Holy Week: Video Devotional. Day 3

After3: Day 3: Judas Loved Jesus

After3 is a blog series intended to help you prepare this Holy Week...to anticipate the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus.

(You can read earlier After3 posts HERE and HERE)

Today is not a regular Hump Day. It's Holy Wednesday and with another day we step closer to the moment that will rattle Creation's most distant nebula down to the core of your soul. Today we reflect on this passage:

Then one of the twelve apostles, Judas Iscariot, went to talk to the leading priests. He said, "What will you pay me for giving Jesus to you?" And they gave him thirty silver coins. After that, Judas watched for the best time to turn Jesus in. (Matthew 26:14-16)

No one names their kid Judas. No one even names their dog Judas, unless the dog chews up all the furniture, poops in the house, and likes the taste of neighborhood children. Many villains have their moment in the pages of scripture: Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Goliath, Jezebel, but Judas takes center stage at history's climax. It is hard to recover from such historical failure. His betrayal of Jesus overshadows any good that he might have done in his three years with Jesus. Surely he helped someone. Surely he believed something Jesus said. Surely there was some imago Dei (image of God) in him. Perhaps, but we will always remember him as the one who betrayed Jesus. The bible even labels him as such. Judas will always have an asterisk by his name.

*Judas

The trajectory of Holy Week would have you pause today and ask yourself, "How have I betrayed Jesus?" But, I want to adjust our trajectory ever so slightly. I'm going to assume you have betrayed Jesus. God knows, along with several hundred of others, I have. I'm writing under the presumption that we all have some Judas in us. With that in mind, I want to give Judas a second look, the benefit of the doubt. 

After Judas betrays Jesus, the Jewish authorities convict him and sentence him to death. Judas receives word and...

When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. "I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood." (Matthew 27:3-4a)

I find Judas' reaction a bit odd for someone who wants Jesus dead. He seems genuinely surprised and broken-hearted at the news of his conviction. His "I have sinned!" sounds as much like a confession as I have heard. So, here's my take on Judas.

I think Judas loved Jesus, but he had a money problem. The biblical authors agree: Judas...was the one who kept the money box [for the disciples and Jesus]. He often stole from it (John 12:6). Judas knew better than anyone of Jesus' innocence. He figured the lack of evidence would never lead to a conviction. Judas capitalized on an opportunity: 

Hand Jesus over. 

Make some easy money.

The authorities release the innocent Jesus.

No harm, no foul.

Win-win!

But it all went terribly wrong, and when he realized Christ's blood was on his hands he couldn't bear the shame and...he went away and hanged himself. (Matthew 27:5b)

I wish Judas had hung (no pun intended) around until the resurrection. I wish his remorse had the opportunity to see the Risen Lord. I wish he could have heard Jesus say, "You are forgiven!" Betrayal of Christ always destroys, undoes, and annihilates. It is the nature of sin. Judas made a horrible choice in accepting money for Christ's arrest. But his greater mistake was assuming Christ's grace could not cover it! Perhaps if he had the hindsight of the resurrection he would be...

Judas

Rather than...

*Judas

As you reflect on your betrayal of Jesus today, yes, take it seriously. Your sin breeds destruction, but unlike Judas, you have the hindsight of Easter. Don't let guilt and shame snuff out hope. Lean into Christ not away from him. Increase church participation rather than create distance. Your betrayal does not have to define you. 

No more *** 

3 Degrees from a Noose: Remorse to Repentance (Part I)

A little over a week ago I tag-teamed a sermon with a great friend and preacher Luke Norsworthy.  Luke is the Lead Pastor of Venture Community, a dynamic church plant in Denton, TX.  Check them out!! He was preaching a Lenten series using Matthew as his text. As a part of the series he wanted to compare Matthew's narrative of two better known Jesus disciples, the yin and yang of the elect 12, Peter and Judas.  Luke invited me to step into the series and co-preach this particular passage. What follows comes from that sermon.

If you have studied the gospels at all you will recognized the two names Peter and Judas and likely you will have very different reactions to each of them.  You will tend to picture Peter as a hero of the faith, as a pillar of early Christianity, as a model and example of a legit Christ-follower.  Judas, on the other hand...let's just say you are not going to name your child after him.  Both characters ended in very different places. Peter ended, according to Christian tradition, as a martyr for Christ.  Judas? His intestines exploded all over the ground when he hanged himself in shame. Although both apostles wound up at different ends of the spectrum there was a moment when they were in the exact same place.

Jesus chose both Peter and Judas to follow him.  Both accepted.  Jesus predicted that both of them would deny/betray him.  Both swore they would never do such a thing. Both did deny/betray him.  Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss, turning him over to the Jewish authorities for a mere 30 pieces of silver. Peter denied Jesus three times in Christ's most desperate hour. Both failed miserably, and HERE IS WHERE WE NEED TO REALLY FOCUS - both were remorseful and sorrowful over their sin and failure.

When Peter realized what he had done the text says, "...he [Peter] went outside and wept bitterly." And when Judas realized that the Sanhedrin actually delivered a guilty verdict against Jesus (It's my opinion Judas did not think Jesus would be convicted. He knew Jesus was innocent and figured there was not enough evidence to convict him) the text reads, "He [Judas] was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. 'I have sinned,' he said, 'for I have betrayed innocent blood.'”

Peter and Judas both had the proper response when coming to grips with their sin: remorse and sorrow and yet they ended up in vastly different places.  Peter goes on to be a great leader in the Church while Judas commits suicide. They ended up in different places because Peter demonstrated Godly Sorrow while Judas demonstrated Worldly Sorrow.  Paul defines Godly Sorrow and Worldly Sorrow in II Corinthians 7:10, "Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death."

In other words, God desires for sorrow to lead you to repentance.  Sorrow is not repentance.  Sorrow is brokenness and remorse over the destruction you have caused.  Repentance is a change in direction, a 180 degree turn. It is the choice to realign yourself with the way of Christ. If your sorrow leads you toward repentance, then repentance will lead you back to salvation and regret-free living.  On the other hand, Satan desires for your sorrow to feed your guilt and grow your shame until you are held captive by your brokenness, ending in despair... or as Judas, in death.  When sorrow leads you in that direction it is Worldly Sorrow.  NT Wright describes it this way, " -“The first goes down the hill of anger, recrimination, self-hatred and ultimately self-destruction, the way that leads to death. The second goes down the route Peter took, of tears, shame & a way back to life.”

I'm going to venture to say that all of us have felt sorrow and/or remorse over our sin. This is the correct first step, but what will you do with it?  Will you let your sorrow lead you to repentance or will you let it shackle you to shame?  Clearly, we want the way of Godly Sorrow, one that leads to repentance. The struggle lies in figuring out how to move from remorse/sorrow to repentance.  I believe the key to Godly sorrow, the bridge from remorse to repentance is the ability to accept God's grace.

In my next post I'll share three things from my personal experience that are necessary when accepting God's grace.