7th Day Of Lent
Dear friends in Christ. In our Lenten reading, we have the words of our text. They serve, if you will, as the prelude to the passion. We see the groundwork being laid for Jesus’ death. First, we hear Christ again announcing / predicting His Passion, His crucifixion; and then we see the human elements at work: the religious leaders of the Jews scheming to seize Jesus by deceit in order to kill Him; and then we also see Judas making arrangements to betray Jesus.
But before we examine these parts of our text, let us also ponder for a moment something “hidden” in the background but which is a vital part of Christian doctrine: the Person of Christ, namely, that He is, in one Person, both true 100% God and true 100% man. It is this that makes these events possible.
The very fact that Jesus time and time again predicted/ announced beforehand the very events of His death—for example when earlier Matthew reported [Mat. 16.21]: Jesus began to show to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day,--this shows His omniscience, that He knows all things. This omniscience is a divine characteristic/ trait showing that Jesus is true God.
Yet, the very fact that Jesus could indeed die, shows that He is true man. Jesus, the God-man, could, according to His human nature die. That means that the One who died on the cross that first Good Friday was not just any man, but the God-man. And because it was God, the Son, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity that died, His death has infinite worth and value for all us sinners.
1. Our text begins: Now it came to pass, when Jesus had brought to completion all these sayings, that He said to His disciples, “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified.” When He had brought to completion all these sayings, Jesus’ public exercise of His office as prophet during His earthly ministry, as One proclaiming the word of the Lord, came to an end. Yes, He would still speak to His disciples from the heart, comfort them and tell them about great things He would work, like the sending of the Holy Spirit, but no more would He speak to the crowds preaching God’s Word, proclaiming Himself Savior, calling them to repentance and faith in Him.
Now was the time for the culmination of His earthly ministry. All of His preaching was for a goal, a purpose—to point the people to faith in Him as Savior. Now He was about to carry out His saving work of suffering and dying for the sins of the world to reconcile sinful humanity with the holy God. “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified.” Jesus’ final prediction of His suffering and death is different from the rest. Before, He had just stated the fact of it and the events surrounding it; now He states the exact time: in two days, on the Passover, He will be crucified. The time, the right time, the time unchangeably set in the eternal counsel of God had come. Jesus had come to suffer then and there, as He had said before [John 12:27]: Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour?’ But for this purpose I came to this hour. God had made plans for Christ’s death.
Notice as well what Jesus says of Himself here: the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified. That’s present tense; it’s as if the “handing over” already began as Jesus speaks. Here is the prelude to our Lord’s Passion. Jesus, two days out, foretells His Passion, His suffering and death. But because this is the carrying out of God’s eternal decree, because this is the reason why He came to earth, Jesus approaches it with joy! As the all-knowing God, He not only knows the exact day and hour but He knows that it will be the most horrible and wretched death as the world’s sinner, enduring the wrath of God over every single sin ever committed but He looks to what will happen in the end—His resurrection and our salvation. The apostle writes by the Holy Spirit [Heb. 12:2]: Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith…for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and…sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
The very fact that the holy Triune God in counsel fixed the date and that Jesus, the Son, the Second Person of the holy Trinity here predicts the exact date of His Passion shows His hearty willingness to suffer and die for us. Elsewhere Jesus had said [John 10:18], No one takes [My life] from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. What a glorious comfort we have—Jesus willingly came and gave up His life for us. Because it was that willing sacrifice of the very God Himself, the Son, we know it has infinite worth and value for all sins. We need never doubt that it is the sufficient, once for all sacrifice for your sin, my sin and the sin of all. In joy and willingness, for us and for our salvation, Jesus accepted the divine plans made for His death.
Of course, nothing in our Lord’s life is by accident or fluke; so also here His Passion on the Passover. “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified.” Notice, it’s not just the Passover, but this is THE Passover. Jesus’ death on the Passover was not accidental. Instead, the Passover itself was a preaching and foreshadow of Jesus’ death for 1500 years. What a more glorious preaching / picture of Christ’s death is there than the Passover? Just like that Passover lamb was to be perfect and without blemish, so Jesus is holy, innocent, unspotted separate from sinners; just as it was to be killed and its blood smeared on the doorpost, so too does the blood of Christ protect us from God’s wrath, from death and damnation; just as that Passover lamb was to be roasted in the fire whole, without a bone of it being broken, so too was Jesus crucified but not one of His bones was broken; just as the Passover lamb was to be entirely consumed, so must we by faith eat and make Christ our very own, receiving Him and trusting in Him as our Savior. “You know that after two days is THE Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified.” Here in two days Jesus would be the true Passover Lamb, the fulfillment of that OT preaching. The divine plan for Christ’s death was laid and He willingly agreed!
2. Jesus’ Passion, His suffering and death to save the world from sin, death, devil and hell began with His betrayal in the Garden—Thursday evening, the Passover—but the groundwork was already being laid: Then the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders of the people were assembled at the courtyard of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and plotted in order that by deceit they might seize and kill Jesus. But they kept saying, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar among the people”. Not only was the divine plan for Jesus’ death laid: “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified”, but also the human plans were also being laid for His death. Notice the way the Holy Spirit pictures this: it seems that at the same time Jesus tells the exact moment of His Passion, the religious leaders of the Jews are gathered around conniving a way to get Jesus via deceit / trickery. But notice, the very thing they insisted on avoiding—Not during the feast, [Passover and the 7 days of the Festival of Unleavened Bread] lest there be an uproar among the people—is the very way that Jesus says it will happen: after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man is being handed over to be crucified. A huge contrast between the divine and human plans for Jesus’ death!—But which one won out? In the plans being laid for Christ’s death, by God and by man, we see fulfilled the words the Father to the Son [Ps. 110:2]: Rule in the midst of Your enemies. It was Christ’s decision alone, not His enemies. Christ Jesus was in charge of the situation; He did not submit to circumstances beyond His control.
The religious leaders of the Jews are those who should have known better. They had the OT, they had all the ceremonies that pointed forward to Christ, they had the promises; they should have been the devoted followers. They even heard Jesus preach and saw His miracles confirming His teaching. The straw that broke the camel’s back was Jesus’ miracle par excellence—the raising of Lazarus from the dead after 4 days, a foreshadowing of Jesus’ own resurrection. John records [John 11:53]: Then from that day on they plotted to put Him to death.
The religious leaders of the Jews thought they had everything under control. They weren’t sure of the whim of the people, having just witnessed Palm Sunday so they gathered together in a spot different from normal, in the high priest’s palace, in order to meet privately and make their plans. This was by no means a public meeting. Had it been a public meeting, they figured, word could have gotten out and Jesus could slip through their fingers; so they met secretly. Since this wasn’t a public meeting, they obviously didn’t have a crime to charge Him with so they thought they could seize Jesus by trickery and kill Him.
Then things got even better for them: Then one of the 12, called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What are you willing to give me and I will deliver Him to you?” And they counted out to him 30 pieces of silver. So from that time he sought opportunity to betray Him. It is well to note that the chief priests didn’t solicit or entice Judas; he came to them. If the religious leaders should have known better, Judas should have known even better than them. After all he had been close to Jesus in that 3 year teacher / pupil relationship; as a future apostle he had the promise of great reward and be a teacher of the world with that life-saving Gospel. But somehow, someway, Judas had fallen from faith and had become a thief on account of his greed; he must have hardened himself from Christ’s warnings and was under the power of and a tool of Satan. His greed led Judas to think that more money was the only source of joy and satisfaction in life. And you can picture the greed of Judas and the delight on his face as the Jews counts out to him 30 pieces of silver—about 120 days wages.
We do ourselves a Lenten injustice here if we just pat ourselves on the back for not being like Judas or the Jews’ religious leaders as they laid their plans for Christ’s death. Although Jesus’ suffering and death were the eternal decree of God and prophesied in the OT, Judas was not “forced” to betray Jesus; the religious leaders were not “forced” to plan His death. God was not the cause of their sin. The point here for us to remember this Lenten season is that every sin we commit is, in a sense, voluntary; our corrupt sinful will plays a role. With Judas and the religious leaders, they actually planned the sin. We also commit sins having willfully planned them out and carry them out with heart and soul, although we may hide behind all kinds of excuses. Other times we sin in rashness or ignorance but our sinful will is still there—just in the background. Let us this Lent recognize our sinful human will; that we truly are sinful and corrupt as we come into this world. Let Judas and the religious leaders here be our warning.
Let us also use them as our example and let us not continually let our sinful desire have way in our heart and life, and so deaden our conscience. Instead, let us earnestly hear God’s voice in His holy Law; let it accuse us of sin and bring us to mourn our sin so that the Lord may come with His holy Gospel and point us to Jesus and His forgiveness. The divine plans for Jesus’ death were laid and prevailed so that we may have forgiveness of sin and eternal life.
In the Name of Jesus, Amen.