The Bible is a marvelous book and I believe, in more ways than we are even aware of. The Bible has been around for a very long time and it has been read and reread. It has been quoted and requoted. There are so many parts that we are familiar with. And in a way, there is a danger to that familiarity. We become comfortable in what we THINK we know. And once we think we KNOW something, we stop looking any further and this is how we miss so many of the deeper truths of the Bible. Our challenge then is to try and read the Bible with fresh eyes; as if we had never seen or heard anything about it before.
In my years of study, I have learned that there is not one idle word in the Bible. Not one. And it is this fact above all else that convinces me of its divine origin. A few posts ago, I wondered why Christ needed John the Baptist to come before Him. Now, I have another question. What was the point of Judas?
Couldn't the Jewish officials just have arrested Jesus without the betrayal of Judas? If all Christ was sent to accomplish was our salvation, then the crucifixcion would have been enough. I am convinced there was more to Christ's life on earth than just the crucifixcion and our salvation.
In another earlier post, I spoke of my belief that Christ was sent here to teach us a new way of "being" and that this new way of being was necessary if one is seriously seeking the Kingdom of God. This question about Judas has convinced me that I am on the right track. So back to Judas. What was the point of having Christ betrayed by one of His inner circle.
I believe there are several points to Christ's betrayal. First and foremost, it is a powerful lesson to us that how people treat us, is NOT a reflection of who we are but instead is a reflection of THEIR hearts. When someone is cruel to us, it is not because we deserve cruelty, but because that individual has cruelty within their hearts. By the same token, when someone is kind to us, it is not because we deserve it, but because that individual has kindness within their hearts. And isn't this further illustrated by God Himself when He gave us His son while we were yet sinning, not because we deserved Him but because Love is within God's heart?
In John 2:24-25, the Bible says "But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men, and because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man." Christ would not trust Himself to men because He knew the evil within mens hearts. So it is also a lesson that even though people say they love us, because of the evil within man's heart, they are also fully capable of betraying us. christ told us to love God first and love man second. Do we not trust those that we love? There are varying degrees of trust and if we love God first, He will have ALL of our trust. He will not betray us. He will not lie to us. He is fully worthy of our trust. But man, is not to be trusted to the same degree as God because of man's inherent sinful nature. Didn't Christ tell us that He sends us out as sheep among wolves?
Another interesting observation about the betrayal of Christ is that the only guilty one that died due to his evil actions WAS Judas. Not the Pharisees and not Pilot. Judas. What does this say to you? To me, this speaks volumes of the debt we incur in our soul when we betray others.
And yet, aren't we just as guilty of betrayal as Judas? The definition of betrayal is "To give aid or information to an enemy of; commit treason against;to deceive; to be false". So whenever we sin, or lie, or lead others astray, aren't we giving aid to satan and betraying Christ?
And yet, it was Judas, the ultimate example of treason, the one we look at with such scorn, who also had a heart soft enough to fully feel the weight of what he had done, and commit suicide. How much remorse do we feel when we betray someone? And how does it feel to know that Judas's heart was softer than ours?
gently,laura
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