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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.
Similar to our last year’s Lenten use of and focus on St. Luke’s Divinely-inspired account of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, this year, in our five midweek Lenten services between Ash Wednesday and Holy Week, we are hearing St.Matthew’s Divinely-inspired account of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and I am preaching on five of St. Matthew’s seven unique contributions to Passion of our Lord for us. Tonight’s first of those five unique contributions is when essentially “Jesus tells Judas he will betray Him”.
Judas’s question and Jesus’s answer come in the context of Jesus’s intimate table fellowship with His twelve closest disciples, which fellowship makes the betrayal all the more outrageous. Jesus’s statement that one of them would betray Him made apparently eleven of the disciples, being very sorrowful, begin to say to Him one after another, “Is it I, Lord?” As also St. Mark’s and St. Luke’s Gospel accounts record, Jesus answered that one who had dipped his hand in the dish with Him would betray Him, likely basically restating that the betrayer would be one of the twelve (Mark 14:17-21; Luke 22:21-23; confer Psalm 41:9), and St. John’s Gospel account even records Jesus’s both somewhat privately telling at least St. John that the betrayer was the one to whom Jesus would give a dipped morsel of bread and then Jesus’s giving the morsel to Judas, what otherwise would have been a sign of honor and care (John 13:21-30). But, even there, St. John seems to suggest that no one knew or maybe understood what Jesus was doing, or perhaps they simply could not imagine one of their group’s actually betraying Jesus. As we heard from St. Matthew’s unique report, Judas’s being the betrayer was at least indirectly more explicit and the climax all the more heightened!
After Jesus contrasted His going as it was written of Him with the woe to His betrayer, for whom not having been born would be better, St. Matthew uniquely reports, that “Judas, who would betray Him, answered, ‘Is it I, Rabbi?’ [and Jesus] said to him, ‘You have said so.’” Admittedly, St. Matthew does not tell us why or how Judas asked, and Bible commentators who speculate do not all agree. We might safely assume that Judas asked in order to not appear to be different from the other eleven disciples who had asked, though Judas nevertheless addressed Jesus differently, not as “Lord” but as “Rabbi” (confer Matthew 26:29; Lenski, ad loc Matthew 26:25, p.1021-1022). Judas might have asked in order to hide his intentions, or he might have asked out of genuine anguish (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 26:23-25, p.1397 n.21). But, since Judas had already gone to the chief priests, been paid thirty pieces of silver, and was seeking an opportunity to betray Jesus (Matthew 26:14-16), Judas’s question certainly appears to have been hypocritical.
We might be equally hypocritical if we asked Jesus if we have betrayed, are betraying, or will betray anyone else, including Him. We know that at times we share confidants’ information with others who do not need to know it. We know that at times our thoughts, words, and deeds not only create conflict in our relationships with our Lord but also cause Him harm. Even one breaking of confidence or act of treachery is damning. Because of our sins of betrayal, because of all of our other sins, and because of our sinful natures themselves, we deserve both death here in time and torment in hell for eternity, and so our not having been born arguably would be better.
Judas’s emphatic question of Jesus expected a negative answer (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 26:25, p.1394), as if to say “surely not”. Yet, Jesus seems to have given an affirmative answer. Again, Bible commentators do not all agree: some commentators think that Jesus’s answer is a common Jewish way of affirming something said by a questioner (Lenski, ad loc Matthew 26:25, p.1022), as Jesus similarly does later before both the Jewish council and the Roman governor (Matthew 26:64; 27:11), other commentators think Jesus gives a qualified affirmation (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 26:25, III:464), while still other commentators think that Jesus’s answer does not follow the common affirmation form closely enough (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 26:23-25, p.1397 with n.20). Yet, Bible translators generally agree that Jesus does affirm what Judas said. Jesus’s answer literally reads: “You yourself have said so”, and it has been translated “You have said it yourself” (NASB), or, as you have it on the front of the service outline, paraphrased, “Yes, it is you” (NLT, confer NIV). The translation “You have said so” (ESV) we heard at least is not to be understood in the sense of “That is what you say, but, if I were to say something, I would say something else.”
As with Judas’s question, St. Matthew does not tell us how or why Jesus answered the way that He did. Whatever our Lord’s “mysterious reticence” in speaking from His Divine omniscient foreknowledge the way that He did (Roehrs-Franzmann, ad loc Matthew 26:25, p.39), we do not know whether He did so in order to challenge Judas or to judge him (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 26:23-25, p.1397 with n.23), in order to heighten Judas’s guilt by implying that Judas knew the answer to his own question (Gundry, ad loc Matthew 26:25, p.527), or perhaps not only in order to do all of those things but also to express Jesus’s own sorrow over Judas’s imminent betrayal and to call Judas to repent (confer Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 26:23-25, p.1397 with n.23). To be sure, Jesus effectively says to us who betray Him, “Yes, it is you”, and He calls and enables us to turn in sorrow from our sin, to trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, and to want to do better. When we so repent, then God forgives our sin. God forgives our sins of betrayal and all of our other sins, whatever our sin might be. God forgives our sin by grace through faith in His Son Jesus Christ.
Judas is not the only one who “betrayed” or “delivered up” or “handed over” Jesus. For example, the New Testament uses the same verb both of the Sanhedrin’s delivering up Jesus to Pilate (Matthew 27:18) and of Pilate’s handing over Jesus to the soldiers for execution (Matthew 27:26). And, St. Paul can write both that the Son of God loved us and delivered up Himself for us (Galatians 2:20) and that God the Father did not spare His own Son but handed Him over for us all (Romans 8:32). Truly, out of His great love for and mercy on us, Jesus was betrayed for our sins (Romans 4:25). Jesus died on the cross in our place, the death we deserved. The Son of Man willingly went as it was written of Him, which included His being delivered into the hands of sinful men, being crucified, and on the third day rising (Luke 24:7).
The “tragedy” of Judas’s betraying Jesus had a redemptive purpose (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 26:26-29, III:464). And, after the discussion of that betrayal Jesus accomplished a Sacramental purpose, not only keeping the Passover but also moving beyond it (confer Lutheran Service Book 630:3), giving His Body with bread and pouring out His Blood with wine for the forgiveness of sins. We who are baptized and not delivered to Satan to execute divine judgment but individually absolved (1 Corinthians 5:5; 1 Timothy 1:20) so eat of that Body of Christ and drink of that Blood of Christ and so receive not only forgiveness of sins but also life and salvation.
So forgiven through God’s Word and Sacraments of our sins, including betrayal, we hand over to others the faithful teaching and practice that we have received from those before us (Luke 1:2; 1 Corinthians 15:3). We know that Jesus said that we ourselves may be betrayed, even by family members and delivered over to courts, but we should not be anxious how we are to speak or what we are to say, for it will be given to us in that hour (Matthew 10:17-22). As we did in the Office Hymn, we pray that we may not betray our calling but serve God to the end (LSB 517:1, 13, 3).
Tonight’s first of St. Matthew’s five unique contributions to the narrative of the Passion of our Lord for us was when essentially “Jesus tells Judas he will betray Him”. Despite our Lord’s discussing that betrayal with Judas, our Lord remained confident of His eternal fellowship with all repentant believers in the Father’s Kingdom in the world to come (Roehrs-Franzmann, ad loc Matthew 26:17-29, p.39), and we likewise can be confident of that eternal fellowship and so live even now in His peace and joy (confer LSB 445:5).
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +