One of you...! — Aaron Dunlop

Jesus Announces the Betrayal in the Upper Room

And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, one of you which eateth with me shall betray me. And they began to be sorrowful and to say unto him one by one, Is it I? And another said, Is it I?

And he answered and said unto them, It is one of the twelve that dippeth with me in the dish. The Son of Man indeed goeth as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.

Good were it for that man if he had not never been born. Then over to Luke chapter 22, Gospel of Luke and the chapter 22 and the verse 21. But behold, the hand of him that betrayeth me is with me on the table.

And truly the Son of Man goeth as it was determined, but woe to that man by whom he is betrayed. And they began to inquire among themselves which of them it was that should do this thing. And then finally over to John chapter 13 and the verse 21.

When Jesus had thus said, he was troubled in spirit and testified and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, one of you shall betray me. Then the disciples looked one on another, doubting of whom he speak.

Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples whom Jesus loved. But Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him that he should ask who it should be of whom he speak. And he then lying on Jesus' breast saith unto him, Lord, who is it?

Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it. And when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the sop, Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest do quickly.

What intent? What thou doest do quickly. Now no man at the table knew for what intent he speak this unto him. For some of them thought because Judas had the bag that Jesus had said unto him, buy those things that we have need of against the feast, or that he should give something to the poor.

He then having received the sop, went out, went immediately out. And it was night when he went out, the time of day. But Judas was to enter into a great night of the soul, and to discover that his soul was going to enter into the darkness of eternal night.

The Solemn Warning: One of You Shall Betray Me

There is a phrase that comes up over and over again in these passages that we have read. And it is the phrase, One of you shall betray me. I want to pick up on the three words that the Lord said in the upper room that night.

One of you shall betray me. If there ever was a sermon that was suited to cut right to the heart of religious hypocrisy, it was the sermon that the Lord preached in the upper room that night. If there ever was a sermon that was intended to cut right to the heart of a religiously hypocritical audience, it was the one that Christ preached in the upper room the night before his death.

I do not say that pejoratively. I do not say that slightly. For when this sermon was preached by Christ in the upper room, it was preached with the utmost solemnity and with the deepest of feelings. The Lord himself, the Bible tells us, was deeply sorrowful.

And as John tells us in verse 21 of chapter 13, that Jesus was troubled in spirit. And so when Christ said to the audience that night, One of you shall betray me. He said it with a troubled spirit. He said it with feeling.

There was a pathos in those words that still resounds today in the world in which we live. And there is a sorrow and a regret bound up in those words of the Lord Jesus Christ. One of you will betray me.

That will live on in eternity and eternally in the heart and mind not only of Judas, but in the heart and mind and consciousness of those who hear the gospel message and continually and persistently refuse Christ as their Savior.

The Lord in his ministry is coming to the end of his earthly walk. And the night before his death, the Thursday evening, he gathers in the upper room for the Passover feast. It will be the last feast that he has on this earth.

Many believe it was the last meal he had himself on this earth. But his purpose is to gather that night was to celebrate the Passover feast with his disciples. And you get the picture of the city of Jerusalem busy with the throngs of Israelites gathering in Jerusalem for the Passover feast.

The city is buzzing, a hive of activity. There in a lone room, only his disciples with him. Christ gathers in the quietness, in the solemnity, in the peace of the final feast with his disciples. As they were engaged that night in the ritual that that feast necessitates, the Bible tells us that the Lord revealed to them a very painful secret.

He informed them that there was in their midst an unhappy individual, one who had worked with them, one who had all the airs and graces of a Christian life, one who had all the appearances of a happy Christian life individually, and a Christian home sat in their midst.

And even then he was plotting the destruction of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was not cleansed by the blood of Christ, he had never experienced the grace of God in his life, and he knew nothing of the righteousness of Christ and the covering of sin.

And there he sat in the upper room with the disciples of Christ and Christ himself, communing, fellowshipping, to use the term broadly, with the disciples of Christ. And Christ exposed that night as he preached this sermon to a group of preachers in the upper room, and he said, one of you will betray me.

I don't want you looking at this thing abstracted from your own life. I want you to imagine that you were there. Or better still, I want you to imagine that Christ is here, and he says to this audience, one of you will betray me.

And as we look at this exposure of hypocrisy, I want you to be aware that the words of Christ to his disciples are as applicable to the preachers in the upper room as they are to you who sit here today in a Christian audience, on the Christian Sabbath, purporting to worship the Christ of God.

And Christ says to you, one of you will betray me. Which one? There are three things that I want you to see that the Lord Jesus Christ exposed in this speech or message of his. In this message, when the Lord said to his disciples, one of you will betray me, there are three things that he exposed.

The Saints’ Sensitive Heart

The first thing that the Lord exposed was the saints' sensitive heart. The saints' sensitive heart. The statement of the Lord was to men that he knew were Christians, for the most part. Indeed, as I said, they were preachers of the word.

They had been out on missionary work. They had been out on evangelistic tours. They had preached the word. They had seen the miracles. And the Lord says to this group of preachers, one of you shall betray me.

He knew that for the most part, the hearts of those men were right with him. While they had failures, while Thomas was doubting in himself, while Peter was impetuous and brash and forward, Christ knew that those men, for the most part, were men of God who knew the Lord.

And so, as he said these words to the disciples, he is exposing the saints' sensitive heart. In John chapter 13, the passage that we have read, it seems that when the Lord quoted the Old Testament in verse 18, I speak not unto you, I know whom I have chosen, but that the scriptures might be fulfilled, that he that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.

A quote from the Psalms. And it seems that just minutes before that, when the Lord quoted that quotation from the Psalms, that it made no impression on the disciples. There they sit, and the Lord is reciting scripture to them.

And he says that the scriptures in the Old Testament say, brethren, that he that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me. There was no astonishment in the disciples' words or thoughts at that phrase.

As the Lord calmly spoke of the Old Testament scriptures, it was not until he made the personal application of that, that the disciples and their sensitive hearts, and the Lord says concerning that one who was going to kick up his heels against Christ, the Lord said in personal application to every one of them, one of you shall betray me.

And he made personal application. Here we see in the words of the disciples, as the Lord applied this to their hearts, and the reaction that they get, they say among themselves to the Lord, they say, is it I?

Is it I, Lord? Is it I, Lord? And right around the eleven disciples, faithful disciples, they say, each of them, is it I? And in those words of the disciples, we have an exposure of their sensitive hearts.

The disciples did not make their search for sin in the hearts of their brethren. The disciples did not start their search for sin in the hearts of those men who sat around them. They started searching for sin within the bounds of their own heart.

And they were not like the Pharisees who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others. How much of that Pharisaical spirit is found in the church of Jesus Christ, and among Christians today, where we are able to see with clear vision, with a 20 -20 vision, the sins and faults and flaws in others.

Those sins, perhaps magnified in our own lives, we cannot see. We do not look for. But the disciples, as the Lord Jesus Christ said, one of you will betray me. Immediately made a search within the bounds of their own hearts for the sin of betrayal against Christ.

Christ in this then, and in the response of the disciples, exposed their sensitive hearts. Now I say that this statement of the Lord, when he said to them, one of you shall betray me, caused an examination of the faithful, because they were not guilty of the crime.

They were not guilty of the crime of betrayal. But what I want you to notice today, that while they were not guilty in this case, while they were not guilty in this case, their hearts before God were sensitive.

And they were acutely aware of the possibility of guilt. Of the possibility of guilt. Let me say it another way. That as these disciples sat around the feet of Christ, and as they fellowshiped with Christ, and Christ said to them, one of you will betray me.

Here is a group of men, who were willing to admit to a sin, or the possibility of a sin, that they were not conscious of. Do you get the significance of that? They were willing to admit to a sin, or the possibility of a sin, that they in their own minds were not conscious of.

And how often in our lives as individuals, in our interaction with others, and in our criticism of others, we refuse to see, and we refuse to even entertain the thought, that we might be guilty of a similar or worse sin, than that which we are criticizing and condemning.

One of you, Christ said, will betray me. And with one accord, and without hesitancy, each of them asks, Lord, is it? They believed the statement of the Lord, and they brought themselves under the search of that statement.

They brought themselves under the light of that statement. Because they were acutely aware, that hidden in the recesses of their hearts, unknown to them, there was the possibility, that they were guilty of such a crime.

They were questioning the Lord regarding that sin, that they were not conscious of, but they were willing to make search of. While they were not conscious of it, while they did not believe they were guilty of it, at the same time, they addressed the Lord, and asked Him, is it I?

And the grammar of the text bears this out, in that it is an interrogative particle in the Greek, which implies a negative answer. There are different ways in the Greek language of asking a question. And this method, grammatically, implies a negative answer.

And so we could legitimately translate this question of the disciples, Surely it's not me, Lord. Surely it's not me, Lord. There you see, that while they did not believe that they were guilty of it, and while they had no consciousness of that particular crime of treason and betrayal of Christ, they were willing and sensitive to make a search.

And they went to the right place. They didn't turn to one another. They didn't search one another's lives and make an investigation into each other's lives. They turned to the Lord. Why? Because they had the sensitive heart of a child of God.

They had the sensitive heart of a child of God. Is this not what Paul said in Philippians chapter 3, verse 3, when he speaks of the works and the standing that he had in the Jewish community? Paul says that I have no confidence in the flesh.

In other words, I have no confidence in myself. I have no confidence in my own ability to keep the law of God. I have no confidence in my own ability to live right before God. I have no confidence in my own ability to rise above the sins of the world.

I have no confidence in the flesh. And so he appeals continually to the work, the dying and doing of the Lord Jesus Christ, the sufferings of Christ on the cross, the working of the Holy Spirit in the life, applying the work of Christ, applying the word of God to the heart, enabling the Christian by the power of the Spirit of God to rise above sin and to rise above imperfection in their own lives and in the lives of others and to live then in confidence in Christ.

The psalmist had the same sensitivity of heart in Psalm 139, verse 23, when he said, Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me, and know my thoughts. And see if there be any wicked way in me. Lead me in a way everlasting.

The Social Gospel and the Nature of Sin

And so the words of Christ here expose the saint's sensitive heart. Not only does the words of Christ in the upper room expose the saint's sensitive heart, but secondly, these words, one of you, exposes the social gospel.

The words of Christ in the upper room, when Christ said, One of you will betray me, exposes the social gospel. You may never have heard of that term. You may not be interested in that term. You may not be interested in a theological investigation of what the social gospel is, and I would not advise you to search it.

But let me tell you that the social gospel is very much alive today in evangelical churches. The social gospel is very much alive in the Christian church worldwide. And this statement of the Lord in the gospels, when he said, One of you will betray me, exposes this social gospel.

This gospel, so called, began in the late 1800s, and was popularized by a man called Walter Rauschenbosch. In 1912 he published a book called, Christianizing the Social Order, whereby he called for socializing of the economy and politics.

These so called Christian socialists, were attempting to, in their own words, transform human society into the kingdom of God, by regenerating all human relations, and reconciling them in accordance to the will of God.

That was their attempt, to transform human society into the kingdom of God, by regenerating all human relations, and reconciling them in accordance to the will of God. It was then, the gospel of social reform.

It was a gospel that promoted instruction and teaching, or to lead by example, and that alone, they said, was able to create the kingdom of God on earth. Because the kingdom of God is merely a social order, then they could build the kingdom of God, to put it in simplistic terms, they could build a church, they could build the kingdom of God, by social behavior, by etiquette, by good behavior, and if you followed a certain social order, and followed etiquette, and followed a certain social behavior, then you were in the kingdom of God, according to this social gospel.

So you can see the direction of this social gospel, and as they defined it themselves, as Russian Bosch defined it himself, salvation then, is the voluntary socializing of the soul. The voluntary socializing of the soul.

If sin is selfishness, salvation must be a change that turns a man from self to God. Complete salvation therefore, would consist in an attitude of love, in which we would freely coordinate his life, with the life of his fellows.

Now you may never have heard of the social gospel, but this concept of a social gospel is very much alive in the Christian church today, where if we are told to love one another, we are told to be tolerant to one another, we are told to tolerate everything, we are told to follow a certain social behavior, and not to be negative.

We are told that we can build the kingdom of God, just by our social behavior of positive love to one another. How many times have we heard that? And their definition of love has been so skewed, that it has been torn away from scripture.

They believe that behavior builds the Christian church. To put it in very simple terms, you may associate with this more. If you are out witnessing, and you hear someone say, well I have done good, and I haven't committed murder, or I haven't stolen, or I am generally a good person, and I generally seek to do good, and I join this society, and do good through this society, and my life in the world is not harming anybody, that my friend is a social gospel in the vernacular, that we hear on the streets.

And that is the gospel that many evangelical churches, so called, are preaching today. But the words of Christ in the upper room, when he said, one of you shall betray me, exposes the social gospel for the nonsense that it is.

Here is a man called Judas, who lived with Christ himself for three years. Here is a man called Judas, who had the example of Christ himself, and who lived with the disciples for three years. And still here he has this selfishness, to use their term.

He has this hatred of Christ, still inbred in his heart. Because sin is not a social misbehavior. Sin is not the fact that I do not follow the social order. Sin is a matter of the individual heart. Sin is an aberrance and a breaking of God's law.

Sin, my friend, first of all, relates to God, not to society. Sin, first of all, relates to God, not to the political order of the day. One of you, Christ said, will betray me. Not because you haven't followed protocol within the twelve.

You have. Judas was not in the least suspected of betrayal. One of you will betray me, because your heart is not right. Your heart is not right. One of you who have listened to the teaching of my ministry, one of you who have allowed me to wash your feet, one of you who have sat at the table of fellowship with me, one of you, Christ said, will betray me.

Regardless of all the example, and regardless of all your behavior, and regardless of how well you have behaved, and follow the social order, one of you will betray me. The last thing that these words of Christ expose is the sinner's hypocrisy.

Judas and the Exposure of Religious Hypocrisy

The sinner's hypocrisy. They expose the saint's sensitive heart, they expose the social gospel, and they expose the sinner's hypocrisy. Throughout the gospels, it is significant to notice that Judas, as we have already stated, was a man who was not in the least suspected of sin.

In fact, if we can look on the fact that Judas carried the treasury of the disciples, we can see that Judas was a man, above all the disciples, who was trusted as a disciple. Unsuspecting. And throughout that ministry of Judas, here is this hypocrite of the first rank living among the disciples, taught to pray by Christ when the disciples asked him, Lord, teach us to pray.

The Lord taught them to pray. Sat at the table of fellowship with Christ and ate with Him. Allowed Christ to wash His feet. But none of the disciples in all of this doubted that Judas was a traitor. For all of this, here is a man who is undeterred in his sins, himself.

As he sat and ate that night in the upper room, exposed Judas for the traitor he was. I can't read your heart today. Christ is. Christ is reading your heart. Christ says to us today, all of us, one of you, will betray me.

One of you will betray me. You might have all, you might have life with a varnish of social behavior on it. But you know in your heart, before God, that it's not right with God. That things are not well.

That there's no peace there. And as the Lord sat that night in the upper room and revealed trouble, troubled individual in the upper room, perhaps there's one here today who sits in the same emotional state as Judas did.

Troubled in heart. An exposure of your sin. Wondering what to do. Again, after the Lord exposed him, exposes further the social gospel in that he went out and he sought his own way of salvation. Beloved, the only method, the only means of salvation today is to turn to Christ and say to Him, is it I?

Let's bow in prayer.