The sins of Judas Iscariot - I can only imagine!
Now the Feast of Unleavened
Bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching. And the chief priests and
the scribes were trying to find a way to put Him to death, since they were
afraid of the people.
And Satan entered Judas, the
one called Iscariot, who belonged to the number of the twelve. And he left and
discussed with the chief priests and officers how he was to betray Him to them.
And they were delighted, and agreed to give him money. And so he consented, and
began looking for a good opportunit
y to betray Him to them away from the crowd.
I can only imagine what might have been going through Judas’ mind when he decided to betray Jesus.
As they were going on the road,
someone said to Him, “I will follow You wherever You go.” And Jesus said to
him, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of
Man has nowhere to lay His head.”
I imagine that Judas would have believed
that Jesus was the messiah, enough so that he would have left everything he had
just to follow Jesus, something many others failed to do.
Now He said to them, “These are
My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all the things
that are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms
must be fulfilled.”
Then He opened their minds to
understand the Scriptures,
I imagine how Judas, like his
fellow apostles would have struggled to understand what Jesus’ was doing.
Now He called the twelve together
and gave them power and authority over all the demons, and the power to heal
diseases. 2 And He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to perform
healing.
I imagine how Judas, after having the
opportunity to experience and wield miraculous powers, would have felt excited
and privileged to help Jesus usher in Jesus’ new kingdom!
When His disciples James and
John saw this, they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down
from heaven and consume them?” But He turned and rebuked them.
I imagine how Judas, like James and
John, might have had different ideas about how Jesus would have or was supposed
to punish non-believers and even overthrow Israel's oppressors in order to establish
His new kingdom!
But Judas Iscariot, one of His
disciples, the one who intended to betray Him, *said, “Why was this perfume not
sold for three hundred denarii and the proceeds given to poor people?” Now he
said this, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and
as he kept the money box, he used to steal from what was put into it.
I can only imagine how Judas, might
have gradually grown bitter against Jesus over His methods which did not match his
own expectations, and how his love for money combined with his growing mistrust of Jesus
resulted in a relapse of his sinful tendencies to steal! I can only image how he might have justified
helping himself to a little of what was in the money box. I can only imagine how he might have had many
unrealized and unsupported ideas and plans to raise more funds that could be “given
to the poor” or to finance the rebellion that would be needed to overthrow
Israel’s oppressors; maybe asking himself why Jesus wasn’t using the power he apparently
to ushering in the Kingdom with a show of force to vanquish the enemy?
But He warned them and
instructed them not to tell this to anyone, saying, “The Son of Man must suffer
many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be
killed and be raised on the third day.” ---- But I say to you truthfully, there
are some of those standing here who will not taste death until they see the
kingdom of God.”
I can only imagine how Judas might
have responded in confusion to Jesus’ warnings to keep His predicted death a
secret. Was Jesus going to return from the
dead to show his power, to convince the elders, chief priests and scribes, to rally
all of Israel to pledge allegiance to and support the new kingdom, which would
then rise up to finally overthrow Israel’s oppressors?
I can only imagine, maybe in his confusion, he reasoned that he could kill two birds with one stone, raise some money from the chief priests while fast tracking what Jesus was always telling them would happen anyway.
Now He said to them, “These are
My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all the things
that are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms
must be fulfilled.”
Then He opened their minds to
understand the Scriptures,
Hindsight is 20/20 - it can be so
easy for us today to judge and criticize Judas Iscariot in a way that makes him
seem so much more evil than we are. We
don’t want to be able to relate to Judas in any way, we want to feel like we
could never be guilty of his terrible sins.
But, don’t we today struggle with
the same sins that led to the ruin of Judas?
Don’t we struggle with not trusting in Jesus’ plan and the only ‘way’ for
made for us to be? So many of us today lack
the faith to trust Jesus with our lives, refusing to make the first step, which
Judas was at least able to do. Aren’t we
sometimes guilty of scheming and cutting corners to come up with a better ‘way’
that the one Jesus left for us to follow?
I don’t know for sure, but I can only imagine, erring on the side of caution, that maybe I too struggle with the same sins that Judas struggled with.
I remember struggling with the whole
"church plan" that Jesus established for us... I thought to myself, "surely
I don’t need the church or fellowship from potential hypocrites", convinced
that I knew a better way, a better plan, I refused to support Jesus plan for me
to let the "wheat and weeds " grow together (Matthew 13:24-30). Some of us doubt the importance of Jesus’ complete
plan for us to “repent and be baptized”, reasoning, "what if I sincerely
accept Jesus in my heart, then accidentally die before I get to the water? Surely God would not hold me sin against me,
so… maybe baptism isn’t necessary! Surely
I can get in at the last minute - like the thief on the cross, that’s only fair! No need to do it the way Jesus said we should
do it, He’ll make an exception for me!”
Let us be careful to consider how we could be guilty of some of the same sins that drove Judas to betray Jesus... disbelief and mistrust combined with our ego and a desire to find ‘another way’, which can result in resistance, defiance and even outright rebellion against Jesus ‘way’.
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