May God be with us this evening
as for a while we turn together to consider His Word and we'll
turn back to the chapter that we read, John chapter 13, Gospel
according to John chapter 13 and we'll read verses 1, 2 and
3. Now before the feast of the Passover,
when Jesus knew that His hour was come, that He should depart
out of this world unto the Father, Having loved his own which were
in the world, he loved them unto the end. And supper being ended,
the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot Simon's
son to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all
things into his hands, that he was come from God and went to
God. Well, on those dramatic events
of the Passover night, when God caused all of the firstborn of
the Egyptians to be killed, and when Israel was preserved under
the blood of the Passover lamb, God commanded Israel to remember
the Passover every year, that they should partake of the lamb
that they should have the bitter herbs and so forth to remember
all that had happened that night. And that they would set it before
their children and future generations as a reminder that once they
were slaves in Egypt, for one night God by his almighty power
and goodness saved them. And so over the years, the Passover
was celebrated. Sometimes it lapsed, but was
then restored. And for many, many years, Israel,
throughout their generations, looked back at the events of
Egypt and remembered the freedom and liberty they had through
the blood of the Passover lamb. All of them looked back. Some
of them looked forward. Some of them saw, by faith, that
the Passover was a picture of something bigger, something greater,
something more glorious than just the lamb in Egypt. They saw that it pointed forwards
to a greater sacrifice, a greater death, more precious blood. Of
course, the death and suffering of the Messiah who was still
to come. And so for many years, People
looked back and people looked forwards. Until we come centuries
later to the days of the Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus himself
grew up celebrating the Passover. With his mother and with Joseph
and with his brothers and sisters, they would have annually gathered
as a family to celebrate the Passover. and they would have
remembered. The father, Joseph, would have
read the Passover account from Exodus and they would have gone
through the different stages of the Passover meal and remembered
the different things that happened that night and the teaching that
was set before them. And so Jesus grew up celebrating
the Passover, looking back and looking forwards. And then, in
his humanity, As a real man, Jesus would have grown in his
understanding and realization that that Passover feast that
he celebrated with his family was pointing to him. That as
he came to realize the fullness of what it was that he was the
Son of God, the anointed Messiah, he realized that that Passover
feast and all that it spoke of was pointing to himself. that
he is the Lamb. And surely when John speaks,
behold the Lamb of God, these words of course have a deep resonance
in the person of Christ himself. Yes, he is the Passover Lamb. And we believe, you can think
of the Lord Jesus Christ. As he grows up reading the scriptures,
opening the Old Testament, turning to Psalm 22, turning to Isaiah
53 and other passages of scripture and coming to this realization,
this is speaking of me. This prophet is speaking of my
death, of my suffering. And so Jesus, I believe, had
grown in this knowledge and realization that all of this prophecy and
all of these promises of God were to be fulfilled in himself. Until finally we come to this
night as we read. And on this night Jesus gathers
with his 12 disciples to celebrate the Passover as they had all
done many times before. But this is the final night.
This is the last time he will celebrate the Passover. This
is the night that it's all been working towards. This is the
night the devil or he has been waiting for. There have been other occasions,
other occasions when people thought that he would be raised up to
be a king. Or people thought now was his hour. But on those
times it was not his hour. It was not time. But now it is. Now the time has come. And so I wonder if we could just
try and imagine the situation this evening, how we would feel
just from a human perspective. If we knew that the hour of our
suffering and death had come. If we knew of all what was to
be before us, and when you think of all that was before Christ,
There was to be betrayal. There was to be arrest. There
was to be mockings and beatings and scourgings. And there was
to be the cross. And if we knew that that was
before us, if we knew, how would we feel? Surely we would be terrified. Surely we would be doing all
that we could possibly do to avoid it. And yet Jesus Christ
has none of those thoughts. And so this is the context, this
is where we are as we open John 13. And I want to just pick out
a few vital and yet wonderful things that we can find in these
verses in that context. And the first thing we can see,
considering that this is the night of his betrayal and arrest,
considering that he knows all that is before him, we can see
Jesus has a heart. that is full of love. He is a
heart that is full of love. Jesus, having loved his own which
are in the world, he loved them unto the end. This love in the Greek translated
as agape love, there's different types of Greek word translated
love in the New Testament. This is agape, which is the highest
form of love. It is the deep, affectionate
type of love. It is much more than a brotherly
love. It is a deep, unconditional, emotional love. The highest form. And this is the love that Jesus
has for his own. Having loved his own. Now we may think that's unsurprising
in one sense. We know what it's like to love
our own. We love our families, we love
our spouses, we love our children, we love our own. And so we might
think well there's nothing very unsurprising that Jesus loved
his own people. But the wonderful thing is that
we are told who or where these people are from. Having loved
his own which were in the world. They were in the world. He loved those who were in and
of the world. He loved those who were fallen
in the world. He loved those who were cursed
by the curse that had come into the world. He loved them who
were of the world by their very heart and nature. Their very
inward being is of the world because they are fallen in Adam. Because Adam sinned as our representative
head over humanity, so every successive generation in Adam
has sinned, they have a sinful nature, it is because of the
sinful nature that they do sinful deeds. And all of these which
are accounted to be his own are from the world. They are fallen,
they are lost, they are dead in trespasses and in sins. And
so we see here something of the immensity of the love of God
that he could love those who are of the world, that he could
love those who are fallen, those who are in rebellion against
him, those who are unholy, the exact opposite of himself, and
yet he sets his love on them. We have the picture in the prophecy
of Ezekiel of this child having been cast out, having been newly
born, still covered in its blood and mess and dirt of the road
and of the side where it had been thrown. And we read, there
it was, helpless and hopeless and he says, I passed by and
I said, live. Not for any good or worth or
ability in the child but because he said, live. He loved his own which were in
the world. And so we see a tremendous, wonderful,
amazing, sovereign love of God. But you see this love goes even
further. He loved them which are in the world and he loved
them unto the end. He loved them to the end. Our love to one another is tested
at times. Sometimes we go through difficult
patches in our relationships and our love is tested. Sadly,
at times, that love, that friendship may fail. Sometimes our faithfulness is
tested. And the love of Christ, if you
like, is tested. Because his people continue to
sin. The disciples were certainly not made perfect. When they followed
Jesus, they made many mistakes and errors and sins. Every Christian
is exactly the same. They continue to sin in their
life and yet we're told He loved them to the end or to the uttermost. He loved them to the uttermost. What is the ultimate end that
this love is going to take Christ to? Now this love isn't just
words. It's not just emotion and feeling. Because the love is seen in action. And what he does, it's displayed.
So what is the end that Christ goes to? Well, it's the cross,
isn't it? His love continues even to the
cross, even to the agony and horror and suffering of the cross. What is it that kept him on the
cross? What is it that drives him to
the cross? What is it that keeps him in
that path of humble obedience to the cross? What is it other
than the nails physically which holds him to the cross It's love
to his people. It's because he loves them to
the very end, to the uttermost. And that love goes far and superabounds
above even the mountain of their sin. Despite their sin and their
guilt and how heinous that is in the sight of God, he loves
them to the cross. But this love going to the end,
can surely be looked in the sense of duration in time as well.
He loves them on and on and on to the end. It continues. It's an everlasting love. There
is no end. It never lets go. It never slackens. It never weakens. It goes on
throughout our days and it continues into the very gates of glory. So if we are in the Lord Jesus
Christ, if we're a believer in Him this evening, the mark of
having been loved by Christ is that we believe in Him. We've
been given faith to believe in Christ. And if we believe in
Him, in our Saviour, then we are loved by Him. And if we are
loved by Him, that will not cease. We will feel to be failures. And we will feel to have failed
and sinned against him. And we will feel that our love
to him is cold and faint and waxing and waning. But his love
never changes. His love never comes to an end. He loved them unto the end. And if you think of who these
people were, if you think of the immediate people in the room,
here is these disciples. One of them is going to betray
him or he's a separate case. But the rest will forsake him.
The rest will prove to be weak in this time of need. One will
even deny him. But he loved them to the end.
His love for them didn't change and it's seen even the greatness
of his life. You see, we really stopped our
text this evening in the middle of a sentence because we came
that he came from God and went to God. He rises from supper,
laid aside his garment, took a towel and guided himself. He
displays his love as he stoops and washes their feet. You are cleansed, he says. If I wash you not, you have no
part in me. He washes their feet because
he loved them. And so, firstly, we see that
Jesus has a heart full of love. Secondly, we notice that Jesus,
having come to this point, is fully aware of all that is before
him. He is fully aware of what is
before him. Now, before the Feast of the
Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should
depart out of this world and to the Father. He knew that his
hour was come. So as he takes the elements of
the Passover Feast, he does so knowing that the hour of the
Lamb of God has come. And as he then, in the upper
room with his disciples, institutes the Lord's Supper and says, this
is my body which is broken for you, this is my blood which is
shed for you, he does so with that full realisation that the
breaking of the body and the shedding of the blood is what
he is going to pass through in the coming hours. He is fully
aware and set before him is the cross, set before him is his
suffering, there on the table on the Passover night. And so
in the upper room he is anticipating his sufferings. Now doesn't that in a sense add
to suffering? To be fully aware that this hour
has come, this adds weight to the suffering surely. This weight
to the anxiety and the fear and we see the crushing weight laid
on him in Gethsemane as he says, let this cup pass from me. He knew that his hour had come. But there is absolutely no hint
of turning. No hint of it. Jesus knew that
his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto
the Father And then we have all the events of John 13 and the
words of 14, 15, 16 and so forth and there's no hint whatsoever
of him turning from his calling. And so he steadfastly takes the
next step to Jerusalem and steadfastly takes the next step to suffer. He knew. But just notice how
it's worded. He knew that his hour was come,
that he should depart out of this world unto the Father. In one sense, in the upper room,
Christ is looking to the cross. It's all set before him, as I
say, in the Passover, the Lord's Supper, and everything that takes
place. But in another sense, he's looking beyond the cross.
He's looking to the victory. He's looking to the certainty
that he will conquer. because he has this assurance
that he will depart out of the world unto the Father, that beyond
the cross is the resurrection, and beyond the resurrection is
the ascension. And there is this sense of certainty
here that the Lord Jesus Christ knows that he is going to suffer,
but he also knows assuredly that he is going to conquer. He will
ascend unto the Father. We have this suggested to us,
don't we, in the later chapters in John 17, where he speaks and
prays to his father as if he has already completed the work
that in time he has not yet actually commenced. He says in prayer,
I have glorified thee in the earth, I have finished the work
that thou gavest me to do. Well, he hadn't. finish the work
yet. But you see it was as if it was
as good as finished. It was certain to be done. It
was certain to be finished. And so he has in one sense the
horror and the suffering set before him, but in another sense
he has the joy set before him of ascending onto his father
as that glorious king, that glorious conqueror with the certainty
that his people are saved. He departs from the world to
the Father. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we
could see death in those terms? If we could look at the horror
of death that we naturally humanly shrink from and see it as going
to the Father. To have that assurance that those
in Christ are safe and eternally secure, and that they must rise
to be with him. That as Christ rose from the
dead, so his people rise to be with him as well. Wouldn't it
be wonderful if we come to that day, our last day, This is how
we view the passage of death, to go to be with the Father. And so secondly, we see Jesus
is fully aware of what is going to happen. Thirdly, Jesus now
knows, as he is in the upper room with his disciples, he knows
who he is and why he has come. He knows who he is and why he
has come. Verse 3, Jesus, knowing that
the Father had given all things into his hands, that he was come
from God and went to God. There is a great mystery in the
person of Christ because there is two natures in Christ. He
is God and he is man. He has these two natures which
at different times are shining forth more clearly and so Christ
as God of course knew everything because God knows everything
which is why we read at times that he knew the thoughts of
their hearts and so forth this is why he knows what is set before
him he knows because he is God but there is another sense that
he is of course very man which is why we read things such as
he learned obedience or he grew in grace and in stature. He grows
in knowledge and understanding as a man. Now these things are
a mystery but very true. But as man, Jesus at this point
now has become fully aware that he has come from God, that he
has been sent by God And he has this commission, this calling
to suffer and to die for the people of God. And he knows that
God has put all these things into his hands and that the very
state and security of the church is in the hands of Christ. But
he also knows he's going to God, going to the Father. And so Christ
now sees himself as the fulfillment of prophecy. He now sees himself
as truly divine, the anointed Messiah. He now sees himself
as the one who has a work to do, who must suffer, who must
die, who must bear the iniquities of sinners. And he knows himself
to be the one who must ascend into heaven and return to the
bliss that once he knew. He knows who he is and why he
has come. And so can you see in these thoughts
that over all of these events, and all the events which are
going to happen in the coming hours, which seem to be chaotic,
which seem to be out of control, the betrayal by Judas, the arrest
in Gethsemane, the trials of Caiaphas and of Herod and of
Pilate, and at times when we read the narrative, we scream
out of the injustice that we're reading, that this is so wrong. And we long, in one sense, for
Jesus to show just who he is and to put these people down.
But in fact, over all of this, as we see here, is an absolute
sovereign control of God. He knew his hours come. He knew
that he was from the Father. He knew that he'd put all things
into his hands. He knew everything. He was in
control of it all. To the point when even Judas
goes out to betray him. It's as if he has to have Jesus'
permission to do so. When he says, that thou do, do
it quickly. He was in absolute control of
it all. And why then? Why? If he is in
control, why do we have this path of suffering and of death?
Because having loved his own, he loved them to the end. And so we can have this assurance,
if we're a believer here this evening, that this salvation
is not on shaky ground, but this is a solid foundation. It is
the work of a sovereign God. It is the almighty work of the
Son of God himself. And so when we have our ups and
downs, have our doubts and fears of our own hope of eternal life,
if we are resting in Christ and God's work of salvation, then
we cannot be moved. His work is secure. Jesus knows who he is and why
he's come. Just one other point. While all this is going on, sovereign,
overruling hand of God, there is also the devil at work. Verse 2, supper being ended,
the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot Simon's
son to betray him. The devil's at work even in the
upper room, even at the Passover feast, even in these final hours,
the devil is there. We read later on that the devil
enters into the heart of Judas again when he goes out to betray
him. And the devil has always been
working, always been working to bring the defeat of God's
Christ. You can trace it through the
history of the Old Testament. But God has always been reigning
over it all. You look at it, just to pick
a couple of examples, Joseph. If you think about it, Joseph
was taken down into Egypt but his brothers were left behind
in famine and his family was left behind in famine. If Joseph
had not been in Egypt, it is highly likely that family would
have died. Not only would they have died
of the famine but if they had gone down to Egypt there would have
been no food there either. And if they had died, if Jacob
and his sons and family had died in famine, that was the end of
the line of Christ. But God overruled. He sent Joseph
to preserve the line. Many years later, we come to
the decree under the influence of Haman. Haman makes a decree,
or the king does at Haman's behest, to destroy all of the Jews throughout
the provinces of the kingdom of Babylon. If that decree had
gone through, then the line of Christ would have been destroyed
because every Jew at the time was living in some province under
the rule of the Babylonians. The end of the line of Christ.
But God put Esther on the throne to preserve the line. King Herod,
when he hears from the wise men that their newborn king has been
born in Jerusalem, makes a decree that every child under the age
of two should be destroyed. The end of the line, or the end
of Christ himself. But God warned Joseph in a dream
and he fled to Egypt. When Jesus is fully grown, after
his baptism, the devil takes him into the wilderness to tempt
him, because if he can make him fall into sin, then that is the
end of Christ. But he stands firm and yields
not to temptations. And throughout his life, you
have Peter telling him that he should not go in to suffer. We
have all these suggestions at times, but he stands against
it. He says, get thee behind me,
Satan. Thou savourest not the things that be of God. You see,
Satan has been working throughout since the fall of man, since
the promise of a saviour, to bring that to nothing. But God
has overruled it every time. And now here we have him at work,
even in the upper room. He enters into the heart of one
of the twelve. But the Father is in control. He has entered into the heart
of Judas to betray him. Jesus, knowing that the Father
had given him all things into his hands, he has come from God
and went to God. You see, the Lord is over it all. A tremendous,
amazing, wise God. So tonight, do we ever doubt
the scope and the depth of the love of Christ? Do we ever wonder
Could it possibly reach even to the life and heart of a sinner
like me? Do we ever wonder if we could
lose the love of Christ? If we could sin it away? Do we
ever wonder if the salvation that we once knew is no longer
good enough or great enough or overabounding enough of our sin
today? Do we ever wonder if we are just
too bad for God? These words must tell us a resounding
no. Having loved his own, he loved
them to the end. And this is a love that you and
I as sinners need so desperately because we can't save ourself
and we can't earn our way to God. But God commendeth his love
toward us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for
us. May we all know this Christ.