Verily, verily, I say to you, He who receives whomsoever I shall send receives me; and he that receives me receives him who has sent me.
The Lord has just named a betrayer among His own disciples, and He is about to leave them all behind. So what happens to everyone else He sends — and to those who welcome them?
The words come right after the Lord exposes Judas. Their first work is to protect what the betrayer has not damaged.
The Lord will not allow the presence and treachery of the betrayer to stain His glory. Nor will the complete collapse of one of the twelve cancel the commission of the remaining eleven. That commission would remain in all its force... Judas's sin was terrible, yet the glory of the Lord shines undimmed, and the commission of the eleven stands untouched.
A messenger's standing, backing, and reputation are not what count. Christ's sending is. (The writer quotes an older translation here; where he reads "whomever I send," the ESV has "the one I send.")
The Lord's statement is, "He who receives whomever I send." Here is the principle: "whomever I send" — no matter who the messenger is, the one who receives him receives Christ. The Lord sent Judas, and whoever received Judas received Christ. How blessed for that man! Christ may send someone who is poor and carries no other approval. If the Lord sent him, that is all we have to look to. We receive Christ. The one point we look at is Christ's sending.
The same writer says the principle matters most where confusion has spread among Christians.
That "whomever I shall send" is of vast moral importance, especially in the present confusion of the Church. It is the keystone of holy grace and the destroyer of confusion in the Church. We receive the Sender in receiving the messenger. Let us keep this always in mind. It is a "Truly, truly" of Christ's; and by it we receive God, even the Father, the Sender.
The Lord speaks this promise just as He is about to leave the work in other hands.
He adds to this an absolute confirmation. When He sends a messenger, that sending carries such authority that receiving the messenger is receiving Himself. More than that, receiving Himself is receiving the Father who sent Him (v. 20). For He Himself was leaving, and in this whole age of grace, others would now carry His message.
If God ties Himself to His messenger, then turning that messenger away is no small thing. The same writer also sets a limit on the principle.
When God sends a messenger He is pleased to identify Himself with His servant... This is a solemn thought for the people of God, because the reverse is also true. Refuse a servant the Lord has truly sent, and you refuse the Lord in the person of His servant. Not that we should receive everyone who claims to be sent by God. The test is this: do they speak the words of God?
People often welcome a truth and then turn away from the person who brought it.
How often people openly hold and even enjoy certain truths, while they condemn and shut out the very people who carry those truths. Sometimes they even use the light they have received to heap reproach on the vessels through whom that light has shone. Such conduct may satisfy man, but it can never please the Lord. His witnesses are as sacred in His eyes as the testimony they bear.
That leaves the question of Judas himself.
The Lord made no mistake in sending the guilty Judas, and those who received Judas made no mistake either. He was one sent by the Lord. People heard a divine message from his lips, though he himself had neither saving faith nor eternal life. He was the son of destruction. Judas stands as the sad witness of this: the greatest outward and official nearness to Christ, without eternal life, only exposes a person to the worst sin and ruin.
- Sent, not selected. The verse turns on Christ's act of sending. What counts is not the messenger's quality but the One who sent him.
- Sent despite failure. Judas betrayed his Master. The Lord's glory stayed undimmed, the eleven kept their commission, and those who had welcomed Judas still received Christ.
- Sent reaches the Father. The chain does not stop at the messenger, or even at Christ. Welcome the one He sends and you welcome the Father who sent Him.
- Sent, therefore refusable. The principle runs both ways. Refuse a true servant and you refuse the Lord in him. One test guards it: do they speak the words of God?
- Sent men carry the truth. The message and the messenger belong together. To prize the testimony while despising those who carry it may satisfy people. It never pleases the Lord.
Having said these things, Jesus was troubled in spirit, and testified and said, Verily, verily, I say to you, that one of you shall deliver me up.
At the table in the upper room, after washing the disciples' feet, Jesus is troubled in spirit and speaks of a traitor among His own. The words raise two questions the commentators press — why was the Lord troubled, and why does He say "one of you"?
The weight of the announcement does not fall on Judas by name. It falls on the phrase "one of you" — one of the circle He had chosen and kept close.
It would be good to gather all these sentences marked "Truly, truly." They are the expressions of the great principles our Lord revealed. This was one of the great principles on which the Church hung: "One of you will betray Me." It was not only, I know who will, I know Judas. That was not the point. One of you, you who are so joined to Me — this was what troubled His spirit. Is Jesus, our blessed Master, wronged by us, any less grieved and troubled at evil and falling away in the Church?
The trouble was not injured pride. One writer traces it to holiness and love, and finds His grief reaching even to the guilty man.
It was holiness, it was love, which took the coming wickedness of Judas so to heart. The Lord felt it from every side. He felt sin itself, in its opposition to God. He felt its effect on others as well as on Himself. And He felt how dreadful it was for the wretched guilty man. It is not self, but love, that goes together with the truest feeling. The Lord says it as a testimony too. They were all faulty. But one, and only one, was about to become Satan's prey and the tool of his malice against the Lord.
Why could He feel it so far past our own measure? Because sin had never blunted anything in Him.
It is beyond wonderful that the Son of God became man and entered into the sufferings of mankind. His heart felt as men feel. Yet His feelings were perfectly holy, untouched by the sin that dulls all true natural feeling. As a divine Person, the Son of God could also know what sin is in man as no other man could. And He could grieve as no man could.
One writer follows the word "troubled" through John's account and shows what always follows it.
This expression, "He was troubled," comes three times. In chapter 12:27 He says, "Now is my soul troubled." … Then in chapter 13:18 He had said, "He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me." There too He was troubled in spirit. In each of those passages it was soul-trouble in Christ. And in each passage glory from God is the answer. "Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him."
When He spoke of the betrayal, He thought of the disciples before Himself.
Their faith would be shaken that one of them could do such a thing. So before speaking of His own deep trouble, He first provided for them: "I am not speaking of all of you; I know whom I have chosen. … I am telling you this now, before it takes place, that when it does take place you may believe that I am he." … Is this not the most marvellous grace? He thinks first of what it will mean for them, before speaking of what it means for Himself.
The eleven had no idea who was meant. One writer sees our own habit in their confusion.
The way to be intelligent and know the Lord's mind is to be near Him. By what he does, John says in effect, "I will show you the way." No one except Judas knew who was going to betray the Lord… How like ourselves! When things are low in an assembly, and we know something is wrong, how we look at one another. Are things very cold, dull and flat where you live, and are you looking at one another? Do not do it.
On the same night He announced the treachery, He gave the Supper. One writer asks what that timing meant.
No tongue can tell how the Lord felt that! He felt it keenly; but, feeling it, He took the bread and there and then instituted the Supper. What did that mean? It seems to me it meant this. You may not be able to trust anyone else, but you may trust Me. If treachery springs up in this inner circle, who can you look to? My love will not fail you… In days of darkness and nights of treachery and betrayal you will find Me always the same.
- Nearness wounds. The grief is not "someone" but "one of you" — treachery from inside the chosen circle, the friend who shared His bread.
- Nearness explains the feeling. He was troubled because holiness and love met sin in a nature sin had never dulled. He felt it toward God, toward others, and for Judas himself.
- Nearness is guarded. He announced it in advance, so their faith would stand when it happened. He put them before Himself.
- Nearness is the cure. The eleven looked at each other and learned nothing. Nearness to Him is the way to know His mind.
- Nearness is pledged. On the night of betrayal He gave the Supper. It is the standing sign that His love never fails.