Now I would like you
to turn to
Luke 22:14. "And when the hour was come, he sat down,
and the twelve apostles with him.
15 And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat
this passover with you before I suffer:
16 For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until
it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God.
18 For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the
vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.”
I guess it was with
mixed feelings that Jesus came to the crucial hour of his
ministry. He well knew that in just a few hours He would be
betrayed into the hands of the murderous mob.
God Spares Us from the Knowledge of Tomorrow
Mercifully God spares
us from the knowledge of what is to happen tomorrow. There are
some who say that the worst thing is the uncertainty of
tomorrow. But if you knew that tomorrow you would die a most
agonizing death, suffering terrible pain, would that help you?
No, as I have already stated,
mercifully God spares us from the knowledge of what is to
happen tomorrow.
But Jesus knew what
tomorrow was to bring and yet He gave thanks. He knew that
tomorrow His back was to be lacerated with those cruel thongs;
that the cruel crown of thorns was to be forced on His
forehead; the nails were to be driven into His hands and His
feet; that He would be spat upon, mocked and derided by the
cruel Pharisees; tormented by a terrible thirst. But worse
than any physical torture there would be that terrible hour of
separation from His Father as He carried the burden of sin
alone. His death was no ordinary death. It wasn’t like yours
or mine; for He had the burden of a lost world hanging in the
balance.
How Jesus Felt the Night Before
And yet He was able to
say in
verse 15. "And he said unto them, With desire I
have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer: “
I wonder if we will
ever understand just how Jesus felt at this time. One hardly
comes to the final hours of their life and says I have greatly
desired this time to come. To my way of thinking it was the
most undesirable hour of all. The atmosphere at that final
meeting was hardly conducive to happy fellowship.
Jesus was well
aware of the fact that there was strife and wrangling among
His disciples; that Judas was ready to betray Him to his
enemies.
Were the Disciples Ashamed in Retrospect?
As I thought carefully
about that meeting, I wonder if those disciples were not
ashamed of themselves as they thought back to that meeting and
of their attitude at that time.
Have you ever been
ashamed of how you have acted and how you spoke on some
occasion? Most of us have had that kind of experience. When a
person dies, someone you have known real well, have you had
regrets for the way you have acted towards that person. I
think all of us perhaps have had this experience.
Verse 15 says, "And He said unto them, with desire I
have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer.”
There was no pleasure
in the actual feast, not with the way things were among those
disciples. But Jesus looked past the immediate, for I believe
that the eighteenth verse reveals why He made that statement.
18th verse says, "I will not drink of the fruit of
the vine, until the kingdom of God shall
come."
The Disciples' Lack of Understanding
