"Distrust no man's strength so much as thine own"
There was a very remarkable thing that happened in the upper room when Jesus celebrated his last Passover with his disciples before he suffered. He had said that one of them would betray him. And then, as Matthew tells us, “they [each] began to say to him one after another, ‘Is it I, Lord?’ ” (Matt. 26:22). I say this is remarkable because eleven of the twelve disciples had no consciousness of ever having formed the intention to betray him, yet each one asks, “Is it I, Lord? Am I the one?” The disciples had come to understand that Jesus “knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man” (Jn. 2:24-25). And now he announces that one of them would betray him and rather than saying, “No this can’t be! Surely not!” Or, “Surely not me!” They each “began to say to him one after another, ‘Is it I, Lord? Is it I? Am I the one?” See how distrustful they were of themselves. Though they were not conscious of ever having formed the inten...