Luke 22:1-6
Please remain standing and turn
in your copy of God’s word to Luke chapter 22. I will be reading
verses one through six. While you’re making your way
there and discovering that we did a quick overview last week
of 22, one through verse 23, just alert you that we will be
going through that section again, breaking it up into three parts.
There’s a lot of wonderful, redemptive, and historical events that take
place. So last week, a good preparation
for the Lord’s Supper, but over the next week or two, we’ll dig
in a little more. Before we read, let us ask for
God’s help. Lord, give us eyes that see,
give us ears that hear, give us hearts that perceive and understand
the will of God for our salvation, our growth in grace, and our
service to you, the king. Lord, soften our hearts and give
us your grace that we might be doers of your word and not just
hearers. And we ask for your help in Jesus’
name, amen. Luke chapter 22 beginning at
verse 1. Now the feast of unleavened bread
drew near, which is called the Passover. And the chief priest
and the scribes were seeking how to put him to death, for
they feared the people. Then Satan entered into Judas
called Iscariot. who was of the number of the
12. He went away and he conferred with the chief priest and officers
how he might betray him to them. And they were glad and they agreed
to give him money. So he consented and sought an
opportunity to betray him to them in absence of a crowd. Amen. You may be seated. I think
you’re beginning to figure out by now that Jesus, as he has
entered Jerusalem for what is his final passion week, failed
to take the Dale Carnegie course on how to win friends and influence
people. He’s got his little band of disciples. He has entered Jerusalem and
he has upset the apple cart. He has said every wrong thing
that could be said to the religious officials. But keep in mind,
Jesus is not there to win friends and influence people. Jesus is
there to turn upside down a religious system gone bad. He is there
to show the people of God that the old covenant gone bad under
the religious leaders, the religious officials hands is about to be
made a new covenant, a better covenant, a faithful covenant. by his own sacrificial work at
the cross. He will be the Passover lamb
put to death on Good Friday once and for all for the sins of the
people. The religious officials are seeking
to put Jesus to death. And he’s really angered them.
Remember when he first entered the city, this is maybe Tuesday. It was Sunday or so when he first
entered on his triumphal entry. He went into the marketplace
of the temple, the money changers booth. He turned over the tables. He made a court of whips. He
cleansed the temple and said, you have made my house of prayer
into a den of robbers. And then every day we’re told
he is preaching on the porch. And at night he goes to the Mount
of Olives where he lodges. But every day while he preaches
on the porch, he’s poking in the face of the religious officials
against their hatred, against their hypocrisy, against their
love of money, their pride, and their places of position. In
one place he preaches on the porch the parable of the tenants.
A man leased out his vineyard His vineyard was Israel. He leased
it out to tenants, the tenants being the religious officials.
He comes to get some of the fruit of his vineyard, to get an account,
a payout from his investment. He sends servant number one,
they kill him. Servant number two, they kill
him. Servant number three, they take his life also. Then he sends
his own son. And they say, this is the heir.
If we don’t kill him, then we will never have ownership of
this vineyard. And that’s what Jesus is facing
as he enters in Holy Week and goes day by day towards the cross. He is the heir of the vineyard
Israel. And these religious officials
do not want him upsetting their status quo. They want things
to continue as they are. Now, there’s a big problem. Jesus
may not have read how to win friends and influence people. but he has preached the gospel.
He has healed diseases. He has cast out demons. He has
given sight to the blind. He has given legs to those who
could not walk. He has healed palsies and all
sorts of sicknesses and diseases, and the crowds love him. And as our passage reminds us,
it’s the Passover week. the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
There’s seven days plus Passover, where this city will be filled
with people from all over the surrounding countryside. The
various tribes and the various allotments of land will make
their pilgrimage this week to Jerusalem. And so the scribes
and the Pharisees, the elders, the Sanhedrin, the teachers of
the law, all these religious officials seeking to put Jesus
to death are realizing their opportunity, their window is
slipping for they know they can do nothing because Jesus is popular. He is loved by the people. Now there’s a couple things to
keep in mind with these religious officials. They love the politics
of the day. Rome is an occupying force in
Jerusalem. And insofar as the religious
officials keep things peaceful, keep things happy, it’s a lucrative
stretch of time for them. Rome loves peace. And Rome loves
these religious leaders who keep peace and keep things in Jerusalem
under wraps. But there’s another reason other
than political reasons that these religious authorities want things
to stay the same. It’s a lucrative business for
them to trade in the temple, to change money, to sell offerings
for sacrifice there at the temple. And Jesus has not only cleansed
the temple, his preaching is becoming popular and they’re
becoming less and less and less important in the eyes of the
masses. Now you might liken this to politics
in America. You’ve seen in our recent history
what happens when an outsider comes into our political system,
no prior political work or history, but comes in and says, I’m a
businessman. I will do what it takes to drain the swamp. I’ll
do what it takes to turn the ship around and make things right
for the people. That’s what we saw in our nation
in recent history. And that’s in a sense what Jesus
is doing. He’s the every man’s hero. He’s coming to Jerusalem and
he’s not requiring money and offerings and sacrifices. He’s
simply saying, believe in me, believe in the power of God,
be healed of your diseases, be healed of your You’re being bound
to sin and Satan and the kingdom of darkness. And the people love
him. The religious leaders absolutely
hate him. But Jesus is coming to literally
drain the Jerusalem swamp. No more money changing, no more
sacrifices. In fact, on the day of his death,
the curtain of the temple will be torn in two and we will no
longer have to enter in the holy of holies once a year and that
through the mediation of a human priest. All of this will go away. We read in the book of Hebrews,
Jesus better. He’s better than angels. He’s
better than Moses. He’s better than sacrifices.
He’s better than all the old covenant ways, which in God’s
economy were the thing to do, but they always looked for the
coming of the Messiah. And now Messiah is here. The
religious officials are rejecting him and the people are in love
with him. Well, as we pick up in our story
today, we see the plot thickens. This is a story in the Bible
that should really begin in the infamous way. It was a dark and
stormy night. This is another story in the
sense of Genesis 3, the foreboding feeling of darkness entering
Jerusalem. We remember Genesis 3 and how
it begins, now the serpent. was more crafty than any other
beast of the field. It was Passover. It was the feast
of unleavened bread. There were eight days of celebration
and there were people filling this city to worship and follow
Jesus. And these religious officials
were trying their best to build a case against Jesus, trying
their best to build a case against him so that they could put him
to death. But how? They feared the people, they
feared the crowds, they feared an uprising that would upset
their peace with the Roman authorities. And so they sought to build a
case in the absence of a crowd and enter Judas. Enter one of
the 12. He knows Jesus every move. He knows that Jesus lodges at
the nighttime at the Mount of Olives. In fact, that’s where
the temple guards will come in a day or two to arrest Jesus. But before we look at Judas,
let’s back up and look at the bigger picture. Enter Satan. Satan is one of God’s creations. He was an angelic being and there
are different views of who Satan is and what he actually did before
his fall. We don’t know the timing of his
fall, what he did to fall. We don’t know some of those details,
but he was a created being who held a very high position in
the court of the heavenly places. And because of his pride, because
of his hatred of God and his glory, he fell. And ever since
his fall, he has been seeking to destroy the glory of God on
the face of this earth. And so we live in a time, I think,
when we think too little of Satan. There’ve been some areas where
they thought too much of Satan. They gave him too much credit.
They gave him too much power. I think we live in a time where,
though we don’t believe much about him at all, but we understand
from the Bible that Satan is real. Satan is powerful. Satan is the god of this age. He is the god of this world.
But this is something we don’t want to miss. Satan is under
God’s authority. He is under God’s thumb. He is
under God’s finger. And when Satan is at work in
the world, as you see from reading the book of Job, he only does
what God allows him to do. And so this brings up another
thing. We’ll be looking at it on a Wednesday night when we
look at why bad things happen to good people in our study of
the book of Genesis. But just very briefly, we have
to understand that God is at work in this world and he uses
all kinds of things for his own glory and our everlasting good.
And even God can sinlessly use sin for his glory and for our
good. Satan is real. Satan is powerful. The other night I was watching
a television show on one of the local religious channels. It’s
a show that has a panel of preachers. And usually their panel of preachers
has a handful of Guys and gals who kind of believe alike and
think alike. But the other night, I just happened
to flip it on, and there was a very diverse panel. There were
liberals, there were moderates, and there were conservatives,
and there were some Pentecostals. And they ranged in their answers
all over the place on every question that was asked. But one question
was asked and they agreed unanimously on their answer. And it was quite
shocking to be honest. I mean, their, their bad answers
on other things was interesting, but this one really got me because
they were unanimous in their bad answer. And the question
was this, was God surprised? when Satan entered the garden
and tempted Adam and Eve and caused the fall of man into sin. And to a man, to a woman, diverse
answers on all kinds of other questions, to a panel, they said,
yes, God was surprised. This was completely out of his
control. Now my brain was going ding,
ding, ding, wrong, wrong, wrong. God ordains whatsoever comes
to pass. That’s what the Bible teaches.
That’s what our confession of faith affirms. There is not a
maverick molecule in this world. There is not a rogue person,
not even in the realm of the spiritual that is not under God’s
control and God’s power. And so we remember the truth
of the scripture as we’re taught in our creeds, in our confessions,
that the devil is God’s devil. That was Martin Luther’s famous
saying, he is God’s devil. And William Gurnall went on to
say even more. He says, when God says to the
devil, you stay, he sits like a dog by the table as the saints
of God feast on God’s comfort. He does not even dare snatch
a tidbit for the master’s eye is always upon him. And that’s a very comforting
thing to remember. We read a passage here where
Satan enters Judas to do something treacherous, to do something
awful in our eyes. But we remember that God ordains
whatsoever comes to pass, that God is working out all things
for his own glory and our everlasting good. He ordains whatever comes
to pass. He sinlessly uses sin. And in
this passage, we see God in working out salvation for sinners, uses
Satan to enter Judas, one of the 12, the one who is greedy
to plot to hatch a plan against the Lord of glory. You see, the
linchpin in the plan of these religious officials was to somehow
get Jesus in absence of a crowd. Well, who better to rat him out? Oh, he goes to the Mount of Olives,
a private place. He goes there every night. That’s
where he prays. That’s where he teaches. That’s where he sleeps.
You go there, I’ll give him a kiss. That’s the one you should arrest. Satan entered him and for 30
pieces of silver, about three or four months wages, Judas makes
plans to betray Jesus. Now contrast this in another
gospel in Matthew chapter 26, where we have this account of,
of Judas and his work. You know what happens right before,
right before Judas betrayal, Mary, One of Jesus’ female disciples,
she takes a alabaster jar filled with a costly perfume. It’s worth
not 30 pieces of silver or three or four months wages, it’s worth
a year’s wages. And she breaks that jar and she
pours it all over Jesus’ body and she mops it up and washes
him with her own hair. And Jesus says, what this woman
has done for me, you don’t understand. She’s prepared my body for death. And so you compare and contrast
the, the true disciple loves Jesus and, and will give up everything
for him. But Judas, one of the 12 will
betray him for 30 pieces of silver. I want to point out a couple
of interesting things in this passage. It speaks of Judas conferring
with the religious officials. It really speaks of him covenanting
with them, making an oath with them. I’m going to break covenant
with Jesus, my master, and I’m going to make a covenant with
you evil ones who seek to destroy this man and his life. And they
come to an agreement, they agree on a price. And notice the word
rejoicing. They rejoiced at the opportunity
to put this man to death. Isn’t there so much irony in
that? The rejoicing at the death of this man, what they don’t
understand, this death will lead to glory. This death will lead
to redemption. This death will lead to no more
Passover lambs. being put to death every year. This death will lead to the end
of all things religious in the Jewish structure. The nation
will be gone. The sacrificial system will be
ended as Jesus’ death once and for all pays for the sins of
God’s people. They were glad. They rejoiced. Now, I want you to rewind to
Luke chapter 4 for just a moment. It’s the passage about Jesus
being tempted in the wilderness. Remember, Satan came into the
wilderness, Jesus there, 40 days, 40 nights. He’s hungry. He’s
not in the garden of paradise being tempted like Adam. He’s
out in the wilderness being tempted and enticed. Take him up to the
mountain. Throw yourself down. The angels
rescue you. Look at all the kingdoms. I’ll
give them to you. You’re hungry. Take these stones. make them
into bread. Jesus every time refutes Satan’s
enticements with scripture. And it basically says something
like this. This is the Brian paraphrase.
Satan slithered away. He left Jesus alone until a more
opportune time. This is now the opportune time. The time is now and Satan will
win another skirmish in the battle of the seed of Eve versus the
seed of Satan. He’ll win a skirmish, but he
will not win the war. Now, most will agree that this
little meeting with Judas took place on a Tuesday. It’ll be
Thursday night when Judas kisses the master and the temple guard
arrest him and take him away. He’s going to seek an opportunity
literally for two days to give Jesus up. I think about Judas
for a moment, three years with Jesus, three years with the master,
three years with the healer, three years with the teacher. three years hearing and seeing
the work of the kingdom. In about 10 weeks time, Peter
and other apostles less Judas will be preaching at Pentecost.
And Peter will remind the religious officials, the very ones plotting
this scheme with Judas and with Satan, this Jesus was delivered
up by the definite plan, the definite foreknowledge of God.
You crucified and killed him. you in the hands of lawless men. And so we have to see here God’s
sovereignty at work, but his sovereignty over Satan, his sovereignty
over Judas. Judas was an apostate. He believed
in Jesus. He walked with Jesus. He worked
with Jesus. but he is one who has departed
the faith. And we know the end of Judas.
He goes and takes his own life. He tosses the money back to the
hands of the religious leaders. And I don’t know if you’ve caught
this in the news today, the religious news that is, but it’s becoming
increasingly cool to become an apostate. Some of you have probably
seen John Piper’s son, Abraham Piper, a million TikTok followers. I don’t love the Lord. I hate
the Lord. I don’t believe what my parents
taught me. I don’t believe what the church taught me. And he’s
not the only one. Remember Josh Harris, I Kissed
Dating Goodbye, popular pastor. He left the faith several years
ago and it’s becoming increasingly popular to say the faith of my
father’s is no longer my faith. I’ve seen this at a personal
level. A good family friend this week, their son said he’s finally
found Jesus and he’s found him in the Mormon faith. Another
longtime friend, even a partner in ministry some years ago in
another town in the last year, has put on Facebook, I’ve left
the church. I’ve left Jesus. I’ve walked
away from the Lord. And we understand Judas to have
done the most treacherous thing, not in betraying Jesus. but in his walking away from
the faith. And friends, whatever you see
on the internet, whatever you’re watching on TikTok, whatever
this generation is doing, to walk away from a holy God, to
walk away from Jesus, his son, who sacrificed himself for sins,
it is not cool. It is not a thing to be famous
for and to flaunt not only in the eyes of the church or the
eyes of your parents who raised you, but to flaunt it before
the watching world and say, this Jesus is of no consequence to
me. This is Judas though, an apostate. And we see the work of Satan
still going on in our world today. He seeks to bring more people
to apostasy. Through his counterfeit trinity,
the dragon and the beast and the false prophet, he is preaching
and proclaiming and tempting and luring and enticing you into
a love of this world, a love of all things of the flesh and
a love of things that are not of this word-centered life, but
this worldliness. And so Satan’s voice continues
to hiss in our ears, calling for our allegiance, calling for
our worship, and in subtle ways, enticing you to lesser things
and away from the greater things. And so there’s a lesson, I think,
in this passage for us today. There’s a warning in this passage.
And I think it is summed up well in the words of the Apostle Paul
in 1 Corinthians 10. Let anyone who thinks he stands
take heed, lest you fall. Pray with me. Lord, we say in our hearts, we
say it with our lips, we would never betray our Lord. We would
never walk away from our God who’s redeemed us. But Lord,
we know the enemy. We know that when the gospel
seed is sowed, some falls among the rocks, some on the path,
some along good soil. And we know that Satan snatches
the cares of this world, choke it out. But we know that the
spirit waters and produces fruit and other. Lord, let that be
us. Let the seed of your gospel fall
into good, rich soil. May it be cultivated by the church,
by the word, by the spirit, by a devoted life of discipleship. And may we be of those who do
not shrink back, who do not depart from the faith, but who walk
faithfully by your grace, the pilgrim way, bearing fruit and
keeping with repentance. Lord, let anyone today in this
room who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. Lord, help us, be gracious to
us. In the name of Christ, amen. We want to sing of God’s power
over Satan using Sing Choirs of New Jerusalem, number 358,
and we’ll stand to sing together.