“He went out to the mountain to pray; and all night he continued in prayer to God.” (Luke 6:12).
I have written about Judas before because there is something fascinating about the man who was described in the Bible as “Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.” (Luke 6:19).
And there is something fascinating about the man of whom Christ said, “The Son of man goes as it is written of him: but woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born.” (Matthew 26:24). For those are very strong words… Better not to have been born… Why?
Was it because he betrayed God? Surely not. Although we remember the sin of Judas, his sin is no greater than my sins every single day. I commit the sin of Judas a million times a day in every choice to sin and not resist temptation to add one more wound to the multitude of sins that were inflicted on Christ Crucified. So surely God did not say Judas could not be born because of the betrayal. Because if that were the case, then I should not have been born either, and neither should have Saint Peter, who betrayed Christ three times before the cock crew…
Of course there was a different reason. And the reason is very clear. After that betrayal, Judas did not return to His Beloved and beg forgiveness. Instead, he judged God by his own capacity. Judas saw the result of his betrayal of God and thought to himself that since he himself would be unable or unwilling to forgive such a sin, then God too would be incapable. Thinking in this way, Judas then did the only thing that he could do, he took his own life, because he believed that his sin was too great. And the terrible tragic irony of that is that the sin of betrayal pales in comparison to the sin of despair.
You see, God can forgive a betrayal. I am living proof of that, because I betray Him every day of my life and He forgives me every single time. But God cannot forgive if I do not invite Him to forgive. If I do not ask my God to forgive my sins, He will not forgive them. And THAT was the true sin of Judas – the unwillingness to ask for forgiveness.
And I wonder today, as I reflect on the way that Christ chose His apostles – after a night of prayer – how He must have prayed for Judas to resist the temptation if that despair…
“He went out to the mountain to pray; and all night he continued in prayer to God. And when it was day, he called his disciples, and chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles; Simon, whom he named Peter, and Andrew his brother, and James and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon who was called the Zealot, and Judas the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.” (Luke 6:12-19).
And today I ask my Lord and God to pray that same prayer for me… For there is not any great difference between Judas and me – in fact, if we were to be compared, I am sure that mine is the more sinful soul…
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.
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