Have you ever heard of Resurrection Eggs? It is a plastic egg carton that contains 12 different plastic eggs and inside each egg is an object that represents a part of the Easter story. Usually our family opens one egg each day the last 12 days before Easter Sunday. Last year, we opened them all on Easter day and took turns telling the Easter story as we each opened an egg. This year I want to look at these objects, one or two each week, and look closer at the texts which these objects represent. The first “egg” to be opened contains a coin. These coins represent the coins which Judas received when he betrayed Jesus.
Matthew 26:14-16 reads: Then one of the Twelve—the one called Judas Iscariot—went to the chief priests and asked, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you?” So they counted out for him thirty pieces of silver. From then on Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over.
I think all of us are very familiar with Judas and know that he betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, but let’s look at the bigger picture and the context of when this happened.
Matthew 26:1-25 (NIV)
When Jesus had finished saying all these things, he said to his disciples, “As you know, the Passover is two days away—and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.”
Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, and they schemed to arrest Jesus secretly and kill him. “But not during the festival,” they said, “or there may be a riot among the people.”
While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table. When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. “Why this waste?” they asked. “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor.”
Aware of this, Jesus said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”
Then one of the Twelve—the one called Judas Iscariot—went to the chief priests and asked, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you?” So they counted out for him thirty pieces of silver. From then on Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over.
On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
He replied, “Go into the city to a certain man and tell him, ‘The Teacher says: My appointed time is near. I am going to celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house.’” So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them and prepared the Passover.
When evening came, Jesus was reclining at the table with the Twelve. And while they were eating, he said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me.”
They were very sad and began to say to him one after the other, “Surely you don’t mean me, Lord?”
Jesus replied, “The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me. The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.”
Then Judas, the one who would betray him, said, “Surely you don’t mean me, Rabbi?”
Jesus answered, “You have said so.”
The first thing that stood out to me when reading this text is the timeline of events. I think that I wrongly had an idea in my head that Judas had gone to the chief priests and asked for money, weeks or even months, before he turned Jesus over to them. I didn’t realize that it was only a couple of days. Why that stuck out to me is the fact that Jesus and the disciples had been at Simon the leper’s house and the text says that a woman anointed Jesus’ head with oil and the disciples complained that it was expensive perfume and it was so wasteful to spend money that way. Jesus rebuked them, but then Judas went to the chief priests and asked his wicked question: “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you?”
Did seeing the waste of that expensive perfume send him over the edge? Had he already been considering this plan? Or was the plan hatched in that very moment when he witnessed that?
John 12:1-7 tells us even more information:
Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.
But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.” He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.
“Leave her alone,” Jesus replied. “It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”
At first, I thought this account in John 12 was telling the same event as Matthew 26. I noticed, though, that Matthew 26 states that it was two days before the Passover started. Here in John 12, it says that it was six days before Passover. Both texts say they are in Bethany, but the Matthew text says they are at Simon the leper’s house. Here in John 12 it says they were where Lazarus lived, and Martha, Lazarus’ sister, is serving. This time it says Mary pours perfume on Jesus’ feet, not on His head. If this event is different, then this took place four days before that event. Unlike the account in Matthew, this text says it was Judas who complained. Maybe he is the one who started the complaining and by the time they go to Simon the Leper’s home, some of the others agreed with him? We learn from this passage that Judas was the disciple who carried the money bag and that he was already stealing from it. Perhaps he was angry that Mary hadn’t given that money to Jesus so that he could steal some of it? Reading both texts closely, it seems like these are two different occasions.
Luke 22:2-6 offers another perspective with some more information. It tells us, “Now the Festival of Unleavened Bread, called the Passover, was approaching, and the chief priests and the teachers of the law were looking for some way to get rid of Jesus, for they were afraid of the people. Then Satan entered Judas, called Iscariot, one of the Twelve. And Judas went to the chief priests and the officers of the temple guard and discussed with them how he might betray Jesus. They were delighted and agreed to give him money. He consented, and watched for an opportunity to hand Jesus over to them when no crowd was present.”
Since Luke tells us that Satan entered Judas, does that excuse Judas’ behavior? Is he just a victim? In the book Spiritual Warfare for Every Christian by Dean Sherman, he says that, “our participation in sin gives the powers of darkness permission and opportunity to work in our lives.” In other words, our participation gives permission for the devil to attack us. When we willing open the door to sin, we are opening ourselves to being attacked by the devil. I don’t want to simply take an author’s word for it though, so can we find support for that idea in scripture? I think so. Ephesians 4:26 -27 says, “‘In your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.” That tells us that when we sin, we give the devil a foothold, meaning that the devil can get a grip on us. Judas had already opened the door to the devil when he started swiping the money out of the disciple’s money bag. He was willfully sinning and so the devil simply took advantage of him. This, of course, was all part of God’s plan as well. God, being omniscient, knew all this would take place and how things must happen. That is how Jesus could drop so many hints to the disciples and directly tell them He would be betrayed and die. Remember how Matthew 26 begins? Jesus said, “As you know, the Passover is two days away—and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.” Jesus knew exactly what was going to take place and even though He told the disciples what would happen, they did not understand. Jesus knew what Judas was going to do.
Judas was so corrupted by his love of money that he was willing to sell Jesus out for 30 pieces of silver. That is not a lot of money, by the way. We see this same amount mentioned in Zechariah 11:12-13, which says, “I told them, ‘If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.’ So they paid me thirty pieces of silver.”
“And the Lord said to me, ‘Throw it to the potter’—the handsome price at which they valued me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them to the potter at the house of the Lord.”
This passage in Zechariah is an interesting story of that prophet, who the Lord tells to shepherd a flock marked for slaughter. He shepherds the flock and “got rid of the three shepherds” the text says. He asks to be paid for his work and when Zechariah says, “the handsome price at which they valued me,” I believe he is speaking sarcastically. The Lord tells him to throw that money to the potter because it is not worth very much. Also, I think it’s not worth very much because Exodus 21:32 says, “If the bull gores a male or female slave, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull is to be stoned to death.” Thirty shekels of silver is how much a slave was considered to be worth. The amount they paid Zechariah was the amount a slave was worth. When the chief priests gave Judas thirty pieces of silver to betray Jesus, they were saying that Jesus was not worth very much. I looked up this verse in Matthew Henry’s Commentary to see if I am interpreting the sarcasm correctly, and he wrote of this passage, “The prophet demanded wages, or a reward, and received thirty pieces of silver. By Divine direction he cast it to the potter, as in disdain for the smallness of the sum. This shadowed forth the bargain of Judas to betray Christ.”
All that to say, Judas was not given very much for his betrayal of Jesus. Yet, he still agreed to it. He made the deal, saw his opportunity and brought them to the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus was praying. Luke 22:47-48 says, “While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, 48 but Jesus asked him, ‘Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?’”
In our modern western culture, a man greeting another man with a kiss might seem really odd, but in that time and culture it was normal. 1 Peter 5:14 says, “Greet one another with a kiss of love.” I also found four other New Testament verses that say the same thing. I think Jesus responded the way He did, not because a kiss for a greeting was unusual, but because it was mighty bold of Judas to do something so friendly right before he betrayed him.
Matthew 27:1-10 tells us what happened to Judas after that:
Early in the morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people made their plans how to have Jesus executed. So they bound him, led him away and handed him over to Pilate the governor. When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. “I have sinned,” he said, “for I have betrayed innocent blood.”
“What is that to us?” they replied. “That’s your responsibility.”
So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
The chief priests picked up the coins and said, “It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money.” So they decided to use the money to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: “They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me.”
Again, it is worth noting that this all happened very quickly. Judas returned the money and hung himself before Jesus was crucified. He didn’t even wait to see what would happen to Jesus. It all seems so impulsive, so very rash. It makes me think of a verse that helped me a lot when I first became a Christian. Psalm 4:4 (NRSV) says, “When you are disturbed, do not sin; ponder it on your beds, and be silent.” Some translations say “angry” instead of disturbed. I have always liked this verse because when things really upset us or anger us, wouldn’t it be wise to simply go and sit by ourselves and calm down, rather than do something rash? Rather than do something we will regret, what if we went and mediated on our beds? What if we went and prayed about it?
I think Judas’ life stands as a warning to all of us. He knew Jesus. He was counted as one of the twelve. Yet he was stealing from the disciples. He was greedy and must have been harboring a lot of anger and bitterness toward Jesus and the disciples. He became an easy target for the devil to manipulate and possess. How could someone that close to Jesus act so horribly? How could someone who spent so much time with Jesus not want to obey Him? My guess is that he didn’t start out wanting to be evil. He probably made a series of little decisions that led him further and further along the path of sin. We know he stole. He probably started off stealing just a little and then it snowballed. Isn’t that how sin works in our own lives?
I think it’s easy to look at Judas and dismiss him as the worst of the worst. After all, his name has become ubiquitous with someone who betrays someone else. Judas is the ultimate villain, right? Who could ever betray Jesus? I wonder, though, if we are honest with ourselves, have we ever been tempted to do the same thing? Sure, I doubt any of us have plotted intentionally to sell out Jesus, but I can think of times when I have kept quiet about my faith in Jesus, willing to “sell out” my relationship to Him, so that I could buy friendship with someone who wasn’t a Christian. I know that I have gone ahead and laughed at things that are totally inappropriate in order to fit in with someone, rather than risk not being accepted. In those moments, wasn’t I behaving the same way? Me, a Christian and a child of God, pretending not to know Him? Isn’t that a form of betrayal? We know what Jesus says about this, too. He says in Matthew 10:33, “but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.” That is an incredibly frightening verse to consider. Amazingly, if we repent, Jesus will pardon our betrayal, and forgive us.
Right before Judas regretted betraying Jesus and returned the money and ended his life, Peter models for us what another path looks like. This same night that Jesus is betrayed, Matthew 26:31-35 tells us:
Then Jesus said to them, “You will all become deserters because of me this night; for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.’ But after I am raised up, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.” Peter said to him, “Though all become deserters because of you, I will never desert you.” Jesus said to him, “Truly I tell you, this very night, before the cock crows, you will deny me three times.” Peter said to him, “Even though I must die with you, I will not deny you.” And so said all the disciples.
You probably know the rest of the story; Peter denies knowing Jesus three times, just like Jesus said he would. Peter’s story, though, does not end in despair. He repents and is forgiven. If Judas had done what Peter did and repented and sought out Jesus, instead of taking his life, he too would have found forgiveness. Instead of hanging himself, presumably from a tree, he could have knelt before Jesus while Jesus was hanging on the cross. Judas ran to the wrong tree. As 1 Peter 2:24 says, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.”
That forgiveness would have been extended to Judas if he had repented.
That same forgiveness is extended to us today. If we have denied Jesus or betrayed Him in big or little ways, if we go to Him and repent, then He will forgive us and help us change, just like Peter was changed, after he repented. He did not stay the same. Peter was a changed man who was filled with boldness and faith. Jesus wants to build that faith and boldness inside each of us as well.
As we spend these next few weeks of Lent, focusing on repentance, let us allow the Holy Spirit to search our hearts and minds and work change inside us. As David prayed in Psalm 139:23-24, let this be our prayer as well; “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
Pray: Heavenly Father, we are sorry for any times when we have betrayed Jesus. We repent of the times when we have acted or thought the opposite of what You would have us do. Please forgive us. Please help us, by the power of Your Holy Spirit, to live out the righteousness that You extend to us. Please work change in our hearts. Help us to bring our anger or bitterness to You, instead of acting in hast, and please lead us in the way everlasting. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
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