“If you seek Me, let these go their way” (John 18:8)  

With these words, Christ sums up His Earthly mission to give His life for His disciples. For ordinary men, survival is the ruling passion, but for Christ, it was doing the will of the Father. This was the exact moment in time to accomplish the mission He planned with the Father from eternity as, “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:8). 

 Notice His concern for his disciples in His darkest of nights. For Himself, like a sheep before her shearers, He is dumb and opened not His mouth (Isaiah 53:7), but for His disciples, He speaks with Almighty energy. Herein is love, constant, selfless, faithful love. But there’s much more than that. The heart of the atonement is contained in the words, “If you seek Me, let these go their way”. 

 Because the Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep, He’s able to plead that they must therefore go free. Because the price is paid, justice demands that those for whom He stands a substitute should go their way. Out of slavery of sin and Satan, the redeemed come forth from dungeons of despair and fear. Satan hears the voice of Christ, and lifts his foot from the neck of the fallen. Death hears it, and gives up the dead. The redeemed are set free to progress in holiness, and no one but themselves can prevent them from accomplishing the will of the Father, for Christ commands, “let these go their way”. 

 Rejoice in the freedom Christ Has purchased for you with His blood. “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage” (Galatians 5:1).