This chapter begins that part of Mark's Gospel, which describes our Lord's sufferings and death. Hitherto we have chiefly seen our Savior as our prophet and teacher. We have now to see Him as our High Priest. Hitherto we have had to consider His miracles and sayings.

In these verses, Mark tells us how our Lord was delivered into the hands of His enemies. It came to pass through the treachery of one of His own twelve disciples. The false apostle, Judas Iscariot, betrayed Him.

These verses contain Mark's account of the institution of the Lord's Supper. The simplicity of the description deserves special observation. Well would it have been for the Church, if men had not departed from the simple statements of Scripture about this blessed sacrament! It is a mournful fact…

We see in these verses, how well our Lord foreknew the weakness and infirmity of His disciples. He tells them plainly what they were going to do. "All of you shall desert me." He tells Peter in particular of the astounding sin which he was about to commit--"This night, before the rooster crows…

The history of our Lord's agony in the garden of Gethsemane is a deep and mysterious passage of Scripture. It contains things which the wisest divines cannot fully explain. Yet it has upon its surface plain truths of most momentous importance.

Let us notice in these verses, how little our Lord's enemies understood the nature of His kingdom. We read that Judas came to take Him "with a great multitude, with swords and clubs." It was evidently expected that our Lord would be vigorously defended by His disciples, and that He would not be…

Solomon tells us in the book of Ecclesiastes, that one evil he has seen under the sun, is when "folly is set in great dignity, and the rich sit in low place." We can imagine no more complete illustration of his words than the state of things we have recorded in the passage before us.

A shipwreck is a melancholy sight, even when no lives are lost. It is sad to think of the destruction of property, and disappointment of hopes which generally attend it.