Daily devotion – Judas
Judas – chose to do evil…
Mark 14:10 Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Him to them. 11 And when they heard it, they were glad, and promised to give him money. So he sought how he might conveniently betray Him.
It is true that the betrayal of Jesus by Judas was seen by the early Church as a fulfilment of Scripture – Psa 41:9 Even my own familiar friend in whom I trusted, Who ate my bread, Has lifted up his heel against me.
John 17:12 “While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.
That his act of betrayal took place after Satan had first ‘prompted’ and then ‘entered into’ Judas – yet these facts do not exonerate Judas.
Neither Bible prophecy nor Satanic influence robbed him of personal responsibility for his actions. At the last minute in the upper room Jesus made a final appeal to Judas – John 13:25 Then, leaning back on Jesus’ breast, he said to Him, “Lord, who is it?”
26 Jesus answered, “It is he to whom I shall give a piece of bread when I have dipped it.” And having dipped the bread, He gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. 27 Now after the piece of bread, Satan entered him. Then Jesus said to him, “What you do, do quickly.” 28 But no one at the table knew for what reason He said this to him. 29 For some thought, because Judas had the money box, that Jesus had said to him, “Buy those things we need for the feast,” or that he should give something to the poor. 30 Having received the piece of bread, he then went out immediately. And it was night.
When Judas rejected it, Jesus said: “Woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man!” – Matthew 26:34
Judas’s motivation…what was it? The Gospel writers tell us that Judas focus was his love of money. John tells us that he was the treasurer of the apostolic band and that he was a thief, helping himself to the contents of their common purse.
No wonder he was so upset when Mary poured her expensive ointment on Jesus. After that he seems to have gone straight to the priests in order to recoup some of the ‘loss’!
Judas bargained with them and settled on 30 silver coins, the ransom price of a common slave at that time.
The gospel writers set Mary and Judas in stark contrast to one another. Mary’s uncalculating generosity and Judas’s coldly calculated bargain. Incensed by Mary’s waste of a years wages, Judas sold Jesus for barely a third that amount.
Truly “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” 1 Tim 6:10