LENT 2016 – GOING TO JERUSALEM

Saturday, March 12

Judas Agrees to Betray Jesus: Matthew 26: 14 – 16

(We spent a fine, quality weekend by  tickling and playing with and going to “Old McDonald’s" for chicken nuggets with 3 yr. old William and snuggling with 6-month old Henry. Now back to our regular schedule programming….)

Have you ever betrayed anyone?

Maybe you broke a confidence, a secret that someone had shared with you. Maybe you lied to a friend, not the kind of little, white fib that was meant to protect their feelings, but the kind of lie that deceived and misled them in some way.

Perhaps, you spread some nasty bit of gossip about someone or spoke a lie about someone which besmirched and slandered their character.

Have you ever broken an important promise?  Have you ever made a commitment and then didn’t follow through, and thereby let someone down terribly?

Most of us may have done something like this. Maybe intentionally; more likely, inadvertently. We may hope that no harm was done; that the other person will understand; that the other person will forgive. But very often, the pain of severe betrayal cuts to the bone and leaves terrible, relational scars. Trust, faith, loyalty, friendship, kinship, love, all fly out the window when betrayal wreaks its havoc.

There has been much conjecture about why Judas chose to betray Jesus? Was he trying to goad Jesus into taking more violent action against the Romans? Was he fed up with the passive nature of Jesus’ methods? Was he an agent for the priests and elders? Or did he simply just do it for the money? Whatever his motivation it has turned him into a heinous villain, always remembered in the words, “on the night in which he (Jesus) was betrayed…”

Perhaps, we need look no farther than what has caused the betrayals we have experienced; the ones we have caused or the ones done to us. Is it jealousy? Resentment? Laziness, in that we just can’t be bothered to follow through?  Do we think our commitments don’t matter to someone else?  Do we take trust so lightly?  Do we think that we and our time are more important than anyone else’s?  Are we so careless with relationships that we toss them away?

Judas didn’t just betray Jesus; he betrayed his fellow disciples, his brothers, with whom he had been in close friendship for three years or so. Judas betrayed a cause – Jesus’ Vision for the Kingdom.  Judas betrayed God’s Champion for, seemingly, his own gain or, at least, his own agenda of some kind.

He will never ever live that down!