Matthew 26:33-54

33-35 Compare Mar_14:29-31; Luk_22:31-34; Joh_13:36-38.

33 The Lord had said distinctly that all of them should be snared. Peter's fall began by refusing to believe that the Lord's all meant all. Of course, it could not include him! By exalting himself above the rest he invited the fate of all who walk in pride, who must be abased. The same spirit is rampant today. We hear the loudest protestations of loyalty and devotion to Christ, which, if carried out, would transform the whole world in one generation. There is no doubt that it is honest. Peter fully intended to stand by his Lord to the very death. But he did not know himself or the impotence of the human will. It is the creature and the sport of circumstance. No man can use the emphatic I, as Peter did, and not fall.

36-38 Compare Mar_14:32-34; Luk_22:39-40 Joh_18:1-2.

36 How different it was with our Lord! He was about to brave the most awful battle with the hosts of darkness and their human minions, yet not a boast proceeds from His lips. He shrank from it. He implored to be spared. It was not His will. Hitherto His will and the Father's had been in perfect accord. He acquiesced in it even though it meant failure and defeat. He delighted in it though it brought Him opposition and hate. Yet with all His unparalleled loyalty and devotion, the terrors of the curse, the abandonment by God, were beyond the concurrence of His will. But there is a deeper and more powerful force than this. The heart can subdue the will. Christ had not come to do His own will. So He prayed the prayer that befits us far more than Him, “Not as I will, but as Thou!” No man can use the emphatic “I”, without the negative, and carry out his vaunting. It is the symbol of defeat, “ not I” the banner of victory, though it should lead through the deepest depths to God. Gethsemane should prepare our hearts for the deep unfoldings of the cross. It transforms it from a mere manifestation of human and satanic hate into a deliberate and foreordained act of God. Our Lord did not beg the chief priests for mercy, or Pilate for clemency. He recognized the fact that God alone could deliver Him from their power, and, since this was not His will, He makes not the slightest effort to appease them. Without in the least minimizing the guilt of man or the sin of Satan, we may look beneath all their hateful deeds and see God using them as His puppets in the preparation of the great Sacrifice which had been promised from the beginning. Though apparently and consciously doing their utmost to oppose the will of God, they were carrying it into effect with the same precision as their Victim Who had renounced His own will in favor of His Father's. The cross of Christ is the touchstone of humanity. Not only is the cowardice of Pilate and the perfidy of the priests exposed to the gaze of all, but His own little band all find their true value in its vicinity. What should we not expect from His own apostles who have been with Him and have seen His mighty power and have felt the attraction of His love? Judas, who was entrusted with the funds, turns traitor. Boastful Peter forswears his Lord. And all the rest, who but a short time since were loud in their protestations of loyalty, desert Him at the first approach of danger.

30-41 Compare Mar_14:35-38; Luk_22:41-46. See Heb_5:7; Joh_6:38; Php_2:8.

42-46 Compare Mar_14:39-42.

45-46 Compare Luk_22:45-46.

47-50 Compare Mar_14:43-46; Luk_22:47-48; Joh_18:2-9.

47 Judas, one of the twelve. It is necessary that snares should be coming (Mat_18:7). The Lord deliberately chose one of His apostles for the essential duty of betraying Him. He knew from the beginning that Judas was a traitor.

50 See Psa_41:9; Psa_55:12-14.

51-52 Compare Mar_14:47; Luk_22:49-51; Joh_18:10-11.

51 It is most difficult to receive evil from the hand of God. The disciples evidently could not understand how this could be of God. Their highest thought was to escape evil through divine protection. But our Lord assures them that, however easy it might be to enlist the legions of heaven, it is not His present plan to escape the clutches of His enemies. Evil must needs be, and God controls it so as to accomplish His beneficent purpose.

53 See 2Ki_6:17