Luke 22:19-40

19-20 Compare Mat_26:26-28; Mar_14:22-24; 1Co_11:23-26.

21-23 Compare Mat_26:21-25; Mar_14:18-21; Joh_13:18-30; Psa_41:9.

23 How sad it is to see the self-centered apostles, whose hearts should have been overflowing with sorrow and sympathy for Him as He confides to them the significance of the symbols and the nearness of His betrayal, forget His part and think only of themselves! They were concerned lest they should be thought guilty of disloyalty, yet worse still, at such a solemn time, when He was revealing the depths of His humiliation, each one seeks his own exaltation. The contrast is a most vivid illustration of how far the very best of men sink below the moral grandeur of the peerless One. He finds few rivals in His descent from highest glory to deepest shame! They were content to let Him tread that path alone.

24-27 Compare Mat_20:25-28; Mar_10:42-45.

25 They deserved a stern rebuke, yet He gently chides them while explaining the true essence of greatness. His own example should have taught them better, for His superiority consisted in service. Hence He received the homage of men's hearts, not the adulation of their lips.

27 Compare Mat_20:28; Php_2:5-8; Joh_13:3-17.

28 Compare Mat_19:28.

28 Trial leads to the throne. Not service or success, but endurance in failure fitted the twelve apostles to sit at the table of the great King and to be associated with Him in the government of Israel.

31-34 Compare Mat_26:30-35; Mar_14:26-31; Joh_13:36-38.

31 Both the betrayal and denial of the Lord were the work of Satan. Judas was actually possessed by the enemy, while Peter was the object of an outward attack. Wheat is sifted to get rid of the chaff. So Peter was rid of the self-conceit which hindered the exercise of the sterling qualities he possessed. He may not have been more selfish than the rest, for they all clamored for the highest place, but, as it was the Lord's will that he should be the chief of the twelve, it was necessary to humiliate him first. Satan's claim is limited by the Lord, for the adversary is allowed to do only so much evil as will eventuate in good. It is a sober truth that Satan had a hand in preparing Peter for his high place among the apostles. In the same way all his efforts will be turned to beneficial account.

32 Compare Joh_21:15-17.

35 Compare Luk_9:3.

35 Isaiah's prophecy concerning Him indicates a great change in His relations to His fellow men. Hitherto He was anything but a criminal, and His disciples were welcomed and freely entertained. To intimate this enmity, He counsels them to buy swords. But, as usual, the apostles fail to catch the drift of His figure, and produce two swords, without evidently perceiving the irony of His words "It is enough." Two swords would be of little avail for twelve men, especially if they should attack the Roman empire! Later, when one of them uses his sword, the Lord corrects the false impression, and restores the severed ear of His enemy.

37 Compare Isa_53:12; Mar_15:28.

39-40 Compare Mat_26:36-38; Mar_14:32-34; Joh_18:1-2.

39 Compare Luk_21:37.

40 Compare Mat_6:13.

40 The great confiict between good and evil is here seen in its most intense exercise. The Lord well knew the evil that lay ahead of Him, for He had been speaking of it again and again. Moreover, He was well aware of the immeasurable benefits of His death to God, and to all His creation. Does He therefore meet it with stony indifference and stoicism? Are the sufferings less real because they are known and come from God? Not at all! In the face of trial He urges His apostles to pray that they should not enter it. He Himself does not wish to drink the cup. The sufferings of Christ are not His will, but the will of His Father. Hitherto there had been perfeet unanimity between the will of the Father and that of the Son, but in this extreme agony of soul, acquiescence gives place to submission. From the dawn of creation He had delighted in the will of God. He had gladly emptied Himself of the glories of the form divine and took the form of a slave, and entered into the humiliation of humanity, but when it came to the death of the cross His soul revolted and His will refused to follow. Our wills are instinctively in conflict with God's, so it seems almost impossible for us to realize the awful gulf revealed in the agonizing words, "not My will, but Thine, be done! "