But none of those at table knew why he said this to him;
Judas has just taken the piece of bread from Jesus' hand and heard the words, "What you are going to do, do quickly." The whole table hears it too, yet no one understands — so how did eleven close friends miss a betrayal announced in front of them?
Their blank reaction says something about Judas' reputation. He was no outsider they tolerated — they trusted him with the money.
The Lord's clear statement that one of the chosen twelve was about to show himself a traitor also brought trouble into the minds of the disciples. Verse 22 shows that no suspicion of Judas was lurking in their minds. He appeared perfectly sincere in their eyes, so much so that they had entrusted the common purse to him. The craft of Satan's camouflage is almost perfect.
No one at that table could share the weight of the moment with Him. Their blankness also had a cause deeper than ignorance:
How little the disciples entered into the sufferings, the sorrow, of the Lord, of the Son of Man. There are certain sorrows kept for the secret of the Lord's heart… If He had anyone to sympathise with Him, His betrayal would in this sense have been easier to bear. There would have been some faithful hearts, a veil over the other man's turning away. But He was alone in it. None understood what it was. They thought it was to buy something, or give to the poor. But this wrong guess came from more than ignorance. Their hearts were full of other things than the one thing that necessarily filled the Lord's heart.
Not even John understood. Their two guesses fell far short of the real business of that hour.
Yet the disciples looked on and listened, not knowing what terrible issues were at stake. Not even John grasped the meaning of words that would soon be clear to all. It was not to buy things needed, but to sell their Lord and Master. It was no preparation for the feast, but the very thing the feast, not they, had always looked forward to… It was not that Judas should give to the poor — the last thing that would occupy his mind. It was that He should give, who though He was rich, yet for our sake became poor, so that we by His poverty might become rich (2 Cor. 8:9). It was a man's, a disciple's, worst sin; it was God's infinite love; both met in the death of the Lord on the cross. But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.
The confusion belonged to the eleven alone. Judas knew what had just passed between him and Jesus.
The eleven, stunned, it seems, by this terrible disclosure, fail to grasp the meaning of the Lord's words. They had entrusted the bag to Judas, so they judge that the Lord's words must refer to meeting the needs of the feast or to relieving the poor. Judas has no misunderstanding. The presence of the Lord has become unbearable to this devil-possessed man. Having received the morsel, he gets up at once and, without a word, passes into the night.
Jesus named no sin out loud and shamed no one at that table. That silence is part of why no one understood:
Others have noted that in this whole solemn scene no one denounces Judas. No reproach is heaped on him, no word of expulsion spoken against him, no demand made that he leave. The Lord reveals that a false one is present. He foretells the sin about to be committed, and points out the man who will commit it. Then, in a silence more terrible than words, Judas leaves the light that was too searching, the holy Presence he could no longer endure. He passes into the night for which no morning will ever dawn. Let us remember that but for the grace of God, and the precious blood of Christ, we should each one follow Judas into the night.
What was unclear in the upper room did not stay unclear for long.
In the upper room the Lord had said to him, "What you are going to do, do quickly." The rest had not understood it then. Now it was plain indeed to every one of the eleven.
- Hidden. Judas was so convincing that the eleven trusted him with their money. Even after Jesus announced the betrayal, they suspected nothing.
- Alone. No one understood, so the Lord carried this sorrow without a shred of human sympathy.
- Distracted. Their mistake came from more than ignorance. Their hearts were full of other things than what filled His.
- Contrast. They pictured shopping and charity. At the cross, a disciple's worst sin met God's infinite love.
- Warning. Jesus named no one and threw no reproach. Yet the man who understood best walked out into the night, and only grace keeps anyone from that road.
for some supposed, because Judas had the bag, that Jesus was saying to him, Buy the things of which we have need for the feast; or that he should give something to the poor.
The eleven had just heard their Master tell one of their own to act quickly. They guessed He meant shopping or charity. Their guess shows how little they suspected the man beside them, and how far their thoughts were from the truth.
The disciples reached for the most ordinary explanation because Judas held the group's money, and nothing about him had ever raised an alarm.
The Lord's clear statement troubled the disciples: one of the chosen twelve was about to show himself a traitor. Verse 22 shows that no suspicion of Judas was lurking in their minds. He appeared perfectly sincere to their eyes, so much so that the common purse had been entrusted to him. The craft of Satan's camouflage is almost perfect.
That trust was misplaced, and one writer asks how it was ever given — pointing out that the choice of a treasurer says something about the men who make it.
How did Judas Iscariot become treasurer for the apostles in the days of the Lord Jesus? It is unthinkable that the Lord Himself chose him for such service… His companions must have chosen him for this job. They chose him for his business ability, not for his spiritual grace. Fatal blunder! It ended in disaster, as we know. Many years after the unhappy Judas had "gone to his own place," the Apostle John wrote of him. He did not care about the poor, but "he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it" (John 12:6).
Set the disciples' two theories beside what Judas actually went out to do, and each one turns inside out.
He went out not to buy the things they needed, but to sell their Lord and Master. This was no preparation for the feast. It was the very thing the feast itself — not the disciples — had always looked forward to: the fulfilment of God's mind and purpose in it. That meant the Jews crucifying their own Messiah by the hand of lawless men. Judas was not going out to give to the poor; that was the last thing on his mind. Instead the Giver was the One Who "though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich" (2 Cor. 8:9). It was a man's, a disciple's, worst sin; it was God's infinite love; both met in the death of the Lord on the cross. But where sin increased, grace increased far more.
Their mistake was not only a lack of information. It also left the Lord alone with what He was facing.
How little the disciples entered into the sufferings, the sorrow, of the Lord. … There are certain sorrows kept for the secret of the Lord's heart. … If He had had anyone to sympathise with Him, His betrayal would in this sense have been easier. … But He was alone in it. No one understood what it was. They thought it was to buy something, or to give to the poor. But there was more than ignorance in this wrong guess. Their hearts were full of other things, while the Lord's heart was full of the one thing it had to be full of.
The verse contrasts eleven puzzled men with one who understood perfectly what had just been said to him.
The Eleven, stunned, it seems, by this terrible disclosure, fail to grasp the meaning of the Lord's words. Judas had charge of the bag, so they judge that the Lord's words must refer to meeting the needs of the feast or to relieving the poor. Judas has no such misunderstanding. The presence of the Lord has become unbearable to this devil-possessed man. So he takes the morsel, gets up at once, and passes into the night without a word.
What they could not read that evening became obvious a few hours later in the garden.
What the Lord had said to him in the upper room, not understood by the rest — "What you are going to do, do quickly" — was now plain indeed to every one of the Eleven… Providing for the feast had not been in his thoughts that night. To satisfy his greed had been his desire.
The feast named here raises a question about John's timing.
Could John have meant, by the "feast of the Passover," the feast of Unleavened Bread which directly followed it? The mention of the feast in verse 29 might give some support to such a view. Remember that the Lord was crucified on the fifteenth day of Nisan, the first day of the feast of Unleavened Bread.
- Purse — Judas carried the common fund, and his cover was so complete that no one at the table suspected him.
- Guess — Because of the bag, the eleven assumed an errand: supplies for the feast, or a gift to the poor.
- Opposite — He went out not to buy but to sell his Master. He went not to give to the poor, but to betray the One who became poor to make others rich.
- Blindness — They missed more than a fact. Their hearts were full of other things, while His was full of the cross.
- Warning — A man can be trusted with the money, chosen for skill and not for grace, and still walk out into the night.
Having therefore received the morsel, he went out immediately; and it was night.
Judas has just taken the piece of bread from the Lord's own hand, and he leaves the room without a word. John then adds the hour, which raises two questions: why record the time, and what did Judas walk out on?
The morsel was the Lord's last appeal to Judas. He took the bread and refused the One who gave it.
The Lord appealed to the traitor. He gave him the morsel of bread, and Judas took it, but resisted the appeal. All the love of Christ was thrown away on him. His soul lay devastated and ruined. "What you are going to do, do quickly," the Lord said. Then he got up from the table and went out. Scripture adds, "it was night." He went out into the blackness of night's darkness to do a deed of still blacker darkness. Judas was at the Passover table, but went out from the presence of the Lord, to go to his own place. He was not "clean," as the Lord had said (John 13:10).
Judas moved at once. Even so, he did not move outside God's permission.
The Lord accepted the situation and told him to act quickly. It seems that even Satan could not move freely in this matter without divine permission. Once Satan had it, Judas rose and left under his controlling power. He went out into the night, in more senses than one.
The words state the hour. They also carry a second meaning, because of who sat at that table.
First of all, John points to the plain fact that it really was night when Judas took the morsel of bread and went out from the presence of his Lord. But think of the solemn moment, and of his awful moral condition — Satan had entered into him (v. 27). There can be no doubt at all: the moral meaning of those words is meant to stop us short. Jesus had said, "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world"; for in Him was life, and the life was the light of men. That is surely what He was as He sat at the Passover table among His disciples. So when Judas turned his back on Him and went out under the power of Satan, it was indeed night in his soul.
For Judas the night did not end. It grew darker after he saw what he had done.
What darkness rested on that soul from then on! "It was night," says John. And that night grew more horrible for the faithless man. He saw the evil he could never undo only after he had done it. The night closed on him as he went to his own place.
One writer uses the same word for the world itself, and says what makes a night a night.
Believers are not in darkness. They are "children of light, children of the day." They know God and stand in the light of the day that is coming. "Night" and "darkness" mark the world. The absence of Christ makes the night, and the ignorance of God makes the darkness (compare John 12:35-36, 46; 13:30).
The door shut behind Judas. Only His own were left in the room with the Lord.
Love laid its last service at his feet, he spurned it, and he goes out into the betrayer's night. The contrast is sharp. Outside is the fellowship of the world, with its thoughts and purposes of evil. Inside is the fellowship of this other world, where the thoughts and purposes of love open out. Jesus was alone with His true disciples.
Readers often ask whether Judas shared in the Lord's Supper.
Judas was not present at the Lord's Supper. These verses show that the Lord gave the Supper after the Passover. It was "when He had supped" (verse 25), and Judas went out as soon as he received the morsel of bread from the Lord. The Lord gave him the morsel and said, "What you are going to do, do quickly," and after the traitor left, He founded this ordinance. Can you imagine the Lord asking Judas to do this "in remembrance of me"? No, it is true hearts He wants.
- Offered. The morsel was love's last approach to Judas — grace reaching its limit with a man who took the gift and refused the Giver.
- Refused. "Immediately" marks how fast he went. Satan drove him, yet even Satan moved only by divine permission.
- Night, twice over. The hour was dark, and the man walking away from the Light of the world carried that darkness inside him.
- Deepening. For Judas the night never broke. It thickened until it closed on him going to his own place. For the world, night is the absence of Christ.
- Divided. One door separated two fellowships. Outside, the plotting; inside, the Lord alone with His own — and there He gave the Supper for true hearts.