HH, Sir Godfrey Gregg D.Div
“And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, came, and with him a great multitude with swords and staves, from the chief priests and elders of the people.” Matthew 26:47
Strange that there should be a Judas among the twelve chosen friends of Jesus! My questioning mind finds inscrutable mysteries here, but my heart may read solemn and practical truths.
It teaches me that a man’s gift may be a man’s temptation. Judas had the business faculty, the commercial instinct, and the capacity for management, as his simpler comrades had not. But his carefulness degenerated into covetousness until for thirty pieces of silver he sold his Lord. Ah, let me watch lest my very endowments and abilities should prove my undoing. Where I imagine myself strongest — the enemy may vanquish me.
It teaches me that a man’s external nearness to Christ may be inward distance and alienation. None could be closer than Judas, none more honoured than he, and yet this was the outcome of it all — this black treachery, this consummate sin! I too am reckoned among Christians. I have had my experiences. I have made my promises. I have rendered my service. But what if I have only a name to live, while I am dead?
