Welcome to the Plenteous Redemption podcast, where the cross and the culture are on a collision course for discussion. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign The Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified. Under the Jews a stumbling block, under the Greeks foolishness, but under them which are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. Now, here's your host, Thomas Ervin. Matthew 26, 75 verses, whew. Let's see, I think we can do it. Verses one through five, we're just gonna make the best of it. I hate to, this chapter needs about a year to cover, because there's so much. I mean, this is one of the most incredible chapters in all the Bible, but we'll do what we can in the Sunday school hour. Chapter 26, verses 1 through 5, And it came to pass, when Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said unto his disciples, You know that after two days is the feast of the Passover, and the Son of Man is betrayed to be crucified. Then assembled together the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people, unto the palace of a high priest, who was called Caiaphas. and consulted that they might take Jesus by subtlety and kill him. But they said not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar among the people. All right. Now, this is all sorts of confused. First of all, why does Caiaphas, the high priest, have a palace in the temple? You go back and show me in the instructions to build the temple where the instructions were from God to build a palace for the high priest. It's not there. This is all corruption from from head to toe. Then secondly, They want to be so careful. We couldn't do this improperly. We can't betray someone and murder him improperly. We at least have to give the impression that we are still the godly, righteous people that you should look up to and listen to and maintain our order here. This is what religion does. This is all straight out of Romans chapter 2. You're a bunch of crooked, perverted, religious fools who will do all this in the name of your religion. You would kill the God who gave you your religion in order to uphold your authority over that religion. That makes no sense whatsoever. That's where that that parable that Jesus gives about the son the father, you know, the man that owns the vineyard. He said I'll send my son. They'll respect the son and they took him and killed him. It's perfectly in line with that. They should have known but somehow they continually slip their minds. This is a plot to kill the Lord Jesus Christ those opening lines about the disciples. He said unto them, you know, well, they should have known. He told them repeatedly. And at no point did they seem to get it or grasp it or fully understand it. And so the Lord is speaking directly to his disciples at this point. And and, you know, they're talking the palace of the high priest, some something. Now, another interesting phrase here. They take him. They're plotting to take him by subtlety. That's the same thing Satan did to Eve in the garden. He deceived her through subtlety. And so Jesus said in John 8, you are of your father the devil and the lust of your father you will do. And so the Lord is just laying out here. They're just carrying out the details of their father, Satan. Look at verses 6 through 13, verse 6. Now, when Jesus was in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, there came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment. and poured it on his head as he sat at meat. But when his disciples saw it, they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste? For this ointment might have been sold for much, and given to the poor. When Jesus understood it, he said unto them, Why trouble ye the woman? For she hath wrought a good work upon me. For ye have the poor always with you, but me ye have not always." Alright, so then what does that mean for every initiative that gets pushed to eliminate poverty? It's a failed endeavor. It's a waste of money. In fact, what's interesting is the very thing that has done the most to rid the world of poverty is a free market and a capitalistic system. And they're doing everything they can to get rid of it. Nothing has done more to elevate the world than that system. So if you want to get rid of poverty, well, first of all, that's not going to happen. But if you wanted to make it better for everybody, then the best way to do that would to get rid of communism, get rid of socialism, and just open a free market and leave people alone and let incentive, let the incentive point to people who are productive. You give people who are productive some incentive and they'll do incredible things. And when they do incredible things and other people benefit, people that complain, all these billionaires, that billionaire gives you a job. If he wasn't a billionaire, what would you be doing? They think if he wasn't a billionaire that they would have part of that money. That's not how it works. If we just get rid of all these billionaires, we could all share their money. It'd just go right back to them. You know, they've done these studies where they dispersed money from people, and they found out in the end that when they dispersed money from people and gave it to people who didn't have money, it ended up right back in the hands of the people they took the money from. Because people who don't have money don't have it because of the way they live. Not because, you know, there are occasional caveats to that. Your home gets burned down or, you know, something terrible happens. But most of the time it's just because you chose to go buy alcohol rather than, you know, bread. The guy next door comes in here every now and then. I took him food one night. He came in here looking all sad and pathetic, so I took him food. And I saw him a couple months later, and he said, you know, I sure am hungry. I said, where did you get that bag of tobacco? Well, I mean, I bought it at the beginning of the month. I said, well, at the beginning of the month, it might be better to buy food that would last rather than tobacco that would last. So, no, I'm not buying any more food. You need to go get a job and figure that out. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. And so, verse 12, Friend, that she hath poured this ointment on my body, she did it for my burial. Verily I say unto you, whosoever this gospel, wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this that this woman hath done be told for a memorial for her." Now, what an incredible thing to have written in the Word of God. You sacrifice for Jesus something precious. It wasn't, you know, what, you know, do we have some old oil laying around here that nobody wants? You have any Vaseline? I want to anoint the Lord's head. No, she went and broke out the expensive stuff that was costly and gave for the Lord. Now, she did something wonderful for Jesus. And as a result, she is despised by the people who were with Jesus. If you're going to try and do something for the Lord, inevitably, somebody's going to come along and tell you, you know, you need to just sit down, calm down. You don't need to do all that. You're making the rest of us look bad. Why don't you just chill out a little bit? That is inevitably what's going to happen because they don't want to step up to the plate and go as far as you're willing to go in your service and sacrifice to Jesus Christ. And rather than either being happy for you and encouraging you or joining you, they're going to try to discourage you. They're not going to get and do anything on their own. They're not going to put themselves, their hand to the plow. They're going to try and take your hands off of it as you make them feel bad. And so, if you're going to live a sacrificial life for Jesus, someone is going to come along and inform you. That's just not necessary. Why don't you just calm down a little bit. Now, giving for Jesus. This woman gave for the Lord, and it pleased the Lord. Now, when someone tells you that you should have given to the poor instead, just remind them that's exactly what Judas said. So, and that inevitably happens. We go out on street corners and larger cities where they got a bunch of homeless people roaming around and inevitably some fool on his way to a bar or a nightclub will stop and tell you, why don't you give to the homeless? Why don't you give to the homeless? Let's go right now. And they don't want to go and do that. And we enjoy putting them on the spot. Let's go do it right now. Come on. How much money you got in your pocket? Let's go. Let's go find a homeless person. Let's give your money to that homeless person. Why don't you teach me how to do it? Show me. Be an example right now. Yeah, that's what I thought. And so that's what Judas said. You shouldn't give for the Lord. You should give to the homeless. And we could have fed the poor. Yeah. Yeah. interesting how that works. Now, in this passage, Jesus essentially sanctions giving your money for the Lord rather than to the poor. That's why we don't support, you know, poverty initiatives, and the Republican Party, and the Democratic Party, and Feed the Hungry, and for that matter, you know, Homes, and you know, all these people doing great things in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, trying to help people. Great. Wonderful. I'm glad you're doing it. There's nothing wrong with that. But that is not what missions money is for. Missions money is for missions. You keep it that simple and you keep yourself out of trouble. Now, that doesn't mean that some of these, you know, some people have to come up with some creative ways to get into countries and places and have opportunities based on their willingness to set up a home or help people or whatever, whatever the case may be. There's all sorts of different ways people get into different countries and all that, and we'll consider that. But generally speaking, our money is going to support the missionary who is preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the goal. That's our aim. Now, the Lord said this woman did a good work. So when you give in order to support the gospel, the ministry, your church, in honor of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord looks at that and says, that's a good work. That pleases me. That makes me happy. And so that's where you should be careful to put your money, if you're going to put your money somewhere. If you're not, you want to hang on to it? Well, whose will these things be? Who is he going to go to? What are you going to do with it when you die? So that's between you and the Lord. Now, verses 14 through 16, Judas portrays the Lord. Verse 14, then one of the 12 called Judas Iscariot, went unto the chief priests and said unto them, what will ye give me? So who initiated this conversation? Judas did. They didn't approach him. They didn't encourage him. They didn't try to trick him. They didn't lure him. He went looking for it. What a dirty thing to do. What will you give me? And I will deliver him unto you. And they covenanted with him for 30 pieces of silver. And there's all sorts of ideas in the Bible related to this 30 pieces of silver. We don't have time to look at them. It'd be interesting if we did. But essentially, in the Old Testament, that was the cost of a slave. That was all that the he said, what will you give me for him? And they said, well, we'll give you the cost of a slave. How about that? That was all he was worth. And very interesting. Verse 16. And from that time, he sought opportunity to betray him. 30 pieces of silver. Man, he's in here. He's got people breaking alabaster boxes and pouring ointments, just wasting it. And I could just come and betray him and get 30 pieces of silver. I'll let you know when I got him. And so he set out from that time forward to betray the Lord. Very sad thing. It says they made a covenant together. Wasn't that an interesting choice of words? Why'd they make a covenant? That's what God did with Israel. He made a covenant with them. The New Testament is the new covenant, and yet Judas and these religious Jews made a covenant together to betray the Lord Jesus Christ. What a thing to do. Very interesting choice of words. All right, verses 17 through 25, verse 17. Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Jesus saying unto him, where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the Passover? And he said, go into the city to such a man and say unto him, the master saith, my time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at thy house with thy disciples. And the disciples said, or did as Jesus had appointed them, and they made ready the Passover. Now when the even was come, he sat down with the twelve, and as they did eat, he said, Verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me. And they were exceeding sorrowful, and began every one of them to say, Lord, is it Judas? What a question to ask. Now, I wasn't there, I've never been there, never will be there, but I would like to think sitting there that I would have some understanding in myself that it wouldn't be me. I can honestly say right now in front of the people in this room that there's no way I would betray you in this way. Now, I might do something you don't like. I might do something goofy. I might do something wrong. Or you might perceive that I've done something wrong. But I'm not going to go deliberately looking for some way to betray you the way that Judas did. And the man in that room is sitting around looking and asking, is it me? Could it be me? What a terrible thing. Verse 23, where are we going now, 25? Verse 23, and he answered and said, he that dippeth his hand with me in the dish, the same shall betray me. The son of man goeth as it is written of him, but woe unto that man by whom the son of man is betrayed. It had been good for that man if he had not been born. Right there Judas should have hit his knees and said, I repent. Forgive me. And he did not. It gets worse. Verse 25, then Judas, which betrayed him, answered and said, Master, is it I? I mean, I got to do what everybody else is doing, or it's going to let on that I'm the one. Is it I? Well, thou hast said. In other words, yeah, yeah, it's you. You know it's you. Why are you asking? Thou has said is what the Lord, it's the Lord's way of saying yes, but the connotation is yes, and you know the answer to this question. Not yes, and I'm informing you now, but you already know the answer to this question. You already understand that. You already know that. That's the purpose of that phrase. All right, verses 26 through 29. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread and blessed it and break it and gave it to the disciples and said, take, eat, this is my body. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it, for this is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my father's kingdom." And yeah, we'll stop there, in my father's kingdom. All right, so the Lord establishes the Lord's Supper. Now, we've talked about this a lot. We'll continue to talk about it a lot. We do it every month, the first Sunday of every month in Sunday School. We have a lesson about the Lord's Supper. We partake of the Lord's Supper. So we're not going to spend a whole lot of time here. You, by now, should have a good understanding of it. If not, you will, because we're going to have years and years and years of it, doing it together as oft as we will. Praise the Lord. Now, verses 30 through 35. Verse 30, And when they had sung in hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives. Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night. For it is written, I will smite the shepherd and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad. That's fulfilled prophecy from, I believe it's from the book of Zechariah, verse 32. But after I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee. Peter answered and said unto him, though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never, never be offended. Yeah. We saw how long that lasted. Verse 34, Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee that this night before the cock crow thou shalt deny me thrice. Peter said unto him, Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee. Likewise also said all the disciples. Now, it's a blessing to have somebody around that has that type of zeal. You just, it's good for, this is why it's good to To do your best to make sure you're sitting under a pastor that has some discernment and is careful and is patient because that zeal flutters out. That zeal, there's something under that zeal oftentimes that's not very authentic or it's not very substantive. And so that's why the Bible says, lay hands on no man suddenly. Just take your time, watch them, let it play out, let it work out. Eventually, you will see and not hear. If that zeal is real, then it'll begin to manifest itself, and you'll see it. They'll show up at the ministries. They'll be at the church every time the doors are open. They're going to want to help. They're going to be a part of things. They're going to want to do things. And so you get to see over time a measure of faithfulness that matches the zeal. But a lot of people can talk the talk and talk a big game and show up and do nothing. All right, so you have to be real careful about telling the Lord what you will do. How about just do what the Lord has asked you to do and see a lot of people had they make up in their minds what they would do for the Lord if he would just let them and the Lord saying how about just show up to church. How about just pray every now and then? Could you read your Bible? You'd be amazed at how many Christians, Christians, people who claim to be Christians, people who actually are Christians, have never read their Bible at home together as a family, have never sung a single hymn together in their home. That's astonishing. That's really sad. That should not exist. You don't just, well, we did that in church. No, that's supposed to be part of your life. And they don't do it. But Lord, I would die for you. You won't even read a chapter of the Bible in your home. Are you going to die for me? You won't show up to church every week. You're going to die for me? Yeah, just let's work on the fundamentals so we can talk about the more extreme stuff later. All right. And beside, the Lord is not asking us to die for him. The Lord is asking you to live for him. And yet everybody wants to talk about and think about how they would do this great thing, martyrdom. I would do that for you, Lord. Well, I'm not asking you to do that. I'm just asking you to show up to church. You see that missionary? Can you just help him out? Can you do something just fundamental, just the basics consistently? And then we can move on to the more extreme things. But if you don't do the fundamentals consistently, you're not going to do anything great for the Lord. It's just not going to happen. The greatest athletes are excellent at the fundamentals. That's what makes them great, is they just exercise the fundamentals over and over and over, and they drill them, and they get them down. And then when it's time to do something great, they're ready for it. Well, Christians, they just think, this one event's going to happen, and man, I'm going to get wings and have an angelic glow over my head, and the Lord's just going to open those pearly gates and say, enter in. That's just not how it's going to happen. It's possible the events in John 15 through 17 take place between these verses. So when the Lord, his high priestly prayer and all those incredible things that he lays out in chapters 15 through 17 of the book of John likely happened between these passages, between verses 30 and 36. Now, Jesus said, all ye shall be offended. Peter said, I will never be what? Offended. You see a problem there. It is likely that the Lord has a clue what he's talking about and that you should probably listen to him instead of instructing him on what you would never do. It just doesn't work that way. All right, let's read down to the end of the chapter and then we'll make some notes if we can. All right, verse 36. Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here while I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then say of the unto them, my soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death, tarry ye here and watch with me. And he went a little further. Now, now this passage said the Lord is exceeding sorrowful even unto death because of the weight of all of this. So the Lord is exceeding sorrowful and it brings him nigh unto death. But if you read in this parallel passage in the other Gospels, it said the disciples were exceeding sorrowful, so they went to sleep. See the difference? Here they have Jesus crying out to his Father right in front of them, just a few feet away, far enough to walk away and bow down and fall on his face. And they're like, well, I'm so worn out. I'm just going to go to sleep. That's the best man, that's the best that God has on earth. Praise the Lord. Tell you here and watch with me, verse 39, and he went a little further and fell on his face and prayed saying, oh my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt, and he cometh unto the disciples and findeth them praying and watching and doing exactly what he said. asleep. And say then to Peter, what could you not watch with me one hour? Man, what a question. I feel like that would have just broke my heart. But again, I wasn't there. They're worn out. They've been traveling. There's a lot going on. It's easy to be presumptuous in this situation. But you're not there. You're not in this situation. And so we've got to just be careful about that. Now, notice the question. God is talking to God, right? The Son of God is talking to God the Father. Is there some other way we can redeem the souls of men? And there's no answer to the question. So then how did the Roman Catholics find another way? How did Muhammad find another way? How is it that when God sat down and reasoned this out with God, they couldn't find some other way? But the Methodist Church found another way, and the Church of Christ found another way. We'll just use baptism. We'll just use works. We'll just be a good person. We'll just... People find some other way, though God himself, who is the one who lets you in or keeps you out, couldn't find another way. I just submit to what the Lord did for you. Verse 41, Watch and pray that ye enter not into temptation. The Spirit indeed is willing, the Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. It's a blessing. It's good to have a willing spirit, but you've got to make that flesh come along and do what it's supposed to do. Verse 42, he went away again the second time and prayed, saying, Oh, my father, if this cup may not pass away from me except I drink it, thy will be done. And he came, and found them asleep again, for their eyes were heavy. And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words. Then cometh he to his disciples, and saith unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest. Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going. Behold, he is at hand, that doth betray me. And while he yet spake, lo, Judas one of the twelve came, with and with him a great multitude with swords and staves from the chief priests and elders of the people. Now he that betrayed him gave them a sign. saying, Whomsoever I shall kiss. What a way to betray somebody. That same as he, hold him fast. And forthwith, he came to Jesus and said, Hail, Master. It's interesting, as far as I can remember, Judas never called Jesus Lord. always called a master. The Bible says, Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And he just never did that, and kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore art thou come? Friend. I don't want to want to punch him in the face, but the Lord said, Friend. What a God we have. Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, and took him. And behold, one of them which were with Jesus stretched out his hand, stretched out his hand, and drew his sword, and struck a servant of the high priest, and smote off his ear. Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place, for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Thinkest thou I cannot now pray to my father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be? In that same hour said Jesus to the multitude, Are you come out as against a thief, with swords and staves, for to take me? I sat daily with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on me. But all this was done, that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. Then all the disciples forsook him and fled. And they that had laid hold on Jesus led him away, Caiaphas the high priest, two Caiaphas high priests, where the scribes and the elders were assembled. But Peter followed him after afar off unto the high priest's palace, and went in and sat with the servants to see the end. Now the chief priests and elders and all the councils sought false witness against Jesus to put him to death. But found none. Yea, though many false witnesses came, yet found they none. At the last came two false witnesses, and said, This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days. And the high priest arose, and said unto him, Answerest thou nothing? What is it which these witness against thee? But Jesus held his peace, and the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure thee by the living God. Oh, do you? Interesting. He's standing in front of you. I adjure thee by the living God that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the son of God. Jesus saith unto him, thou hast said, nevertheless, I say unto you, hereafter shall you see the son of man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest rent his clothes saying, he hath spoken blasphemy. What further need have we of witnesses? Behold, now you have heard his blasphemy. What think ye? They answered and said, he is guilty of death. Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him, and others smote him with the palms of their hands, saying, Prophesy unto us, thou Christ. Who is he that smote thee? Now Peter sat without in the palace, and a damsel came unto him. This is the same Peter who said, Though I die with thee, never. Okay. Well, thou also was with Jesus of Galilee, but he denied before them all, saying, I know not what thou sayest. And when he was gone out into the porch, another maid saw him and said unto them that were there, this fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth. And again, he denied with an oath, I do not know the man. And after a while came unto him they that stood by, and said to Peter, Surely thou also art one of them, for thy speech bereath thee. Then began he to curse, and to swear, saying, I know not the man, and immediately the cock crew. And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out, and he wept bitterly." Amen. All right. We hope you enjoyed this podcast. You can learn more about our ministry by visiting www.plenteusredemption.com. You can hear more Plenteous Redemption podcast audio at www.plenteusredemption.media. Please comment below if this podcast has been a help to you. Also, inform us of future topics that would interest you. Thank you again for listening to the Plenteous Redemption podcast.