Let us turn to that portion of
Holy Scripture that we read in Luke. In Luke chapter 22 and verse 53. Luke 22, 53. As the Lord addresses those who
would come into the garden of Gethsemane to arrest Him, And
he says, When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched
forth no hands against me, but this is your hour and the power
of darkness. When I was daily with you in
the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me, but this
is your hour and the power of darkness. Luke 22 and verse 53. and so to say something with
regards to this power of darkness and in contrast the light of
the Lord Jesus Christ the light shineth in the darkness we're
told and the darkness comprehended it not that word comprehend literally
to overtake it or to seize hold of it light must prevail over
the darkness is what John is declaring there at the beginning
of his gospel the light shineth in the darkness and the darkness
comprehended it not. To say something then first of
all with regards to the power of darkness and we did say something
with regards to this on Thursday evening we were considering those
words in Colossians chapter 1 verses 12 and 13 thanks being given
on to the father and really those thanks of course center in that
remarkable gift that he did not withhold his son even his only
begotten son There in Colossians 1 then verse 13, we read of God
who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and has translated
us into the kingdom of his dear Son, translated us into the kingdom
of the Son of his love, his only begotten Son, his well-beloved
Son. The deliverance is spoken of
there from the power of darkness. And I did make some reference
to the words that we have here at the end of this 53rd verse.
This is your hour and the power of darkness. And speaking of
that power of darkness, amongst other things, I remarked that
the reference is to Satan's kingdom. It is literally the authority
of darkness. And it is the realm of Satan,
it is that place where he reigns. And as it is Satan's kingdom,
the power, the authority of darkness, so it is also the domain of sin. This expression then, the power
of darkness, suggests the evil of sin, the ungodly, the unbelieving,
how they are such as love the darkness, they delight in the
darkness. Or remember the words again of
John 3.19, this is the condemnation that light is coming to the world,
and men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds
were evil. That's why they want the light,
or rather, why they reject the light and want the darkness,
because their deeds were evil. The unfruitful works of darkness
is how Paul describes them and on Thursday we made some reference
to the language that we have there in Proverbs chapter 7 concerning
the harlots and how she plies her evil trade under the cover
of the night. Remember what the wise man says,
Proverbs 7 Verse 6, he says, for at the window of my house
I looked through my casement and beheld among the simple ones
I discerned among the youths a young man void of understanding
passing through the street near her corner and he went away to
her house in the twilight in the evening, in the black and
dark night, and behold, there met him a woman with the attire
of an harlot, and subtle of heart, and so forth. All those who are
workers of iniquity, they do their dastardly deeds in the
night season. And so here The Lord speaks of
those things that are coming to pass now as he comes to the
end of his ministry and he makes that great sin atoning sacrifice. And he says to these who come
into the garden for him, this is your hour and the power of
darkness. And here is the Lord being betrayed.
And what do we see? What do we observe in all that's
associated with the end of him who was such a holy man, such
a sinless man? Well, we see here something of
the deceitful ways of sin in the way in which the Lord is
being betrayed. Satan works in darkness because
he wants to cover all of his evil deeds. He is a deceitful spirit, the
devil, the one that believers are having to contend with. Wrestling
not against flesh and blood, says Paul, but against principalities,
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world. Oh, woe unto them that seek deep
to hide their counsel from the Lords, and their works, it says,
are in the dark. And they say, Who seeth? Who understandeth? This is the
way of the devil, you see. He does his work always in the
dark. And who is so active here? Is
it not Judas Iscariot? And he is the very instrument
of the devil. how the Lord had exposed him
there at the institution of the Holy Supper, previous to going
with his disciples over the brook Cedron into the Garden of Gethsemane. How we have the detail there
in the 13th chapter of John, where the Lord takes bread, makes
a sop and hands it to the one who will betray Him. and we are
told how he gives it to Judas and having received the sop it
says he went out immediately and it was night. Now the devil
is in this man and now what he is doing you see is under the
cover of darkness. What is he going to do? He is
going to betray the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is what we see when
the Lord refers in this text to that season where the power
of darkness is so prevalent, or the deceitful ways of sin. Remember in John 17 the Lord
speaks of this man as that one who is doing the very works of
Satan. He prays concerning His disciples,
He has watched over them, He has kept them, and none is lost
save the Son of Perdition. And He is the Son of Perdition
in that He is the very instrument of Satan himself. And how does
He come to betray the Lord? He betrays Him with a kiss. He betrays Him with a kiss. He
comes, he wants to appear as one who is a friend of Christ,
one who has an affection for Christ. What do we read here at verse
47? While he had spake, he speaking
to his disciples, behold, a multitude and he that was called Judas,
one of the twelve, went before them and drew near unto Jesus
to kiss him. This is the sign that he had
given. the one that he kissed there in the darkness of the
garden, that was the one that they were to take hold of. Also deceitful is pretence. He pretends to have affection
for the Lord, but he's the Lord's betrayer. Again, the words of
the wise man in Proverbs, he says, the kisses of an enemy
are deceitful. And this is deceit. This is the
deceit of sin. And remember how David speaks
of it in the Psalm, in Psalm 55. He speaks of that it seems probably Absalom.
It's difficult to know just who it is that he is speaking of.
But the language is most telling, because although it's David's
own experience, Yet David is speaking prophetically, and the
one that we really need to observe here in the psalm is the Lord
Jesus Christ. Verse 12 of Psalm 55, he says,
It was not an enemy that reproached me, then I could have borne it,
neither was it he that hated me that did magnify himself against
me, then I would have hid myself from him. But it was thou among
mine equal, my guide, and mine acquaintance. We took sweet counsel
together and walked unto the house of God in company." And
what does he say later in the psalm, verse 21? The words of
his mouth were smoother than butter, but war was in his heart. His words were softer than oil,
yet were they drawn swords. And isn't it all fulfilled really
in the very activity of the betrayer in Judas, this is the this is
the power of darkness, this is the devil and you know the devil
is such a subtle foe, he will sometimes appear as an angel
of light he will appear as one who loves the Lord Jesus Christ
and we are not to be ignorant of his devices so clever and
so cunning a foe all the deceitfulness then of the powers of darkness
And also here we see something of the great danger, the danger
of sin. Look at what the Lord says in
the text, When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched
forth no hands against me, but this is your hour and the power
of darkness. There were previous occasions
When the Jews really desired to kill the Lord Jesus Christ,
we read of them in John's Gospel, for example, in John 7 at verse
30 again, in John 8 verse 20, they would take up stones to
kill him, but his hour was not yet come, it says. His hour was
not yet come, but now, all that hour has come. And this is what
the Lord is speaking of, this is your hour. and the power of
darkness. The hour has come, it's all permitted.
It's all predestined in the sovereign purpose of God, strangely. We
know all events are in God's hands. His sovereignty is an
absolute sovereignty. We know that was certainly the
case with regards to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ into
the world, His birth, when was it that He came? It was at that
very precise moment that had been ordained from before the
foundation of the world. And now Paul speaks of it as
the fullness of the time. There in Galatians 4 and verse
4 he uses the definite article twice to emphasize the exact
moment in time, it's the fullness. of the time. And what is it that
is to happen? God sends forth His Son, made
of a woman, made under the law. And as with the coming of Christ,
the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, so also with the death of the
Lord Jesus Christ. What did we read previously in
this Gospel back in chapter 9? and verse 51. It came to pass when the time
was come that he should be received up, he steadfastly set his face
to go to Jerusalem. What is this time that's being
spoken of? The time was come that he should
be received up. It is the hour that he's appointed
for his dying. And here he is now, he steadfastly
sets his face, and he makes his final journey up to Jerusalem,
knowing full well the things that were to befall him there. Oh, to everything there is a
season, and a time to every purpose under heaven, a time to be born,
and a time to die, and how true it was in the experience of the
Lord Jesus Christ. There was a reason, you see,
He had come, that He might, in the time appointed of God, make
that great sin-atoning sacrifice once and for all. Again, look
at the language in John 12, 27. He says, For this cause came
I to this hour. Now what is He saying there in
John 12? Look at the context of that 27th
verse. What is the cause? It is dying. It is death. It is making the great sin atoning
sacrifice. For this cause came I to this
hour. All God's sovereignty is seen
in this. And you know God's sovereignty
is to be recognized even in the sin of Judas. I've already alluded
to the language that we have in John 17, but look at what
it says there in the 12th verse of that remarkable chapter that
speaks of the prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ. What does the Lord
say? He's praying to the Father. This
is a great high priestly prayer. He's a priest. and as a priest
he pleads and he prays and he's going to go on as a priest to
make a great sacrifice but in the prayer he utters these words
verse 12 while I was with them that is with the disciples while
I was with them in the world I kept them in thy name those
that thou gavest me I have kept and none of them is lost but
the son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled. He is the Son of Perdition and the Scripture must be fulfilled.
Now, how do we explain this? It's a mystery. God is not the
author of sin. God is not the author of sin.
God is Light and in Him is no darkness at all. And yet, What Judas is doing
is under the sovereign hand of God. And you know, from the very
first, the seed of sin was in the heart of that man. He was ever in the very grip
of Satan. At the end of John chapter 6,
the Lord says, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is
a devil? This He spoke of Judas, who would
betray Him. Oh, that seed was there always,
but it was held back, as it were. It was restrained. But when the
restraint was taken away, when it was withdrawn, oh, sin sprang
forth. There is a restraint, you see,
upon sin. One has said, and it's a most
interesting statement, I think, Man knows the beginning of sin,
but who can bound the issues thereof? Or the beginnings of
sin? And the beginnings of sin might
be very small, but the bounds of it. Where does sin lead? Well, there's that remarkable
verse that we have in the general epistle of James. James 1.15,
he says, When lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin
when it is finished bringeth forth death." And in those few
words we have the whole history of sin from conception to its
awful end which is death. Mark the words that the Apostle
utters there, when lost hath conceived when lost hath conceived
it bringeth forth sin And sin, when it is finished, bringeth
forth death. And that seed of sin is in every
heart. All that seed of sin, it's in
all our hearts, all our hearts by nature, what we are. We are
those who are the children of Adam, the children
of Eve. We have received a fallen nature
who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean. How that sin has
come down and down and down through all the generations. It's in
all of our hearts. How we're those then who must
be kept. Kept from the power of sin. That that we read off
here in the text. where the Lord utters these remarkable
words, this is your hour all these who have come to take him
under the leadership of this man who is in the very grip of
Satan with all his deception this is your hour and the power
of darkness so friends we need to be kept kept by the power
of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last
time. Now, we need then to be those
who would be much in prayer. This is the context, is it not? What's the situation that we
find ourselves in here? It's why the Lord yet spake in
verse 47, a multitude And Judas, one of the twelve,
going before them, and they draw near unto Jesus. And what is
it that the Lord is saying? It's interesting what the Lord
is saying. He is telling His disciples how they must pray. Verse 46, Why sleep ye? Rise and pray, lest ye enter
into temptation. And previously, back in verse
40, He says much the same. He said unto them, Pray that
ye enter not into temptation. It is, you see, an awful time,
a dreadful period, as we see in the text. It's your hour,
it's the hour of darkness, as the Lord is about to enter into
all the bitterness of that experience when He makes the great sin atoning
sacrifice. how the Lord even in that pattern
prayer that we are so familiar with what are one of the petitions
in that prayer lead us not into temptation but deliver us from
evil how we need to pray constantly it's easy for us you see to condemn
Judas Iscariot when we see the consequence of that sin in one
who is in the very grip of Satan. But there we need to be kept.
We cannot keep ourselves. We cannot keep ourselves. But
our comfort is in God. It's in prayer to God. It's in
the Word of God. Oh, we have that assurance given
in 1 Corinthians chapter 10, There hath no temptation taken
you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful. and will not let she be tempted
above that she are able, but shall with the temptation make
a way of escape, that she may be able to bear it." This is
why we have to come to this God, this God who is sovereign, this
God who is so gracious a God, who makes a way of escape for
His people, who keeps them. Oh, with those then who recognize
our awful vulnerability, that seed of sin that is in our fallen
nature, that could so easily manifest itself, except the Lord
God Himself restrain us and keep us. This is what we read of then
here, the power of darkness, the dreadful hour, but there
is one who overcomes all the powers of darkness and it is
that one that we're considering really. He who comes as the great
I am that I am. What a revelation we have when
we consider what is told here in the Gospels, the fourfold
Gospel. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
concerning the Lord Jesus and that ministry that He exercises.
He comes as Him who is the image of the invisible God. No man
has seen God at any time, we're told by John. The only begotten
Son which is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Now the Lord does declare God
to us and reveal God to us. And we see Him of course in John
as the great I Am that I Am. And amongst other things He declares
there, I am the light of the world. I am the light of the
world, he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall
have the light of life. Oh, the Lord Jesus Christ, He
is the Savior. And this is what we're witnessing
in this passage that we've read. He is the Savior. And those who
have come to take Him in the garden, they would destroy Him. Or they take him, he endures
all the mockery of those trials before Pontius Pilate, before
Herod, he's mocked, he's scoffed. It's a mockery of a trial that
he has to endure and ultimately the people under the biddings
of the scribes and the Pharisees are demanding that he be crucified. They will choose Barabbas, a
murderer, sooner than the Lord Christ, how He is rejected. They come to destroy Him. But
what does the Lord do? What does the Lord do as they
come to destroy Him? Again, He manifests something
of His healing power. Verse 49, When they which were
about him saw what would follow, they said unto him, Lord, shall
we smite with the swords? His disciples are springing to
his defence, they are going to fight for him. Shall we smite
with the sword? And one of them smote the servant
of the high priest and cut off his right ear. Oh, what they
will do to the Lord Jesus is of course much worse than that
They're going to see Him now to the cross, pierced in His
hands, in His feet, the spear thrust into His side.
That's what they're begging for, His blood. But one of His disciples
smote the servant of the high priest and cut off his right
ear, it says. And Jesus answered and said,
Suffer ye thus far. And he touched his ear and healed
him. Oh, they come and they want to
destroy him. And what does the Lord do? He heals. He heals. The Son of Man is not
come to destroy men, but to save men. Oh, that's the wonder of
the Lord Jesus, is it not? And how does the Lord save men? Well, strangely, He does that
by showing sinners something of themselves. He is the light. And as the light
he comes and he shows the sinner what his real true condition
is. Shows him something of the darkness of his own soul, the
deadness that is in his own soul. The Swami says, in thy light
shall we see light. But what does the light do? It
exposes all the guilt, all the filth of the sin of man. That's the ministry of the Lord
of God. We know that what thing soever the law saith, it saith
to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped,
and all the world become guilty before God. For by the deeds
of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight. by the
Lord is the knowledge of sin. This is how the Lord comes, it
is His law, and He comes in all the awful
power and authority of that law, and when that shines into the
heart of the sinner, how the sinner is seen to be one who
is only a transgressor. of that Lord of God which is
holy, that commandment which is holy and just and good. In
thy light shall we see light. But God has a good and a gracious
end in view when he deals with the sinner thus. He doesn't just
come in all the terrors of the Lord, does he? He comes also
in all the tenderness of the Gospel. Isn't that what we see
in the way in which the Lord even heals this one who's the servant of the high priest
whose ear had been cut off. The tenderness of the Lord Jesus.
Lord and tellers do but harden all the while they work alone.
But a sense of blood brought pardon soon dissolves the heart
of stone, says Joseph Hart. How true it is. And what is the
Lord doing here? Why, this is the greatest of
all the works of the Lord Jesus that He is about to enter upon. And He undertakes this great
work in all the midst of the power of darkness. He is going to make that great
sacrifice, that sin-atoning sacrifice. Now we see it in what follows.
We read through into the 23rd chapter. And then we're told
there at verse 44 it was about the 6th hour and there was a
darkness over all the earth until the 9th hour. The 6th hour would
be high noon, 12 noon. And then when the sun is at its
height there's a darkness. over the earth until the ninth
hour, three o'clock in the afternoon. The sun was darkened. The veil
of the temple was rent in the midst. This is the great work
that the Lord Jesus Christ has come at this hour in the midst
of all the power of darkness. He has come to make that great
sacrifice and how willingly He makes it. Therefore does my Father
love me, He says, because I lay down my life that I might take
it again. No man taketh it from me. I lay
it down of myself. I have power to lay it down.
I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received
of my Father. Or they come, they will seek
to arrest him, but we know that they couldn't lay a finger upon
him. Remember how it's brought out in John's account there,
in John Is it John 18 or John 19 where as they would arrest
him he declares himself to be the great I am and they fall
backwards. They fall backwards. They cannot touch him. He has
to commit himself into their hands. It's a voluntary death and he
comes to die. And this is the great message,
is it not? This is the great message of the Gospel. The light that comes to shine
in the midst of all the darkness of sin. There in the opening
chapter of John's first epistle in 1 John 1 verse 5 this is the
message which we have heard of him and declare unto you that
God is light and in him is no darkness at all If we say that
we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and
do not the truth. But if we walk in the light,
as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another,
and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all
sin. Oh, this is the Christians calling
to walk then in the light, not to be of the darkness, not to
be of the night. And don't we need God's Word
to come? The entrance of God's Word, He giveth light. give us
understanding to the simple this then is the Christians calling
and what John says Paul says very much the same when he writes
to the Thessalonians there in 1st Thessalonians chapter 5 and
verse 5, we are all the children of light he says and the children
of the day we are not of the night nor of darkness therefore
let us not sleep as do others but let us watch and be sober
For they that sleep, sleep in the night, and they that be drunken
are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day,
be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for an
helmet the hope of salvation. O God, grant that we might be
those then who are evidently of the light, who seek to walk
in communion with the Lord Jesus Christ who only desire to be
obedient to all the holy precepts of his gospel who want to conform
more and more to that image the image of Christ in all his obedience
he was so obedient he was obedient unto death even the death of
the cross who are we those then who desire that we might walk
after His example, after His pattern, and be those who are
evidently the children of light. Oh, what solemn words they are
when we think of all that the Lord had to endure, all that
contradiction of sinners, but not only that, all that He had
to bear of the wrath of God against the sins of His people. Why was
it that He was obedient? Well, it was love to the Father,
yes. Delighting in all the Father's
will, yes. But also, we're told, having
loved His own, which were in the world, He loved them unto
the end. And what was the end? Why, the
words that we have here in our text tonight. This is your hour
and the power of darkness. And He willingly submits and
makes that great sin atoning sacrifice. Oh the Lord be pleasing
to bless these things to us.