A Painful Path, A Sovereign Savior

Introduction

-{Gospel of John 18}

-For a couple of years, I’ve taken a sporadic pathway through the gospel of John—hitting some major sections and then taking a break with some other sermon series. Now I want to complete the journey studying John’s account of Jesus’ arrest, death, burial, and resurrection as we make our way to Easter.

-I want to begin today considering the hero’s journey. Literary scholar Joseph Campbell popularized the idea of the hero’s journey which is the pattern that is found in much of ancient myth, religions, and literature of where the hero of a story goes, how he gets there, and what he experiences.

~Campbell’s scholarship greatly influenced much of our modern-day stories and entertainment. George Lucas was especially influenced by the hero’s story in creating Star Wars and the story of Luke Skywalker. But the path or pattern of the hero can be found in many of our favorite tales.

-While Campbell gives amazing detail to innumerable steps in the hero’s journey, I am going to very much oversimplify it. The hero is placed on the journey, along the way they encounter conflict and difficulties and even pain before eventually coming to the point of victory. When you think of the stories you enjoy, that is a very simple outline to that story.

-We could say that what is true of the hero’s journey is true of our own life journeys. And yet, for some reason, we all think that we are somehow exempt from the middle part. We think that life is going to be an adventure, and the voyage is going to be nice and easy, and then we find victory in the end.

~We even sometimes get these weird ideas that a good, obedient person is going to have an easy life. We think that if we do things right, everything is going to be alright. We reason within ourselves that if I do what I’m supposed to do then only good will come my way.

-I had a moment in life thinking that way. After I knew that I was called to ministry, my dad got sick with cancer. I had a choice to make, be obedient to the call and where God was leading me, or not. So, I went off to seminary. I reasoned within myself and tried to reason with God, look, I’m doing what I’m supposed to do so God can now cure my dad. That’s not how it works. That is not the reality of the journey.

-And then we look at Jesus. He is the only true hero there is. All the ones we call heroes are fiction, Jesus is really, historically, the Son of God. And Jesus is the only person to ever truly be obedient. Surely, if anyone’s journey should be easy, it ought to be His. But it wasn’t. In fact, Jesus actually had the hardest path to walk ever, and yet it brought about the greatest victory ever.

-And because Jesus took His journey and followed the path the Father had for Him, God then invites us to join the journey and follow the path that He has for us. The question is, do we expect the path to be easy, and if it’s not will we go on the journey anyway? Let’s consider what happened to Christ and his journey.

READ John 18:1-11

John 18:1–11 ESV

When Jesus had spoken these words, he went out with his disciples across the brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which he and his disciples entered. Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with his disciples. So Judas, having procured a band of soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Then Jesus, knowing all that would happen to him, came forward and said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered him, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus said to them, “I am he.” Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them. When Jesus said to them, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground. So he asked them again, “Whom do you seek?” And they said, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus answered, “I told you that I am he. So, if you seek me, let these men go.” This was to fulfill the word that he had spoken: “Of those whom you gave me I have lost not one.” 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.) So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?”

-After the Lord’s Supper, Jesus gave a final discourse to His disciples—some final lessons before the events that begin to unfold here in our passage. Jesus then leads them to a garden that He and the disciples would often retreat to.

~The other gospel writers identify it as Gethsemane (which means oil press). This garden would be a place of repose and safety—a place to get away and have time to themselves for learning and fellowship.

-From the other gospels we know what happens in the garden on this particular night. Jesus takes the leading three apostles separately a little farther into the garden, tells them to pray, and He goes by Himself to do the same.

~Jesus prays that the cup would be taken from Him. Jesus is not so much concerned about the physical aspect, nor was He concerned about the dying aspect. Others would suffer just as horribly in His name in the centuries to come and would gladly die in His name. No, it was the spiritual aspect that weighed heavily upon Him.

~Jesus, the perfect, spotless, Lamb of God, who knew no sin and never sinned was about to become sin. Jesus would embody the very thing that a holy God detested. It was amazing enough that the eternal Son would condescend Himself to take on the limitations of humanity—but now He was to take on and become the most spiritually vile thing there is. The perfect Jesus would be defiled by humanity’s wickedness.

~And then, having known nothing other than perfect fellowship with the Father for all of eternity, the Father would then treat the Son as a curse and pour out every ounce of wrath that His justice required.

-That is the cup that Jesus faced. And Jesus came to the same conclusion with each prayer that He gave—NOT MY WILL BUT YOUR WILL BE DONE

-It’s interesting that John omits that episode from His gospel because it is so compelling and powerful. Nevertheless, the effects from that episode are felt here because we see a Jesus who is set and bound and determined to go to the cross. His eyes are on Calvary. But even the path to the cross was a painful one, for consider what we see in today’s passage.

-Judas had left the supper earlier to put things in motion for Jesus’ arrest. He received his money, the priests gave him a group from the temple guard, and it seems that some Roman soldiers came along to ensure that there would be no rioting—things were always politically volatile during the Passover in Jerusalem.

-And Judas leads this group to the garden—to their safe haven. Judas defiles their sacred space with a betrayal. And that betrayal was painful. One of Jesus’ best friends turned on Him and turned Him over to His enemies.

-The other apostles were in disbelief. They had been around Judas all these years. They ate together. Laughed together. Cried together. Ministered together. Loved together. They were all like brothers. And now Judas does this—betraying Jesus with a kiss as the other gospels tell us. How could it be Judas?

~We have this idea in our minds that Judas somehow stood out from the others. We picture him as some beady-eyed, slick-haired snake oil salesman that maybe even had a sinister laugh. We know he was a thief, but the others didn’t know it. Judas was their comrade, their friend. Judas was Jesus’ comrade and friend. And now it was Judas who was the betrayer.

-Even though Jesus knew it was him and it would come, it was still nevertheless painful. Imagine, if you will, the person who is closest to you—with whom you share the most intimate parts of your life, the one who hears your deepest darkest secrets, the one who stands with you in your time of need, the one who laughs with you and cries with you and is there for you------and then that is the one who betrays you, turns on you, kicks you while you are down, and humiliates you in front of everyone. Feel that pain within you, and then multiply it exponentially. There is Judas and Jesus.

-Judas and his large group of armed men think they have everything well in hand, and yet John makes it clear that Jesus is the one who is actually in complete control of the situation.

~It says in v. 4 that Jesus knew that this was going to happen. The arrest and betrayal were no shock, nevertheless they were painful beyond measure.

~But then Jesus makes a pronouncement about Himself and displays His power and authority. Even with the Judas’ signal by a kiss, a leader in the group asks which one is Jesus.

~The English translations give Jesus’ reply as “I am he” when in actuality Jesus says two simple words. I AM. Most definitely this hearkens back to Exodus 3 where God reveals His name to Moses—YAHWEH, JEHOVAH, I AM!

~Jesus said it with such force and commanding presence that the whole group steps back and falls over themselves. They become disoriented, so Jesus starts the conversation again, and again identifies Himself as I AM.

-Yet, even knowing what Jesus was proclaiming, they nevertheless go ahead with the arrest. Jesus tells them to let His disciples go. His physical protection of the disciples pictures and points to the spiritual protection that He would give them through His death and resurrection.

-And then there is Peter—impetuous, impulsive Peter who acts without thinking. He pulls out a sword, aims for a guy’s head, misses, and gets the guy’s ear instead. Jesus rebukes Him.

~This reminds us of an earlier passage where Jesus had to rebuke Peter for thinking worldly instead of thinking heavenly—thinking like a mere man instead of God.

~Even after Jesus had told Peter and the rest of them the plan a thousand times before, and yet they still didn’t understand. They may have been in a state of denial, but Jesus told them He must die but He would be raised. It always went over their heads.

-And now, here again, Jesus has to correct Peter, and He says SHALL I NOT DRINK THE CUP THAT THE FATHER HAS GIVEN ME?

~There is that cup again. God had a plan for Jesus that would impact the world and eternity. And this leads us to the lesson I want us to walk away with today.

{Yes, there actually is a point to this sermon—just one point…don’t know if you’ve ever heard of a one-point Baptist sermon…}

THE PATH OF GOD’S PLAN MAY BE PAINFUL, BUT IT IS ALSO PERFECT AND PURPOSEFUL

-Here, God has sent His own Son to fulfill the plan of redeeming a remnant out of humanity. I’m sure that we could come up with a million ways that we think it could have happened more easily, while instead it was a painful path. And yet without that path we would not be saved, and Jesus would not have a kingdom of redeemed humans.

~God led Jesus in that path because that is the only path that satisfied both His justice and His love. The painful path included betrayal by a friend that was closer than a brother and being arrested even though He was truly the only innocent person in the world.

~Jesus’ path was painful, but it was for the purpose of redemption and He accomplished it perfectly. There was no other way.

-But what about us? First, if God says that this is the only way to save us, then we need to avail ourselves of that salvation.

-But what about those who are already Christians. We may have had the thought that if I do all the right churchy and Christiany things, then I’ll have a smooth path. We may have had the mistaken notion, as I mentioned earlier, that our path will be like the hero’s path without the conflict and drama in the middle. We start the journey and we end in victory and nothing much happens in between.

-Well, we can rest assured that we are called to join God in the journey of His plan. He didn’t just save us for us to sit around until we die or Jesus returns. There is a journey we join Him in.

~We can also rest assured that there is victory. Have no doubt that Jesus has already won, and when we are in Christ, we join Him in that victory.

~But right now we are in the middle of the story—and experience bears out that our path also involves some pain. But we can also rest assured in this—our path also is perfect because it is led of God and it is purposeful because it is part of the redemption story.

-We can’t be surprised by the pain. Jesus earlier in the gospel of John reminded His disciples, and by extension us, that the student isn’t greater than the master. If Jesus had His cup to drink from, what makes His followers think that their path will be smooth and easy.

-Now, there is a difference between our paths and Jesus’—our path is for the purpose of glorifying Jesus and making Him known. We are not the heroes in this story—Jesus is. We are secondary characters whose job is to point to the hero—nevertheless, we are loved and cherished and God has a path in His plan for us. And whatever happens to us (painful or otherwise) has purpose behind it. We may never know the purpose, but it is there.

~However, unlike Jesus, we are not in control, but we are held in the hand of the one who is in control.

-Consider where God may take you on your path:

~Your path may lead you to sickness. But maybe your sickness will put you in the path of someone who needs to see faith in Christ put into action so as to soften their heart for belief.

~Your path may take you to and through a crisis of some sort, but then having gone through that crisis you will have the opportunity to be an encouragement to other believers and point them to Christ so that they will persevere and never give up.

~I know that God used what I went through with my dad as a training ground for future ministry. I hadn’t really been to the hospital a lot before that and never really had to deal with death. And then dad got sick and I was in the hospital a lot and then he died and I had to deal with grief—these are issues that are an important part of pastoral ministry.

~I’m not saying God made dad sick specifically for that purpose, but God was able to use the crisis to prepare me for further down the path on my journey.

~You might be a parent with a prodigal. It tears your heart into a million pieces. And yet you learn prayer like few people do. You learn trust as you entrust your prodigal to the hands of God. And then you are able to minister to others who are either prodigals or have prodigals, and you can point them to their only hope.

-You are a single mom who is barely making ends meet and the kids are driving you crazy, and yet when people see your tenacity and your trust in the Lord they want to know what it is about this Jesus that gets you through.

-There’s a million examples and a million scenarios, but the bottom line is that the painful path is used of God for a perfect purpose.

~Maybe you are not a Christian and you are on a painful path. God might be trying to get you to stop relying on yourself and instead rely on Him, especially when it comes to your eternal destiny. You are not good enough, but Jesus is…

-You might be a Christian and the path is painful, but God might be using it to mature you even further for even greater ministry down the road.

Conclusion

-We are on this hero’s journey; except, we are not the hero. Jesus is the hero, and He secured the victory and we get to reap the benefits. Through His painful path of betrayal, arrest, torture, death, and resurrection He secured eternal peace for those who believe.

-And we are invited into this journey, each of us having our own unique path in God’s plan. And when our path is painful we remember that God is going to use it for His glory and our good, for we are told:

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28 ESV)

We know that this is truth because of the path that Jesus willingly followed.

-Christian, maybe you are on a painful path right now, I invite you to come to the altar and pray for insight, strength, hope and peace.

~Or, maybe you know someone on a painful path, come pray for them as well

-Maybe you are not yet on the path…