sacrificial death He was to endure as the ratification of the covenant He was inaugurating with His people, even as Moses ratified the covenant of Sinai by the shedding of blood. (D. A. Carson).
The phrase “Poured out for many” again, was an allusion to the Passover. I mentioned earlier that the blood of the sacrificial lamb was collected in one container, and then poured out into another, rather huge container, which if I understand correctly collected the blood from all the sacrifices. And then the priest would sprinkle some of the blood on the altar.
In the symbolism of the Bible, the blood represents life. Jesus life was about to drained away for the sake of “the many.” “The many” is made up of all people of all times who have placed their faith in the promise of God for the salvation. Both OT saints, and NT saints. Both Jew and Gentile. Both male and female.
That is what we celebrate the first Sunday of every month. We do so in remembrance of Christ’s death on the cross. Jesus didn’t direct that this ordinance be practiced in memory of His life, as wonderful as that memory is. He didn’t direct that it be practiced in memory of His miraculous works, as wonderful as they were. He didn’t direct that it be practiced in memory of His teaching, as profoundly wonderful as that was. He directed that it be practiced in memory of His substitutionary death on the cross.
His life for mine, His life for mine, How could it ever be — that He would die, God’s Son would die to save a wretch like me! What love Divine, He gave His life for mine.
Notice that Jesus left off by giving a future hope for when they would once again be together and celebrate the consummation of His coming kingdom. Look at verse 29.
But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.”
That’s why Paul was able to say “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.”
This morning we have looked at the tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. My hope is that you will come away with a clearer understanding of this tension. Remember, we are not responsible for explaining how these things can both be true. Rather, we are responsible for embracing both as truth, and for living our lives before God in a responsible way.
Let’s pray.
Closing Song: Rock of Ages
Closing Song: Rock of Ages
Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hid myself in Thee; Let the water and the blood, From Thy wounded side which flowed, Be of sin the double cure, Save from wrath and make me pure.
Could my tears forever flow, Could my zeal no languor know, These for sin could not atone; Thou must save, and Thou alone. In my hand no price I bring; Simply to Thy cross I cling.
While I draw this fleeting breath, When my eyes shall close in death, When I rise to worlds unknown And behold Thee on Thy throne, Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee.