Judas had free will. Without free will Judas could not freely love Jesus. But with free will, Judas chose to betray Jesus. The same is true with us. We have free will and we are given the same ability that Judas had to accept the love of Jesus or to reject it. We can let His loving gift of salvation and grace enter our lives or refuse it. It’s 100% up to us.
Holy Week is an ideal time to seriously contemplate the road we are on. Each and every day of our life we are invited by God to choose Him with all our might and love. But, like Judas, we so often betray Him by our refusal to enter Holy Week with Jesus, embracing His Cross as ours. We so often fail to give completely of our lives in a sacrificial and generous way, as our Lord did that Holy Week. If there could be a ‘silver lining’ to our current pandemic, it’s the sacrifices and hardships we’re enduring as a result of our quarantines from sons, daughters, grandchildren, friends, and especially the Eucharist that at times it seems we are walking with Christ on the Via Della Rosa.
I reflected for a long while today upon the love Jesus had for Judas. It was His love for Judas, more than Judas’ sin, that brought so much pain to Jesus’ Heart. If Jesus didn’t love him, the rejection would not have hurt. I also thought about the love Jesus has for each and every one of us. I think that if we, in fact, do profess our love for Jesus, we have to wonder whether or not His Heart is also troubled as a result of the actions we’ve taken in our life. If Jesus is troubled in any way as a result of our actions and choices this is no reason to despair as Judas did. Rather, it should be the cause of rejoicing that we’re aware of our weakness, sin and limitation. We need to turn that over to Jesus who loves us more than we love ourselves. Doing this will bring much consolation and peace to our hearts. And it will also bring much consolation and peace to the Heart of our Divine Lord. He loves us and is waiting for us to come to Him this Holy Week.
As I sit here tonight thinking about and writing of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus, I can think of a lot of different reasons (although none are justified) why he did it. I think the most important conclusion I came to is that Judas’ betrayal was the result of failure to understand.
What kind of Messiah was Judas expecting? It would seem that the Messiah was not a spiritual figure for Judas but rather the concept that had evolved of a military, royal figure who would restore Israel to greatness among the nations. I imagine that Judas, as a close follower, pictured himself in high place in such a kingdom. Thus Jesus’ message of loving one’s enemies, concern for the poor and so forth was probably nonsense to Judas. His disillusionment then gave way to greed.
Judas also failed to understand Jesus on a far deeper level. His subsequent despairing end indicated his failure to understand the forgiveness of Jesus. The tragedy of Judas’ life was not that he betrayed Jesus but that he did not ask for forgiveness. Judas failed to realize that our God is a loving and forgiving God.
This leads me to wonder, what kind of savior am I looking for? One that will keep challenge and hardship out of my life or, hopefully, dispatch a miracle to resolve any such problems? Do I realize that the value of suffering consists in the lessons to be learned from it? I may not reject, but do I simply ignore those areas of the Christian message that appear too challenging? It’s something I need to work on.
With God’s grace, I realize that Judas’ failure in understanding must not be mine. In my opinion, every person must ask the question: What kind of God do I pray to? The redemptive events of Holy Week supply the answer: Our God is a loving and forgiving God.
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