What are the thoughts that occur when one hears the name “Judas”? The visceral response is the same as to the word “betrayer” for the name has come to mean the same thing. Those who have heard anything at all of the man who gave the Lord over to his enemies are quick to disassociate themselves from any identification with him. He has come to represent the ultimate in human evil. How did he manage to waste his life and arrive at so sad an ending? Yet his dishonor can be instructional.
Before he met Christ, Judas was a normal person, indistinguishable from almost any other Jewish person of his era. The longing for the promised messiah was the definitive desire of Hebrew society at this time, brought on by the crushing weight of Roman domination. They wanted to be freed from their chains. Listening in on the conversations of the disciples, it was obvious that the men closest to Jesus, until their last view of him, expected a violent conqueror of the enemies of Israel. Judas was probably not different in this regard.
Judas was definitely aware that Jesus was the promised one the prophets spoke of. It is likely he felt frustration that meek and servile Jesus failed to live up to his expectations. Perhaps he wished to “help” God restore the kingdom to Israel by provoking a confrontation between his messiah and the gentile rulers lording it over him and his brethren. His suicide response to the death of Jesus would seem to indicate that the Lord’s sacrifice was not the result he was expecting.
Judas entirely missed the point of why Jesus came. He had not learned, despite all his time with Jesus, that only God is qualified to control things and be the top decision maker. Only God knows everything. Like a disobedient horse stealing the reins from it’s rider, Judas felt he knew the best path and made his own plans to make sure that it happened. He was “smarter than God”. If God were to expose our innermost thoughts, wouldn’t we be flabbergasted to discover that Judas lives on… in us? Jesus gave us the example when he acknowledged his physical and emotional weakness to God and yet chose to take the path of obedience by saying “Thy will be done”. Do we follow him by bringing every thought and action “captive to Christ” or do we hedge our bets by having fallback strategies in play? Do we, maybe just occasionally, feel that we could do things better than God?
No comments:
Post a Comment