The Faithful Friend
Luke 22:1-23 ·October 13, 2024· Joel Passmore
Part of: Luke, No Greater Love
Part 1 of a 7 week series called No Greater Love
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So we have three chapters left in Luke. We are rounding, believe it or not, we're rounding the corner. We've been dipping in and out of Luke since the church launched in October 22. Three chapters left. We are close to the end now. Close to the end of Jesus' mission. So today begins the passion narrative. The events that unfold, that lead up to Jesus' death. Many things happen to him, one after the other, and yet he is in complete control the entire time.
And all of these things are part of his work. Part of his work showing us the Savior that he is, that he came to be. Each episode in this whole narrative, in the next seven weeks, in the passion narrative, each one teaches us something about our Savior. So today we're going to start a little seven-week miniseries in Luke. It's called No Greater Love. It's seven things about Jesus, seven aspects of him that the passion narrative tells us and shows us about who he is.
It shows us how amazing he is, how wonderful he is, how he is our completely sufficient Savior in every way. And today, it's about friendship. This week I was on a video call with a really close friend of mine. We talk every couple weeks or so. We've known each other for a long time. And we've seen each other through some real difficulties. We've worked through conflicts with each other. We've taken on each other's burdens. We've been vulnerable with each other.
It's refreshing. True friendship is marked by a lot of different things, but something that's essential is trust. You have to be able to trust someone to really build a friendship with them. A close friend is someone you feel safe with, even if they have something to say to you that's hard to hear. Because you know that they have your back. And faithful are the wounds of a friend, Proverbs says. So that trust means we can hear even hard things from them, be vulnerable with them, even when they have something that might be hard from somebody else.
And that trust that you build up in a friendship, that you need in a friendship, that leads to vulnerability, that's exactly why friendship can be one of the hardest things when it goes wrong.
Today, Jesus is hit by something that has impacted all of us, or maybe not literally everyone. Some of you maybe are too young to have experienced this yet. But a lot of people have experienced betrayal.
The violation of trust by someone that you gave yourself to in a significant way. There's few things worse than betrayal by a close friend. It cuts so deep that you might just pull back from everyone.
The erosion of trust, it spreads. It's like a virus. It infects somehow these other relationships in your life. It should be unaffected, but somehow you see them differently now. You wonder. You're suspicious.
So what will Jesus do when he's betrayed? How will he respond? Let's turn to Luke 22 and find out. Friends, this is God's word for us. He does not lie. He does not change. And likewise, his word is truthful and reliable. So let's receive it with open hearts and open ears. And let him work on us. Luke 22, verses 1 through 23. Now the feast of unleavened bread, drew near, which is called the Passover. And the chief priests 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 twelve. He went away and conferred with the chief priests and officers how he might betray him to them. And they were glad and agreed to give him money. So he consented and sought an opportunity to betray him to them in the absence of a crowd. Then came the day of unleavened bread, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. So Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat it.
They said to him, Where will you have us prepare it? He said to them, Behold, when you have entered the city, a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him into the house that he enters, and tell the master of the house, The teacher says to you, Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples? And he will show you a large upper room furnished, prepare it there. And they went and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared Passover.
And when the hour came, he reclined at the table, and the apostles with him. And he said to them, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God. And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, Take this and divide it among yourselves. For I tell you that from now on, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.
And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and he gave it to them, saying, This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And likewise, the cup, after they had eaten, saying, This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. But behold, the hand of him who betrays me is with me on the table. For the Son of Man goes as it has been determined, but woe to that man by whom he is betrayed. And they began to question one another, which of them it could be who is going to do this.
Pray with me. Lord, we thank you for your holy word, given to us, revealed to us. We thank you that it tells us more about Jesus, and who he is, the all-sufficient Savior that he is. And even more, I'm grateful today. Not just for your word, but for your spirit, which makes it living and active in us, and makes our hearts fertile and able to receive it eagerly.
To not just be hearers of the word, but doers. Because that's what we want, Lord. Change us. In this moment, in every moment of our lives. But Lord, sanctify and set apart this moment, so that your word does good work in us. We pray this, Jesus, in your name.
Jesus is the faithful friend. This passage tells us to come to the one who endured betrayal to reconcile his enemies. In his book, The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis wrote a wonderful chapter on friendship. I don't remember much about what he wrote in the other chapters, but I remember that one a long time ago when I read it. It was really good, so I opened it up and I read it again this week. If you haven't read it, it's very good. I highly recommend it.
It's a very insightful chapter about friendship. He begins with a lament, a lament about friendship and the state of friendship that honestly could have been written today. Here's what he says. To the ancients, friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves. The crown of life and the school of virtue. The modern world, in comparison, ignores it. It is something quite marginal. Not a main course in life's banquet. A diversion. Something that fills up the chinks of one's time.
How has this come about? I think part of the answer as to how it's come about, at least in our day and time, is that we're guarded people. We have a shell on. We protect ourselves from things like what happens here in Luke 22. We don't want to go through something like this. So we sing along with Paul Simon. I'm a rock. I'm an island.
Let's unpack what happens here. This passage opens with scheming. Let's start with this. Plans to harm. Plans to harm. It was the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and at the end of that comes Passover. Jerusalem is filled with pilgrims. Jews from across the country, across the Roman Empire, coming into Jerusalem to celebrate the high holy days, to worship, to sacrifice. The city would get two or three times bigger for about a week or two. The Jewish religious leaders are there too, but at a time when they should be serving and teaching the people, all they can think about is this guy Jesus.
They were seeking how to put him to death. And the tense of that verb, we're seeking, tells us that this was a nagging thought in their minds, an ongoing desire, a constant effort. It was like a splinter. They just could not get out of their minds. And yet they feared the people. They couldn't do anything to him. It might cause an uproar. It might cause an uprising. That would bring the Roman authorities down on them. So they were stuck. They couldn't figure out what to do.
But then something happens. Satan entered into Judas called Iscariot. Now this doesn't mean that Judas was possessed and like he was a puppet or something. Demon-possessed people have showed up in the book of Luke and in other gospel accounts. He's not acting like them, literally out of control, like a madman.
In verse 22, Jesus holds Judas responsible. So again, he can't be a puppet. Satan is merely making use of the evil intent that was already there in Judas' heart. And so he went away and conferred with the chief priests and officers how he might betray him to them. It's a tragic irony. After all the impotent teeth grinding of the religious authorities, these men of power who had no real power to do anything to Jesus, they finally have a way to get to him.
And it came from someone on the inside. One of the number of the 12, Luke reminds us. One of the number of the 12. It was an inside job. Inside jobs are the most hurtful. That's how the most damage can be done. During the Revolutionary War, George Washington had a major general that he admired and he trusted. So much so that Washington gave him command over West Point, the most important fort in the whole country. What Washington didn't know was that this major general had asked for this post because he had already conspired with the British to surrender it over to them.
At the last moment, the plot was discovered and foiled and he fled to the other side. And now every American knows the infamous name of Benedict Arnold. But it started with trust. George Washington trusted him.
Being close to Washington and being involved at the top level of the war effort, it did not guarantee that Benedict Arnold was loyal to the cause. And this passage stands as a warning to us. Being close to Jesus, being involved in a lot of kingdom stuff, a lot of church stuff, it does not guarantee spiritual well-being.
There's got to be a heart change. A loyalty to Jesus. When you see God face-to-face, he is not going to ask for your resume. How often did you serve at church? He's going to say, what did you say about my son while you were alive?
So these men have plans to harm. But this is where the contrast begins because Jesus has his plans of his own. Plans to bless. He's got something good for them. The disciples are looking around. Hey, where did Judas go? We haven't seen him in a while. Jesus knows something is up. But there's no panic in him. He stays the course. The next day he tells Peter and John, go and prepare the Passover for us that we may eat it. But they didn't know where to go.
They weren't from Jerusalem. No one in their entourage was from Jerusalem. They didn't have a place to go. So of course they were wondering, well, where are we supposed to do this, Jesus? Jesus, turns out, had already thought of this. Find the man carrying a jar of water, follow him, and ask him where the guest room is for the teacher. He'll know what to do. And that's exactly what happens. Jesus, you see, is shrewd and careful. He's made all these arrangements, and he's done so without telling the group about it.
Because if he had, if he disclosed the location, Judas would know, right? And that would be the opportunity away from the crowd to betray him. So he's kept this secret, even from his closest three. Even when he tells them to go find it, he doesn't tell them where to go exactly. He gives them this cryptic message. He's kept the location secret. He isn't trying to avoid capture forever. He just does not want it to be tonight. It's not the right time.
And why? Because at this meal, he's got something special in mind. This is a special meal for a special gift that he's going to give to his disciples. I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffered. The Greek for earnestly desired, it's a Hebrew idiom. It literally, literally the sentence is this. With desire, I have desired to eat this Passover to you. That's what the disciples would have heard. With desire, I have desired to eat this Passover with you.
It's a turn of phrase that shows them he really, really, really wanted to do this with us. Treachery is afoot right in his own inner circle, and his focus is on a meal. Now, it's not because he likes food. This is not Jesus being like, guys, I'm starving. We've got to get something to eat. I know some of you teenagers feel like that a lot. And it's not even because this is his last meal. Probably his last meal before his death. It's not because he's like, I'm just looking for a break.
I've got to sit down for a while, collect my thoughts. It's not even that he wants one more night with his bros. Come on, one more. One more time with the bros together. Come on, guys. It's not even that. He has gone to great lengths with a lot of planning to avoid capture, to give them something very important. When the wine is first poured, Jesus says, take this and divide it up among yourselves. None for me, Jesus says. None for me. He's abstaining to show that he's sacrificing for them.
He's like a parent that takes a bunch of kids on a hike in the summer solo. If the kids start to run out of water, you know what the parent would do. He or she would say, here, take mine. You guys divide it up and have it. It's for you. In fact, this whole meal is for them. The entire thing. And, church, it's for us. It's for us. So let's unpack this. Let's talk about the meaning of the meal. If someone you love comes up to you and they say, here's a gift.
I picked this out especially for you. It's going to be a fun gift to open, right? You're going to be curious about it. You're going to be excited about it. Not all gifts are preceded with, I picked this out just for you. Once Nikki surprised me with some dress shirts. At first, I thought, oh, that's nice. I guess I needed some new shirts. That's nice of her. I reminded her, hon, you know nothing fits me, right? Just, you know that, right? I mean, I love these shirts, but.
And she just smiles and she says, just try them on. I tried one on and it fit perfectly. It's like, what have you done? What magic have you. She says, look at the tags. And I looked at them and it said, tall, slim. She heard me say over and over that nothing fits. She saw me buy shirts and then they would get washed and they wouldn't fit and I didn't know what to do with them anymore. She went out looking. I didn't even know places sold tall, slim shirts.
It fit me perfectly. This gift that Jesus gives to his disciples to us, it fits us perfectly. It's exactly what we need. And here's why it's so perfect. It ties together the past, the future, and the present all at once. It connected with the past. Passover started at the Exodus, the nighttime departure from Egypt. The meal, it consisted of bitter herbs because the bitterness of their slavery there was something that they needed to be reminded of.
Generations after needed to be reminded it was bitter to be enslaved by the Egyptians. There was unleavened bread at the meal because they were reminded, your ancestors fled by night. They didn't have time to let the bread rise. They were in a hurry to get out of there before the Egyptians changed their mind. And of course, the meal consisted of a lamb, the Passover lamb.
The last plague was coming right before the Exodus. This, God's final judgment against Pharaoh's hardness of heart. God's people were told, kill a lamb and spread its blood on the doorframe of your house and death will pass over and will not strike you.
And you know what? That's exactly what happened. When they did that, they were spared. Death did not afflict their houses because they had painted their doorframes with the blood of a lamb. And that deliverance from Egypt was a signpost. It was pointing to what happens here in Luke 22. It's pointing to what's going to be fulfilled in Jesus. And Jesus is filling up this ancient ritual with that new meaning. It's been pointing to this. He's filling it up with something new.
The fulfillment, that old deliverance pointed to this new deliverance, this final deliverance. This is my body, he says. Deliverance is not just from physical slavery, but spiritual slavery. From death itself. This is the cup in my blood. Through him, the ultimate Passover lamb. The final Passover lamb.
It's a fulfillment of the past, but it is also, friends, a promise for the future. Twice Jesus says he won't do this again until, until, until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God. Until the kingdom of God comes. Take note, Jesus is not saying if. He's not saying if. He is speaking with assurance. With surety about what will happen. His words are a promise. That day is coming. When the kingdom of God will arrive and he will drink again. At that table with us, his people.
In the new heavens and the new earth. Until, until, until. It's not if. It's when. It's a promise for the future. But it's also the present. It's right now. It's 2024. It's past. It's future. But it's present. Here, too, is a very meaningful gift for us. Because Jesus is giving them a new way to fellowship with him. Over and over and over. As they live faithfully, even after he's gone. The symbols have new significance. This bread, he says, it doesn't represent any longer the bread you ate coming out of Egypt.
Now it represents me and my body given for you. The blood is not a lamb's blood, but it's my blood. The ritual has become a new means of worship. He says, do this in remembrance of me. And the early church began doing it often, as often as they could. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, the breaking of bread and prayer. The breaking of bread. We're continuing in the apostolic tradition of devoting ourselves to the apostles' teaching, the breaking of bread and prayer, even now.
And the whole thing happens in a new context. This is the part that we miss sometimes that I want you to pay attention to. This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. The word covenant, it indicates relationship. When you hear covenant, don't think contracts. Think relationship. We use that word most often when we think about marriage and talk about marriage, the covenant of marriage. Jesus is telling us when we do this, it is not a remembrance of a contract or even the remembrance simply of a historical event that happened a long time ago.
It is a relational act with our relational God who is relating to us in and through the Lord's Supper. It would be odd, wouldn't it, for a married couple to go out to dinner and get a framed copy of their marriage license and set it on the table and both of them just stare at the marriage license the whole time.
Right? That would be weird. Celebrating their marriage, it means celebrating their relationship. It means looking at each other, talking to each other, eating together, dancing together, laughing together. That's how you celebrate a marriage.
The Last Supper becomes the Lord's Supper and it's not just remembering. It's relating, relating to the one that saved us through the elements as we eat and drink of them in faith. It's a spiritual communion with us. I mean, with us, with our Lord and Savior. It's a spiritual communion that we have with him by faith. This is the gift that Jesus gave to his disciples. He eagerly desired to eat this meal with them because he wants to do something for them.
Look back over the passage at how often it says, with you or with us and for you or for us. The with you is connected to the for you. He wants to be with them to give something for them. And this brings us back at the end here to our friendship theme. Because this meal shows us how enemies become friends.
We live in a world full of treachery and betrayal. People sell each other out all the time. Or fail to follow through on their pledge of loyalty. We're hurt by it. In our families, in our workplaces, our schools, and oh, Lord help us, even our churches. And though we fear that betrayal, we still do it too sometimes.
The human race are natural traitors. That is our natural bent. To be traitors. Our love for neighbors, for family, for friends, even God, it reaches its limit right when it bumps up against our greatest love. Ourselves.
It's true that we oppose God. But my friends, Jesus came anyway. He came anyway, in a world full of traitors, among a suspicious people. He rode into Jerusalem being called a king, but he knew in just a matter of days they would say crucify him. And yet he rode in anyway. He came anyway. It didn't stop his mission. He doesn't withdraw. He doesn't protect himself. Even at this meal, this intimate moment, where there should be no such betrayal, where he knows it's going to happen, he knows the hand of him who betrays me is on the table with me.
But he still doesn't hide. He chooses to stay vulnerable in the presence of his betrayer, even serving him, even washing his feet, which we'll talk about that in the coming weeks. For the sake of his disciples, he does it. This passage shows us the deep extent of Jesus' friendship towards sinners. He's faithful through thick and thin. He will not fail to show steadfast love. The gospel is God with us, and it's God for us. Just like at the table, where he wanted to be with them to do something for him.
And that's how the table shows us how enemies become friends, because the very betrayal that he submits himself to makes him our Passover lamb. He knows he must endure it for the sake of the people that he will gather to himself and call friends. His body was given, his blood was shed, so that all, any and all who repent and believe, would be brought in and forgiven. If while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
The verse tells us that salvation is more than forgiveness. It is not just a change from guilty to forgiven. It's a change from enemy to friend. That's what's happened to us. That's why Jesus said greater love has no one than this, that someone laid down his life for his friends.
If Jesus isn't your friend, let me tell you the truth, you are not going to find a better one. And anywhere in this world, among any person, Jesus will never, ever fail you. He will never, ever turn on you. He will always keep his word. He will walk with you joyfully, gladly, in every circumstance you will ever face.
And he's got the best house, and the best table, and the best food. And he's inviting you in. Don't you want a friend like that? That's the kind of friend we all want. That's better than a friend with a boat.
Come to Jesus, if you have not come already in repentance and faith. Come and be his. Be his friend, instead of being his enemy. He wants to welcome you in. He died to welcome you in.
If Jesus is your friend, then be a friend to someone who needs it. Be different than the world. Be faithful. Be true. Persevere in love and kindness and service, even when there's misunderstanding, even when there's conflict. Persevere. Be gracious. Be true. Be loyal. Be like your Savior. Be like the one who has made you a friend. Offer the same kind of friendship that Christ has given you. And do it resting in him. In a world full of suspicion and betrayal, you can rest, and you should rest, in the friendship of Christ.
Like the old hymn says, What a Savior. What a friend. Saving, helping, keeping, loving. He is with me to the end.