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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
In our Reading of the “Lord’s Supper” portion of “The Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ: Drawn from the Four Gospel Accounts” last week, we heard about and in the sermon that followed we meditated on “Satan’s Role”, such as Satan’s entering into Judas Iscariot, and, in our Reading of the “Gethsemane” portion of “The Passion” this week we heard about and in the sermon that now follows we meditate on “Judas’s Betrayal”, especially as it relates to us and our sin. For, like Judas, we certainly also “betray” Jesus and our neighbors in our own lives, but, unlike Judas, who ultimately was not forgiven, we want to be forgiven.
You may recall from last week’s Reading how Jesus at first bore witness that one of His Twelve disciples would betray Him, fulfilling Old Testament prophecy that a trusted close friend, who had eaten Jesus’s bread, would lift up his heel against Jesus (John 13:18; Psalm 41:9). When pressed, Jesus said that the betrayer was the one to whom He would give a piece of dipped bread, dipped perhaps in the bitter herbs of the Passover meal. And, Jesus gave the dipped piece of bread to Judas, Satan again entered into Judas, and Judas went out immediately. Tonight we heard how, after they had sung a hymn, the whole group went out, as was Jesus’s custom, to the Garden of Gethsemane, which Judas knew, and where Judas eventually betrayed Jesus, identifying Jesus with a kiss, in this case most likely a sign of pretend love and reverence (Stählin, TDNT 9:141).
So infamous is Judas’s betrayal that his name “is often used synonymously with betrayal or treason” (Wikipedia), and a “Judas kiss” can refer to any “act appearing to be an act of friendship” that in fact “is harmful to the recipient” (Wikipedia). There may be others whom we think of as such “Judases” who have betrayed and so “kissed” us. But, even while we recognize the depth of betrayal that we may have felt in the past from such people, we also need to consider how we ourselves may have been “Judases” who have betrayed and so “kissed” others, including our Lord Jesus Christ. Too often, we, who bear His Name as Christians, who have eaten bread at table with Him and had His flesh touch our lips, fail to show genuine love and reverence for Him, belying Whose we are, for example, in the ways that we deal with other people, even when we do not do something as hurtful as deeply “betraying” them. People who observe us every day can think less of our Lord because of how we speak and act in public, not to mention how we speak and act in private, even thinking thoughts that we imagine no one knows, forgetting that God knows our sin better than we do ourselves. We dare not hypocritically judge Judas for his betrayal of Jesus without recognizing our own betrayals of Jesus, which on their own, like our sinful nature and other sin, merit our death and damnation.
Popular culture, however, tries to excuse Judas in various ways. For example, the 1970s rock opera “Jesus Christ Superstar” freely interpreted Jesus’s and Judas’s psychologies, sympathetically depicting Judas as a tragic figure who only did what Jesus wanted him to do (Wikipedia). Perhaps more recently, a supposedly Christian play depicting Judas on trial, made available for churches to use at a price, lets audience members decide Judas’s fate and so includes “guilty” and “not guilty” endings (Christian Publishers). To be sure, as the Bible tells and as our Lutheran Confessions express, Judas later was sorry he betrayed Jesus and confessed his sin to the chief priests and elders, but, with no help from them, instead of combining his sorrow with trust that God would forgive his sin and instead of receiving individual absolution, Judas went and hanged himself (Matthew 27:3-5).
While not wanting, much less causing, Judas to betray Jesus, God nevertheless used Judas’s betrayal for us. Tonight’s Office Hymn (Lutheran Service Book 544), an anonymous work of the fifteenth century usually attributed to Thomas à Kempis (Precht, LW:HC, 294), emphasized well how everything Jesus did was for us. Somewhat similarly our Closing Hymn will base our penitential cry on all Jesus did for us. Truly, Jesus, God in human flesh, was betrayed by Judas to crucifixion on the cross for us and for our salvation. Jesus lived the perfect life, free of betraying God or others, that we fail to live, and Jesus with His death paid the price for our failures to live that life. When we combine sorrow over our sin with trust that God will forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, then indeed God forgives our sin: our sin of betraying Him and others, or whatever our sin might be. Tonight’s Psalm (32) and its antiphon of words familiar to many of us from older settings of the Divine Service (v.5) reminded us well that, when we confess our transgressions to the Lord, then the Lord forgives the iniquity of our sin. God forgives all our sin, and God forgives all our sin through His means of grace, His Word and Sacraments, that Word combined with things that we can see, feel, and taste.
Recently our Sunday Morning Adult Bible Class, in connection with Romans 16:16 (see also 1 Corinthians 16:20; 2 Corinthians 13:12; 1 Thessalonians 5:26; and 1 Peter 5:14), discussed the holy kiss that the Christian Church has used as a sign of peace between baptized and absolved believers who, after exchanging that sign of peace, are admitted to the Sacrament of the Altar, in order to have that intimate meal with their Lord and have His flesh touch their lips (confer Matthew 5:23-24). The Sacrament of the Altar is first and foremost a communion with Christ Himself, His Body and Blood, but the Sacrament of the Altar is also a communion with our brothers and sisters in Christ, who are also forgiven by Him, and whom we also have forgiven. At this Altar and its Rail, we are united together with Him and with one another in the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation, and the peace that He here gives us thereby.
Called by the Holy Spirit through Word and Sacrament to be Christ’s, made His in the waters of Holy Baptism, and with His Name upon us there at the Font and again and again each time we are individually absolved, or speak the Invocation or receive His Benediction, we go out from here and, instead of betraying our Lord and our neighbor, we pass along the faithful teaching of both His law that condemns sin and His Gospel that forgives sins, by grace through faith in Him. Strikingly, at the time of His betrayal by Judas, Jesus Himself did not deny Who He was but repeatedly faithfully identified Himself. When we fail to so faithfully pass along His teaching and instead betray Him or our neighbors, as we will, we turn again in sorrow and faith to put to death our sinful nature and let our redeemed nature arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.
So, tonight we have considered “Judas’s Betrayal”, and, in so doing, we have realized that, like Judas, we sin by betraying our Lord and our neighbors, but, unlike Judas, we combine sorrow over our sin with trust that God forgives our sin for Jesus’s sake. As we do so, God truly forgives our sin. So, the final verses of tonight’s Psalm call out to us both now and for eternity: “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!”
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +