1 When Jesus had spoken these words, He went out with His disciples across the brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which He and His disciples entered. 2 Now Judas, who betrayed Him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with His disciples. 3 So Judas, having procured a band of soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went there with lanterns and torches and weapons. 4 Then Jesus, knowing all that would happen to Him, came forward and said to them, “Whom do you seek?” 5 They answered Him, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus said to them, “I am He.” Judas, who betrayed Him, was standing with them. 6 When Jesus said to them, “I am He,” they drew back and fell to the ground. 7 So He asked them again, “Whom do you seek?” And they said, “Jesus of Nazareth.” 8 Jesus answered, “I told you that I am He. So, if you seek me, let these men go.” 9 This was to fulfill the word that He had spoken: “Of those whom you gave me I have lost not one.” 10 Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant and cut off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.) 11 So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
Chapter 18 begins the final section of John’s Gospel, as he takes us through Jesus’ arrest at Gethsemane, His appearances before the high priest and Pilate, His death by crucifixion, His resurrection, and His post-resurrection appearances.
In the opening scene of John 18, Jesus crosses the Kidron Valley into Gethsemane, where He is arrested. What is important for us to bear in mind, particularly in the events leading up to His death, is that Jesus not only embraces what is about to happen, but He is the one who orchestrates it all. He said in John 10:17-18, “For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.”
One of the first things we notice is that John’s account of these events is quite different to the synoptic Gospels - Matthew, Mark and Luke. John makes no mention of Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane, Judas’ betrayal with a kiss, Simon of Cyrene, who helped carry His cross, the confession of the thief crucified with Jesus, and most of Jesus’ anguished cries while on the cross.
On the other hand, John gives many other details which are not recorded in the other Gospels, like Jesus’ dramatic encounter with the soldiers who came to arrest Him (which we’re looking at this morning), His conversations with the high priest and Pilate, the piercing of Jesus’ side, and John names Nicodemus as one of the followers of Jesus who helped Joseph of Arimathea remove Jesus’ body from the cross and placed it in the tomb.
Why are there these differences? Firstly, John’s account agrees with the main points of the other Gospel writers, but he does point out other details. This is consistent with how different eyewitnesses recall the same event.
Secondly, John wrote his Gospel some 20 or 30 years after the other three, so it is reasonable to assume that John assumes we already know about some of the details he leaves out, while at the same time he tells us about some of the details not recorded in Matthew, Mark and Luke.
More importantly, as is consistent with the central message of John’s Gospel, he stresses that Jesus was not an innocent victim of circumstance over which He had no control. Jesus acted in obedience to the Father’s will and sovereignly orchestrated not only the events leading up to His death, but even His death itself. When John records Jesus crying, “It is finished” in 19:30, he was referring to the completion of a carefully arranged and eternal plan, not to an unavoidable tragedy.
It must be said though, that the execution of Jesus was a tragedy in the sense that He was unjustly arrested and tried by an illegal court. From a purely human perspective, the arrest, trial and execution of Jesus Christ was a terrible travesty of justice, but the message that John conveys to his readers, is the hope of the Gospel, the good news of the ultimate triumph of good over evil. Not only is the tragedy of the cross followed by triumph, but the cross itself is the triumph.
The scene we are looking at today is Jesus’ arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane. Both Matthew’s and Mark’s accounts go into greater detail by recording Jesus’ prayer in the garden, but John also makes the point that it was in the garden where Jesus surrendered Himself to the authorities. Now there was no turning back, as it was here where everything was set in motion. The fact that the work of redemption began in a garden is no coincidence. As our Saviour enters the garden to redeem His people from sin, we remember that it was in another garden where we fell into sin.
So there is a remarkable contrast between the two, if you think about it. We’re told that Jesus often went to Gethsemane where He spent time in prayer with God, while in the Garden of Eden, instead of seeking out God, Adam and Eve talked to Satan, and tried to hide away from God. In Eden, Adam fell in defeat, but in Gethsemane, Jesus conquered sin.
John tells us in verse 2, “Judas, who betrayed Him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with His disciples.” This is an important detail which is easy to miss. Had Jesus wanted to avoid being arrested, the Garden of Gethsemane would be the last place He would go to that night. Instead, He went to the very place where Judas would probably start looking for Him. Jesus was not avoiding arrest. He actually went out of His way to make it easy for those who came to arrest Him.
We come to another important detail in verse 3. “Judas, having procured a band of soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went there with lanterns and torches and weapons.” Firstly, the fact that Roman troops were there as well as the Jewish authorities means that the Jews had already approached the Romans. Remember, this was just before the Passover, a time when Jewish nationalism and emotions ran high, because they were under Roman oppression. During the Passover, there would have been extra troops sent to Jerusalem, because the Romans would swiftly suppress any uprising, so it would seem they were expecting some armed resistance from Jesus and or His followers.
Also, the number of troops was significant. The ESV translation speaks of a band of soldiers. Other English translations use a cohort or a detachment, which was was one-tenth of a legion. A legion consisted of 5000 to 6000 soldiers, so when Judas arrived with the temple guards, he had at least 500 Roman soldiers with him, so the Jewish authorities were taking no chances. It’s also quite ironic that it was both Jews and Gentiles who worked together, something rarely seen in those days, to arrest the Saviour of the world. And they brought their own lanterns and torches to apprehend the Light of the World…
The question is often asked why it was necessary for Judas to betray Jesus. The easy answer is that the authorities needed Judas to find Jesus, as they weren’t expecting Him to be found so easily. As it turned out, they couldn’t have wished for Jesus’ arrest to have been any easier. They were prepared for a long and difficult search, and possibly even armed resistance, so they must have been caught completely off guard when Jesus surrendered Himself so willingly. Peter, when he tried to take matters into his own hands was very quickly and firmly told by Jesus to put his sword back into its sheath.
But they didn’t only fear an uprising from Jesus’ followers. The Jewish authorities feared Jesus Himself. Just days earlier, on Palm Sunday, as Jesus rode into Jerusalem, the crowd of people, had they had their way, would’ve anointed Him as the king. John 12:13 says, “They took branches of palm trees and went out to meet Him, crying out, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!’”
So the Pharisees had not ruled out the possibility of Jesus making some kind of bid for the throne, and they were well aware of His well-documented supernatural power. Just before Palm Sunday, Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead. If He could do that, then taking the throne by force or resisting arrest had He wanted to would have been easy.
This explains why they not only arrived in the garden with a huge show of force, but why they fast-tracked everything they needed to secure a guilty verdict. When Judas approached the chief priests and told them he could lead them to a quiet place where Jesus could be arrested, they acted immediately, and broke whatever rules they deemed necessary to get what they wanted. Jewish law stipulated that capital cases had to be tried during the day, but they rushed everything through that night.
The sooner they could get rid of Jesus, the better.
Time was of the essence. The Passover began at sunset the next day, less than 24 hours away, so they immediately arranged for Jesus’ arrest and convened the Sanhedrin, the council of Jewish elders. The Sanhedrin decided that Jesus should be executed, but Pilate, as the Roman governor had to approve their decision, so they met that same night so that early in the morning they could meet with Pilate to convince him to approve the sentence of death.
All of this had to happen as a matter of urgency. They couldn’t afford to wait until after the Passover, because that would’ve given Jesus the extra time He might need to either take the throne as the people wanted, or even to just escape His arrest. By showing up suddenly in the Garden of Gethsemane, they mistakenly thought they had the element of surprise on their side, but nothing catches God by surprise. Jesus knew exactly what was happening, and in obedience to the will of the Father, He calmly waited for them to arrive.
John writes in verses 4 and 5, “Then Jesus, knowing all that would happen to Him, came forward and said to them, ‘Whom do you seek?’ The soldiers answered, ‘Jesus of Nazareth.’ Jesus replied, ‘I am He.’
The Roman army was the most powerful military force in the world. These were battle hardened soldiers who had conquered far and wide, but as Jesus declared “I am He”, encapsulating the seven great “I am” declarations which John has previously taught in his Gospel, the soldiers “drew back and fell to the ground.” This was God Himself in human form, who by merely speaking with the same authority and power that brought creation itself into existence, renders a powerful army completely ineffective.
Psalm 76:6-7 says, “At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both rider and horse lay stunned. But you, you are to be feared! Who can stand before you when once your anger is roused?” The answer is, no one.
Just as God spoke to Moses with divine authority from the burning bush, “I am who I am,” in Exodus 3:14, here He speaks with the same authority to the most powerful army in the world, and they have no defence against Him.
The Scottish minister and Bible commentator Alexander Maclaren wrote, “I am inclined to think that here, there was for a moment a little rending of the veil of His flesh, and an emission of some flash of the brightness that always tabernacled within Him; and that was enough to prostrate with a strange awe even those rude and insensitive men. When He said, ‘I am He,’ there was something that made them feel, ‘This is One before whom violence cowers abashed, and in whose presence impurity has to hide its face.’”
In Graham Kendrick’s hymn we sing, “From heaven you came, helpless babe, entered our world, your glory veiled.” The Son of God came in human form, His glory veiled, but every now and then in the Gospel accounts, we are given glimpses of the power and glory of Christ, most notably in His miracles which left no doubt as to just who this man is. Here, in the Garden of Gethsemane, the Roman soldiers were given a glimpse of His glory, and they fell before His divine presence in sheer terror.
Just this episode alone should serve as a warning to those who openly ridicule and blaspheme the name of Jesus Christ. When you look at what the world says about Him, mocking His holy name at every opportunity, you have to think, do these people have any idea just who this is they’re messing with? James 2:19 says, “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe - and shudder!”
In Mark 1 Jesus delivered a man possessed by a demon. The demon knew exactly who Jesus was: “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are - the Holy One of God.” (Mark 1:24)
It’s been said that even Satan and his demons know who God is. It is only human beings who are arrogant and stupid enough to deny the existence of God…
Paul wrote in Philippians 2:7-11 that Jesus “emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
The point that John is making by describing the reaction of the Roman soldiers is, if this was the power Jesus had when being arrested as a common criminal, how awesome and terrifying will His display of power be when He returns in His glory?
Revelation 6:14-17 gives us the answer. “The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?’”
If you have yet to turn to Jesus Christ, accepting His gracious offer of forgiveness of your sin, you need to know just who it is you are refusing to bow the knee to, and the eternal consequences of your refusal to do so.
The 19th century German theologian Friedrich Krummacher wrote of the Roman soldiers in John 18, “Their prostration in the dust before Him points out to unbelievers the situation in which they will one day be found. The homage which they refused to Jesus here below, He will in due time compel them to render Him. The knee that would not bow to Him in voluntary affection, will at length be constrained to do so by the horrors of despair.”
On the other hand, if you have already trusted in Jesus Christ for your salvation, this episode promises tremendous comfort and hope. We don’t need to be reminded of the darkness and evil we see in the world, and how our faith in Christ is threatened on a daily basis, but we take comfort from what we read in verses 7 and 8. “He asked them again, ‘Whom do you seek?’ And they said, ‘Jesus of Nazareth.’ Jesus answered, ‘I told you that I am He. So, if you seek me, let these men go.’”
“These men” He referred to in verse 8 were His disciples, those who were with Him that night. It is highly likely that Jesus’ disciples were also in danger of being arrested. In Mark’s account of the arrest of Jesus he wrote, “Jesus said to them, ‘Have you come out as against a robber, with swords and clubs to capture me? Day after day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize me. But let the Scriptures be fulfilled.’ And they all left Him and fled. And a young man followed Him, with nothing but a linen cloth about his body. And they seized him, but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked.” (Mark 14:48-52)
So it seems that the soldiers wanted to arrest Jesus’ disciples too, which is why some commentators believe that Jesus’ supernatural confrontation with the soldiers was for the purpose of making them obey His command to leave them alone and let them go.
Just as Jesus protected His disciples from arrest, and possibly also their executions too, so He protects us from the condemnation our sin has brought upon us. John Calvin wrote, “Here we see how the Son of God not only submits to death of His own accord, that by His obedience He may blot out our transgressions, but also how He discharges the office of a good Shepherd in protecting His flock.”
Calvin links this directly to what John wrote in verse 9. “This was to fulfill the word that He had spoken: ‘Of those whom you gave me I have lost not one.’”
The New Testament stresses this wonderful truth many times. Jesus has promised to seal and preserve the salvation of all who come to Him in true faith. Just a few examples are Hebrews 7:25, “He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
2 Timothy 2:12, Christ “is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me.”
Peter wrote that Christians “by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1 Peter 1:5)
And Philippians 1:6 promises that “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
The message of hope to us is that our salvation does not depend on the strength of our faith, which is just as well. Rather, it depends entirely on the faithful promises of God to us, that Christ holds us, and He will not let us go. This is why the cross was so necessary. Had Jesus not offered His life as an atoning sacrifice for us, we would have no hope of salvation. Without Christ, we would be lost and condemned forever, which is what He spoke about when telling Peter to put away his sword after cutting off Malchus’ ear. “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?” (John 18:11)
The cup He spoke about here is the cup of God’s judgment and wrath, a figure of speech which is used many times in the Old Testament, as it contrasts the cup of judgment with the cup of blessing.
When Jesus referred to the cup of wrath, He meant that every person who has ever lived will drink from one of the two cups that God has poured, and we are reminded of that this morning at the Communion table.
If you turn to Christ for your salvation, you will enjoy the cup of blessing forever. As David wrote in Psalm 23:5: “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.”
But reject the salvation that Jesus offers you, and you will drink the cup of God’s judgment on your sins. Psalm 75:8 says, “In the hand of the Lord there is a cup with foaming wine, well mixed, and He pours out from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall drain it down to the dregs.”
The choice is yours: You either drink from the cup of Psalm 23 or the cup of Psalm 75.
This is why the cross was so necessary. Had Jesus not submitted to the will of the Father, we would be lost forever. Again, not only is the tragedy of the cross followed by triumph, but the cross itself is the triumph.
We close with the words of A. W. Pink, who summarises the words of John 18:1-11 so well. “The entrance of Christ into the Garden at once reminds us of Eden. The contrasts between them are indeed most striking. In Eden, all was delightful; in Gethsemane, all was terrible. In Eden, Adam and Eve parleyed with Satan; in Gethsemane, the last Adam sought the face of His Father. In Eden, Adam sinned; in Gethsemane, the Saviour suffered. In Eden, Adam fell; in Gethsemane, the Redeemer conquered. The conflict in Eden took place by day; the conflict in Gethsemane was waged at night. In the one, Adam fell before Satan; in the other, the soldiers fell before Christ. In Eden the race was lost; in Gethsemane Christ announced, ‘Of them whom thou gavest me have I lost none.’ In Eden, Adam took the fruit from Eve’s hand; in Gethsemane, Christ received the cup from His Father’s hand. In Eden, Adam hid himself; in Gethsemane, Christ boldly showed Himself. In Eden, God sought Adam; in Gethsemane, the last Adam sought God! From Eden Adam was driven; from Gethsemane Christ was led. In Eden the sword was drawn; in Gethsemane the sword was sheathed.”
Homegroup Study Notes
Read John 18:1-11
Jesus made no attempt to hide from the authorities or resist His arrest, so why was it necessary for Judas to betray Him?
Discuss the significance of both Jews (the Pharisees) and Gentiles (the Roman soldiers) joining forces to arrest Jesus.
How do the soldiers’ reaction to Jesus’ proclaiming “I am He” in verse 6 remind us of the significance of God’s words to Moses in Exodus 3:14 and Jesus’ 7 “I am” statements in John’s Gospel?
Read Philippians 2:5-11
How does this passage fit in with John 18:5-6?
“Let these men go.” How does this remind us of the Gospel of Jesus?
Close by discussing the importance of Jesus’ words to Peter after telling him to put his sword away.