Wednesday after Laetare + Matthew 26:36-75 + March 14, 2018

In the Name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

As the calendar moves us closer to Easter we begin to contemplate the sufferings of Christ. Those sufferings begin on the night in which He was betrayed. After Jesus celebrates the Passover with His disciples, the go the Mount of Olives, to a garden called Gethsemane. He leaves behind the disciples except for Peter, James, and John, the same men He took with Him to witness His transfiguration. On Mount Tabor they saw Jesus’ glory and hear God the Father’s witness, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him” (Matthew 17:5). Instead of seeing a glorious Christ they see a sorrowful Christ. They see “a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3). Christ suffers this intense agony of soul because, as true God, He knows what lies ahead of Him and yet, as true man, He wishes to avoid suffering and death as any man would. So He prays, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” On the mount of Transfiguration, the Father’s voice had spoken that He was pleased with His Son. Now there is silence. The cup must be drank. The path must be walked. The cross must be borne. And He must do it alone. He goes to His disciples, three times, and finds them sleeping. They can offer Him no comfort, no support, and no consolation, for vain is the help of men. Such were His sufferings in the Garden.

Then the betrayer approaches. Judas, one of the Twelve, whose heart Satan had turned against Him through greed. Jesus is arrested. One of His disciples, John tells us it was Peter, cuts off poor Malchus’ ear in blundering attempt to defend Jesus. Not only is Jesus betrayed by one of His own disciples, but in that moment Peter shows how little He understood Christ’s purpose, how little he had listened to Christ’s word about the necessity of being handed over, treated shamefully, and killed so that He might rise on the third day. Judas has rejected Jesus for the sake of money. Peter has been learning from Christ with fat, calloused ears. “Do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father and He will provide me with more than twelve legions of angels?” It must happen this way. The Scriptures have foretold it. David wrote in Psalm 41:9, “Even my own familiar friend in whom I trusted, Who ate my bread, Has lifted up his heel against me.” So the disciples forsook Him and fled. They weren’t in any danger. The Scribes and Chief priests were after Christ alone. But just as drowsiness overcame them earlier, so that they neglected their prayers, so now fear overcomes them so that the run from the perceived threat. Jesus had prayed alone and none of His disciples could comfort Him. Now Jesus is alone, His disciples having fled. Even in this, the Scripture is fulfilled, for it is written in Zechariah 13:7, “Strike the Shepherd, And the sheep will be scattered.”

Then the Caiaphas approaches Jesus. The trial is shrouded in the darkness of night, lest the light of truth show these men for what they are. False testimony is sought against the defendant. The sentence has already been decided. Evidence must be discovered that fits the predetermined sentence. False witnesses are finally conjured up. There is no remedy against a slanderer, so Jesus is silent. Once again, prophecy must be fulfilled. It is written in Isaiah 53:7, “He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth.” Only when the High Priest puts Jesus under oath does He speak and confess that He is the Christ, the Son of God, whom they will not see again until the Judgment Day when He comes in glory. The sentence is passed, officially. They spit on Him. They strike Him. And the Word of God in human flesh permits even this, for it is written in Isaiah 50:6, “I gave My back to those who struck Me, And My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard; I did not hide My face from shame and spitting.”

Then Peter approaches from a distance. He had followed at a safe distance from Gethsemane. He ends up in the courtyard of the High Priest’s house. It is fitting that while Jesus is being interrogated so should His disciple, though not by the authorities. “You were with Jesus of Galilee.” Peter denies it. “This fellow also was with Jesus of Nazareth.” Peter denies it, this time with a willful oath! “Surely you also are one of them, for your speech betrays you,” that is, your Galilean accent gives you away. The oath didn’t suffice. He resorts of cursing and swearing to cover himself, as we are wont to do when we need to prove a lie. “I do not know the man.” Jesus is hounded by false witnesses inside. Here Peter has an opportunity to be a true witness and fails. The spirit is willing. The flesh is pathetically weak. Peter, as he had so often, misjudged his own strength and willpower and in that mistrust, falls to temptation and denies Christ three times. He knows full well what He has done. He remembers the word of Jesus. “So he went out and wept bitterly,” lamenting his lack of strength and sorrowing over his sin in genuine repentance. In this Christ is left utterly alone, given into the hands of sinful men to drink the cup of wrath unto death.

But it is not wise to simply recount Christ’s sufferings. If we do this, even with penitent heart for our own sins, for which Christ died, we run the risk to remaining in sorrow. The sufferings have a purpose, the chief of which is to atone for our sins, and not only ours, but the sins of the whole world. He is drinking the cup His Father in heaven has given Him to drink so that you and I do not have drink it and experience the wrath of God we deserve for our sins. He suffers the agony of soul so that you do not have suffer the pangs of everlasting death in your soul for eternity. He bears the betrayal of Judas to redeem us poor sinners who betray God’s graciousness so often by sinning. He endures the crushing blow of the eleven disciples forsaking Him at His arrest so that all who believe in Him may not be forsaken by God on account of their many sins. He allows false accusations to fill His ears so that the true accusations against us, from the devil and our consciences, might be silenced when we believe the words of absolution which remove our sin and its guilt. He accepts the dishonor of being spat upon so that we, who have dishonored God with our sinful neglect, might receive the honor of being calls sons of God through faith. He holds His tongue when called a blasphemer, so that we, who have actually blasphemed God with our words, might have the Lord open our lips so that we now show forth His praise. He allows Peter to fall into sin to show the fisherman, and all men, that His saving mercies know no bounds, that even willful sins will be forgiven to all who weep bitterly over them and flee to Christ for refuge from those sins and the wrath of God against sinners.

It is all done for you. It is all suffered for you. It is all endured willingly for you. Look upon Christ in faith and see in His innocent, bitter sufferings and death, not only the depth of God’s wrath against your sins, but also, more so, the grace and mercy that God has upon sinners. Christ’s sufferings are payment lovingly rendered, and satisfaction for sins willingly offered, so that all who believe in Him shall not perish in their sins but receive the forgiveness of every sin, everlasting life, and adoption as sons of God. Go in peace. All this is for you.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.