March 2, 2025 • 48 mins
The tension between control and betrayal during the Last Supper reveals deep truths about human nature and divine fate. We explore Judas Iscariot’s decisions and the significance of Jesus’s sacrifice through the lens of Luke 22.
• Key events leading up to the Last Supper
• The significance of Passover in the context
• The motivations behind Judas's betrayal
• Jesus's transformative teachings at the meal
• Understanding the new covenant introduced by Jesus
• The call to heartfelt introspection for believers
• The implications of Jesus's sacrifice for our lives
• The importance of authentic faith over appearances
• The assurance of God's control throughout the narrative
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Please turn in your Bibles to Luke 22, 1 through 2,
and then 14 through 23, which ison page 881 in the Pew Bibles,
and follow along as I read God'sWord.
Now.
The feast of unleavened breaddrew near, which is called the
(00:23):
Passover, and the chief priestsand the scribes were seeking how
to put him to death, for theyfeared the people.
Now picking up in verse 14.
And when the hour came, hereclined at table and the
apostles with him.
And he said to them I haveearnestly desired to eat this
Passover with you before Isuffer, for I tell you I will
not eat it until it is fulfilledin the kingdom of God.
(00:45):
And he took a cup and when hehad given thanks, he said take
this and divide it amongyourselves, for I tell you that
from now on, I will not drink ofthe fruit of the vine until the
kingdom of God comes.
And he took bread and when hehad given thanks, he broke it
and gave it to them, saying thisis my body which is given for
you.
Do this in remembrance of me.
And likewise the cup, afterthey had eaten, saying this cup
(01:09):
that is poured out for you isthe new covenant in my blood,
but behold the hand of him whobetrays me is with me on the
table, for the son of man goesat it as it has been determined.
But woe to that man by whom hehas betrayed.
And they began to question oneanother which of them it could
be who was going to do this.
This is the word of the Lord.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Check, check.
Hey, how's it going guys?
Good morning.
My name is Thomas.
If I haven't gotten thepleasure to meet you, if you
can't tell, I'm the youth pastor, and so here's what I'll say.
Will might have made a mistake.
He gave me five differentpassages and he said just pick
one of these for you to be ableto preach through.
And if you guys don't know, I'mlike a super nerd and so I was
(02:15):
like I'll take Passover, likethat sounds really fun to me,
and so we may be having secretchurch this morning.
We may go six hours.
Who knows, the second servicemay come and join us.
Here's also what I'll say.
Will's been doing this reallycool thing where he like writes
with his pen and he likehighlights and all that kind of
stuff, and I really reallywanted to be able to do that and
I was like that's so cool and Iwant people to see my thought
(02:35):
process and all that kind ofstuff and write things down on
the screens.
But I have horrible handwritingand whenever I do that with the
youth, whenever I like writesomething down, they act like
demon possessed and they're likeI can't read that and they
start writhing in pain and Iwanted to spare kind of the
congregation from that and Ididn't want also anyone to think
(02:56):
that I was writing in Koreanbecause I don't know Korean.
But so we're going old school,I'm clicking the slides, they're
doing the scriptures, but weare gonna rock and roll this
morning in Luke, chapter 22.
So the question of the morningthat I want to frame this text
in the one that Lane just readmay be a little strange and I
feel kind of cheap using it,because this could be applied to
(03:19):
any text.
But this morning specifically,I want us to consider who is in
control, and I mean this in twodifferent ways.
I mean this one, like where weprobably beeline, is who's in
control of my life, who's incontrol of me and my destiny, my
decisions, all of that kind ofstuff.
So, yes, I want us to get there, but first and foremost, I want
(03:42):
us to wrestle with and toconsider and to slowly read this
passage and wonder, withoutspoilers, who is in control of
what's happening?
Who's in control of thedecisions and the power to
(04:06):
influence or direct people'sbehavior or the course of events
?
And so this morning we're goingto see different factions of
different people trying to dojust this.
They're going to be trying toget control.
They're going to try tomanipulate things in a way that
goes beneficial for them andkind of them alone.
(04:28):
And so, as we read, especiallythe front part of this, I want
you to question who is incontrol?
And yes, it's God, but don'tjust say God on the front end.
And so the setting of where weare.
If you guys have paper Bibles,look with me just at the
physical book.
If you guys have those, at Luke, chapter 22.
Now I don't know if you guyshave red letter Bibles.
(04:50):
I always to you students andjust people I talk, to recommend
red letter Bibles if you canget one.
I believe all of God's word isinspired.
They all carry the same weight.
Just because Jesus is saying itdoesn't make it any greater or
heavier.
But sometimes it's nice just tobe able to see when Jesus is
(05:13):
speaking and when a story ishappening, or see when someone
else pipes up and asks aquestion.
It's nice to be able to see.
And if you look back in Luke,chapter 21, it's mostly all red
letters.
It's mostly all red letters.
We're coming right off the heelsof just a pretty dense, a
pretty just, theologically richteaching of Jesus.
We just got through a month ofthis Will preaching, through
(05:34):
this.
Actually, I have a note Inbetween services.
Today, will mentioned thisgeneration will not pass until
these things come to happen.
Will's teaching a little classin the one another room.
Is that right?
One another room Next week?
Okay, next week Will's teachinga little class.
So if you have any questionsabout kind of the end times,
(05:55):
will said that he's got it allfigured out and that he would
love to walk through a detailedmap of the end times and he's
really excited about it.
And so that's next week.
In between services.
Come with your questions.
I don't think he'll answer anyof them directly, but Jesus is
preaching, he's teaching andhe's doing actually a lot more
(06:16):
targeted teaching towards thePharisees, the scribes and the
chief priests.
He starts to, if I can say itthis way, have a little bit more
venom in his mouth where he'skind of going from general good
theology and teachings to kindof narrowing in on their hearts
and they don't like it.
So we turn the page to Luke,chapter 22, and here we get some
(06:40):
black letters indicating thatit is about to be a story, and
so in this passage there's alittle bit of teaching but
there's a lot of story, andlet's see how it starts.
It says Now the feast ofunleavened bread drew near,
which is called the Passover,and the chief priests and the
scribes were seeking how to puthim to death, for they feared
(07:04):
the people.
And so now we kind of get intothis kind of like tonal
difference where Jesus is kindof the hero of the story.
Jesus is being celebrated bythe crowds.
He's kind of putting to shame,sometimes the Pharisees, and now
they are sick of it.
They've gone long past tryingto be amicable, trying to be
(07:25):
friendly, trying to garnerrespect for one another.
They are seeking how to put himto death, not if they should,
but how they should.
There's two issues with this forthe chief priests.
One they love the Bible, theylove the Old Testament and
unfortunately for them, the OldTestament says something about
murder.
It says you shouldn't do it.
(07:46):
And so they're like we can'tjust outright kill him.
So what should we do?
They decide let's get Romeinvolved and let's get a band of
soldiers to come together.
And they say that's a greatidea.
Wait, we can't do that rightaway because the people love
Jesus right away, because thepeople love Jesus, the people
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see how he interacts with thesick and they're drawn to it.
They're like this guy'sdifferent.
They see how he interacts withthe sinner and they're like this
guy's awesome, like we want tobe around this guy while the
Pharisees are on the outsidepouting.
They know that they need to putJesus to death from their
perspective, but it wouldn't besimple.
They would have to get craftyif they wanted things to go
their way.
And as they're kind of huddledup, I'm picturing in the dead of
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night, they're wondering.
They're talking how are wegoing to do this?
How are we going to put him todeath?
They get one of the greatestgifts that they could have
imagined.
Look with me in verse 3.
It says Then Satan entered intoJudas, called Iscariot, who was
one of the number of the twelve.
He went away and conferred withthe chief priests and officers
(08:54):
about how he might betray themVerse 5, and they were glad.
I think that's anunderstatement that they're
huddled up, wondering how are wegoing to stick it to this guy,
this teacher, maybe a prophet,we don't know, but he is
throwing a wrench in our plansand our religiosity and our
followings.
What are we going to do?
And lo and behold, one ofJesus' closest followers walks
(09:18):
up with the intention of hey,you guys want Jesus gone.
Let me help you with that.
They must be over the moon.
And the irony of this is thatthe chief priests, the ones who
are responsible for handling thesacrifices and representing the
people of God to God, are nowin league with Satan himself,
(09:42):
like they are partnering withSatan through Jesus how to get
rid of Jesus.
And they don't have eyes to seebecause they are so blinded by
their rage, their jealousy,their envy, their demand to keep
the status quo, whatever it is.
(10:03):
They can't see that Judas isbeing evil, he's betraying his
rabbi, which would have beenseen as a disrespectful, evil
thing, and that he is full ofSatan per verse 3.
They can't see it.
They themselves are blind toone of the saddest realities in
Scripture.
These are kind of the threebiggest villains in Scripture
(10:26):
all teaming up.
I don't know about you guys.
I as a young man, as a littleboy, I loved the villains.
The villains were always themore compelling people in the
stories, in the movies, all ofthat kind of stuff.
I did not want to be LukeSkywalker when I grew up.
I wanted to be Darth Maul whenI grew up I wanted to be Darth
(10:50):
Maul.
Like villains, like they drawus in because they create this
tension.
They create this part of thestory where things aren't going
to go right and we as audienceswant to see who's going to win.
Is it the bad guys or is it thegood guys?
And so here we have three ofthe biggest kind of bad guys in
the New Testament teaming uptogether to try to take out
(11:14):
Jesus.
And this comes without muchwarning on Judas's part.
Why does Judas do this?
The Bible doesn't sayexplicitly.
Some people think it was greed.
Some people think that he wasjust looking for an opportunity
to receive money from the chiefpriest.
I think 30 pieces of silverjust from what I've read wasn't
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a ton.
It was a good chunk, but itprobably wasn't the driving
factor.
Even though it says that Judaswas a thief, some say that he
tried to force Jesus's handagainst the religious elite.
He wanted to get the ballrolling and if he needed to hold
the pool queue he was willingto do that.
Like if he needed to set thingsin motion, he definitely would.
Others think that Judas saw thewriting on the wall and that he
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knew that Jesus's torch wasabout to get snuffed and he
wanted to be on the right sideof history.
He wanted to be on the rightside of the majority, that if
people were holding pitchforks,he wanted to be with them and
not in the minority.
The bottom line is we don'tknow the exact reason, because
scripture doesn't say.
But what I can tell you is thatJudas wanted to be in control
(12:23):
of the situation.
He didn't trust Jesus, hedidn't trust the plans of God.
Whatever reason whether it wasdiabolical or quote-unquote,
noble, we don't know he wantedto be in control of the
situation.
He said I'm going to take theball and I'm going to run with
it.
And so all three of these areconspiring against Jesus.
(12:47):
And so the question is so far inthe story, who is in control?
Who is the ones dictating thestory?
Who's moving the tension along?
Is it the chief priests?
Because they have religiouspower.
They actually do have somepower with Rome, tandem to Rome.
They are the ones who are gonnasay if you let Jesus go, you're
(13:10):
no friend of Caesar.
Are these guys in control?
Is it Judas?
Judas is the one with a foot inboth camps.
He says I'm team Jesus overhere and I'm also maybe not team
Jesus, I'm team Pharisee overhere.
He's the one that maybe has thebest purview, since he is
getting inside information fromJesus and he is getting inside
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information from the chiefpriest.
Is Judas in control?
Is it Satan?
Satan like the enemy fromGenesis 3.
Is he the one in control?
Perhaps Satan thought he knowsthe prophecy Genesis 3, 15.
Perhaps he thought I know thatI get to strike his heel because
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God said that that one day thechild of Eve is going to come
and I am going to be able tostrike his heel, but he's going
to crush my head.
Perhaps Satan thought if I canget my fangs deep enough,
perhaps if I can catch him justenough off guard, perhaps if I
can maybe pull the rug out fromunder him and get my fangs in
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his heel, maybe I can win.
Is Satan in control?
We see kind of jumping to theend of the story.
Who really is in control ofthis story?
The true shock and kind of thereveal of who is in charge comes
at the table after the Passovermeal, where Jesus shows his
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hand and he says capital, I amin control.
Look with me at verse 21 of thesame chapter.
This is Jesus speaking and hesays but behold, they go through
this whole meal and they'revery familiar.
So picture yourself in thisscene and we're gonna get to the
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meal.
They're sitting together,probably just the 13 of them
Jesus and the disciples andthey're having this intimate
meal.
They're enjoying one another,they're remembering the past and
they're doing all of this stuff.
It's a tight knit family.
Picture your MCG.
If you get along with your MCG,they're doing life together in
the right way.
(15:19):
And Jesus kind of says beforethey pick up the dishes and
before they sweep the floors, hesays I got one more thing for
you guys.
He says in verse 21, behold thehand of him who betrays me is
with me at the table.
Like Jesus often does speak inriddles and parables, this is
pretty clear and they'reprobably like what do you mean,
(15:43):
jesus?
Like they don't know exactlywhat Jesus knows.
They don't know what's coming,even though Jesus has talked
about it many times before.
But he says verse 22, for theson of man goes as it has been
determined.
But woe to that man by whom heis betrayed.
Jesus knows Psalm 41.
This is Psalm 41.
We were in a room kind of doinga Bible study and I was like
(16:06):
Judas betraying Jesus, likethat's, like some prophecy of
old.
What is that?
And we looked it up and me,mitch Aldridge, laura, our jaws
were on the floor because wewere like we've never read this
or we have, but we've neverconnected the dots.
We've never heard this preachedPsalm 41, never heard this
preached Psalm 41, verse 9, itsays even my close friend in
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whom I trusted, he who ate mybread, he has lifted his heel
against me.
That's David writing hundredsof years before this happens, as
a prophecy about the kind ofdeath that Jesus would die that
even a close friend he wouldconsider Judas to be a close
friend has lifted his heel andbetrayed him.
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Go back to verse 23.
I think this is, I think, one ofthe most interesting parts and
I think maybe a word of warningto us.
And they began to question oneanother which of them it would
be.
Who is going to do this?
My favorite, I think, part ofthis is Jesus says one of you,
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12 is going to betray me.
And they didn't all look atJudas, they didn't all crane
their necks and say, well, it'sgot to be that guy, because he
fill in the blank.
We have been reading achildren's kind of Bible to
Emmett and Hamish while they runaround.
This was a picture of one halfwas the disciples, the other
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half was the other.
See these guys.
There's only seven disciples.
Which of these guys do youthink is Judas?
I kind of blurred out the names.
I blurred out the names.
So it's an honest test.
Which one do you think is Judas?
Because it was this guy.
This guy, if Jesus says at thetable, and these are their
(17:52):
postures, if these are theirfaces, if he says one of you
guys is going to betray me, Ibet the other six look at that
guy on the end that doesn't wantto be there, like that's kind
of a natural type thing.
This is how I think we think ofJudas as this kind of guy in
the back that's kind of rubbinghis hands in an evil fashion.
Maybe he's got a long darkblack trench coat and he kind of
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just looks shady.
I think from the witness ofScripture you can put it back on
verse 23, they genuinely didn'tknow who was gonna betray him.
They genuinely didn't know, per, what we have in the other
gospels.
Jesus says one of you guys willbetray me, and Peter and John
literally questioned Lord, is itme.
(18:33):
Am I the one that's gonna do it?
I look at these other guys.
I think they're rock solid.
All 11 other guys.
Is it me?
I want to know so that I canfortify myself.
And Jesus says no.
In other words, and I think thisis the word of warning, judas
seemed, by outward appearance,above reproach.
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This guy may have been a deaconat a church.
He may have even been an elderof a church.
He had every outward appearanceto say I am one of you guys.
When Jesus sends out the 72,they go in pairs.
Judas had a pair and they didmiracles, they taught, they
(19:16):
prayed and they came back andthey all celebrated together.
The guy with Judas didn't say,hey, things got a little hairy
and he kind of lost his mind.
He was one of them.
1 Samuel 16, verse 7.
It says and so kind of theapplication here is not to
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examine others with suspicion.
It's not to look around and say, hmm, there might be a Judas
amongst us.
I wonder who it could be.
I think the application is thatinward introspection almost is
it me, lord?
Type questioning, introspectionalmost is it me, lord?
Type questioning.
And I think one of the ways toquestion this is is there a
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difference between your publiclife and your private life?
Is there a difference betweenhow you portray yourself on
Facebook or at church or at work?
And inwardly you are verydifferent and disconnected.
I think that's kind of theearmark of Judas, especially
right here, that outwardly noone would have known, but
(20:27):
inwardly his heart was very farfrom the Lord.
I think the warning is thatproximity to Jesus and his
people does not always equalintimacy and union with him.
It does not always equalintimacy and union with him Does
not always mean intimacy andunion with him.
Yes, it can, it definitely can.
The people who are united toChrist, the people who are
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intimate with Jesus, that knowhim and love him, will desire to
be with God and his people.
But just because you're in theroom today doesn't mean that you
are one of his people, justlike the fact that Judas was at
the table when they did the LastSupper.
Judas was there and justtalking with people about the
text and as we've read ittogether, almost one thing comes
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up uniformly is people go.
Does that mean Satan was thereat the Last Supper?
Because it says in verse threethat Satan entered Judas and
Judas was at the Last Supper.
I think, yes, I think there's noindication that Satan left.
Maybe he did, but the powers ofdarkness have conspired against
Jesus and I think one of thebig points is it didn't catch
(21:36):
Jesus off guard.
There was no blind side.
It wasn't out of the blue.
They didn't come out of theshadows and apprehend him.
Jesus knew from the beginningprobably even from the writing
of Psalm 41, that this wouldhappen.
I think, demonstrating thatChrist is in control, not the
(21:58):
chief priests, not Judas, notSatan, but Jesus is the one
controlling the narrative, he'sthe one pushing it forward and
he is the one that holds allthings in his hands.
And we see that here in the bigpicture Cosmic powers, Satan,
all this kind of stuff, betrayalbut what about the mundane?
What about the day-to-day?
Is Jesus only overseeing thelarge picture, cosmic type stuff
(22:23):
, or does he know the details ofour day-to-day in the smallest
degree?
Sometimes I think my tendencyis to think that God is so big
and so great that he's manningkind of the planets and their
orbits and all that kind ofstuff that he doesn't care about
my Thursday morning or mySaturday afternoon.
(22:43):
He's got bigger fish to fry, soto speak.
Look with me in verse 7.
Then came the day of unleavenedbread, on which the Passover
lamb had to be sacrificed.
So Jesus sent Peter and Johnsaying go and prepare the
Passover for us that we may eatit.
And they said to him when willyou have us prepare it?
(23:03):
This is what Will read earlier.
He said to them Behold, whenyou have entered the city, a man
carrying a jar of water willmeet you.
Follow him into the house thathe enters and tell the master of
the house.
The teacher says to you when isthe guest room where I may eat
(23:34):
the Passover with my disciples?
I think by having these twostories, almost as bookends to
the passage, we're about to lookin the middle at the meat of it
.
But almost as bookends we seethat Jesus is.
He knows the large, big stuff,like Satan being on the move,
and he knows and controls thesmall details, down to a man
(23:57):
carrying a jar.
It seems like a strange small,insignificant detail until you
realize that he is the onemanning it all and this should
be a great comfort to us.
He's not so in the details thathe kind of misses the big
picture of, let's just say, oursalvation and things like that.
And he's not so big picturethat he kind of loses us and
(24:20):
we're just a number to him.
He knows each and every one ofus, he knows the numbers of hair
on our heads, he knows whatwe're feeling and what we're
thinking as we walk into church,as we walk into any place.
He knows it all and this shouldbe a great comfort to us.
And so, as we kind of hone in onthe middle of the passage six
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times, there is a word repeatedin this text.
It's the word Passover.
The repetition of Passover.
I don't think it's just astylistic choice or that Dr Luke
ran out of the words to say,but I think it underlines the
centrality of Passover and whatJesus is doing tonight, as we'll
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see.
And so what was the PassoverFor our purposes this morning?
Let's just say it was theepitome of God's control God
orchestrating events and Godorchestrating people in the way
that he wanted it to go, in acrooked and twisted generation.
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In a nutshell, god's people werein slavery.
They were in slavery to aPharaoh and the Egyptians, and
so if you would have askedanyone in that day who's in
charge here, they would havepointed at the big pyramid and
said that guy's sitting up top,the Pharaoh is in charge, and
God made promises to rescue andredeem his people and to bring
(25:49):
them out into a land flowingwith milk and honey.
And so God sees his people inslavery.
It says that he hears theirprayers, he hears their cries
and God appoints someone Mosesto talk to the Pharaoh and to
compel him to let his people gofree so that they can worship
the Lord.
One thing I want to highlightwhen God says you guys are
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leaving slavery, he gives them apurpose.
He says I want you to worshipme and he gives them a place.
He doesn't just say you guysare going to wander.
He says you're going to a landflowing with milk and honey and
he gives them a place.
He doesn't just say you guysare gonna wander.
He says you're going to a landflowing with milk and honey and
I want you to worship me there.
He doesn't say I'm getting youout of slavery.
Now, you know, do your best,remind your own business.
And so Moses tells Pharaoh letGod's people go so that they can
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worship him.
And he refuses.
And nine plagues ensue on thepeople Gnats, hail, frogs,
darkness, etc.
And finally, god tells Mosesthere's one last plague that
must occur and it's the hardestone, it's the heaviest one.
He says tonight every firstbornin the land of Egypt shall die.
(26:55):
Would you throw up that Exodus11 passage?
So Moses said.
Thus says the Lord aboutmidnight I will go out in the
midst of Egypt and everyfirstborn in the land of Egypt
shall die, from the firstborn ofPharaoh who sits on the throne
even, to the firstborn of theslave girl who's behind the hand
mill, and all the firstborn ofthe cattle.
(27:18):
Here's kind of the wrench or theinteresting thing about this.
God doesn't say the firstbornof every Egyptian is going to
die.
He says every firstborn in theland of Egypt.
There are some plagues thatkind of went to all of the
people and there were someplagues that only affected the
Egyptians.
In this one, in this last one,in this kind of death blow that
(27:42):
God gives to Pharaoh, he says inverse five every firstborn in
the land of Egypt shall die.
The people of Israel are inslavery, living in Egypt.
The slave girl, from thefirstborn of the slave girl
who's behind the handmaul, whois the slave girl, if not the
Egyptian or the Israelite women,like, every firstborn is going
(28:05):
to die, including the Israeliteswho are in Egypt, but the Lord
gave them a way to be spared.
He says take a spotless lamb,kill it, drape its blood over
the doorposts.
And when I come to takevengeance, if I see the blood of
the lamb if you didn't knowthis, this is literally where
(28:25):
the word come from I will passover your house.
I'm going through the town, I'mgoing through the streets and
I'm going to invade every housethat there is in Egypt, but if
there's blood on the doorpost, Iwill pass over it because I
don't need to take any bloodbecause blood has already been
spilt.
And so he goes, and he goes,and that night occurs and
(28:50):
Pharaoh says get out.
And they do.
In a sense, god did not sparethem from the punishment of the
world around them, but he gavethem a shield, something to
protect them.
If they were covered in theblood of the lamb, no further
blood had to be spilled.
And so, if I could boil downPassover to three points this
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morning and we're gonna tie itinto the Lord's Supper One the
Passover represented God's carefor his people.
That, yes, he was big, but healso heard the cries of the
infants.
He heard the cries of the slavewoman.
He heard the cries of hispeople and he cared enough about
them to do something.
Passover was God's way ofcaring for his people.
(29:35):
Number two it was a shield forhis people.
It was God's way of caring forhis people.
Number two it was a shield forhis people that they would
literally huddle under the bloodof the lamb and that was kind
of their escape from the sins ofthe world around them.
The reason that they're in thissituation is because Egypt
sinned and because Egypt wasputting them in slavery, and God
(29:57):
gives them a shield for hispeople.
And then, number three, it'sGod delivering his people from
slavery to the promised land.
Again, he doesn't lead them outof the dungeon, so to speak, and
say figure it out Like yourlife is yours now, like make
(30:18):
good choices, I hope you dowhat's right.
He says I'm taking you out ofEgypt and I'm going to lead you
by the hand to the land that Ihave prepared for you.
This is who is in charge.
Pharaoh has nothing to sayagainst the God of the Bible and
the God of Moses.
And so, with these three thingsand there's guys, probably 50
(30:45):
other things that we could say,but with these three things in
mind, the Passover was somethingthat the people of Israel
rehearsed, they celebrated andthey did every year like they
were supposed to.
This is like us celebratingEaster.
No one says is it Easter again?
Didn't we just do that Like wehad Easter last year?
(31:06):
Do we have to continue?
This is like Christmas, likethe way that we kind of build
our lives around some of theseholidays.
They would have built theirlife around celebrating the
Passover.
They would have dictated whenand where they traveled, how
they went about, who they sawduring the year.
Passover dictated really muchof their lives.
(31:28):
And think about this Jesus hasbeen doing ministry for three
years with his disciples.
This is year three.
He started when he was 30.
He gets crucified when he's 33.
And so just think about thefact that twice before they've
probably done Passover withJesus, they've probably had the
(31:48):
meal and had the celebration andsung the hymns and confessed
the sins and all of the kind ofstuff that goes along with
Passover.
They did it once normal.
They did it the second timenormal.
And this time is going to bedifferent.
Look with me at verse 14.
And when the hour came, hereclined at table and the
apostles with him, and he saidto them.
(32:09):
I have we don't see this a lotfrom Jesus.
He says I have earnestlydesired to eat this Passover
with you before I suffer.
He says this one.
He doesn't tell him why yet,but he says this one's going to
be different and I've lookedforward to, I've earnestly
desired it's almost kept me upat night thinking about doing
(32:31):
this with you guys.
And he says for I tell you, Iwill not eat of it until it is
fulfilled in the kingdom of God.
Think about the symbolism thatis happening on this night, the
night of Passover, the nightthat the Passover lamb was to be
slaughtered, each for his ownhousehold, and so probably in
Jerusalem, the streets and theravines and the rivers are
(32:53):
probably flowing with blood oflambs because each household
needed their own lamb.
Think about the symbolism.
Jesus knows that in a matter ofhours he will be hanging on a
cross for the sins of his people.
The apex of the meal and thecelebration was the sacrifice of
the Passover lamb, and this isa title that Jesus has worn for
(33:16):
a little while.
You guys remember John theBaptist and John Jesus at the
very beginning of his ministry.
He's kind of just walkingaround.
He's got maybe a handful ofdisciples.
John has a lot of disciples andhe's walking around and John
says it says the next day he sawJesus coming towards him and
John yells out behold the lambof God who takes away the sin of
(33:40):
the world.
Interesting thing about thePassover lamb it was supposed to
.
It didn't really take away thesins, but it covered the sins of
each household.
John looks at Jesus and he saysthis isn't a household lamb,
it's bigger than that.
This isn't a nation lamb, thisisn't just for Israel.
He says behold the lamb of Godwho takes away the sin of the
(34:04):
world.
John knew something that evenJesus's closest disciples didn't
.
Verse 19, we get to kind of theapex of our text They've had the
meal.
We get to kind of the apex ofour text They've had the meal.
Presumably this is probably apost-meal teaching that Jesus
(34:24):
gives.
And it says in verse 19 that hetook the bread and when he had
given thanks, he broke it and hegave it to them, saying this is
my body which is given to you.
Do this in remembrance of me.
Jesus takes the loaf same loaf,big loaf, and he starts to rip
it apart, piece by piece, sothat he can hand it to his
(34:46):
disciples and he says do this inremembrance of me.
This symbolizes, thisrepresents my body, which is
going to be torn for you, whichis going to be torn for you the
way that that one loaf fed allof the disciples.
Christ, when he is being torn,he feeds us all from his same
singular body.
(35:09):
And rather than pointingbackwards in remembrance to
Moses, jesus points forward.
He says I'm doing this for areason, I'm doing this for you.
He says, in effect, aslaughtered lamb won't be your
shield anymore.
A broken and bloody me will beyour shield, the way that you
guys would put your faith in thespotless lamb, because that's
(35:32):
what God told you to do.
He says you're going to putyour faith and trust in me and
my finished work by my brokenbody.
In verse 20, he says likewiseafter they had eaten, he took
the cup and he said this cup ispoured out for you.
This is the new covenant in myblood.
And so he kind of does the samething, using a different
(35:55):
representation, and he says thatthis blood is going to be
spilled, and it's representedhere by the wine that I hold.
But there's a little phrasetucked into the sentence that I
think we gloss over.
He doesn't say this is my body,this is my blood.
That's it.
There's a little phrase, and Ithink we were praying, josh Page
, this is the hinge point ofhistory.
(36:18):
I already had that in my note,but you prayed that and so I was
very happy about that.
The hinge point is this phrase,this cup that is poured out for
you.
It is the new covenant in myblood, and if this sounds super
nerdy, I apologize, but Ipromise you, if we can wrap our
minds around the new covenantand what it means and the
promises entailed in it, I thinkit enriches our Christian life
(36:39):
and maybe even hinges on it.
What is a covenant?
It's basically just a promise.
It's a commitment.
The best thing that we havetoday is marriage.
It's a contract, but it's morethan that.
It's highly relational, and anew covenant implies an old
covenant, and so, as Moses ledhis people from slavery out of
(37:01):
Egypt to the promised land, godgave them a covenant.
God said I'm rescuing you.
You guys are my people andthese are kind of the rules,
these are the statutes that Iwant you to abide by, because
you are my people and I don'twant you to look like the rest
of the nations.
I don't want you to look likethe Philistines.
(37:21):
I don't want you to act likethe Moabites.
I want you guys to be set apart.
I want you to be different.
I know you can't see it, butthis is the Ten Commandments,
exodus 20.
This is the old covenant.
When everyone says old covenant, this is what they mean.
And God spoke all these wordssaying I am the Lord, your God,
who brought you out of the landof Egypt, out of the house of
(37:42):
slavery.
And it gives basically 10either you shalls or you shall
not.
This is the old covenant.
If you do these things, if youworship me and me alone, great.
I'm going to be your God.
I'm going to be close with youand I'm going to give you peace
from your enemies.
I'm going to give you this landyou shall not steal, you shall
not commit adultery.
(38:03):
If you can stay away from thosethings like great, it's going
to go great for you in the land.
I'm going to bless you.
You're going to have peace andall of these things.
When God gives this, if we canlook forward to the New
Testament, what Paul would sayis it was not meant to save, but
(38:24):
it was meant to demonstrate howmuch we needed a savior, that
these are good rules that westill should abide by, that we
still should see, because theseare a picture of God's heart.
But even if we tried, wewouldn't be able to keep these
and we would have to do soperfectly to be saved.
That was the old operatingsystem for Israel, and Jesus
(38:47):
says I'm going to supersede thiswith something even better.
You guys are going from a flipphone that you can only play
Snake on, you can't even text,to an iPhone Pro Max, 16,
whatever.
You're going to have just adifferent operating system
altogether.
Jeremiah 31,.
You don't have to turn there.
But if you turn there, theheader of this is the new
(39:11):
covenant.
This is a couple hundred yearsbefore Jesus and Jeremiah
predicts, he prophesies, hehears from the Lord that this is
(39:35):
what's going to happen.
I won of the land of Egypt mycovenant that they broke, even
though I was their husband,declares the Lord, for this is
the covenant that I will makewith the house of Israel.
And he goes into this list ofthings that God himself is going
to undertake.
He says, in effect, in the newcovenant, you don't have to do
the work.
There's no you shalls.
(39:56):
He says I will do this for you.
When Jesus says this blood thatis spilled is the blood of the
new covenant, what he's sayingis all of these I wills God
speaking, I wills are about toapply.
He says I will put my lawwithin them.
In the old covenant, the lawwas written on tablets of stone.
(40:17):
Jesus is saying now that I'mhere, now that I'm about to shed
my blood and die and resurrect,it's not going to be written on
tablets of stone, it's going tobe written on your hearts and
you guys are going to want to dothe things that I want you to
do, and you guys are going towant to be with me and I will be
their God and they shall be mypeople.
Look at the very bottom, theirGod, and they shall be my people
(40:40):
.
Look at the very bottom and Iwill forgive their iniquity and
I will remember their sins nomore.
Guys, what a great grace it isthat God gives us any covenant,
let alone this new one.
We do not have to guess on theleft side what pleases him.
We don't have to, you know,kind of huddle up and say what
does God want from us today?
He's told us clearly in the oldcovenant what pleases him, and
(41:05):
we don't have to guess what hewill do for us.
He's told us clearly I willmake you my people.
Though you didn't ask for it,though you didn't deserve it, I
will make you my people.
The new covenant I would suggestis the heart of the gospel
Baseline, like.
What we need are new hearts.
(41:27):
We need hearts that want toplease God.
Naturally, we want control.
We want to dictate our lives,whether it be our time, our
talent, our treasure.
We want to call the shots.
We may feel comfortable cuttingGod a check, but my time is my
time.
It may be I'll give God all thetime that I want, but I don't
(41:47):
have a lot of money.
I kind of need to hold on to it.
Whatever it is, we want controland the new covenant gives us
new hearts.
We want control.
Sometimes it's sinister, likeJudas.
Sometimes we are bent onoutright evil, and sometimes
it's just us wanting to do whatbenefits us the most.
Sometimes it's us not lookingafter our neighbor.
(42:10):
Sometimes it's not doing theright thing when we know that
we're supposed to.
But the new covenant gives usbeating hearts at great cost to
himself.
So if this is what Passoverrepresented, we have even a
better list in what the Lord'sSupper represents, that, as
Jesus says, passover was great.
(42:31):
I'm not diminishing it.
What I'm doing is so muchbetter and superior.
This is kind of a list that Godstill cares for his people, and
even in bigger and greater andgrander ways God cares for his
people.
Number two Jesus as a shieldfor his people.
We do not put our faith andtrust in the blood of goats and
lambs and things like that, butwe have God in the flesh
(42:55):
spilling his blood for us.
And then, lastly, goddelivering his people from death
into eternal life, intoknowledge and communion with the
Father, and so it's not just aphysical thing, but this is a
highly spiritual and eternalthing that we are about to do.
(43:15):
And so, ushers, if you guys areready to come down as we prepare
to come to a table, a couple ofwarnings and some
encouragements for us.
I think it's just one of each,though, unbelievers.
The warning is this is a meal.
The warning is this is a mealthat is for the family of God.
(43:40):
There is no magic in it.
There's nothing virtuous in andof itself in this meal, in
these elements.
Nothing is going to happen.
If I can remind you that Judaswas at the table and it did not
go well for him.
There's nothing about cominghere and receiving this that's
going to make you any morespiritual, but it is an open
(44:04):
table and so you don't have tobe a member of midtree as long
as you are a member of thehousehold of God.
If you are a Christian, if youhave your faith and trust in
Christ, come and eat and partake.
It is a wonderful thing when weare able to gather together
from the same loaf and to feedourselves both physically and
(44:25):
spiritually.
Believers, we come in here witha wide range of spiritual states
.
Some of us are walking with theLord and feel great, and we
love doing all this kind ofstuff.
Praise God for that.
Praise God for those people.
Some of us, even though we'rein Christ, have an accuser
(44:50):
whispering in our ears.
Some of us may hear things likeeven though you're in Christ,
you are not worthy, and to thatI would say you're right, I'm
not worthy.
But he is, and he is the onewho invites me, calls me,
commands me to come and eat.
(45:11):
The accuser may say you are toosinful.
To that I'd say that's, in asense, true sinful.
To that I would say that's in asense true, but he remembers my
sins.
No more Part of the newcovenant.
The accuser may say God isangry with you and that you
shouldn't be here.
You are not ready for this mealyet.
You've got work to do beforeyou can come and take To that I
(45:33):
would say he has already donethe work for me, and me.
Eating is participating in thatwork and receiving it in faith,
and so we find comfort at atable, at a meal that doesn't
just change our circumstances,like the Passover did, but this
meal changes our hearts, thatJesus has established through
(45:54):
his work In all thingscircumstances, both great and
small, from Judas' betrayal to aman carrying a jar, to the
breaking of his body and thespilling of his blood the lamb
is in control and he invites usto eat with him.
(46:16):
And so I'm gonna throwRevelation 7 on the screen.
I'm not gonna read it If youguys would just take a minute or
two.
Stokes is gonna lead you, butjust read this.
This is a picture of what's tocome.
That we have the lamb now onthe throne.
I'll let you read it yourself,but if you pray, thank Jesus,
talk to him, spend time with him.
(46:38):
If you want to pray with peopleon the side, we'll be over on
the side, but Stokes will callyou up and he will take it from
there.
But we worship a lamb who hasbeen slain and he loves us and
he's done the work for us, solet's pray to him and worship
him together this morning.
Please turn in your Bibles to Luke 22, 1 through 2,
and then 14 through 23, which ison page 881 in the Pew Bibles,
and follow along as I read God'sWord.
Now.
The feast of unleavened breaddrew near, which is called the
(00:23):
Passover, and the chief priestsand the scribes were seeking how
to put him to death, for theyfeared the people.
Now picking up in verse 14.
And when the hour came, hereclined at table and the
apostles with him.
And he said to them I haveearnestly desired to eat this
Passover with you before Isuffer, for I tell you I will
not eat it until it is fulfilledin the kingdom of God.
(00:45):
And he took a cup and when hehad given thanks, he said take
this and divide it amongyourselves, for I tell you that
from now on, I will not drink ofthe fruit of the vine until the
kingdom of God comes.
And he took bread and when hehad given thanks, he broke it
and gave it to them, saying thisis my body which is given for
you.
Do this in remembrance of me.
And likewise the cup, afterthey had eaten, saying this cup
(01:09):
that is poured out for you isthe new covenant in my blood,
but behold the hand of him whobetrays me is with me on the
table, for the son of man goesat it as it has been determined.
But woe to that man by whom hehas betrayed.
And they began to question oneanother which of them it could
be who was going to do this.
This is the word of the Lord.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Check, check.
Hey, how's it going guys?
Good morning.
My name is Thomas.
If I haven't gotten thepleasure to meet you, if you
can't tell, I'm the youth pastor, and so here's what I'll say.
Will might have made a mistake.
He gave me five differentpassages and he said just pick
one of these for you to be ableto preach through.
And if you guys don't know, I'mlike a super nerd and so I was
(02:15):
like I'll take Passover, likethat sounds really fun to me,
and so we may be having secretchurch this morning.
We may go six hours.
Who knows, the second servicemay come and join us.
Here's also what I'll say.
Will's been doing this reallycool thing where he like writes
with his pen and he likehighlights and all that kind of
stuff, and I really reallywanted to be able to do that and
I was like that's so cool and Iwant people to see my thought
(02:35):
process and all that kind ofstuff and write things down on
the screens.
But I have horrible handwritingand whenever I do that with the
youth, whenever I like writesomething down, they act like
demon possessed and they're likeI can't read that and they
start writhing in pain and Iwanted to spare kind of the
congregation from that and Ididn't want also anyone to think
(02:56):
that I was writing in Koreanbecause I don't know Korean.
But so we're going old school,I'm clicking the slides, they're
doing the scriptures, but weare gonna rock and roll this
morning in Luke, chapter 22.
So the question of the morningthat I want to frame this text
in the one that Lane just readmay be a little strange and I
feel kind of cheap using it,because this could be applied to
(03:19):
any text.
But this morning specifically,I want us to consider who is in
control, and I mean this in twodifferent ways.
I mean this one, like where weprobably beeline, is who's in
control of my life, who's incontrol of me and my destiny, my
decisions, all of that kind ofstuff.
So, yes, I want us to get there, but first and foremost, I want
(03:42):
us to wrestle with and toconsider and to slowly read this
passage and wonder, withoutspoilers, who is in control of
what's happening?
Who's in control of thedecisions and the power to
(04:06):
influence or direct people'sbehavior or the course of events
?
And so this morning we're goingto see different factions of
different people trying to dojust this.
They're going to be trying toget control.
They're going to try tomanipulate things in a way that
goes beneficial for them andkind of them alone.
(04:28):
And so, as we read, especiallythe front part of this, I want
you to question who is incontrol?
And yes, it's God, but don'tjust say God on the front end.
And so the setting of where weare.
If you guys have paper Bibles,look with me just at the
physical book.
If you guys have those, at Luke, chapter 22.
Now I don't know if you guyshave red letter Bibles.
(04:50):
I always to you students andjust people I talk, to recommend
red letter Bibles if you canget one.
I believe all of God's word isinspired.
They all carry the same weight.
Just because Jesus is saying itdoesn't make it any greater or
heavier.
But sometimes it's nice just tobe able to see when Jesus is
(05:13):
speaking and when a story ishappening, or see when someone
else pipes up and asks aquestion.
It's nice to be able to see.
And if you look back in Luke,chapter 21, it's mostly all red
letters.
It's mostly all red letters.
We're coming right off the heelsof just a pretty dense, a
pretty just, theologically richteaching of Jesus.
We just got through a month ofthis Will preaching, through
(05:34):
this.
Actually, I have a note Inbetween services.
Today, will mentioned thisgeneration will not pass until
these things come to happen.
Will's teaching a little classin the one another room.
Is that right?
One another room Next week?
Okay, next week Will's teachinga little class.
So if you have any questionsabout kind of the end times,
(05:55):
will said that he's got it allfigured out and that he would
love to walk through a detailedmap of the end times and he's
really excited about it.
And so that's next week.
In between services.
Come with your questions.
I don't think he'll answer anyof them directly, but Jesus is
preaching, he's teaching andhe's doing actually a lot more
(06:16):
targeted teaching towards thePharisees, the scribes and the
chief priests.
He starts to, if I can say itthis way, have a little bit more
venom in his mouth where he'skind of going from general good
theology and teachings to kindof narrowing in on their hearts
and they don't like it.
So we turn the page to Luke,chapter 22, and here we get some
(06:40):
black letters indicating thatit is about to be a story, and
so in this passage there's alittle bit of teaching but
there's a lot of story, andlet's see how it starts.
It says Now the feast ofunleavened bread drew near,
which is called the Passover,and the chief priests and the
scribes were seeking how to puthim to death, for they feared
(07:04):
the people.
And so now we kind of get intothis kind of like tonal
difference where Jesus is kindof the hero of the story.
Jesus is being celebrated bythe crowds.
He's kind of putting to shame,sometimes the Pharisees, and now
they are sick of it.
They've gone long past tryingto be amicable, trying to be
(07:25):
friendly, trying to garnerrespect for one another.
They are seeking how to put himto death, not if they should,
but how they should.
There's two issues with this forthe chief priests.
One they love the Bible, theylove the Old Testament and
unfortunately for them, the OldTestament says something about
murder.
It says you shouldn't do it.
(07:46):
And so they're like we can'tjust outright kill him.
So what should we do?
They decide let's get Romeinvolved and let's get a band of
soldiers to come together.
And they say that's a greatidea.
Wait, we can't do that rightaway because the people love
Jesus right away, because thepeople love Jesus, the people
(08:10):
see how he interacts with thesick and they're drawn to it.
They're like this guy'sdifferent.
They see how he interacts withthe sinner and they're like this
guy's awesome, like we want tobe around this guy while the
Pharisees are on the outsidepouting.
They know that they need to putJesus to death from their
perspective, but it wouldn't besimple.
They would have to get craftyif they wanted things to go
their way.
And as they're kind of huddledup, I'm picturing in the dead of
(08:33):
night, they're wondering.
They're talking how are wegoing to do this?
How are we going to put him todeath?
They get one of the greatestgifts that they could have
imagined.
Look with me in verse 3.
It says Then Satan entered intoJudas, called Iscariot, who was
one of the number of the twelve.
He went away and conferred withthe chief priests and officers
(08:54):
about how he might betray themVerse 5, and they were glad.
I think that's anunderstatement that they're
huddled up, wondering how are wegoing to stick it to this guy,
this teacher, maybe a prophet,we don't know, but he is
throwing a wrench in our plansand our religiosity and our
followings.
What are we going to do?
And lo and behold, one ofJesus' closest followers walks
(09:18):
up with the intention of hey,you guys want Jesus gone.
Let me help you with that.
They must be over the moon.
And the irony of this is thatthe chief priests, the ones who
are responsible for handling thesacrifices and representing the
people of God to God, are nowin league with Satan himself,
(09:42):
like they are partnering withSatan through Jesus how to get
rid of Jesus.
And they don't have eyes to seebecause they are so blinded by
their rage, their jealousy,their envy, their demand to keep
the status quo, whatever it is.
(10:03):
They can't see that Judas isbeing evil, he's betraying his
rabbi, which would have beenseen as a disrespectful, evil
thing, and that he is full ofSatan per verse 3.
They can't see it.
They themselves are blind toone of the saddest realities in
Scripture.
These are kind of the threebiggest villains in Scripture
(10:26):
all teaming up.
I don't know about you guys.
I as a young man, as a littleboy, I loved the villains.
The villains were always themore compelling people in the
stories, in the movies, all ofthat kind of stuff.
I did not want to be LukeSkywalker when I grew up.
I wanted to be Darth Maul whenI grew up I wanted to be Darth
(10:50):
Maul.
Like villains, like they drawus in because they create this
tension.
They create this part of thestory where things aren't going
to go right and we as audienceswant to see who's going to win.
Is it the bad guys or is it thegood guys?
And so here we have three ofthe biggest kind of bad guys in
the New Testament teaming uptogether to try to take out
(11:14):
Jesus.
And this comes without muchwarning on Judas's part.
Why does Judas do this?
The Bible doesn't sayexplicitly.
Some people think it was greed.
Some people think that he wasjust looking for an opportunity
to receive money from the chiefpriest.
I think 30 pieces of silverjust from what I've read wasn't
(11:36):
a ton.
It was a good chunk, but itprobably wasn't the driving
factor.
Even though it says that Judaswas a thief, some say that he
tried to force Jesus's handagainst the religious elite.
He wanted to get the ballrolling and if he needed to hold
the pool queue he was willingto do that.
Like if he needed to set thingsin motion, he definitely would.
Others think that Judas saw thewriting on the wall and that he
(12:00):
knew that Jesus's torch wasabout to get snuffed and he
wanted to be on the right sideof history.
He wanted to be on the rightside of the majority, that if
people were holding pitchforks,he wanted to be with them and
not in the minority.
The bottom line is we don'tknow the exact reason, because
scripture doesn't say.
But what I can tell you is thatJudas wanted to be in control
(12:23):
of the situation.
He didn't trust Jesus, hedidn't trust the plans of God.
Whatever reason whether it wasdiabolical or quote-unquote,
noble, we don't know he wantedto be in control of the
situation.
He said I'm going to take theball and I'm going to run with
it.
And so all three of these areconspiring against Jesus.
(12:47):
And so the question is so far inthe story, who is in control?
Who is the ones dictating thestory?
Who's moving the tension along?
Is it the chief priests?
Because they have religiouspower.
They actually do have somepower with Rome, tandem to Rome.
They are the ones who are gonnasay if you let Jesus go, you're
(13:10):
no friend of Caesar.
Are these guys in control?
Is it Judas?
Judas is the one with a foot inboth camps.
He says I'm team Jesus overhere and I'm also maybe not team
Jesus, I'm team Pharisee overhere.
He's the one that maybe has thebest purview, since he is
getting inside information fromJesus and he is getting inside
(13:30):
information from the chiefpriest.
Is Judas in control?
Is it Satan?
Satan like the enemy fromGenesis 3.
Is he the one in control?
Perhaps Satan thought he knowsthe prophecy Genesis 3, 15.
Perhaps he thought I know thatI get to strike his heel because
(13:52):
God said that that one day thechild of Eve is going to come
and I am going to be able tostrike his heel, but he's going
to crush my head.
Perhaps Satan thought if I canget my fangs deep enough,
perhaps if I can catch him justenough off guard, perhaps if I
can maybe pull the rug out fromunder him and get my fangs in
(14:14):
his heel, maybe I can win.
Is Satan in control?
We see kind of jumping to theend of the story.
Who really is in control ofthis story?
The true shock and kind of thereveal of who is in charge comes
at the table after the Passovermeal, where Jesus shows his
(14:36):
hand and he says capital, I amin control.
Look with me at verse 21 of thesame chapter.
This is Jesus speaking and hesays but behold, they go through
this whole meal and they'revery familiar.
So picture yourself in thisscene and we're gonna get to the
(14:58):
meal.
They're sitting together,probably just the 13 of them
Jesus and the disciples andthey're having this intimate
meal.
They're enjoying one another,they're remembering the past and
they're doing all of this stuff.
It's a tight knit family.
Picture your MCG.
If you get along with your MCG,they're doing life together in
the right way.
(15:19):
And Jesus kind of says beforethey pick up the dishes and
before they sweep the floors, hesays I got one more thing for
you guys.
He says in verse 21, behold thehand of him who betrays me is
with me at the table.
Like Jesus often does speak inriddles and parables, this is
pretty clear and they'reprobably like what do you mean,
(15:43):
jesus?
Like they don't know exactlywhat Jesus knows.
They don't know what's coming,even though Jesus has talked
about it many times before.
But he says verse 22, for theson of man goes as it has been
determined.
But woe to that man by whom heis betrayed.
Jesus knows Psalm 41.
This is Psalm 41.
We were in a room kind of doinga Bible study and I was like
(16:06):
Judas betraying Jesus, likethat's, like some prophecy of
old.
What is that?
And we looked it up and me,mitch Aldridge, laura, our jaws
were on the floor because wewere like we've never read this
or we have, but we've neverconnected the dots.
We've never heard this preachedPsalm 41, never heard this
preached Psalm 41, verse 9, itsays even my close friend in
(16:27):
whom I trusted, he who ate mybread, he has lifted his heel
against me.
That's David writing hundredsof years before this happens, as
a prophecy about the kind ofdeath that Jesus would die that
even a close friend he wouldconsider Judas to be a close
friend has lifted his heel andbetrayed him.
(16:49):
Go back to verse 23.
I think this is, I think, one ofthe most interesting parts and
I think maybe a word of warningto us.
And they began to question oneanother which of them it would
be.
Who is going to do this?
My favorite, I think, part ofthis is Jesus says one of you,
(17:10):
12 is going to betray me.
And they didn't all look atJudas, they didn't all crane
their necks and say, well, it'sgot to be that guy, because he
fill in the blank.
We have been reading achildren's kind of Bible to
Emmett and Hamish while they runaround.
This was a picture of one halfwas the disciples, the other
(17:31):
half was the other.
See these guys.
There's only seven disciples.
Which of these guys do youthink is Judas?
I kind of blurred out the names.
I blurred out the names.
So it's an honest test.
Which one do you think is Judas?
Because it was this guy.
This guy, if Jesus says at thetable, and these are their
(17:52):
postures, if these are theirfaces, if he says one of you
guys is going to betray me, Ibet the other six look at that
guy on the end that doesn't wantto be there, like that's kind
of a natural type thing.
This is how I think we think ofJudas as this kind of guy in
the back that's kind of rubbinghis hands in an evil fashion.
Maybe he's got a long darkblack trench coat and he kind of
(18:13):
just looks shady.
I think from the witness ofScripture you can put it back on
verse 23, they genuinely didn'tknow who was gonna betray him.
They genuinely didn't know, per, what we have in the other
gospels.
Jesus says one of you guys willbetray me, and Peter and John
literally questioned Lord, is itme.
(18:33):
Am I the one that's gonna do it?
I look at these other guys.
I think they're rock solid.
All 11 other guys.
Is it me?
I want to know so that I canfortify myself.
And Jesus says no.
In other words, and I think thisis the word of warning, judas
seemed, by outward appearance,above reproach.
(18:54):
This guy may have been a deaconat a church.
He may have even been an elderof a church.
He had every outward appearanceto say I am one of you guys.
When Jesus sends out the 72,they go in pairs.
Judas had a pair and they didmiracles, they taught, they
(19:16):
prayed and they came back andthey all celebrated together.
The guy with Judas didn't say,hey, things got a little hairy
and he kind of lost his mind.
He was one of them.
1 Samuel 16, verse 7.
It says and so kind of theapplication here is not to
(19:44):
examine others with suspicion.
It's not to look around and say, hmm, there might be a Judas
amongst us.
I wonder who it could be.
I think the application is thatinward introspection almost is
it me, lord?
Type questioning, introspectionalmost is it me, lord?
Type questioning.
And I think one of the ways toquestion this is is there a
(20:04):
difference between your publiclife and your private life?
Is there a difference betweenhow you portray yourself on
Facebook or at church or at work?
And inwardly you are verydifferent and disconnected.
I think that's kind of theearmark of Judas, especially
right here, that outwardly noone would have known, but
(20:27):
inwardly his heart was very farfrom the Lord.
I think the warning is thatproximity to Jesus and his
people does not always equalintimacy and union with him.
It does not always equalintimacy and union with him Does
not always mean intimacy andunion with him.
Yes, it can, it definitely can.
The people who are united toChrist, the people who are
(20:50):
intimate with Jesus, that knowhim and love him, will desire to
be with God and his people.
But just because you're in theroom today doesn't mean that you
are one of his people, justlike the fact that Judas was at
the table when they did the LastSupper.
Judas was there and justtalking with people about the
text and as we've read ittogether, almost one thing comes
(21:13):
up uniformly is people go.
Does that mean Satan was thereat the Last Supper?
Because it says in verse threethat Satan entered Judas and
Judas was at the Last Supper.
I think, yes, I think there's noindication that Satan left.
Maybe he did, but the powers ofdarkness have conspired against
Jesus and I think one of thebig points is it didn't catch
(21:36):
Jesus off guard.
There was no blind side.
It wasn't out of the blue.
They didn't come out of theshadows and apprehend him.
Jesus knew from the beginningprobably even from the writing
of Psalm 41, that this wouldhappen.
I think, demonstrating thatChrist is in control, not the
(21:58):
chief priests, not Judas, notSatan, but Jesus is the one
controlling the narrative, he'sthe one pushing it forward and
he is the one that holds allthings in his hands.
And we see that here in the bigpicture Cosmic powers, Satan,
all this kind of stuff, betrayalbut what about the mundane?
What about the day-to-day?
Is Jesus only overseeing thelarge picture, cosmic type stuff
(22:23):
, or does he know the details ofour day-to-day in the smallest
degree?
Sometimes I think my tendencyis to think that God is so big
and so great that he's manningkind of the planets and their
orbits and all that kind ofstuff that he doesn't care about
my Thursday morning or mySaturday afternoon.
(22:43):
He's got bigger fish to fry, soto speak.
Look with me in verse 7.
Then came the day of unleavenedbread, on which the Passover
lamb had to be sacrificed.
So Jesus sent Peter and Johnsaying go and prepare the
Passover for us that we may eatit.
And they said to him when willyou have us prepare it?
(23:03):
This is what Will read earlier.
He said to them Behold, whenyou have entered the city, a man
carrying a jar of water willmeet you.
Follow him into the house thathe enters and tell the master of
the house.
The teacher says to you when isthe guest room where I may eat
(23:34):
the Passover with my disciples?
I think by having these twostories, almost as bookends to
the passage, we're about to lookin the middle at the meat of it
.
But almost as bookends we seethat Jesus is.
He knows the large, big stuff,like Satan being on the move,
and he knows and controls thesmall details, down to a man
(23:57):
carrying a jar.
It seems like a strange small,insignificant detail until you
realize that he is the onemanning it all and this should
be a great comfort to us.
He's not so in the details thathe kind of misses the big
picture of, let's just say, oursalvation and things like that.
And he's not so big picturethat he kind of loses us and
(24:20):
we're just a number to him.
He knows each and every one ofus, he knows the numbers of hair
on our heads, he knows whatwe're feeling and what we're
thinking as we walk into church,as we walk into any place.
He knows it all and this shouldbe a great comfort to us.
And so, as we kind of hone in onthe middle of the passage six
(24:43):
times, there is a word repeatedin this text.
It's the word Passover.
The repetition of Passover.
I don't think it's just astylistic choice or that Dr Luke
ran out of the words to say,but I think it underlines the
centrality of Passover and whatJesus is doing tonight, as we'll
(25:06):
see.
And so what was the PassoverFor our purposes this morning?
Let's just say it was theepitome of God's control God
orchestrating events and Godorchestrating people in the way
that he wanted it to go, in acrooked and twisted generation.
(25:26):
In a nutshell, god's people werein slavery.
They were in slavery to aPharaoh and the Egyptians, and
so if you would have askedanyone in that day who's in
charge here, they would havepointed at the big pyramid and
said that guy's sitting up top,the Pharaoh is in charge, and
God made promises to rescue andredeem his people and to bring
(25:49):
them out into a land flowingwith milk and honey.
And so God sees his people inslavery.
It says that he hears theirprayers, he hears their cries
and God appoints someone Mosesto talk to the Pharaoh and to
compel him to let his people gofree so that they can worship
the Lord.
One thing I want to highlightwhen God says you guys are
(26:10):
leaving slavery, he gives them apurpose.
He says I want you to worshipme and he gives them a place.
He doesn't just say you guysare going to wander.
He says you're going to a landflowing with milk and honey and
he gives them a place.
He doesn't just say you guysare gonna wander.
He says you're going to a landflowing with milk and honey and
I want you to worship me there.
He doesn't say I'm getting youout of slavery.
Now, you know, do your best,remind your own business.
And so Moses tells Pharaoh letGod's people go so that they can
(26:35):
worship him.
And he refuses.
And nine plagues ensue on thepeople Gnats, hail, frogs,
darkness, etc.
And finally, god tells Mosesthere's one last plague that
must occur and it's the hardestone, it's the heaviest one.
He says tonight every firstbornin the land of Egypt shall die.
(26:55):
Would you throw up that Exodus11 passage?
So Moses said.
Thus says the Lord aboutmidnight I will go out in the
midst of Egypt and everyfirstborn in the land of Egypt
shall die, from the firstborn ofPharaoh who sits on the throne
even, to the firstborn of theslave girl who's behind the hand
mill, and all the firstborn ofthe cattle.
(27:18):
Here's kind of the wrench or theinteresting thing about this.
God doesn't say the firstbornof every Egyptian is going to
die.
He says every firstborn in theland of Egypt.
There are some plagues thatkind of went to all of the
people and there were someplagues that only affected the
Egyptians.
In this one, in this last one,in this kind of death blow that
(27:42):
God gives to Pharaoh, he says inverse five every firstborn in
the land of Egypt shall die.
The people of Israel are inslavery, living in Egypt.
The slave girl, from thefirstborn of the slave girl
who's behind the handmaul, whois the slave girl, if not the
Egyptian or the Israelite women,like, every firstborn is going
(28:05):
to die, including the Israeliteswho are in Egypt, but the Lord
gave them a way to be spared.
He says take a spotless lamb,kill it, drape its blood over
the doorposts.
And when I come to takevengeance, if I see the blood of
the lamb if you didn't knowthis, this is literally where
(28:25):
the word come from I will passover your house.
I'm going through the town, I'mgoing through the streets and
I'm going to invade every housethat there is in Egypt, but if
there's blood on the doorpost, Iwill pass over it because I
don't need to take any bloodbecause blood has already been
spilt.
And so he goes, and he goes,and that night occurs and
(28:50):
Pharaoh says get out.
And they do.
In a sense, god did not sparethem from the punishment of the
world around them, but he gavethem a shield, something to
protect them.
If they were covered in theblood of the lamb, no further
blood had to be spilled.
And so, if I could boil downPassover to three points this
(29:12):
morning and we're gonna tie itinto the Lord's Supper One the
Passover represented God's carefor his people.
That, yes, he was big, but healso heard the cries of the
infants.
He heard the cries of the slavewoman.
He heard the cries of hispeople and he cared enough about
them to do something.
Passover was God's way ofcaring for his people.
(29:35):
Number two it was a shield forhis people.
It was God's way of caring forhis people.
Number two it was a shield forhis people that they would
literally huddle under the bloodof the lamb and that was kind
of their escape from the sins ofthe world around them.
The reason that they're in thissituation is because Egypt
sinned and because Egypt wasputting them in slavery, and God
(29:57):
gives them a shield for hispeople.
And then, number three, it'sGod delivering his people from
slavery to the promised land.
Again, he doesn't lead them outof the dungeon, so to speak, and
say figure it out Like yourlife is yours now, like make
(30:18):
good choices, I hope you dowhat's right.
He says I'm taking you out ofEgypt and I'm going to lead you
by the hand to the land that Ihave prepared for you.
This is who is in charge.
Pharaoh has nothing to sayagainst the God of the Bible and
the God of Moses.
And so, with these three thingsand there's guys, probably 50
(30:45):
other things that we could say,but with these three things in
mind, the Passover was somethingthat the people of Israel
rehearsed, they celebrated andthey did every year like they
were supposed to.
This is like us celebratingEaster.
No one says is it Easter again?
Didn't we just do that Like wehad Easter last year?
(31:06):
Do we have to continue?
This is like Christmas, likethe way that we kind of build
our lives around some of theseholidays.
They would have built theirlife around celebrating the
Passover.
They would have dictated whenand where they traveled, how
they went about, who they sawduring the year.
Passover dictated really muchof their lives.
(31:28):
And think about this Jesus hasbeen doing ministry for three
years with his disciples.
This is year three.
He started when he was 30.
He gets crucified when he's 33.
And so just think about thefact that twice before they've
probably done Passover withJesus, they've probably had the
(31:48):
meal and had the celebration andsung the hymns and confessed
the sins and all of the kind ofstuff that goes along with
Passover.
They did it once normal.
They did it the second timenormal.
And this time is going to bedifferent.
Look with me at verse 14.
And when the hour came, hereclined at table and the
apostles with him, and he saidto them.
(32:09):
I have we don't see this a lotfrom Jesus.
He says I have earnestlydesired to eat this Passover
with you before I suffer.
He says this one.
He doesn't tell him why yet,but he says this one's going to
be different and I've lookedforward to, I've earnestly
desired it's almost kept me upat night thinking about doing
(32:31):
this with you guys.
And he says for I tell you, Iwill not eat of it until it is
fulfilled in the kingdom of God.
Think about the symbolism thatis happening on this night, the
night of Passover, the nightthat the Passover lamb was to be
slaughtered, each for his ownhousehold, and so probably in
Jerusalem, the streets and theravines and the rivers are
(32:53):
probably flowing with blood oflambs because each household
needed their own lamb.
Think about the symbolism.
Jesus knows that in a matter ofhours he will be hanging on a
cross for the sins of his people.
The apex of the meal and thecelebration was the sacrifice of
the Passover lamb, and this isa title that Jesus has worn for
(33:16):
a little while.
You guys remember John theBaptist and John Jesus at the
very beginning of his ministry.
He's kind of just walkingaround.
He's got maybe a handful ofdisciples.
John has a lot of disciples andhe's walking around and John
says it says the next day he sawJesus coming towards him and
John yells out behold the lambof God who takes away the sin of
(33:40):
the world.
Interesting thing about thePassover lamb it was supposed to
.
It didn't really take away thesins, but it covered the sins of
each household.
John looks at Jesus and he saysthis isn't a household lamb,
it's bigger than that.
This isn't a nation lamb, thisisn't just for Israel.
He says behold the lamb of Godwho takes away the sin of the
(34:04):
world.
John knew something that evenJesus's closest disciples didn't
.
Verse 19, we get to kind of theapex of our text They've had the
meal.
We get to kind of the apex ofour text They've had the meal.
Presumably this is probably apost-meal teaching that Jesus
(34:24):
gives.
And it says in verse 19 that hetook the bread and when he had
given thanks, he broke it and hegave it to them, saying this is
my body which is given to you.
Do this in remembrance of me.
Jesus takes the loaf same loaf,big loaf, and he starts to rip
it apart, piece by piece, sothat he can hand it to his
(34:46):
disciples and he says do this inremembrance of me.
This symbolizes, thisrepresents my body, which is
going to be torn for you, whichis going to be torn for you the
way that that one loaf fed allof the disciples.
Christ, when he is being torn,he feeds us all from his same
singular body.
(35:09):
And rather than pointingbackwards in remembrance to
Moses, jesus points forward.
He says I'm doing this for areason, I'm doing this for you.
He says, in effect, aslaughtered lamb won't be your
shield anymore.
A broken and bloody me will beyour shield, the way that you
guys would put your faith in thespotless lamb, because that's
(35:32):
what God told you to do.
He says you're going to putyour faith and trust in me and
my finished work by my brokenbody.
In verse 20, he says likewiseafter they had eaten, he took
the cup and he said this cup ispoured out for you.
This is the new covenant in myblood.
And so he kind of does the samething, using a different
(35:55):
representation, and he says thatthis blood is going to be
spilled, and it's representedhere by the wine that I hold.
But there's a little phrasetucked into the sentence that I
think we gloss over.
He doesn't say this is my body,this is my blood.
That's it.
There's a little phrase, and Ithink we were praying, josh Page
, this is the hinge point ofhistory.
(36:18):
I already had that in my note,but you prayed that and so I was
very happy about that.
The hinge point is this phrase,this cup that is poured out for
you.
It is the new covenant in myblood, and if this sounds super
nerdy, I apologize, but Ipromise you, if we can wrap our
minds around the new covenantand what it means and the
promises entailed in it, I thinkit enriches our Christian life
(36:39):
and maybe even hinges on it.
What is a covenant?
It's basically just a promise.
It's a commitment.
The best thing that we havetoday is marriage.
It's a contract, but it's morethan that.
It's highly relational, and anew covenant implies an old
covenant, and so, as Moses ledhis people from slavery out of
(37:01):
Egypt to the promised land, godgave them a covenant.
God said I'm rescuing you.
You guys are my people andthese are kind of the rules,
these are the statutes that Iwant you to abide by, because
you are my people and I don'twant you to look like the rest
of the nations.
I don't want you to look likethe Philistines.
(37:21):
I don't want you to act likethe Moabites.
I want you guys to be set apart.
I want you to be different.
I know you can't see it, butthis is the Ten Commandments,
exodus 20.
This is the old covenant.
When everyone says old covenant, this is what they mean.
And God spoke all these wordssaying I am the Lord, your God,
who brought you out of the landof Egypt, out of the house of
(37:42):
slavery.
And it gives basically 10either you shalls or you shall
not.
This is the old covenant.
If you do these things, if youworship me and me alone, great.
I'm going to be your God.
I'm going to be close with youand I'm going to give you peace
from your enemies.
I'm going to give you this landyou shall not steal, you shall
not commit adultery.
(38:03):
If you can stay away from thosethings like great, it's going
to go great for you in the land.
I'm going to bless you.
You're going to have peace andall of these things.
When God gives this, if we canlook forward to the New
Testament, what Paul would sayis it was not meant to save, but
(38:24):
it was meant to demonstrate howmuch we needed a savior, that
these are good rules that westill should abide by, that we
still should see, because theseare a picture of God's heart.
But even if we tried, wewouldn't be able to keep these
and we would have to do soperfectly to be saved.
That was the old operatingsystem for Israel, and Jesus
(38:47):
says I'm going to supersede thiswith something even better.
You guys are going from a flipphone that you can only play
Snake on, you can't even text,to an iPhone Pro Max, 16,
whatever.
You're going to have just adifferent operating system
altogether.
Jeremiah 31,.
You don't have to turn there.
But if you turn there, theheader of this is the new
(39:11):
covenant.
This is a couple hundred yearsbefore Jesus and Jeremiah
predicts, he prophesies, hehears from the Lord that this is
(39:35):
what's going to happen.
I won of the land of Egypt mycovenant that they broke, even
though I was their husband,declares the Lord, for this is
the covenant that I will makewith the house of Israel.
And he goes into this list ofthings that God himself is going
to undertake.
He says, in effect, in the newcovenant, you don't have to do
the work.
There's no you shalls.
(39:56):
He says I will do this for you.
When Jesus says this blood thatis spilled is the blood of the
new covenant, what he's sayingis all of these I wills God
speaking, I wills are about toapply.
He says I will put my lawwithin them.
In the old covenant, the lawwas written on tablets of stone.
(40:17):
Jesus is saying now that I'mhere, now that I'm about to shed
my blood and die and resurrect,it's not going to be written on
tablets of stone, it's going tobe written on your hearts and
you guys are going to want to dothe things that I want you to
do, and you guys are going towant to be with me and I will be
their God and they shall be mypeople.
Look at the very bottom, theirGod, and they shall be my people
(40:40):
.
Look at the very bottom and Iwill forgive their iniquity and
I will remember their sins nomore.
Guys, what a great grace it isthat God gives us any covenant,
let alone this new one.
We do not have to guess on theleft side what pleases him.
We don't have to, you know,kind of huddle up and say what
does God want from us today?
He's told us clearly in the oldcovenant what pleases him, and
(41:05):
we don't have to guess what hewill do for us.
He's told us clearly I willmake you my people.
Though you didn't ask for it,though you didn't deserve it, I
will make you my people.
The new covenant I would suggestis the heart of the gospel
Baseline, like.
What we need are new hearts.
(41:27):
We need hearts that want toplease God.
Naturally, we want control.
We want to dictate our lives,whether it be our time, our
talent, our treasure.
We want to call the shots.
We may feel comfortable cuttingGod a check, but my time is my
time.
It may be I'll give God all thetime that I want, but I don't
(41:47):
have a lot of money.
I kind of need to hold on to it.
Whatever it is, we want controland the new covenant gives us
new hearts.
We want control.
Sometimes it's sinister, likeJudas.
Sometimes we are bent onoutright evil, and sometimes
it's just us wanting to do whatbenefits us the most.
Sometimes it's us not lookingafter our neighbor.
(42:10):
Sometimes it's not doing theright thing when we know that
we're supposed to.
But the new covenant gives usbeating hearts at great cost to
himself.
So if this is what Passoverrepresented, we have even a
better list in what the Lord'sSupper represents, that, as
Jesus says, passover was great.
(42:31):
I'm not diminishing it.
What I'm doing is so muchbetter and superior.
This is kind of a list that Godstill cares for his people, and
even in bigger and greater andgrander ways God cares for his
people.
Number two Jesus as a shieldfor his people.
We do not put our faith andtrust in the blood of goats and
lambs and things like that, butwe have God in the flesh
(42:55):
spilling his blood for us.
And then, lastly, goddelivering his people from death
into eternal life, intoknowledge and communion with the
Father, and so it's not just aphysical thing, but this is a
highly spiritual and eternalthing that we are about to do.
(43:15):
And so, ushers, if you guys areready to come down as we prepare
to come to a table, a couple ofwarnings and some
encouragements for us.
I think it's just one of each,though, unbelievers.
The warning is this is a meal.
The warning is this is a mealthat is for the family of God.
(43:40):
There is no magic in it.
There's nothing virtuous in andof itself in this meal, in
these elements.
Nothing is going to happen.
If I can remind you that Judaswas at the table and it did not
go well for him.
There's nothing about cominghere and receiving this that's
going to make you any morespiritual, but it is an open
(44:04):
table and so you don't have tobe a member of midtree as long
as you are a member of thehousehold of God.
If you are a Christian, if youhave your faith and trust in
Christ, come and eat and partake.
It is a wonderful thing when weare able to gather together
from the same loaf and to feedourselves both physically and
(44:25):
spiritually.
Believers, we come in here witha wide range of spiritual states
.
Some of us are walking with theLord and feel great, and we
love doing all this kind ofstuff.
Praise God for that.
Praise God for those people.
Some of us, even though we'rein Christ, have an accuser
(44:50):
whispering in our ears.
Some of us may hear things likeeven though you're in Christ,
you are not worthy, and to thatI would say you're right, I'm
not worthy.
But he is, and he is the onewho invites me, calls me,
commands me to come and eat.
(45:11):
The accuser may say you are toosinful.
To that I'd say that's, in asense, true sinful.
To that I would say that's in asense true, but he remembers my
sins.
No more Part of the newcovenant.
The accuser may say God isangry with you and that you
shouldn't be here.
You are not ready for this mealyet.
You've got work to do beforeyou can come and take To that I
(45:33):
would say he has already donethe work for me, and me.
Eating is participating in thatwork and receiving it in faith,
and so we find comfort at atable, at a meal that doesn't
just change our circumstances,like the Passover did, but this
meal changes our hearts, thatJesus has established through
(45:54):
his work In all thingscircumstances, both great and
small, from Judas' betrayal to aman carrying a jar, to the
breaking of his body and thespilling of his blood the lamb
is in control and he invites usto eat with him.
(46:16):
And so I'm gonna throwRevelation 7 on the screen.
I'm not gonna read it If youguys would just take a minute or
two.
Stokes is gonna lead you, butjust read this.
This is a picture of what's tocome.
That we have the lamb now onthe throne.
I'll let you read it yourself,but if you pray, thank Jesus,
talk to him, spend time with him.
(46:38):
If you want to pray with peopleon the side, we'll be over on
the side, but Stokes will callyou up and he will take it from
there.
But we worship a lamb who hasbeen slain and he loves us and
he's done the work for us, solet's pray to him and worship
him together this morning.
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