And an angel appeared to him from heaven strengthening him.
The angel comes in the middle of Gethsemane, while the Lord prays and His sweat falls like blood. Two questions follow: what can a creature give the Son of God, and why did heaven send help instead of rescue?
Matthew was in the garden. Mark likely heard the story from Peter. Neither of them mentions the angel. One writer takes that silence as deliberate, since each Gospel draws its own portrait of the Lord.
Neither Matthew, who was there, nor Mark, who may have heard much from Peter, mentions two things: the bloody sweat, and the angel from heaven who strengthened Him. Probably all eleven disciples knew the angel was there, and surely the three nearest Him did. Yet neither Matthew nor John hints at it. Was that by accident or by design? By design, we believe, since each Gospel writer presents the Lord in a character that belongs to his own Gospel. So Luke, who introduces Him as the Son of Man, records the appearance of the angel to strengthen Him — and it is fitting that he should.
One writer meets the strangeness of the scene head on.
Luke tells us of an angel who strengthened Him. How could an angel strengthen Him, who is the Creator of the angels? He certainly could not strengthen His holy soul. That an angel strengthened Him must belong to His deep humiliation.
The kind of help matters as much as the fact of it.
Only Luke mentions an angel from heaven strengthening Him. His distress was so intense that it weakened His body, and this is noted in particular in the Gospel that deals with His true manhood. The angel gave physical strength, not spiritual. Even in believers, it is the Spirit of God Himself who gives spiritual strength (Ephesians 3:16). His deep agony made His prayer more earnest, and it struck His body too: His sweat became like great drops of blood, falling to the ground. How truly and fully He is Man, with all the weakness that dependence brings — yet completely apart from sin, and always doing the Father's will.
One writer asks how far that strengthening went.
How do you interpret that word "strengthening"? It was not the same thing as "strengthen your brothers." It did not go beyond His body. That is the work of angels. They are the messengers who carry out God's providence. The Holy Spirit deals with your spirit. So I take it they were giving some supporting strength to His body. It is a proof that He was not yet forsaken. We find nothing of that in the three hours of darkness. He was left in deep unfathomable loneliness. Not a ray of light from the face of God gladdened Him there. But He had not yet been made an offering for sin, and angels can come and strengthen Him. He is strengthened for a fresh agony.
One writer asks what actually took place in that conflict, and what God sent in reply.
Gethsemane clearly marked out the scene of that conflict. What took place there? He rightly shrank from undergoing the judgment of God against sin. "And He was heard because of His reverence." He was heard because death, the wages of sin, had no claim on Him. God granted His claim to deliverance. Instead of sending His judgment to wither His flesh, God sent an angel to strengthen Him.
This help fits the picture Luke draws throughout: a Man who lives in dependence on His Father.
The Lord's dependence as man then appears in the most striking way. In Luke, the whole scene of Gethsemane and the cross shows the perfect dependent Man. He prays: He submits to His Father's will. An angel strengthens Him: this was their service to the Son of Man. Afterwards, in deep conflict, He prays more earnestly: dependent Man, He is perfect in His dependence. The deepness of the conflict deepens His fellowship with His Father.
- Cause. Real anguish brought real bodily weakness. That is why strength was needed, and why Luke, who presents Him as Son of Man, is the one who tells us.
- Gift. Heaven did not take the cup away. It sent an angel to support the Man who would drink it — help sent, not judgment.
- Limit. The help reached His body, not His soul. Spiritual strength comes from the Spirit of God, not from angels.
- Proof. Because an angel could still come near, the garden was not yet the forsaking. In the three hours of darkness no such comfort appears.
- Pattern. Under greater pressure His prayer grew more earnest, not less. Dependence deepened where it was tested most.
And being in conflict he prayed more intently. And his sweat became as great drops of blood, falling down upon the earth.
Shortly before His arrest, Jesus prays in a garden, and Luke alone shows what that prayer cost Him. The scene raises hard questions: what was in the cup He shrank from, and why did the agony make Him pray more, not less?
In Luke, Gethsemane shows a man leaning wholly on God.
The Lord's dependence as man is then displayed in the most striking manner. The whole scene of Gethsemane and the cross, in Luke, is the perfect dependent man. He prays; He submits to His Father's will. An angel strengthens Him — this was their service to the Son of Man. Afterwards, in deep conflict, He prays more earnestly: dependent man, He is perfect in His dependence. The deeper the conflict, the deeper His fellowship with His Father.
The same writer points out what is missing later, at the cross.
When we come to the cross in this Gospel, we find no trace of the agony. He had gone through it in spirit in Gethsemane, and is then above it all.
The agony had a cause outside Himself. An enemy was setting death before His soul.
Here, then, in Gethsemane, we see Satan presenting death in all its horrors. He seeks to bring that in between Christ and all His perfection as Man before God. On God He leaned in perfect dependence as a Man. That is what the agony in the garden is. It is hardly a subject to discuss, but rather one to think about on your knees before God.
Some read the little word "like" to mean His sweat only looked like blood. One writer answers from Luke's own use of that word elsewhere.
I agree that the Greek word here for "like" does not mean a mere appearance without reality. Weigh the same word in Luke's account of Saul's conversion and baptism (Acts 9). He means that something with the appearance of scales fell from Saul's eyes. He raises no question of whether they were real, for indeed they were really there. So here. Further, as Bengel remarked, the force of that word "like" falls on the clots rather than on the blood. So there is even less reason to disturb the common belief.
Here the cup was still before Him. Another writer draws a sharp line between the garden and the cross.
Was propitiation accomplished by all this? No, my friends. Propitiation means meeting the righteous claims of God, glorifying Him about sin, making atonement for it. It was not accomplished by the living agonies of Jesus, nor by the sorrows He tasted, nor by the tears He shed... Gethsemane was not Golgotha. In Gethsemane He looked at and measured everything. In the garden He took the cup, if I may say so, and looked at its ingredients; on the cross He drank its contents... In that cup, not one single element of sorrow was missing that either the hand of man or the hand of God could supply.
The verse ties the agony to the praying. That link is where it reaches us.
The more He felt the depths of that dreadful cup which He was to drink, the more earnestly He prayed. With us, too often, the trouble that fills our minds turns us away from God. But "He prayed more earnestly." The agony brought Him to God, and that is just the right thing... The poor disciples were sleeping for sorrow while He was praying more earnestly, in agony.
Measured against Him, our own praying often runs at the opposite temperature.
Christ was in an agony at prayer (Luke 22:44). Many, when they pray, are in a lethargy rather than an agony. When they are busy about the world, they are all fire; when they are at prayer, they are all ice.
He leaves the garden calm. One commentator traces that calm to what happened while He prayed.
So, the more pressed by Satan, the nearer to God He is. Therefore it is said, "being in agony, he prayed more earnestly." As a result, He receives nothing at the hand of Satan, but from His Father. "The cup that my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?" Before He left Gethsemane, the whole power of Satan was morally destroyed. He had gone through the hour with His Father, and now takes the cup from His Father's hand, as an act of obedience. He is now as calm as when doing any other miracle.
- Conflict. The agony was a real struggle. Death and Satan's power pressed on the soul of a man who leaned on God alone.
- Anticipation. He measured the cup here; He drank it on the cross. Gethsemane weighed the ingredients, Golgotha emptied them.
- Reality. The word "like" does not soften the fact. The clots of blood were there, as real as the scales that fell from Saul's eyes.
- Response. Pressure did not drive Him from God. It drove Him into deeper prayer. Sorrow put the disciples to sleep and put Him on His knees.
- Result. He left the garden calm and took the cup from His Father's hand. What He settled with God in prayer, He could then face.
And rising up from his prayer, coming to the disciples, he found them sleeping from grief.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And he said to them, Why sleep ye? rise up and pray that ye enter not into temptation.
In the garden of Gethsemane, one Man kneels in prayer while His friends lie asleep close by. The Lord's question and command press on us the same choice — what will sorrow drive us to, sleep or prayer?
One night held three different responses to the same crisis. Luke sets them side by side.
The more He felt the depths of that dreadful cup which He was to drink, the more earnestly He prayed. With us, too often, the trouble that fills our minds turns us away from God. But "He prayed more earnestly." The agony brought Him to God, and that is just the right thing... In the disciples you have man in his weakness. In Judas you have man in his hatred and wickedness. In Christ you have man in his perfection.
Why would the perfect Man need to pray at all?
Here again we have the great evidence of the Lord's complete dependence as the perfect Man. The perfection of a man lies in the total dependence that marks him out as man.
Luke says plainly why they slept — grief. But the commentators refuse to let that excuse stand.
This was not the sorrow of grace: this was really selfish sorrow. They were sorrowing at what they were going to lose; at all this distress that was coming on. It was not the true sorrow of grace. That sorrow feels how serious the moment is, and takes warning from the words of our Lord Jesus Christ.
This was not the first time these men slept through something enormous.
They had slept in the presence of His glory (Lk. 9:32), and now also in the presence of His agony. How sadly we resemble them! We too might take to heart His serious warning to rise and pray, so that we do not enter into temptation instead of resisting it.
The phrase is easy to skim past. Scripture elsewhere calls a tested believer blessed, so the wording needs care. The phrases in quotation marks below follow an older translation.
There is a vast difference between "falling into temptation," or "enduring temptation" (James 1:2, 12), and "entering into temptation" (Matt. 26:41)... Nothing strengthens us more than to "endure temptation." Nothing is more dangerous than to "enter into" it. The words seem almost the same, and people can easily miss the difference in their thinking. But the difference is total. In the one case it is an honour that God puts on us. In the other it is a trap that Satan sets before us.
The test was coming that night. What the Lord told them to pray about was what it would become in them.
Weighed down in spirit by what was coming, He urges His disciples to pray that they do not enter into temptation. That is to say: when the time came for the test, they would be walking with God. Then the test would mean obedience to God for them, and not a way of departing from Him.
Notice the timing in the Lord's command. Prayer comes before the test, not after it.
Now the man that endures temptation is the man that prays before the temptation comes. He does not enter into it. When it comes he is blest; he endures. Peter did not. Peter entered... But if the Lord tells me that temptation is near, and I do not pray, it is clear that I am not depending upon God... Enduring temptation is when a person suffers, and suffers because he does not give in. Entering into temptation is when he does give in, because he does not pray.
The rest of the chapter reads as the outcome of this one refused command.
We will soon see the result of their sleeping instead of praying. Judas was away, and he betrayed Him. But all the rest abandoned Him too. Even the most prominent of the three chosen to be nearest the Lord denied Him with oaths... Only watching and prayer can keep us. Evil is only judged rightly in the presence of God. There His light exposes it, and His grace is enough, even for us. But man has no strength against Satan... Leaning upon Him, the weakest of saints is more than conqueror.
- Sleep — grief was real, but it was sorrow over their own loss, not the sorrow of grace. It sent them to sleep instead of to prayer.
- Twice — they had already slept through His glory on the mountain; now they sleep through His agony. The same weakness meets both extremes.
- Rise — the command comes before the test arrives. The one who endures temptation is the one who prayed ahead of it.
- Enter — a test is an honour God puts on us; entering temptation is a trap. Prayer keeps the test from becoming a departure from God.
- Kept — sleeping ended in a drawn sword, flight, and denial. Only in God's presence do we judge evil rightly, and there the weakest believer is more than conqueror.
As he was yet speaking, behold, a crowd, and he that was called Judas, one of the twelve, went on before them, and drew near to Jesus to kiss him.
Jesus is still speaking to His disciples when the crowd arrives to arrest Him, led by one of His own twelve. Why did it take such a great crowd to arrest one lowly Man, and why did the sign have to be a kiss?
The size of the party says more about the fear of Jesus' enemies than about any danger from Him:
Gentiles and Jews come to lay their hands on the Prince of Life, the Lord of Glory, ready to commit the greatest sin. All the sinfulness of sin is now to be shown. But why such a great multitude and such precaution to capture one man, who was "gentle and lowly in heart"? What a testimony after all to His power, which they feared — and yet what blindness.
Judas walked in front of the crowd rather than among it. One writer reads that as part of a plan laid in advance:
From the Gospel of Luke we learn that he was not only the leader of the great crowd but he walked ahead of them. What a subtle plan he had laid! In it you see the cunning of that same Serpent from the garden where the first Adam was placed. How cunning, and yet how blunt. Everything had been arranged so as to make His escape impossible. The traitor was to kiss Him. The kiss would point the Lord out and at the same time separate Him from the disciples. Then they were to press upon Him at once and capture Him. It was all carefully planned. By his action and his plan Judas shows that he did not believe in the Lord as the Son of God. He knew His power.
Luke does not simply name Judas. He places him among the twelve — the men Jesus chose to be with Him. That nearness proved something terrible:
One of that company chosen to be with Jesus here below was to prove this awful truth. A man may stand very near to blessing on the outside. But if he does not receive it into his heart, he is only further from it morally. There was only one Judas in Israel, and he was nearest to Jesus. Only one man joined all the privileges of such companionship with Jesus to all the guilt of betraying Him.
Of every signal Judas could have used, he picked the gesture of friendship. The Lord saw through it, and still did not shut the door:
The treachery of Judas would still like to hide itself in the kiss that identifies Him. He gives that kiss with emphasis, as if to assure the One he is betraying that he is not part of the crowd that follows him. The Lord sees through this disguise. He answers not with a rebuke but with a question: "Friend, why are you here?" Then, as Luke tells us, He adds the more direct one: "Judas, would you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?" Divine love has still not stopped pleading. It has not closed the door against his return even now.
Judas could lead the crowd straight to the spot, because he knew where his Master usually went:
How gracious, but how terrible, are the words of Jesus here! He spoke them to a man who knew his Master, and his Master's usual places, well enough to hand Him over to His enemies like this.
With the disguise gone, Judas now belongs to neither side:
The Lord's words to him (v.48) were faithful, yet with no bitterness or anger. They showed him that the Lord had seen through his treachery. What could he do now? Where could he go? For he had proved to friends and enemies alike that he could not be trusted. Terrible exposure!
No one could have seized Jesus earlier. What changed was not the strength of His enemies but the arrival of His hour:
As to what went before, they could not touch Him until that hour had come. He must be a willing captive, as He was a willing victim… Now He puts Himself into their hands. He was a willing captive now, as He was a willing victim on the cross. They took Him!
- Nearness — Judas stood as close to Jesus as any man could. He never took that blessing into his heart, so his nearness only measured how far his soul really was.
- Disguise — He led the crowd from the front and chose a kiss as his sign, arranging both to hide the very thing he was doing.
- Word — The Lord answered with a question, not with force. It was faithful and free of anger. It tore off the disguise and still left room for return.
- Exposure — Judas had betrayed his Master. Friends and enemies alike now knew he could not be trusted, and he had nowhere left to go.
- Surrender — No one could lay a hand on Him until His hour came. They took Him because He gave Himself up — a willing captive before He was a willing victim.
And Jesus said to him, Judas, deliverest thou up the Son of man with a kiss?
Judas had walked with Jesus for three years. Now he steps out of an armed crowd and marks out his Master with a kiss, and the Lord's answer names him, the deed, and Himself.
Jesus had warned Judas more than once before this moment.
"Hail, Rabbi!" had been his greeting. "Judas, would you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?" were the Lord's last words spoken directly to him. The Lord had openly announced in the upper room that He was about to be betrayed. He had told Judas to his face that he was the traitor. He had spoken to that wretched man as he left the upper room in words he could not have misunderstood. Now He let him know that He was not deceived by that hypocritical show of affection.
The word for the kiss changes as Judas carries out his plan. The Psalms show how keenly the Lord felt this act from a close friend.
The word for "kissed Him" is changed from the word Judas used when he gave them this sign. Then he had used the word phileo, I love, or I kiss. But he was eager to make sure they seized the One he had once followed. So he "covered Him with kisses": kata-phileo, a much stronger word. It is hard to imagine anything more horrible than the way Judas betrayed his Master. And we know from the Psalms how keenly our Lord felt it. See, for example, Psalm 41:9: "Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me."
Jesus could have rebuked him. Instead He asked a question that left the door open.
Judas would still like to hide his treachery in the kiss that pointed out the Lord. He gave it with emphasis, as if to tell the One he is betraying that he is not part of the crowd following him. The Lord sees through this disguise. He answers not with a rebuke but with a question: "Friend, why are you here?" Then, as Luke tells us, He adds the more direct one: "Judas, would you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?" Divine love has not stopped pleading, even yet. It has not closed the door against his return.
(The first question is Matthew 26:50; the ESV reads "Friend, do what you came to do," while the older wording quoted here puts it as a question.)
The same writer, commenting elsewhere, weighs the insult itself:
Of all the signs Judas could have chosen, this was surely the most brazen: smooth-faced hypocrisy. And the Lord shows how deeply He felt the insult.
Judas knew his Master, and he knew the places his Master used. That knowledge is what he sold.
How gracious, but how terrible were these words of Jesus! He spoke them to a man who knew his Master and his Master's usual places well enough to hand Him over like this to His enemies.
No one arrives here in one step. One writer follows the path from its start, and it begins with something ordinary.
Trace the course of Judas: what led him astray? He loved money — not an uncommon evil… Then, what is his next step? Satan puts it into his heart to betray his Master… Sin makes progress in a conscience that is already defiled. Hypocrisy now enters; he sits with Jesus at the table, carrying on with religion, even after he had sold Him. Note too that it was "after the sop" that Satan entered — he was never nearer to Christ in outward form. Now he is hardened against even natural feeling, and goes out and betrays the Son of Man with a kiss… Sinning and religion go on together. Where the power of godliness is missing, being near to godly things only makes the danger greater.
Everyone in the garden lost their footing except the One they came to arrest.
With verse 47 the last scenes begin. Now everything is calm and gracious with the Lord. Everything is confused and agitated with His friends, His enemies, and even His judges. The communion in the garden led to the calmness in the great hour of trial. Judas reached the summit of hypocrisy in betraying his Master with a kiss… It was their hour, and the hour in which the power of darkness was to be displayed. Against that dark background the Lord displayed His grace.
- Known. The kiss hid nothing; the Lord let Judas see that the show of affection had not deceived Him.
- Named. He addressed the traitor personally — "Judas" — and these were the last words Jesus ever spoke to him on earth.
- Asked. He met treachery with a question, not a rebuke. That question left the door open, even while He felt the insult in full.
- Traced. The betrayal grew step by step: love of money, then a way to feed it, then religion kept up as cover, then a hardened heart. Nearness to holy things without real godliness only makes the danger greater.
- Answered. He answered the whole scene with grace. Everyone around Him was shaken; He alone stayed calm in the hour of darkness.
And they who were around him, seeing what was going to follow, said [to him], Lord, shall we smite with [the] sword?
Judas has given his kiss in the garden, and the men around Jesus see what is coming. They ask whether to fight — but where did the swords come from, and why did they strike before He answered?
Earlier that evening the Lord had spoken about a sword, and the disciples produced two. One writer traces their question straight back to that misreading:
Was not the Lord's meaning plain when He said, "It is enough"? If our warfare were with flesh and blood, would two swords be enough? No — the weapons of our warfare are not weapons of the flesh. He did not mean a material sword to resist the world. He was hinting that the world would draw its sword against them, a warning from the Lord that they would have to meet the world's fiercest hatred. Peter failed to see it, and in the garden he used the sword he had boasted about against the high priest's servant.
They put the question to Christ, yet the blow lands before He speaks. One writer turns that gap into a warning about our own praying:
But the disciples were panic stricken. What could they do? They asked the Lord whether they should use their material weapons for defence. But one of them (Peter) didn't wait for an answer. We too may sometimes pray, then excitedly act without an answer from the Lord.
Peter drew the sword for Jesus. That is what makes it wrong — it treats Him as someone who needs rescuing:
But he has belittled and misrepresented the One he wanted to serve. He must have fallen very low indeed if He needed His disciple's sword to get Him out of such hands as these. If He yields, it is to God, not to man; He yields — to take the cup from the Father's hand. And what should the sword do here? Were not heaven's legions waiting on His will?
The impulse behind the question was genuine affection. Weighed before God, it was still something else:
Peter was self-satisfied and self-confident. He also had a powerful energy of personal love for his Master, and it worked from mixed motives and an unhumbled heart. That is what led him to use the sword and cut off the ear of the high priest's servant. Weighed in God's presence, it was flesh and worldliness. Many of the best among us today have the same thing to confess: zeal without knowledge. The zeal aimed at the right object. But much in us as its defenders was wrong, and so were many of the means and courses we took.
A few hours later that courage collapsed:
But the courage of Peter and the rest was courage of the flesh, and it soon failed them. They all abandoned Him and fled. The Son of God stands in complete contrast to everyone else, even the most distinguished. He, perfectly submissive under the Father's hand; they, hasty and violent.
The stroke had a consequence nobody in the garden foresaw:
They said to Him, "Lord, shall we strike with the sword?" Without waiting for His reply, one of them struck the servant of the high priest. It was Peter who did it. That very action exposed him… When he got into the high priest's hall, the wounded man's relative recognised the man who had used the sword. Possibly Peter thought he was being very devoted, that he was doing a fine thing. What we need is to get the word from the Lord.
What Jesus did next settles the question the disciples asked:
With a word of gentle rebuke to Peter, He stretched out His hand, touched the severed ear and healed it. Before His hardened captors bound those tender hands, their last act was to heal the leader of the men arresting Him… That business was blessing, not judgment. It was healing, not a sword.
The same writer applies it to us. The sword we draw is for ourselves:
How ready we are to draw the sword and slash away when we think someone has wronged us. And we draw it not in imagined defence of the Lord, as Peter did, but in our own defence. A bitter spirit of resentment and retaliation so often rises up in us. How many people we have wounded and harmed by it — people only the Lord's touch can heal.
- Misread. They carried swords because they took the Lord's earlier words literally. Their real warfare was never against flesh and blood.
- Impatient. They asked the right Person the right question. Then they struck before He answered — praying, then acting without a reply.
- Misplaced. Defending Christ with a sword treats Him as though He needed rescuing. Heaven's legions were waiting on His word.
- Exposed. The blow meant to prove Peter's devotion is what identified him in the courtyard. There his courage collapsed.
- Healed. Christ answered "shall we strike?" by touching the wound and mending it. That is the business of blessing, not the sword — the pattern for every wrong we suffer.
And a certain one from among them smote the bondman of the high priest and took off his right ear.
Jesus is arrested at night in Gethsemane, and a crowd comes for Him with weapons. One disciple answers with a sword — and the wound he leaves raises the question of what love should do when its Master is taken.
The disciples had just asked whether they should strike (v. 49). One of them settled the matter before the Lord could reply.
But the disciples were panic-stricken. What could they do? They asked the Lord whether they should use their weapons for defence. But one of them (Peter) didn't wait for an answer. We too may sometimes pray, then rush into action without an answer from the Lord. No doubt he aimed for the man's head, but only cut off his right ear. If the Lord had not been present, this act would likely have started a violent riot.
The man who swung the sword had slept through the hour of prayer. The order of his failures is the lesson.
Such is man — yes, the very best of men! He is self-confident when he ought to be self-distrusting. He sleeps when he ought to be watching. And, we may add, he fights when he ought to be submitting. How out of place a sword was in the company of the meek and lowly Sufferer! Peter was completely out of step with his Master's spirit.
One writer links the stroke to prayer left undone:
If Peter had watched and prayed instead of sleeping, it might have been different. When we fail to pray, we enter into temptation.
One writer weighs the disciple's sword against the Master's grace.
How slow we are to learn grace, or to grasp the unworldly, heavenly nature of Christianity! How slow to learn the differences God has made in the way He deals with people! The law and the sword agreed well together; but grace and the sword do not fit at all. Nature understands the first and is quick to act on it. But the Christian should seek to know the second, and act on that. The disciple acted in law and used the sword; the blessed Master acted in grace and healed the ear of Malchus. How bright the contrast!
The man Peter struck served the high priest, the nation's leading religious figure. One writer asks whose place that servant was filling.
Who was Malchus? He was the servant of the high priest. Is this not remarkable? Was the sound of his master's feet not behind him? It was, though at some distance. It would not have suited the high priest's dignified office to go out at night with that bloodthirsty crowd. They made their way with torches and weapons to dark Gethsemane. No, he stayed behind in his palace. But he sent Malchus to take his place, and Malchus suffered under the stroke of Peter's sword. If the high priest had gone himself, that blow would have fallen on him.
The Lord was not powerless in that moment. Commentators point to what He showed instead.
He could still work miraculously by the Holy Spirit. Indeed, we know from John 18 that He could and did cast them all to the ground by the power of His name. But here we see the witness of His grace to man, even at such a moment, rather than of His own personal majesty. He was about to be rejected and to suffer on the cross.
The one who received that grace had come out to arrest Him.
Elsewhere we read that the Lord touched the ear of the wounded servant and healed him. It was the last miracle of healing the Lord performed before He went to the cross, and the man He healed was an enemy. In the confusion of the hour, Peter's act passed unnoticed.
Peter's blow fell on a man's ear. One writer finds the lasting lesson there.
One case of surgery is left to speak of. It is striking: this one undoes Peter's rash act in cutting off a servant's ear. The act speaks of undue severity — cutting off people's ears instead of opening them. How often our Lord has to undo our poor, blundering use of the sword! A touch is enough here.
- Unwatched. The sword came out of a hand that had slept through the hour of prayer. When we fail to pray, we enter into temptation.
- Unasked. The disciples asked the Lord what to do, but the blow fell before His answer came.
- Unfitting. Loyalty was right; the weapon was wrong. Law and the sword went together; grace and the sword do not.
- Undone. The Lord's touch repaired what zeal had severed — the last healing before the cross, given to an enemy.
- Unhardened. Severity cuts ears off; grace opens them. One touch from the Lord was enough where the sword had only wounded.
And Jesus answering said, Suffer thus far; and having touched his ear, he healed him.
The arrest in the garden has begun, and one of the disciples has already drawn blood. Before His captors bind His hands, Jesus repairs the damage. Two questions follow: what did His brief word mean, and why does Luke alone report this healing of an enemy?
The verse above gives the Lord's brief word as "No more of this!" Older translations read it "Permit even this far." One writer takes it that way — as an appeal to the men seizing Him for room to move His hand.
On His way to the cross, though we know He could have snapped the cords, He asked permission to use His hand. "Permit even this far," He said, and then reached out to heal the servant's ear. How can we divide the human from the divine? May we bow and adore!
All four accounts mention the blow; only Luke mentions the cure. One writer sets the four side by side:
Luke alone, true to his testimony to God's grace, tells us of the Lord's answer, "Permit even this far," and of His touching the ear to heal the wounded man. Matthew alone gives the reproof that warned His servant what it means for saints to fight back in a fleshly way. That fits Matthew's picture of the rejected Messiah who is still the true King of Israel. Mark mentions the fact, but no more. John presents the Lord in unfaltering obedience to His Father, as before in divine power and grace. That fits God's purpose in John's part of the record. Nothing was calmer than His correction of Peter's energy. Nothing was more marked than His submission to the Father's will, whatever it cost.
Peter meant well, but a sword had no place here. One writer sets the disciple's act against the Master's:
How slow we are to learn grace, or to grasp the unworldly, the heavenly nature of Christianity! How slow to learn the differences that God has made in the way He deals with people! The law and the sword agreed well; but grace and the sword are absolutely incompatible. Nature understands the first and acts on it easily. But the Christian should seek to know the second, and act on that. The disciple acted in law, and used the sword; the blessed Master acted in grace, and healed the ear of Malchus. How bright the contrast!
This is the final healing before the cross, and the man who received it was leading the party sent to arrest Him.
With a word of gentle rebuke to Peter, He stretched out His hand and touched the severed ear and healed it. The last act of those tender hands before they were bound by His hardened captors was to heal the leader of them. The boldness of Malchus and the rashness of Peter only gave one more opening for the absolute goodness in Him to show itself — the goodness that would triumph over all evil. "Did you not know that I must be about My Father's business?" Those are the first words recorded from His lips in Luke's Gospel, and Luke alone records the healing of Malchus. That business was blessing and not judgment; it was healing and not a sword.
A severed part of the body was restored in a moment. One writer answers those who call the Lord's miracles merely human:
The writer has often said this. Let so-called divine healers, Christian Scientists, Mormons, Pentecostalists, Roman Catholics at Lourdes, and others prove their claims of divine healing. Let them restore a severed limb in a moment of time, leaving no trace of the operation — even a part as small as an ear. Then he will at once recognise their claims. Malchus' ear is a test case, not yet matched by any of our present-day so-called divine healers.
Malchus returned to his master carrying the evidence on the side of his head.
Thank God that it is written on the page of inspiration, "He touched his ear and healed him" (Luke 22:51). And so for years Malchus may have stood before his master, bearing the visible mark of the healing touch of Jesus. That mark was a witness that could not perish to His love and pity — the love of One who, "when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously." Such displays of His grace win the heart, and make Him dear to it.
- Wound. Peter's zeal was loyal but misdirected. The sword goes with the law, not with grace.
- Word. One writer reads "Permit even this far" as an appeal to His captors for room to act — from One who could have snapped their cords.
- Work. The last miracle before the cross healed the man leading the arrest party: blessing, not judgment.
- Witness. Malchus carried the restored ear as lasting evidence of love shown to a man who came against Him.
- Way. The grace that undid Peter's blow is our pattern. Nature reaches for the sword; the Christian is to learn grace and act on it.
And Jesus said to the chief priests and captains of the temple and elders, who were come against him, Have ye come out as against a robber with swords and sticks?
In the garden, the Lord turns from His disciples and speaks to the men who organised the arrest. He does not protest at His arrest. He exposes the way they came — armed and in force, against a man who had taught them in the open every day.
One name in Luke's list of the arresting party is missing from the other Gospels.
You will notice that "chief priests" belongs to Luke's account alone.
So this was not a squad acting on distant orders. The religious heads of the nation were there in person. The "officers of the temple" were not military men at all:
There was also a "CAPTAIN OF THE TEMPLE." The word means "the leader of an army." It is also used of magistrates. But the captain of the temple had charge not of soldiers, but of the priests and Levites.
Jesus says "robber," not "thief," and the two words do not mean the same thing.
There is a difference between a "thief" and a "robber." A thief may simply take what is not his, but a robber is a thief who uses violence. Such were the "two robbers" crucified with Him, and also Barabbas.
The way they came said more about them than about Him:
They could have taken the Lord any day in the temple, out in the open, for He taught openly and publicly. But they were cowards. They feared the people, and they had no principle at all, so they acted as if they were dealing with a thief. They understood a thief, and they knew how to deal with a thief. But the infinite perfections of Christ were beyond them.
They had free access to Him in the temple, day after day, and never lifted a hand. Luke leaves out the display of power that John records. He gives us a word aimed at the conscience instead.
Luke does not mention the divine power of the Lord Jesus. Speaking His Old Testament name, "I Am," He put His attackers flat on their backs. Only John mentions this (John 18:6). But His calm rebuke to the chief priests, captains and elders in verses 52 and 53 should have burned deeply into their consciences. They had come with weapons of this world, but His daily contact with them in the temple had shown that He never adopted such weapons. The mismatch of their coming in this way only exposed their evil motives.
The swords and clubs were beside the point. He was not captured; He gave Himself.
On one side was a little company with Him, just eleven men, and none of them had ever been trained to fight. On the other side was that great crowd. Resistance would have been impossible. The chief priests were determined to prevent it. But the Lord never meant to resist. He would give Himself up to their will — after, as John describes, He had made them aware of His divine presence. For they went back and fell before Him on the ground. What a sight! Trained fighting men, fully armed for war, and officers of the law used to carrying out their superiors' orders — all on the ground before the Lord. The chief captain, the chief priests and elders, and all their attendants lay in the dust. They had no power to achieve their purpose unless the Lord surrendered Himself.
But men were not the only ones at work here:
God was giving up the Lord Jesus to men before He was forsaken in accomplishing the work of redemption.
Moments earlier Peter had answered swords with a sword. That, too, missed what was happening.
Peter first drew his sword and cut off the ear of Malchus in defence of his Master. But the Lord rebuked him because he was using the wrong weapons. He was resisting evil in a worldly way. He forgot that the Lord's kingdom was not of this world. If it were, His servants would fight as the world fights.
- Who — Luke alone records that the chief priests came in person. The temple captains led priests and Levites, not soldiers. The nation's religious heads did this themselves.
- What — "Robber" means a thief with violence, the class of Barabbas. They came dressed for a criminal, because a criminal was all they knew how to handle.
- When — His question answers itself: they had Him daily in the temple and never touched Him. Their swords exposed a motive the open temple would have shamed.
- Why it failed — Armed men lay in the dust before Him. No one captured Him. He surrendered, and God was giving Him up to men on the way to redemption.
- So what — Peter's sword was as wrong as theirs. Christ's kingdom is not defended by the weapons of this world.
When I was day by day with you in the temple ye did not stretch out your hands against me; but this is your hour and the power of darkness.
Armed men take Jesus at night in a garden, and He turns to the chief priests, temple officers and elders who came for Him. For days He had taught openly in the temple and no one touched Him; now the hour belongs to them, and to darkness.
One writer answers two questions about the phrase: whose hour it is, and when it began.
I think the Lord speaks generally; the actual accomplishment was when He was delivered. But it was seen, so to speak, in the Lord's mind from the supper, and He treats it as already present from the moment Judas went out... "Your hour" is the time in which the priests and scribes were allowed to have their way under the influence of Satan.
Every earlier plot against His life had failed. One writer says why, and what changed in this hour.
He had walked a rough road, but in all His ways God had given His angels charge over Him... Though His enemies hated Him bitterly, they could not hurt Him. They led Him to the edge of the rock on which their city was built. They meant to throw Him down into the depths below. But He passed through the middle of them and went on His way unharmed. The very stones they picked up to throw at Him stuck to their murderous hands while He "passed by." No malice, whether of men or devils, could break through that unseen circle of angels. But for this terrible hour that protection was taken away.
Their weapons did not match the man they came for. One writer says what that mismatch revealed.
They had come with human weapons. But His daily contact with them in the temple had shown that He never used such weapons. The strangeness of their coming this way only exposed their evil motives. "But," He added, "this is your hour and the power of darkness" (v. 53). In their brief hour they were allowed to pour out all their hatred against Him and against God, as the willing tools of satanic power.
This hour is a turning point. One writer draws a careful line inside it, between what men did to Him and what He did willingly.
Now, though it served to bring about the work of atonement, the delivering of the Son of Man into the hands of men was not atonement. The hour of the priests and scribes was the hour of the power of darkness. Before that, when the crowd wanted to throw Him down from the brow of the hill, He passed through the middle of them and went His way. No doubt He gave Himself up. John shows this side of the wonderful picture. He describes the band of men going backward and falling to the ground, and records the unspeakably precious words of the blessed Lord — "If you seek me, let these men go."
The hour looked like a win for the enemy. One writer shows how it ended the other way round.
The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ was seemingly Satan's triumph; it was "Your hour and the power of darkness" (Luke 22:53). But a lie can never finally triumph over the truth, nor the liar over Him who is the Truth. Satan's malice went too far and defeated itself. His unspeakable rebellion against God, into which he had drawn the human race, met its doom in the very act that seemed to secure the world for him.
Their hour was short. One writer sets it beside the day when Christ comes back.
When the Lord Jesus in His humiliation was led as a lamb to the slaughter, He said to His enemies, "This is your hour, and the power of darkness" (Luke 22:53). But the tables are to be completely turned. He comes not in humiliation, but in glory. He comes not as a lamb to the slaughter, but as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. He comes not alone, but "with ten thousands of His saints." He comes not to submit to the will of His enemies, but so that His enemies may be made His footstool. It is not man's little hour and the short-lived triumph of evil; it is the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
- Their hour, granted. For a set time the priests and scribes were allowed their way, under Satan's influence.
- Their hour, because His guard lifted. Earlier plots failed; for this hour the protection around Him was taken away.
- Their hour, exposed. Swords and clubs made no sense against a man who taught daily in the temple. Their weapons gave them away.
- Their hour, entered willingly. He gave Himself up. Handing Him over to men served the work of atonement, but was not the atonement.
- Their hour, overturned. The apparent victory of darkness met its doom in the very act. Man's little hour gives way to the day of the Lord.