Why did Jesus choose Peter, James, and John to be His inner circle?

But now the parting time had come, if He was to fulfill the will of God. They follow Him to Gethsemane; they had often done so before, for Jesus ofttimes resorted thither with His disciples, and in the past they had watched with Him in the silence of the night beneath those olive trees while He held communion with His Father. But now it was different, and He says to them: "Sit ye here, while I go and pray YONDER." Who can tell what that "yonder" meant to Him? He was about to enter the great conflict, and He "looked for comforters," and as Peter and the sons of Zebedee entered more fully into His thoughts than the other disciples, He takes them with Him. Surely these three could give Him what He longed for, and watch with Him through that terrible hour! But He must leave them, also. "He says to them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful even to death; tarry ye here and watch with Me." AND HE WENT A LITTLE FARTHER, or, as we read in Luke's record, "He was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast." In Matthew's Gospel, Emmanuel is the King, and it was the prerogative of David's royal Son to act in His own right, so there "He went." In Luke's record, He is the obedient and dependent Man, filled and anointed by the Spirit to do His Father's business; hence there He is "withdrawn from them" by the Father's will and the Spirit's power. His own voluntary act was in absolute unison with the Father's will and the Spirit's leading.

On the other hand, among the twelve disciples there were three that had a place of special intimacy with the Lord – Peter, James and John. These three were the only ones allowed to be present when the Lord raised Jairus’ daughter, which already sheds light on the relationship that these disciples had with the Lord Jesus. They were also the only three disciples that went up the Mount of Transfiguration with the Lord where they were given an image of the millennium, the glorification of the Lord where Peter uttered those memorable words, “Lord, it is good we should be here. If thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles: for thee one, and for Moses one, and one for Elias” (Matt. 17:4). Then thirdly in one of the most grievous moments of the life of the Lord Jesus, those three were the only ones allowed to accompany Him into the Garden of Gethsemane where He was in a great agony anticipating the work that He should accomplish.

It is far from intimating that one is more interested than another in the grace or salvation of God, or loved with a more faithful and enduring love. But it does intimate that there may be a more personal attachment between the Master and some of His disciples than between Him and others. All, I may say, sat at supper with Him, while only one leaned then on His bosom. All continued with Him in His temptations, and are to receive the kingdom together, but only three were in the garden or on the holy hill with Him. For there is more personal oneness of thought and feeling in some than in others, more of that which, as among ourselves, draws the willing heart along.

If I look at a brother whose way savours much of that which I know Jesus must delight in, being meek, and self-renouncing, and unaffectedly humble, and withal devoted and unworldly, I may remember John, and see that disciple whom Jesus loved reflected in my brother. But then, how happy is it to remember that John himself was but one of a company whom the same Jesus had chosen and called, and bound to Himself for ever! Did John exclude Thomas or Bartholomew? Thomas and Bartholomew, in the great evangelical sense, were as much to Christ as John. The one was not a whit more accepted man than the other.

“Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.” What infinite grace and tenderness lie in the Holy Spirit of God! Who that has read the Gospels would not have expected to find Mary the first mentioned here? Martha is not always in the attitude most approved of by the Lord, and therefore one might have expected Mary to be more prominent in the mind of the Spirit, for her ways are highly approved of. But in thus judging we might find ourselves greatly in error. John lay on the breast of the Lord at supper, and speaks of himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved. But this does not warrant us in thinking that our Lord loved John more than He loved Peter, Matthew, Thomas, or any of the others. Not one of them merited one single look of love from the Holy Saviour. The love which He lavished on them was all grace. Not one of them would ever have chosen to follow His blessed footsteps had there not been the drawing of the Father. He says: “Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you.” They were all the gift of the Father to Him, and by Him all were equally appreciated and loved. It may be that some of them were more devoted to Him than were others, and therefore had more insight into His sorrows and His joys. James, Peter and John seem to have been more privileged than others in this way, but we have no reason to assume that they were more loved. “As My Father has loved Me, so have I loved you,” and this is said to all of them. Martha seems to have been ever occupied with serving in temporal things, while Mary occupied herself with the Lord, perhaps realizing some little of the downstooping of His grace, that brought Him here not to be ministered unto, but to minister.

This loud talk however is silenced when they come to Gethsemane. Leaving the other disciples to wait, He lakes with Him Peter, James and John. They who had witnessed the glory of His transfiguration (Mt.17:1-8) must also witness the contrasting agony of His soul in view of the greater agony of the cross. For He tells them His soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death, and asks that they watch. Why did His unusual words not have more serious effect upon them? Did they not realize this was no ordinary occasion?

But while isolating Himself for prayer, He takes three of His disciples with Him, that in this solemn moment they may watch with Him. They were the same three who were with Him during the transfiguration. They were to see His glory in the kingdom, and His sufferings. He goes a little way beyond them. As for them, they fall asleep, as they did on the mount of transfiguration. The scene here is described in Hebrews 5:7. Jesus was not yet drinking the cup, but it was before His eyes. On the cross He drank it, made sin for us, His soul feeling itself forsaken of Him. Here it is the power of Satan, using death as a terror with which to overwhelm Him. But the consideration of this subject will be more in place when we come to Luke's Gospel.

The next scene, in the garden, equally perfect in its display of Jesus, and most humbling in its exhibition of the choicest of the apostles, shows us the picture, not of holy calm in the full knowledge of all that awaited Himself and His disciples, but of anguish to the uttermost, and of death realized in all its horrors as before God (vers. 36-46). What an insight Gethsemane gives us of Him, Jehovah-Messiah though He was, as the Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief! Who ever saw affliction as He? Not only had Jesus to know the depths of the cross in atonement as none other could; bow His head under the full, unsparing judgment of God when made sin for us; but He underwent beyond all others the anticipative pressure of death on His soul as the power of Satan, feeling it perfectly, and the more deeply by taking it from His Father's and not from the enemy's hand. It was the "strong crying and tears" to His Father now, as afterward to God as such when it was a question of actual sin-bearing on the tree. "And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith He unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with Me" (vers. 37, 38). When the cross came, there was no such call to disciples to watch with Him. He was alone, absolutely, essentially, for us — that is, for our sins — with none of men or angels in any way or measure near Him (morally speaking) — alone, when God forsook and hid His face from Him on whose head met all our iniquities. Here, in Gethsemane, it was pleading as a Son with His Father, when "He went a little farther, and fell on His face [prostrate in His earnestness], and prayed, saying, O My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me: nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt" (ver. 39). He watched, and prayed, and entered not into temptation, though tempted to the uttermost. But He finds the disciples asleep: they could not watch with Him one hour. "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak"; and so it was again and again with them, till He bade them sleep, but warned them that the hour was at hand, as the traitor drew near.

Gethsemane was now reached, and, leaving the body of the disciples to pray, He takes the three who had been the witnesses of His glory on the Holy Mount to be with Him; and we are allowed to know that what was before Him was pressing on His spirit. "He began to be sorrowful and sore troubled," and spoke of it to them, asking them to watch with Him. But none of them could enter into the character of that sorrow. He leaves them and presents it before the Father, the only One who could, in the communion in which He ever walked with Him. It would be there, all the immensity of it would be known in the soul; in His very perfection He shrinks from the cup of Divine Judgment due to sin, but gives Himself up in perfect obedience to drink it. The poor disciples who slept in presence of His glory, do so now in presence of His suffering, and He warns them, "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation," the way to go through it when it comes, in distrust of self and dependence upon God, of which spirit Peter illustrates the opposite. The spirit was willing, as in his case indeed, but the flesh is weak, and he had not learned this. But "That ye may not enter into" seems to go further than a distrust of self that leads me to pray that I may not be exposed to the circumstances that test me. "Lead us not into temptation" would be more simply this. Is it that the spirit of watchfulness and dependence would be itself the preservative, and the circumstances would not become temptation? (Note that the latter clause of verse 41 is before the Spirit was given: now the same allowance can hardly be made for us.) The perfect expression of it all is found in the blessed Lord; absolute dependence in confidence and perfect obedience maintained in communion with His Father when the crucial test had come. "If this cup cannot pass away unless I drink it, thy will be done."

But let us reverently dwell upon the sorrows of that blessed Man, conscious however of our human limitations. The three disciples who were privileged to be with Him and witness His kingdom glory upon the mount of transfiguration and hear the Father’s voice declaring His delight in His blessed Son, are now taken aside that they may watch with Him. We read, “He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s cast,” but how infinite was the distance morally! Indeed who could enter into the meaning of the conflict, as Satan pressed upon His holy soul what it would mean to come in contact with that which He abhorred—sin in all its hideousness and heinousness in the sight of God?

Taking with Him the three disciples who had stood with Him at the bedside of Jairus's daughter and there witnessed His power — who had followed Him to the Holy Mount, and there witnessed His glory, He went a little farther, and, counting upon their human sympathy, said unto them, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here and watch with me." Alas, they prove as unsympathetic towards His sufferings as before, they had been irresponsive to His glory. Just here the secret of all the failure comes out. A prayerless life is a powerless life. There can be no standing for God, where there is no dependence upon God; and if there be no going forward in the Christian life there is certain to be failure and backsliding. So Peter found to his cost. At the close of the chapter he gets his own moral weakness disclosed to himself, by the One who alone could restore, strengthen, and forgive. Peter is seen (verse 33) self-confident, (verse 40) sleeping, (verse 51) rash, (verse 56) cowardly, (verse 70) bold in denying his Master. Inside the high priest's house there was the good confession of the Master; outside there is the thrice-repeated bold denial of the disciple — "I know not the man."