Moreover, behold, the hand of him that delivers me up [is] with me on the table;
The betrayer is not outside in the dark. He is at the table, within reach of Jesus. Two questions follow. How could the Lord sit there knowing it? And what does that moment teach everyone who has come to His table since?
Luke records these words after the bread and cup. That is not where they were spoken.
The Lord spoke the words of verses 21 and 22 during the Passover feast, before the Lord's supper was introduced. Luke only reported those words afterwards. He wanted to bring out the great contrast between the betrayer's cold unfaithfulness and the unswerving faithfulness and grace of the Lord Jesus, shown in the supper.
The Lord knew, and nothing in His manner gave it away. He says it out loud only now, at the last meal He shares with them.
The Lord announces that the betrayer is present at that last feast of love. How perfect the grace that knew the guilty soul, yet never once gave him away by His behaviour! How complete the deceit of the man who had so long heartlessly kept company with such a Master!
If God had already fixed the path to the cross, does that excuse Judas? The Lord's next words answer.
It comes with a stab of pain: the hand of the traitor is with Him on the table. The Son of Man was indeed going in the way determined. But that changed nothing about the guilt of the man who in his wickedness set himself to do what was the purpose of God. "Woe to that man," He says, "by whom the Son of Man is betrayed."
Judas was chosen by Jesus and sat at the closest table in the world. That is what makes him a warning.
One of the group chosen to be with Jesus here on earth would prove this terrible truth. The nearer a man stands to blessing on the outside, the further he is from it in heart, if he never takes it in. There was only one Judas in Israel, and he was the nearest to Jesus.
It is easy to treat these words as a fact to explain. One writer asks what the Lord felt as He spoke them.
Now, the Lord Jesus did feel the traitor's heartless ways (and we may learn it yet more from Psalm 109). We ought to feel it too. It is not enough to treat it as a thing that had to be, or a thing Scripture prepares us for, or a thing God's goodness turns to gracious ends. All that is true. But are such easy words enough for us, when we stand before His troubled spirit?
Commentators differ on whether Judas was still there when the bread and cup were given. One of them answers without hedging.
Not only at the Passover, but at the supper, our Lord says, "Behold, the hand of him who betrays Me is with Me on the table." We do not see how anyone can doubt that Judas was present at the supper. His character was known only to the Lord. His fellow apostles did not seem to have any suspicion of him. But to argue from this case that we ought to allow known evil at the Lord's table is simply wicked.
Whichever view you take, the same limit applies to us. What Christ knew by divine knowledge cannot become a rule for people who do not have it.
If anyone uses this to decide who may share fellowship now, you would have betrayers at the table. Also, no evil had shown itself, and you cannot put a man out where no evil has shown itself… The Lord knew it Himself, of course, by divine knowledge. But that is no ground for us to act on. The disciples knew nothing of it, and their conscience was not troubled about it.
The betrayal is not named here only.
The traitor is mentioned in both passages that tell us to keep the supper, Luke 22 and 1 Corinthians 11. This linking of the Supper with the betrayal is of the greatest importance. It sets two things side by side: the untrustworthiness and complete evil of the flesh, and the changeless, unconquerable love of the Lord. That love was tested and proved by His death, and the Supper keeps reminding us of it.
- Contrast — Luke sets the betrayer's hand next to the bread and cup on purpose. Cold treachery stands against unswerving grace.
- Concealed — the Lord knew, yet His behaviour never once gave Judas away. Grace kept the secret to the last meal.
- Charged — God had determined the path, yet that removed nothing from the guilt of the man who chose it.
- Close — Judas sat nearest to Jesus and was furthest from Him in heart. Outward nearness is not the same as taking the blessing in.
- Continuing — the flesh is still untrustworthy, so the supper keeps pointing us away from ourselves to a love that death could not break.
and the Son of man indeed goes as it is determined, but woe unto that man by whom he is delivered up.
The Lord names His own death as something already settled, and the writers take this as the ground of a believer's confidence. Nothing that men or Satan plot can push God's plan off course.
Judas could, after all, only accomplish the purpose of God, and this the Saviour pointed out... It is an immense support to the heart of the believer to know one thing. Neither the wickedness of man nor the schemes of Satan can frustrate any divine counsel. God makes rebels against their Maker, human or angelic, serve the final result He planned, and He does it against their will. Of course this does not lessen their wickedness in the smallest degree. God and His purposes have no place at all in their thoughts.
Does a settled plan make the man who carries it out less responsible?
God knows how to make the wrath of man praise Him and carry out His purposes of blessing. This does not lessen man's responsibility in the matter. Here is a clear instance of how the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man do not clash in practice. We may still find the two hard to reconcile as a matter of theory.
Everything turns on the small word that follows. Judas carried out God's plan, and the sentence still falls on Judas.
Now at the table the Lord announces to them His departure from the world according to the Scriptures, and the terrible judgment of Judas. The carrying out of God's counsels does not take away the wickedness of those who carry them out. Otherwise how could God judge the world? For everything works together to carry out His counsels. Men's evil will too is always active in doing evil.
So what did God appoint in Judas, and what did He not?
Judas was not appointed to be a sinner, but, being a sinner, he was appointed to be a betrayer of Christ.
Luke places these words right after the supper, and the effect is deliberate. The traitor's hand and the Lord's are on the same table.
The Lord spoke the words of verses 21 and 22 during the Passover feast, before He gave them the supper. Luke reports those words only afterwards. He does it to bring out the great contrast between the betrayer's cold unfaithfulness and the unswerving faithfulness and grace of the Lord Jesus in the supper... Divine sovereignty had ordained that the Son of Man would go to the cross. Yet this took nothing away from the seriousness of human responsibility on the part of Judas.
The Lord knew who it was, and He never once let it show.
The Lord announces the betrayer's presence at that last feast of love. How perfect the grace that knew the guilty soul, yet never once gave him away by His behaviour! How complete the deceit of the man who had kept company so long, and so heartlessly, with such a Master!
Judas is not an outsider. He is one of the twelve chosen to be with Jesus, and that is exactly what makes the woe so heavy.
It was man's sin, Satan's cunning, God's counsel, and Christ's love. But none of these things altered the wickedness of Judas... One of that company chosen to be with Jesus here below was to prove an awful truth. If a man does not receive blessing into his heart, then the nearer he stands to it outwardly, the further he is from it morally.
The warning is not left in the past.
Scripture holds no slightest ray of hope for that man's soul. He is a most solemn warning to those who would dare to take a place outwardly near to the Lord while having no heart for Him personally.
Later in the same chapter the Lord foretells Peter's fall too. One writer sets the two men side by side.
The sin of Judas and the sin of Peter are both foretold. For Judas there was no forgiveness; for Peter there would be... In the case of Peter it was different. No Scripture is quoted as fulfilled by his fall, yet that fall was foreknown and foretold. For him the Lord prayed that his faith should not fail, and for him there was service in store.
- Determined — Christ's death was no accident. He went the way God had settled, and no scheme of man or Satan can overturn God's purpose.
- But — one small word keeps the guilt where it belongs. Carrying out God's plan never cancels the wickedness of the man who carries it out. Otherwise God could judge no one.
- Shaped, not made — God did not make Judas a sinner. Judas was a sinner already, and God gave that evil the shape His plan required.
- Nearness — a hand on the Lord's table proves nothing. The closer a man stands on the outside without Christ in his heart, the further away he stands in his soul.
- Woe or prayer — Peter fell too. But Christ prayed for him and had service in store for him, while for Judas there was no forgiveness.
And *they* began to question together among themselves who then it could be of them who was about to do this.
The Lord has just said that the hand of His betrayer is on the table with Him. The disciples turn to each other with a question none of them can answer. Their reaction is honest. It also shows how little they knew — about the man beside them, and about themselves.
The question could only arise because no one at that table had ever seen through Judas. The Lord had known for a long time, and had never let it show.
The Lord announces the betrayer's presence at that last feast of love. How perfect the grace that knew the guilty soul, yet never once gave him away by any change in behaviour! How complete the deceit of the man who had kept company for so long, so heartlessly, with such a Master!
That silence left the disciples with nothing to go on. Their question proves it.
The disciples asked who the Lord meant. That shows none of them had any suspicion, so it seems Judas had covered his deceit well.
They took the Lord at His word. But honesty and self-knowledge are not the same thing.
Yes, it was from all: our Lord had to meet shame from those He loved best. "They began to question one another, which of them it could be who was going to do this." There was honesty in these hearts; but what ignorance! what unbrokenness of self!
They put the question to each other. One writer shows why that never produced an answer.
The disciples first looked at one another. Then their consciences began to work, and they looked at themselves. Each one asked, "Is it I, Lord?" But this did not bring the answer. Peter was wholehearted, but he lacked spiritual understanding. He longed to know who the traitor was, but could not frame the right question. Why did he not ask the Lord Himself who would betray Him? Because he felt and knew, in the presence of the Lord, what we have often felt — that another was nearer to Him than himself. Peter did not have that freedom, so he signalled to another disciple to ask. Closeness comes out of love, and closeness is the source of real understanding.
The very next verse records a quarrel over who was the greatest. One writer sets the two verses side by side.
Jesus tells His disciples that His blood would be shed for them: "the hand of him who betrays me is with me on the table, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed." Then they question among themselves which of them it was who would do this. One might suppose that they would think of nothing except the death of their gracious Master; but no! "A dispute also arose among them, as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest." What a contrast! But if we examine our own hearts, we will usually find these two things together. There are real feelings that bear witness to our love for Jesus. Yet perhaps within the same half hour there are also thoughts as unworthy as this quarrel among the disciples.
Another writer marks how fast their view of themselves changed.
In the previous verse they were objects of suspicion; now they make themselves objects of importance.
Readers often ask whether Judas was still at the table when the supper was given. One writer answers that Luke's order does not settle it, and that the question changes nothing for us.
Luke reverses the order of this section and the one before it. But Luke's order is often not the order of time. The point, however, is not of doctrinal importance: few would say that a known traitor belongs at the Lord's table... And if Judas was present, the disciples still did not know what he was. The Lord knows every secret of the heart. But His knowledge clearly cannot be our guide, since we do not have it.
- Hidden. The Lord's manner never gave the betrayer away. So their puzzled question was real: no one at that table suspected Judas.
- Honest. Their question came from real hearts. They believed what Christ said, and each man looked at himself first.
- Ignorant. Honesty is not self-knowledge; the same men who asked "which of us?" had no idea what was in them.
- Exposed. Verse 23 searches self; verse 24 promotes self. The same two moods can live in one heart within half an hour.
- Answered. Asking one another produced nothing. The answer came through the disciple nearest to Jesus. Closeness to Him, not debate, brings real understanding.