John 18 - CSB Spurgeon Study Bible

18:8-9 “‘So if you’re looking for me, let these men go.’ This was to fulfill the words he had said: ‘I have not lost one of those you have given me.’” After the words “to fulfill,” we naturally expect some Old Testament text—something said by David in the Psalms or by one of the prophets—but it is “to fulfill the words he had said.” It was but an hour or two since Jesus uttered this sentence, but it is already among the inspired Scriptures, and it had begun to take effect and to be fulfilled at once. It is not the age of God’s Word but the truth of it that constitutes its power. What Christ had said that night in prayer was as true and as much the Word of the King as what God had spoken by his Spirit through holy men ages before.

18:22-23 “When he had said these things, one of the officials standing by slapped Jesus, saying, ‘Is this the way you answer the high priest?’ ‘If I have spoken wrongly,’ Jesus answered him, ‘give evidence about the wrong; but if rightly, why do you hit me?’” Here we get an exposition of one of Christ’s own sayings: “If anyone slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also” (Mt 5:39). Of course, Christ would carry out his own command, so we see that he did not mean that his disciples were literally to turn the other cheek to those who struck them but that they were to bear such treatment patiently and not to give a railing answer. See how Jesus himself turned the other cheek. Nothing could have been more calm or more dignified and, at the same time, more full of the spirit of forgiveness.

18:37 “‘You are a king then?’ Pilate asked. ‘You say that I’m a king,’ Jesus replied. ‘I was born for this, and I have come into the world for this: to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.’” Christ is a king—a king by force of truth in a spiritual kingdom. For this purpose he was born; for this cause he came into the world. Our Lord, in effect, tells us that the truth of God is the preeminent characteristic of his kingdom and that his royal power over men’s hearts is through the truth of God. He dealt not with fiction but with facts—not with trifles but with infinite realities. He speaks not of opinions, views, or speculations but of infallible truths. Jesus is King in his people’s souls because his preaching has set us at rest on points of boundless importance; he has not given us well-chiseled stones but real bread. There are a thousand things you may not know, and you will be little the worse for not knowing them; but if you do not know what Jesus has taught, it will not go well with you. If you are taught of the Lord Jesus, you will have rest for your cares, balm for your sorrows, and satisfaction for your desires. Jesus gives sinners who believe in him the truths of God they need to know—the assurance of sin forgiven through his blood, favor ensured by his righteousness, and heaven secured by his eternal life.