And having sung a hymn, they went out to the mount of Olives.
One line stands between the upper room and the garden: they sang before they went out. Commentators dwell on who was singing, what that song said, and where the walk led.
The hymn was not chosen at random. Its words were about Him.
Singing a hymn at the Passover feast has been and still is the custom of the Jews. The hymn they sang was Psalms 115, 116, 117 and 118, which the Jewish ritual calls the great Hallel. With what emotion of soul He must have sung them with His disciples! These Psalms contain such full messianic predictions. "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone... Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD." These words come at the close of that hymn. The disciples sang them as devout Jews had so often done before, but for Him it meant so much. A little while longer, just a few hours, and the builders would reject Him. A few days more, and by resurrection from the dead He would be the cornerstone, the chief stone. In that shout, "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD," He saw a welcome far in the future from the remnant of His people, at the time of His Second Coming.
after-note: none
One line near the end of that same psalm matched what He was walking out to do.
For the disciples it was just the customary thing, no doubt; but what must it have been for the Lord? He sang as He went out to fulfil what the Passover pictured, by becoming the sacrifice. And Psalm 118, towards the end, speaks of binding "the festal sacrifice with cords, up to the horns of the altar." He went out to suffering and death, bound by the cords of His love; and the disciples to failure, defeat and scattering.
Two things sit side by side here, and neither alone would surprise us.
The two things are so remarkable. We could understand better His singing a hymn and staying in the upper room, or going out without singing. But He sang a hymn as He went out to meet His enemies, the betrayal, the denial, the agony of Gethsemane, and the forsaking of the cross. That shows a calmness of spirit. It surely came from having the Father's will in view, and from the joy set before Him beyond the cross.
He did not just sing along. He led. One writer sets that singing beside Israel's song at the Red Sea.
What a song in that night! Was there ever singing like this? At the Red Sea, from the shore of safety, the joyful song of redemption went up to God... A wonderful choir of praise, sung by countless grateful voices! But what is all this compared to the praise that went up to God from that upper room, sung by those twelve voices? It was not Moses, the servant of God, who began that hymn. It was Christ Himself, the Son over His own house — the Deliverer of His people of old, the very One to whom Israel sang that song of redemption at the Red Sea! He Himself leads the song of praise to His little band.
That leading did not end with that night. It is what He still does whenever His people gather.
"In the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise" (v. 12). We ought to feel, each time we meet as an assembly, that Christ is there, and leads the praise. Think what it is that Christ should be there, raising the song, so to speak! It is a wonderful thing, the way He presently holds us as identified with Himself.
They had every reason to be too heavy-hearted to sing. They sang anyway.
That evening, if ever, shared sorrow might have outweighed shared joy at the remembrance of shelter from God's judgment by blood. But instead, before they left the upper room, they sang together to God. That is a hint for us. No sorrow of any kind is to override the heart's joy which flows from the remembrance of redemption... We must not let troubles and sorrows, personal or otherwise, outweigh the shared joy when we meet to proclaim the Lord's death.
The destination has its own history: back to a rejected king, forward to a returning one.
David, in the time of his rejection, "went up the ascent of the Mount of Olives, weeping as he went" (2 Sam. 15:30). That sad and solemn event foretold the rejection of the Lord Jesus, who, having sung a hymn with His disciples, "went out to the Mount of Olives." Gethsemane was there. Looking ahead to all that lay before Him, the Son of God prayed that the cup might pass from Him, if it was the Father's will... It was from the Mount of Olives that Jesus ascended to heaven (Acts 1:12). When He returns, He will stand with His feet on that same mountain (Zech. 14:4).
The singing of that night was not the last.
Sweet thought! The Lord's voice will yet be heard singing His song again among His brothers, singing the song of praise to God, as it was sung so often here on earth.
- The song — the hymn was the Hallel, Psalms 115–118, sung at the close of the Passover. Its words spoke of the rejected stone becoming the cornerstone, and of the sacrifice bound to the altar.
- The Singer — not Moses but Christ Himself began the song, hours before the cross, with the joy beyond it in view.
- The walk — He sang on the way out to betrayal, denial and Gethsemane, up the same hill that rejected David climbed weeping.
- The lesson — no sorrow should drown out the joy of remembering redemption when believers gather.
- The echo — that same voice will yet sing the song again among His own.
Then saith Jesus to them, All *ye* shall be offended in me during this night. For it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad.
The last hymn is sung, and on the walk out to the Mount of Olives Jesus tells eleven men that they will all fall away that very night. He backs it with Zechariah, and two hard questions follow: why does God say "I will strike" of His own Shepherd, and why does that blow scatter the sheep?
Jesus does not stumble into the night. He announces it in advance, and points to Scripture.
He revealed what was before them. He refers to a Scripture in Zechariah. They were His sheep and He was the Shepherd. In the Gospel of John He speaks of Himself that way — the good shepherd, who gives His life for the sheep. But what would it mean for the Shepherd to be struck, the One whom that prophecy of Zechariah calls the fellow of God (Zech. 13:7)? The cry of the forsaken One on the cross gives us the answer. He knew all that was before Him... And again we notice His calmness, His dignity through all this, which to a mere man would have been an almost unbearable ordeal.
In the quotation God says, "I will strike." One writer shows what that word means everywhere else in Scripture.
In Scripture, "smiting" is a term describing an act of divine judgment. Jehovah struck the rebellious and idolatrous land of Egypt by the death of their firstborn. We also know that He struck the Good Shepherd of the sheep. How marvellous that divine wrath fell on the Lord Jesus, and that with His stripes we are healed!
Another writer feels the shock of it:
What a scene of horror! God's Shepherd, the only One who had a right to this title, who answered to everything needed for this blessed work, had to endure God's judgment!
Does the striking here simply mean the atonement? One writer answers by asking what the atonement actually does to the sheep.
The cross has its side of shame and pain and danger for us, as well as of salvation through Him who bore our sins there. But here it is the way it would test them, not deliver them, that the Saviour speaks of. Does that mighty work of suffering for our sins, does the Atonement, "scatter" the sheep? Is it not, on the contrary, the only righteous foundation on which they are gathered?... But the striking of the Shepherd expresses His utter humiliation as Messiah, cut off and having nothing.
The prediction came true within hours, and then kept coming true on a national scale.
First, the sheep are scattered. This came true on the night He was arrested. All His disciples, who had acknowledged Him as the Shepherd of Israel, left Him and fled. And in another way, we cannot doubt, it has come true in the scattering of the Jews over the face of the whole earth... He came to gather His sheep. But as a people they refused to listen to the voice of the Good Shepherd. So when He was struck, God in His government, and as judge, "scattered" the flock.
Jesus stopped the citation halfway. Zechariah's next line speaks of God's hand on "the little ones."
The Lord did not quote the last part of this verse, nor the beginning of it: "Awake, O sword, against my Shepherd, against the man that is my fellow, says the LORD of hosts." That is God's estimate of Him whom man valued at thirty pieces of silver... "And I will turn my hand upon the little ones." What a sweet thought it must have been to the Lord's heart, that if He was struck, God would turn His hand upon the little ones. If wrath came on Him and the sheep were scattered, there was that drop of sweetness at the bottom of the cup... God's hand turned on the little ones — not one of them ever lost.
The warning had an aim beyond information. It was preparing men to stop trusting themselves.
With indescribable grace the Lord tells them of the trial that would come on them that very night and shake them all. It would happen just as the written Word said... The flesh had shown itself and its worth in the "goodly price" it set on Jesus. It was also going to show the value of its self-confidence and its boasted courage on His behalf... So in the end the trials would confirm their faith and deepen their distrust of self, making Christ their all in everything.
- Written — Jesus knew it all in advance. He points to Zechariah's prophecy, and faces the night with calm.
- Struck — the hand raised against the Shepherd is God's own. In Scripture, "smiting" means divine judgment, and here it falls on the Man God calls His fellow.
- Scattered — the blow scattered the eleven that night, and the nation across the earth. Atonement gathers sheep; the cutting off of the Messiah scatters them.
- Sheltered — the line Jesus left unquoted holds the comfort. God turns His hand on the little ones, and not one is lost.
- Schooled — the warning was grace. It would confirm their faith, break their self-confidence, and make Christ their all.