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1. The Lord's Supper, as set forth in John, must, with His
assistance, be unfolded in a becoming number of Lectures, and
explained with all the ability He is pleased to grant us. "Now,
before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew that His hour was
come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father, having
loved His own who were in the world, He loved them unto the end."
Pascha (passover) is not, as some think, a Greek noun, but a
Hebrew: and yet there occurs in this noun a very suitable kind of
accordance in the two languages. For inasmuch as the Greek word
paschein means to stiffer, therefore pascha has been supposed to mean
suffering, as if the noun derived its name from His passion: but in
its own language, that is, in Hebrew, pascha means passover;
because the pascha was then celebrated for the first time by God's
people, when, in their flight from Egypt, they passed over the Red
Sea. And now that prophetic emblem is fulfilled in truth, when
Christ is led as a sheep to the slaughter, that by His blood
sprinkled on our doorposts, that is, by the sign of His cross marked
on our foreheads, we may be delivered from the perdition awaiting this
world, as Israel from the bondage and destruction of the Egyptians;
and a most salutary transit we make when we pass over from the devil to
Christ, and from this unstable world to His well-established
kingdom. And therefore surely do we pass over to the ever-abiding
God, that we may not pass away with this passing world. The
apostle, in extolling God for such grace bestowed upon us, says:
"Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath
translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love." This name,
then, of pascha, which, as I have said, is in Latin called
transitus (pass over), is interpreted, as it were, for us by the
blessed evangelist, when he says, "Before the feast of pascha, when
Jesus knew that His hour was come that He should pass out of this
world to the Father." Here you see we have both pascha and
pass-over. Whence, and whither does He pass? Namely, "out of
this world to the Father." The hope was thus given to the members in
their Head, that they doubtless would yet follow Him who was
"passing" before. And what, then, of unbelievers, who stand
altogether apart from this Head and His members? Do not they also
pass away, seeing that they abide not here always? They also do
plainly pass away: but it is one thing to pass from the world, and
another to pass away with it; one thing to pass to the Father,
another to pass to the enemy. For the Egyptians also passed over
[the sea]; but they did not pass through the sea to the kingdom, but
in the sea to destruction.
2. "When Jesus knew," then, "that His hour was come that He
should pass out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own
who were in the world, He loved them unto the end." In order,
doubtless, that they also, through that love of His, might pass from
this world where they now were, to their Head who had passed hence
before them. For what mean these words, "to the end," but just to
Christ? "For Christ is the end of the law," says the apostle,
"for righteousness to every one that believeth." The end that
consummates, not that consumes; he end whereto we attain, not wherein
we perish. Exactly thus are we to understand the passage, "Christ
our passover is sacrificed." He is our end; into Him do we pass.
For I see that these gospel words may also be taken in a kind of human
sense, that Christ loved His own even unto death, so. that this may
be the meaning of "He loved them unto the end." This meaning is
human, not divine: for it was not merely up to this point that we were
loved by Him, who loveth us always and endlessly. God forbid that
He, whose death could not end, should have ended His love at death.
Even after death that proud and ungodly rich man loved his five
brethren; and is Christ to be thought of as loving us only till
death? God forbid, beloved. He would have come in vain with a love
for us that lasted till death, if that love had ended there. But
perhaps the words, "He loved them unto the end," may have to be
understood in this way, That He so loved them as to die for them.
For this He testified when He said, "Greater love hath no man than
this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." We have
certainly no objection that "He loved them unto the end" should be so
understood, that is, it was His very love that carried Him on to
death.
3. "And the supper," he says, "having taken place, and the
devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's
son, to betray Him, [Jesus] knowing that the Father had given all
things into His hands, and that He has come from God, and is going
to God; He riseth from supper, and layeth aside His garments; and
took a towel, and girded Himself. After that He poureth water into
a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with
the towel wherewith He was girded." We are not to understand by the
supper having taken place, as if it were already finished and over;
for it was still going on when the Lord rose and washed His
disciples' feet. For He afterwards sat down again, and gave the
morsel [sop] to His betrayer, implying certainly that the supper was
not yet over, or, in other words, that there was still bread on the
table. Therefore, by supper having taken place, is meant that it was
now ready, and laid out on the table for the use of the guests.
4. But when he says, "The devil having now put into the heart of
Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray Him;" if one inquires,
what was put into Judas' heart, it was doubtless this, "to betray
Him." Such a putting [into the heart] is a spiritual suggestion:
and entereth not by the ear, but through the thoughts; and thereby not
in a way that is corporal, but spiritual. For what we call spiritual
is not always to be understood in a commendatory way. The apostle knew
of certain spiritual things [powers], of wickedness in heavenly
places, against which he testifies that we have to maintain a
struggle; and there would not be spiritual wickednesses, were there
not also wicked spirits. For it is from a spiritual being that
spiritual things get their name. But how such things are done, as
that devilish suggestions should be introduced, and so mingle with
human thoughts that a man accounts them his own, how can he know? Nor
can we doubt that good suggestions are likewise made by a good spirit in
the same unobservable and spiritual way; but it is matter of concern to
which of these the human mind yields assent, either as deservedly left
without, or graciously aided by, the divine assistance. The
determination, therefore, had now been come to in Judas' heart by
the instigation of the devil, that the disciple should betray the
Master, whom he had not learned to know as his God. In such a state
had he now come to their social meal, a spy on the Shepherd, a
plotter against the Redeemer, a seller of the Saviour; as such was
he now come, was he now seen and endured, and thought himself
undiscovered: for he was deceived about Him whom he wished to
deceive. But He, who had already scanned the inward state of that
very heart, was knowingly making use of one who knew it not.
5. " [Jesus] knowing that the Father has given all things into
His hands." And therefore also the traitor himself: for if He had
him not in His hands, He certainly could not use him as He wished.
Accordingly, the traitor had been already betrayed to Him whom he
sought to betray; and he carried out his evil purpose in betraying Him
in such a way, that good he knew not of was the issue in regard to Him
who was betrayed. For the Lord knew what He was doing for His
friends, and patiently made use of His enemies: and thus had the
Father given all things into His hands, both the evil for present
use, and the good for the final issue. "Knowing also that He has
come from God, and is going to God:" neither quitting God when He
came from Him, nor us when He returned.
6. Knowing, then, these things, "He riseth from supper, and
layeth aside His garments; and took a towel, and girded Himself.
After that He poureth water into a basin, and began to wash the
disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith He was
girded." We ought, dearly beloved, carefully to mark the meaning of
the evangelist; because that, when about to speak of the pre-eminent
humility of the Lord, it was his desire first to commend His
majesty. It is in reference to this that he says, "Jesus knowing
that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He has
come from God, and is going to God." It is He, therefore, into
whose hands the Father had given all things, who now washes, not the
disciples' hands, but their feet: and it was just while knowing that
He had come from God, and was proceeding to God, that He
discharged the office of a servant, not of God the Lord, but of
man. And this also is referred to by the prefatory notice he has been
pleased to make of His betrayer, who was now come as such, and was
not unknown to Him; that the greatness of His humility should be
still further enhanced by the fact that He did not esteem it beneath
His dignity to wash also the feet of one whose hands He already
foresaw to be steeped in wickedness.
7. But why should we wonder that He rose from supper, and laid
aside His garments, who, being in the form of God, made Himself of
no reputation? And why should we wonder, if He girded Himself with
a towel, who took upon Him the form of a servant, and was found in
the likeness of a man? Why wonder, if He poured water into a basin
wherewith to wash His disciples' feet, who poured His blood upon the
earth to wash l away the filth of their sins? Why wonder, if with the
towel wherewith He was girded He wiped the feet He had washed, who
with the very flesh that clothed Him laid a firm path way for the
footsteps of His evangelists? In order, indeed, to gird Himself
with the towel, He laid aside the garments He wore; but when He
emptied Himself [of His divine glory] in order to assume the form of
a servant, He laid not down what He had, but assumed that which He
had not before. When about to be crucified, He was indeed stripped
of His garments, and when dead was wrapped in linen clothes: and all
that suffering of His is our purification. When, therefore, about
to suffer the last extremities [of humiliation,] He here illustrated
beforehand its friendly compliances; not only to those for whom He was
about to endure death, but to him also who had resolved on betraying
Him to death. Because so great is the beneficence of human humility,
that even the Divine Majesty was pleased to commend it by His own
example; for proud man would have perished eternally, had he not been
found by the lowly God. For the Son of man came to seek and to save
that which was lost. And as he was lost by imitating the pride of the
deceiver, let him now, when found, imitate the Redeemer's
humility.
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