A Light in the Night

John 18:1-11

Though the four gospels provide a variety of information about the life and ministry of Christ, they focus most on the events surrounding his crucifixion. In fact, the events surrounding the crucifixion serve as the climax not only of the four gospels, but also of the entire Bible. The entire Old Testament points and pushes forward to the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, and the rest of the New Testament flows out from it.

The way each gospel writer records his material, he gives more than a historical account.

He writes to persuade nonbelievers to believe on Christ for salvation (John 20:31).

He also writes to strengthen the faith of those who have already believed, preparing them to follow Christ in a hostile world.

John portrays this hostility vividly when he retells the moment of Jesus’ betrayal, and even in this darkest hour, the truth about Jesus shined brightly.

Main Thought: Even in his betrayal, Jesus revealed the truth about himself.

Do you remember how John opened this book? Of the coming and the testimony of Jesus he said, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5). The betrayal of Jesus in the dark of night illustrates this problem with remarkable clarity for it was in that dark, dark moment that the light of Jesus shined brightly.

After Jesus finished praying, he walked with his disciples through the darkness of night, passing over a brook in the Kidron Valley. This valley drops two-hundred feet to the east of Jerusalem just outside the Temple wall (John 18:1). The brook was usually nothing more than a dry ditch through which torrents of water flowed during rainy seasons, eventually emptying into the Dead Sea. During Passover, this brook ran red with the blood from thousands of animals being sacrificed in the temple above. Before another day would pass, Jesus himself would shed his blood for the sins of the world, putting an end to this annual slaughter for sin (Heb 10:12).

John says that Jesus and his followers came to a garden(John 18:1). This was not a flower garden. It was a grove of olive trees, with an olive press for producing olive oil at harvesttime. Ironically, the first Adam plunged the entire human race into sin and death in a garden, when he succumbed to the temptation of Satan. But here, our second Adam would begin to restore what our first Adam had ruined (Rom 5:12, 19). In that lush garden of Eden, where verdant rivers flowed, Adam gave way to the lies of a snake that was guided by Satan. But four centuries later, in a dark and foreboding olive grove, encircled by a river of blood, Jesus stepped forward to a large crowd of people (who were influenced by Satan) to be our Savior. Our first Adam failed, but our second Adam remained strong.

John describes the crowd who came to arrest Jesus.

Judas Iscariot was in the group, leading the way. He knew about this location because Jesus had visited there frequently with his disciples (John 18:2).

A large detachment of troopsaccompanied him, which would have been 200-600 Roman soldiers (John 18:3).

A high-ranking officer, capable of leading one thousand troops in battle, was with them (John 18:12).

In addition to this, the Jewish authorities sent a group of their own “temple police” along.

Together, this large group featured Jews, Gentiles, and a former disciple who had betrayed him. These carried a variety of weapons and lights. They anticipated resistance and prepared for a struggle, but no such thing transpired.

He offered himself willingly.

Jesus did not run from his enemies. He stepped forward instead and offered himself willingly (John 18:4). This is remarkable because he knew everything that was about to happen to him. Knowing the events leading up to the crucifixion, would you have volunteered yourself as he did?

When the mob arrived to arrest Jesus, he calmly stepped out from the small group of disciples and asked, “Whom are you seeking?” By behaving and asking in this simple, straightforward way, Jesus demonstrated remarkable confidence, and poise. He had already agonized in prayer, wrestling with the difficulty of what was about to happen (Matt 26:36-46; Mark 14:32-42; Luke 24:40-46; John 17:1-26). Now he was ready to step towards the hiss of the venomous snake and walk into the paws of the ravenous lion. He would neither waver nor turn back.

The enemies of Jesus did not capture him because they outsmarted or overpowered him. They had attempted and failed to capture him before because he escaped from them (Matt 12:14-16, Mark 3:6-12, Luke 6:11). They succeeded this time because offered himself voluntarily. So, even in his betrayal and arrest, he remained in complete control.

What’s more, no one tricked or forced Jesus to be arrested and crucified. According to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus reminded his disciples that he could have prayed to the Father to send him more than twelve legions of angels, which equals about 75,000 of them (Matt 26:53). However, he refused to do this and chose to suffer for your sins instead. By doing this, he also fulfilled Old Testament prophecy more than 700 years old from the book of Isaiah, which says, “I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who plucked out the beard; I did not hide my face from shame and spitting” (Isaiah 50:6). Jesus suffered and died for you willingly and no one forced him. Why do we struggle to follow him, and why do we resist him instead?

He displayed his deity.

When Jesus spoke to the crowd, they said that they were looking for “Jesus of Nazareth” (John 18:5). At first glance, he appeared to give them a simple answer, saying “I am he.” Technically, he said ego eimi, which means “I am.” As John repeatedly emphasized throughout this book, Jesus had identified himself this way before (John 6:20; 8:24, 28, 58; 13:19). In one instance he said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:58). By saying this, he referred to himself the same way that God had identified himself to Moses in the burning bush (Exo 3:14). Jewish leaders knew that this was a direct claim to being God (John 8:59). So by asking this question and giving this answer, Jesus identified himself not only as a human son from Nazareth but as the divine son of God from heaven.

When the crowd heard this answer, they stepped back and fell to the ground (John 18:6).

Did Jesus speak with a special authority in his voice?

Did these men understand the theological significance of his answer?

Did God somehow overwhelm them in a supernatural way?

We cannot answer these questions, but we do know that these powerful men who had come to arrest him lunged backward and fell down. This is another clue that the one who was being betrayed, and not his captors, was in full control.

He shielded his followers from danger.

As the men were lying on the ground or returning to their feet, Jesus repeated his question, “Whom are you seeking?” (John 18:7). They answered the same way, “Jesus of Nazareth,” and he responded the same way as before, “I am” (John 18:8). This time, however, he added something else. He instructed this band of men to arrest him alone and not his eleven disciples. By doing this, he once again showed his control over the situation by dictating the terms of his arrest. He also displayed control by fulfilling a prophecy, a commitment he had made to the Father that very night, promising to lose none of the men whom the Father had given to him (John 17:12).

As he was being betrayed, he completed that guarantee. Notice the way that John uses “fulfillment” language here. You would normally expect him to say, “That it might be fulfilled,” or, “That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet so-and-so.” But John wrote, “That it might be fulfilled which he spoke, referring to Jesus” (John 17:9). This means that Jesus was fulfilling his own prophecy as he was being betrayed.

Jesus also underscored the fact that he does not lose anyone who believes on him, and this includes you and me. Earlier in John’s Gospel, he recorded Jesus as saying, “This is the will of the Father who sent me, that of all he has given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of him who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:39-40). If you genuinely believe on Christ as your Savior, then you are someone that God has given to Jesus to guard and protect forever. He personally guarantees that he will raise you up at the end of time so that you may live with him forever in the new heaven and earth that he will make, free from death, sin, and sorrow. Everyone who believes on him receives a permanent salvation which may never go away.

In addition to fulfilling this personal commitment, Jesus also foreshadowed what he was about to do. As a man, he stepped forward from the other men with him and insisted that he alone be arrested, prosecuted, and executed. This simple act looked ahead to the far greater way in which he would become the one who would die on the cross for your sins and mine. As he taught earlier in in the week prior to his betrayal and arrest, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” (John 15:13). As the master teacher and the Son of God, Jesus practiced what he preached. When he stepped forward to be arrested that night, he did so out of love for you and me and would ultimately do what was necessary to shield us from the deadly danger of sin, death, and hell forever.

He accepted his sacred responsibility.

At this point in the story, John describes an unusual event which happened suddenly. Another person, Peter – one of the men whom Jesus had shielded from danger – stepped forward. But he did not step forward like his master, with calm and confidence in the plan of God and with love. He rushed out with violence and force. He drew a sword and began to fight, cutting off the ear of the high priest’s servant (John 18:10, cf. Matt 26:51 and Mark 14:47). Before more violence ensued, Jesus commanded Peter to put his sword away.

Imagine the scene. Jesus peacefully stepped forward, then Peter single-handedly set out to fight from 200 to 600 or more soldiers and police. Clearly, Peter was not thinking in a spiritual way. Yet how often do we set out to do spiritual things with violence and force? Remember Moses when he impulsively killed an Egyptian slave master (Exo 2:11-15)? Unlike Moses and Peter, we may not use weapons, but we often resort to other forceful tactics. I am surprised, for instance, at how many believers post all sorts of vitriol and hostile words and images on social media against other religions and against political personalities and agendas of our day.

It is not the Christian way to fight with nonbelievers. We do not advance the good news of Jesus and the love of God through force.

It is one thing to defend your family from a violent intruder

and it is one thing to defend your country from a military threat.

These are moral obligations we share in God’s ordained institutions of family and government.

But when we set out to accomplish the mission of Christ as believers in the church, we should never resort to violence or force, vitriol or hostility. To be sure, there is a time to run and hide as Jesus had done before. But when this is not an option and you are doing Christian work, then you should be willing to suffer like Jesus. In a later conversation with the Roman official, Pontius Pilate, Jesus would say, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now my kingdom is not from here” (John 18:36). When we fight for God’s will with force, we actually fight against his will instead.

Jesus knew what he must do. He said, “Shall I not drink the cup which my Father has given me?” (John 18:11). The imagery of a cup is rich with meaning. This was a cup filled to the brim with the wrath of God, and Jesus was about to drink it dry – to the last drop. It was a drink so horrible that he had begun to ask the Father earlier that night if it would be possible not to drink this cup, though he immediately insisted that he would drink it (Matt 26:39; Mark 14:36; Luke 22:42). Perhaps you remember the nasty-tasting cough syrup your mother would give you as a child. For Jesus to drink the cup of suffering and wrath was infinitely more repulsive than this distasteful childhood memory. By drinking this cup, he would receive on himself the wrath of God for the sins of the entire world.

Yes, even when he was being betrayed, Jesus revealed the truth about himself. He displayed full control over the situation.

He offered himself to his persecutors in a calm and voluntary way.

He claimed to be the great I AM, the one, true God.

He fulfilled his promise to shield his followers from danger

He accepted his sacred responsibility of suffering and dying for your sins and mine.

When you consider the way that Jesus responded to his captors that dark and fateful night, you should not fail to recognize that he is the divine Son of God. You should see through his words and actions a bright and shining light in the darkness that points you to God. You should choose to walk away from the crowds in the world who would arrest him and to believe on him as your Lord and Savior.You should believe on him alone to receive forgiveness of sins and eternal life. He was arrested for you, he suffered for you, he died for you, and he would raise again for you. Have you believed on Jesus for salvation? Has Jesus shielded you from the dangers of death and hell to come?

For those who have already believed on Jesus, as the eleven disciples had done, you should learn to trust God in your suffering – especially when your suffering is due to following Jesus. When suffering for Jesus comes your way, you should learn to step forward with the calm and confidence of Jesus. You should learn that even in suffering, he has everything under control.Like Jesus, you should learn to speak words that witness the truth about Jesus. He is the one true God, as he himself claimed to be that night when he said, “I am.” If you are a follower of Jesus, then do not fight against your suffering as Peter attempted to do but speakof Jesus in your suffering instead.