The Power We Need

Matthew 26:47-56

March 23, 2025 • Mount Pleasant UMC

Power. It’s what we want. It’s what we need. It’s what we expect. Remember those weeks over the last two summers when the big storms came through—we learned a new word, “derecho”—and took out power for most of our area? We had to learn to live without power, and we even had worship without power out in the shelter house the one year. Whenever the power goes out, we become keenly aware of how dependent we are on electrical power. Generator sales soared after both of those storms because we just don’t like to go without power.

But we not only want, need and expect electrical power. We also want, need and expect worldly power—in today’s world, specifically political power. Christians are vulnerable to the temptations of gaining influence by cozying up to those who are in charge—or think they are in charge. Many, many times throughout history, the church and the state have come together and it’s never gone well for the church. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, it is said, and every time the church has tried to rely on political power, the church has suffered. We have yet to really learn that “Christianity cannot save the world by political power” (Zahnd, The Wood Between the Worlds, pg. 97). Pope Francis said it well: “The Church must not use the language of politics, but the language of Jesus” (qtd. in Zahnd 100). Yet that doesn’t keep us from trying. Time after time the church has longed for political power, seeking to influence elections and take over government positions. Because political power, we think, is the power we need. We forget the wisdom of Chuck Colson, who knew firsthand the temptations of political power and because of that determined that salvation is not coming on Air Force One. And the reason that is true is because the one we follow didn’t pursue power through elections or political manipulation. He displayed his power on a cross.

This Lenten season we are looking at various images in the Scriptures of “The Old Rugged Cross.” And we’ve been talking about how the cross is the most recognized symbol in the world. Recognized, yes, but not always understood. People may know it has something to do with Jesus or at least Christianity, but even those of us in the church end up with pretty shallow understandings of all this symbol represents. So far we’ve talked about how the cross shows us who God is, reminds us that God suffers with us, and brings hope out of horror. But the cross also teaches us about power and, if we look long enough, it will show us exactly the power we need.

The power struggle begins the night before the actual crucifixion in a garden called Gethsemane. The name “Gethsemane” means “oil press,” and this garden is at the foot of the Mount of Olives where there used to be a grove of, obviously, olive trees. Today there is a cave on one side of the area and a large church on the other. The cave marks where Jesus was arrested and the church marks where he went to pray. It’s after dinner, after what we know as the Last Supper, and Jesus has brought his disciples to this place because it was familiar. Judas had left during the meal in order to hand Jesus over to the authorities, and now he interrupts Jesus in the garden, bringing with him a “large crowd,” most likely made up of Roman soldiers and Temple guards (26:47; Card, Matthew: The Gospel of Identity, pg. 231). They are armed with swords and clubs, which Jesus sort of snarkily points out were unnecessary (26:55). They come looking for a revolutionary because they believe that Jesus is seeking the kind of power that comes with armed rebellion. In fact, Judas (I believe) is counting on it.

There is a lot of speculation on why Judas did what he did. The truth is no one really knows and the Gospel writers don’t feel the need to tell us. My personal best reading of the situation is that Judas wanted Jesus to be a king. He wanted Jesus to be in power. And since Jesus didn’t seem to know how to go about it, Judas decided he would give the whole situation a push. I think Judas believed if he turned Jesus in, got him arrested, that Jesus would strike back and that would jump start the revolution. Judas didn’t hate Jesus; in fact, in this passage Judas calls Jesus “rabbi,” teacher, which is the only time in Matthew’s Gospel that anyone calls him that (cf. McKnight, Matthew, pg. 385). It’s not sarcastic, it’s not hateful, it’s a genuine term of endearment. Jesus, in turn, calls him “friend,” and that’s not the usual word for friend there. There’s an intimacy here; the word Jesus uses means a comrade, someone you would fight for, or a table companion, someone you would share a table with. It’s almost like a last, gentle question from Jesus to Judas: “Do you really want to go through with this? Are you sure” It’s important to notice that for Jesus, friendship does not end with betrayal (cf. Wright, Matthew for Everyone—Part Two, pg. 164).

As soon as the disciples realize what is going on (and after they wake up), they spring into action. Matthew tells us that there is an unnamed disciple, “one of Jesus’ companions,” who draws a sword and starts swinging. John tells us it is Peter, by the way, which is completely in character (cf. John 18:10). The way it’s described is he starts swinging away, probably at anyone and everyone, and what he cuts off is part of the earlobe of the slave of the high priest. But it’s important to note that Peter draws his own sword; he didn’t grab it from someone else. Matthew is clear about that (26:51). Peter came armed. Peter, too, just like the Temple guards and the Roman soldiers and even Judas, believes that the way out of this garden is by taking charge and claiming worldly power. Power of the sword—that’s what matters. And the throne in Jerusalem—that’s the power we need.

But Jesus has another way. He has other ideas, as he often (usually) does. “Put your sword back in its place,” he tells Peter (26:52). And then from Jesus comes what has become a well-known phrase: the one who lives by the sword will die by the sword. If you insist on worldly power, Peter, Judas, it will kill you. Not always physically but always spiritually. Besides that, Jesus says, he could call twelve legions of angels to his defense and the Father would send them. Interesting, twelve legions—one legion of angels for every disciple. So, let’s do some quick math. A Roman legion consisted of six thousand soldiers, so twelve legions would be seventy-two thousand angels (cf. Card 232). I don’t know how many were in the “large crowd,” but I’m pretty sure they would be outnumbered. If Jesus were to call on those angel legions, this fight would be over.

But Jesus chooses a different path. He’s been in prayer in this garden toward that end. He’s been praying so intently that, we’re told, his sweat was like drops of blood (Luke 22:44). He knows what’s ahead, and he’s begging the Father to be able to avoid the cross. Who wouldn’t? “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.” And though the Gospel writers record the next line immediately after, I imagine that it wasn’t quite that simple or fast. Jesus, we’re told, prayed hard and long that night. There was genuine wrestling in the Trinity that night until Jesus could come to this point: “Yet not as I will, but as you will” (26:39). When he stands up from his time of prayer, he is resolute. He lays down any path he might have toward worldly power. He puts aside swords and war and even an angel army and he allows himself to be arrested so “that the writings of the prophets might be fulfilled” (26:56). He turns away from every other option available to him and instead he demonstrates the power we need. Not worldly power. Not political power. Not power that comes from wealth or influence or any other source. Jesus instead chooses the power of love.

And when he does that, did you notice what happened next? Matthew—one of the original disciples who was there that night—Matthew tells us, “All the disciples deserted him and ran away” (26:56). They didn’t just give up on their plans. They didn’t just act like they didn’t know him. They deserted him and they ran away. They chose their own safety and security over standing with Jesus. Peter, just hours before, had promised Jesus, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.” And Matthew says, “All the other disciples said the same” (26:35). I wonder if Jesus heard those words echoing in his heart and mind as he watched them all, to a man, turn tail and run away into the darkness. So much for dying with him. But I get it. I understand why they took off. They were scared, to be sure. I would have been, too. And they’re also disillusioned and disappointed. You see, we don’t understand other kinds of power. The kind possessed by the Temple guards and the religious leaders, the kind Judas hoped Jesus would grab onto, even the kind owned by twelve legions of angels—we get that kind of power. So did the disciples. They understood that kind of power; they had grown up with it, been oppressed by it, and longed to have it. But the kind of power that allows its enemies to have their way? That made no sense to them. It makes no sense to us. All the disciples—including you and me—deserted him. No one stands with Jesus.

Most of you know that I love a good high-stakes adventure movie, whether that’s a Marvel superhero movie or Star Wars, or Star Trek, Doctor Who or Lord of the Rings. I love it all. I grew up on comic books and stories of good versus evil, and the common theme in all of those things is that the good guys always win. It might take two or three movies or a multi-part comic story or several episodes of a TV show, but the good guys always win. And a lot of times, in those stories, the good guys win by killing the bad guys. Now, of course, in comics and science fiction, no one ever stays dead, but that’s not the point. Spider-man, Luke Skywalker, Captain Kirk and the Doctor all win by ridding the world or the universe of the bad guys. And we come to believe that life should work that way, that life does work that way. Might makes right. Victory through superior firepower. That’s the way the world works. And we never stop to ask if that’s the way the world should work. Or if that’s the way God intended for the world to work. You see, “if the world could be saved by killing the bad guys, God would not have sent his Son. He would have simply sent an army” (Zahnd 98). Instead, Jesus allowed himself to be arrested, and he went to the cross to demonstrate where true power lies. This is the power we need.

First, the power of forgiveness. From the garden, Jesus is taken to a sham trial, is sent back and forth from Caiaphas the high priest to Herod the puppet king, then is ultimately taken before Pilate, the Roman governor. Pilate doesn't really want to be involved, but to appease the religious leaders he has Jesus beaten to within an inch of his life. And when the crowd is stirred up and demands crucifixion, Pilate allows it. So they put a heavy crossbeam on Jesus’ shoulders and take him outside the city gates to Calvary, the place of execution. And as they are nailing his wrists and ankles to the wood, Jesus prays, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). Do you notice what doesn’t happen in that exchange? Nobody asks Jesus to forgive them. Not a single soul. Not Judas. Not the Roman soldier who is holding the hammer. Not the ones who beat him earlier. Not Pilate. Not Caiaphas. Not Herod. And not any of his disciples who deserted him. No one asks Jesus to forgive them. But he does anyway. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

I don’t even know if many of them heard him praying for their forgiveness, or if some of them ever knew what Jesus prayed there on Calvary. Somewhere we’ve gotten the idea that I don’t have to forgive you until and unless you ask me to forgive you. We think we wait for that other person to acknowledge what they have done, to be really, really sorry, and then maybe if I’m feeling like it that day I might forgive them. That’s a transactional idea. You ask for it, I give it to you. But that’s never been the way God works, and so of course it’s not the way Jesus works. God is not transactional. Jesus works in the area of grace, where forgiveness is offered even before it’s asked for. He went to the cross on that very principle, that even before you and I were born, the gift forgiveness for our sins was offered. It’s possible even before you and I receive it. But on an interpersonal level, when we withhold forgiveness, we are only hurting ourselves. It’s been said that not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. I know that to be true. I had a Judas in my own life and for a lot of years I held on to that anger, that bitterness, and I built walls around my life so that no one could do that to me again. But it was killing me. That other person never was going to ask for forgiveness, never has. And yet for my own spiritual health, I had to forgive them if I was going to be able to move forward. It’s not easy; it’s often three steps forward and two steps back, but real healing is rarely quick. Jesus shows us that the power we need is the power of forgiveness. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

He also shows over and over again that the power we need, the power that enables us to forgive is the power of the Holy Spirit. Earlier in the evening of his arrest, Jesus had taught the disciples quite a bit about the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, the Comforter—many titles to describe one person. And we could talk for a long time about that teaching. But one of the things he said is particularly pertinent to the cross. Jesus said to his disciples, “It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate [the Holy Spirit] will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you…When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth” John 16:7, 13). Now, I seriously doubt any of them heard much less understood what he was teaching that night, and so after the crucifixion, after the resurrection, after teaching and hanging out with them for forty more days, Jesus told them this just before he returned to the Father: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Power. You will receive power. To do what? Be his witnesses. Power to change the world. But that power could only come once Jesus had gone away, and that required the cross. The church is given the power of forgiveness, the power of the Holy Spirit—the power of suffering love, not the power of the world. It’s only through the power of the cross that we will conquer the world (cf. Zahnd 99). “Not by might nor by power, but by [his] Spirit” (Zechariah 4:6).

Bob Dylan sang, “You gotta serve somebody.” Whether intentionally or not, Dylan was echoing the Apostle Paul, who put it this way: “You are slaves of the one you obey” (Romans 6:16; Zahnd 99). The things we pursue the most will in the end control us, so what will it be? Will we pursue worldly power at all costs? Some have certainly chosen that path, today and in days past. Sitting on death row the night Jesus was arrested was another man whose first name, Matthew tells us (27:16), was also Jesus. Jesus Barabbas, whose “last name” interestingly enough translates to “son of the father.” Mark and Luke both tell us Barabbas was an insurrectionist who had committed murder (Mark 15:7; Luke 23:19). Most think he was one of the Jewish revolutionaries whose only goal in life was to kill as many Romans as they could. But Barabbas had been caught and, apparently, sentenced to death. His case and his story had become well-known (27:16). He had chosen the way of worldly power, the way of revolution, and it had ended up like this. Most likely he was set to die by crucifixion on the next day, and I imagine him in his cell, counting down the hours and the minutes until it was all over. And though he was well-known in his day, it’s unlikely we would still be talking about him today—I mean, he was just another prisoner, an unfortunate victim of Roman justice—except for the fact that his way came into contact and conflict with another way.

Jesus Barabbas was brought out by Pilate before the people so that they could have a choice. It was a custom, we’re told, to release a prisoner during the Passover. And so Pilate, trying to get Jesus released, gives the crowd a choice of prisoners this year. We have no indication that he offered a choice any other year, but because he knew Jesus was innocent, he thought this might be a way to get the charges against him dropped and still save his own skin. And so Jesus Barabbas—violent revolutionary, lover of worldly power—and Jesus the Messiah—whose way is suffering love—are presented to the people. “Which one do you want me to release to you,” Pilate asks (27:17). Which way will you follow? Which power will you adopt?

The choice still stands before us today. Two thousand years later, the choice is the same. Every day, that choice is before us. In every interaction with every person, that choice is before us. Will we choose the power we want or the power we need? Songwriter Carolyn Arends has put it well, so I’ll give her the last word this morning.

So many living for the love of power

Wanting more until that final hour

The time has come for us to be a part of

The ones who find a ruler in the power of love

(Carolyn Arends, “The Power of Love”)

Amen.