Betraying the Truth

                When I was coming to the end of my pregnancy with our son, I knew that a lot of pain awaited me. As much as I tried to put it out of my mind, I knew that the day was approaching that my son was going to have to come out. I hoped for another way and wished that there was something else I could do in order to receive my son, but birth is painful and nothing could be done to stop it.

                Today we started reading my least favorite part of the New Testament, the story of Jesus’ betrayal and death. I almost decided to write about a different passage this morning because of how much I dislike this part of Matthew. Chapter 26 explains that the religious people at the time wanted to kill Jesus and they paid Judas to betray him. Jesus knows what is coming and goes out by Himself to pray. He reveals His emotions of dread to the only other person that knows what is coming by praying to the Father but Jesus cannot avoid His fate. Nothing can be done to keep Jesus from what is ahead so He presses on feeling very alone.

                There is a part of me that could relate to each person in the story of Jesus’ betrayal. The religious people who plotted to kill Jesus for His bold display of what was true about them were really just trying to find a way to justify themselves and their behavior. I have often been tempted as Judas was to do whatever it takes to make some money even if that meant I was following the money rather than Jesus. Just as the disciples hid their beliefs when it was hard to stand up for them, I have often hid my convictions to avoid conflict.  Of all of the people in this story, I hope and fear that I will relate most to Jesus. As a follower of Christ, we should all be prepared to face the end that Jesus came to in His life.

                Jesus was betrayed by those closest to Him, but we are more often betrayed by our own desires to ignore the truth. Our society tries to tell us in indirect ways that following Jesus or believing in God is not the most important thing we will ever do. It is a decision that we can make lightly if we choose to make the decision at all. Even though we know this is not true, it is easy to want to ignore the most important part of what Jesus did for us.  Jesus suffered and died for us because that is what we deserve and where we are headed without Him. He rose from the dead so that we could live with Him and now we owe Him every second of our lives. When we choose to follow Christ, we choose to live our lives for Him and then we betray ourselves by believing that the lie that we were not really headed for hell without Him.

                I know that following Christ is the most important thing that I will ever do, but does it show in the way that I live my life? Do I act like I am aware of what Christ had done for me? What lies do I buy into and what truths do I seem to be ignoring? I am going to challenge myself today to have a very deep conversation with the Father Who may be the only one who understands all that I have been through in life and ask him to forgive me for ignoring what Jesus went through on the cross for me.