SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/6/2021 11:36 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “Judas’s Progressive Rejection”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
10:4b
Message of the
verse: “and
Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed Him.”
In today’s SD we begin day number 56
looking at the 10th chapter of the book of Matthew, yes it began on
the 12th of July and I have to say that I certainly have enjoyed
looking at the different apostles of Jesus Christ as I have learned many things
about them and many things about me too.
As we look at how Judas began with
Jesus Christ there is not much difference than with the other eleven with the
exception, and it is a big one, that the others became believers in Jesus
Christ while Judas never did become a believer.
The others surrendered more and more to His control; they grew away from
their old ways as their progression went entirely in the opposite direction
than that of Judas. We know that they
too were sinful, worldly, selfish, unloving and materialistic, however they
submitted to Jesus, and He changed them.
On the other hand Judas never advanced beyond crass materialism. Judas refused to trust Jesus and more and
more resisted His lordship, and so eventually he was confirmed in his own way
to the point that he permanently closed the door to God’s grace which became
his demise. In his commentary John
MacArthur writes the following “Like Faust, he irretrievably sold his soul to
the devil.” Wikipedia: “Demon Mephistopheles: “The experience of the legendary Doctor
Faustus, who sells his soul to the demon ‘Mephistopheles’ in return for
worldly knowledge and pleasure, has been treated as a metaphor for unholy political
pacts.”
So it happened that when Jesus
turned his back on the crown offered by the multitude that is when Judas turned
his back on Jesus. This brought out his
vile, wretched motives for self-glory and gain as he could not restrain it any
longer. Judas had given a glimpse of his
true self when he showed more concern for the money that he said was “wasted”
on the perfume to anoint Jesus than concern for the Lord’s imminent arrest and
His death, which the disciples by now knew awaited Him in Jerusalem as seen in
John 11:16 “Therefore Thomas, who is called Didymus, said to his fellow
disciples, "Let us also go, so that we may die with Him.’”
MacArthur writes “Judas’s fascination
with Jesus had turned first to disappointment and finally to hatred. He had never loved Jesus but only sought to
use Him. He had never loved his fellow
disciples but rather stole for himself from what small resources they had. Now he turned completely against them.”
Now we want to look at another
longer quotation from MacArthur’s commentary that I believe is very important
in our understanding of Judas and how Jesus dealt with him. “On the last night Jesus was together with
the disciples, He washed their feet with His own hands, to teach them humility
and service. As He began He said, ‘You
are clean, but not all of you,’ referring to Judas (John 13:10-11). After the object lesson He gave another
warning that Judas could have heeded: ‘I
do not speak of all of you. I know the
ones I have chosen; but it is that the Scripture may be fulfilled, ‘He who eats
My bread has lifted up his heel against Me’’ (John 13:18). Jesus grieved over Judas, being unwilling that
even this vile man should perish (cf. 2 Pet. 3:9). As the time for the betrayal came closer,
Jesus ‘became troubled in spirit, and testified, and said ‘Truly truly, I say
to you, that one of you will betray Me’’(V. 21). He did not grieve over the loss of His own
life, which He willingly laid down. He
grieved over the spiritual death of Judas and, it seems, made one last appeal
before it became forever too late. He
knew Judas’s unbelief, greed, ingratitude, treachery, duplicity, hypocrisy, and
hatred. Still He loved him. The death He was about to die was a much for
Judas’s sin as for the sins of any person every born, and it was for Judas that
the Lord grieved as only He can grieve.
He lamented over Judas in the same way He had lamented over Jerusalem: ‘How often I wanted to gather your children
together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were
unwilling’ (Matthew 23:37). I think that
from the understanding of this quotation that I can at least get a much better
of the great love that our Lord has for me to which I am ever thankful.
MacArthur concludes this
section: “Throughout church history, in
the name of love and compassion, some people have tried to attribute a good
motive to Judas’s betrayal or at least to minimize its evil. But such an attempt flies in the face of
Scripture, including Jesus’ own specific words.
The Lord called Judas a devil and the son of perdition. To make Judas appear better than that is to
make God a liar. Every unsaved person is
under Satan’s control and serves Satan’s will.
But when Judas accepted the morsel from Jesus’ hand without repentance
or regret, Satan took possession of him in a way that is frightening to
contemplate (John 13:27).”
9/6/2021 12:14
PM
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