Day 239 – Mark: Character sketch of Judas Iscariot
“In the evening He came with the twelve. Now as they sat and ate, Jesus said, “Assuredly, I say to you, one of you who eats with Me will betray Me.” Mark 14:17-18 NKJV
It is easy to overlook the fact that Jesus actually chose Judas to be His disciple. We may also forget that while Judas betrayed Jesus, all the disciples abandoned him. Like the others, Judas had a persistent misunderstanding of Jesus’ mission. They all expected Him to make the right political moves, but when He kept talking about His death, they must have felt varying degrees of anger, fear, and disappointment. They didn’t understand at the time. Would you have?
The exact motivation behind Judas’s betrayal is unclear. What is clear is that Judas allowed his desires to place him in a position where Satan could manipulate him. He accepted payment to set Jesus up for the religious leaders by identifying Him for the guards in the dimly lit garden of Gethsemane with a kiss.
In betraying Jesus, Judas made the greatest mistake in history. But the fact that Jesus knew he would betray Him doesn’t mean that Judas was a puppet of God’s will. He made the choice. God knew what that choice would be and confirmed it. Judas didn’t lose his relationship with Jesus, rather, he never truly found Jesus in the first place. He is called “the one headed for destruction” because he was never saved. (John 17:12) Judas does us a favour if he makes us think a second time about our commitment to God and the presence of God’s Spirit within us. Are we true disciples and followers of Christ or uncommitted pretenders?
Life lessons from Judas’s life
Evil plans and motives leave us open to being used by the enemy for greater evil and the consequences are so devastating that even small lies and little wrongdoings have serious results. God’s plan and purposes are worked out even through the worst possible events.
Prayer: Father, thank You for the life of Judas and the valuable lesson we can learn from him. May the choices we make have eternal, life-giving consequences for Your Kingdom instead of self-centred and world orientated. May we truly seek Jesus with humble and honest hearts to follow Him. Amen.
