Lent Midweek 0309– “God’s Truth vs. Satan’s Lies.”  Luke 22:1-5

 

      Grace to you and peace from God, our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.  The text for our sermon meditation is taken from the Gospel account of St. Luke, the 22^nd Chapter:

 

Now the Feast 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.

 

So far the reading.

 

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

 

      Contrary to what some may think or believe, their lives, actions, or words can and so affect not only themselves but also the people around them.  Take for instance the man who received a speeding ticket.  As he sat there waiting for the police officer to finish his work, he wondered what led the police officer to decide to write the ticket after stopping him for speeding.  He figured the police officer’s day went something like this.

 

      Early in the morning at the officer’s house, the alarm clock goes off at 5:30 am.  The officer and his wife get up and begin to get ready for the day.  It’s dark and they stumble around in the darkness.

 

      The officer stumbles to the kitchen to get breakfast ready for the family.  His wife catches her little toe on the foot of the bed.  Limping down the hallway, she trips over the dog who runs away in fear to the kitchen. On the run to the kitchen, the dog knocks over a lamp that bumps a flower pot, spilling dirt and flower petals on the floor.  The dog reaches the kitchen at top speed and slides over the tile floor skidding into the kitchen.

 

      The police officer yelled at the dog to stop, but he was too late.  The dog makes a perfect tackle and brings down one of the children who is holding a full glass of milk.  Now there are two messes to clean up.

 

      Meanwhile, his wife is walking down the hallway to the kitchen and notices the downed lamp, the overturned flower pot and the dirt and flower petals on the living room carpet.  Coming into the kitchen, she asks her husband, “Why is there dirt all over the clean carpet in the living room?”  Mopping up the milk on the kitchen floor, the officer resorts to a flippant response and strained silence reigns.  They all leave the house in frustration.  That’s why the man received a speeding ticket.

 

      Do you understand the point being made?  Do see the lie which Satan places before us, and the truth of God that reveals this lie?  The man waiting for a speeding ticket did not accept the truth that his actions affect others.  While he conjured up in his mind this scenario about the police officer, he ignored the fact that he was responsible for the things he has done.  His actions do indeed affect others.  Our actions affect others.  Satan would have us think “It is My Life!”

 

      Judas thought this way as well.  We find Judas with the chief priests and the teachers of the law hours before celebrating what was to be the last Passover Meal with his teacher.  He is plotting with these men to betray Jesus into their hands for his own personal gain, not thinking how his actions will affect the life of the Son of Man.

 

We next see Judas at the final Passover Meal with his Teacher.  At that meal, Jesus is giving his final instruction to these men who have been with him for so long.  Everything Jesus did, said and taught was leading up to this very point in time.  The final events of Jesus life on earth were about to take place.  There were some actions unknown to others, but known to Jesus and one disciple, that would set these final events in motion.

 

      Jesus makes mention of these actions as he sits with his disciples at this final Passover Meal.  Jesus says,

 

      “I tell you the truth, one of you will betray me – one who is eating with me.”

      They were saddened and one by one they said to him, “Surely, not I?”

      “It is one of the twelve,” Jesus said, “One who dips bread with me into the bowl.”

 

      One of the twelve will betray Jesus.  Each one in turn asks if it is he.  Each disciple, except for one, is perhaps thinking he would never do such a thing.  The one who did this very act of treachery is wondering how Jesus’ knew.

 

      Yet, Jesus has known all along that one of his chosen disciples would act in a selfish manner and bring betrayal into their midst.  His Father had foretold it in the psalms.  The 41^st Psalm speaks of this betrayal with these words;

 

      “Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.”

 

      To lift your heel against someone means you are an adversary or enemy.  You are a betrayer of a trust.  For, you sit at table with one who is a friend to you, and you turn him over to his enemies.  Such is the action and intention of Judas.  Earlier Judas plotted with the chief priests to betray Jesus into their hands.  For a sum of thirty pieces of silver, Judas lifted up his heel against his Teacher.  Even this was foretold by Jesus’ Father.  Matthew quotes the Prophet Zechariah’s words concerning this betrayal.

 

      “They took thirty pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel and they used them to buy the potter’s field.”

 

      Let us now examine Judas’ motives for betraying his Teacher.  Satan’s lie was foremost in Judas’ mind.  Judas believed it is my life.  He has a deceitful and covetous heart.  This heart led Judas to be greedy and seek his own advantage.  Judas has a love for money rather than a love for Jesus.  He is a true hypocrite who publicly professes to be a follower of Jesus but privately seeks personal benefits.

 

      Jesus gently seeks to bring Judas to confess his sinfulness by announcing that one of the twelve will be tray him.  Yet, Judas, feigning innocence, seeks to hide rather than confess his planned betrayal.  John recounts another incident when Judas hid his true intentions. 

 

      Jesus was anointed with expensive perfume by a woman.  Judas indignantly said, “Why was this not sold, and the money given to the poor?”  John writes these words concerning Judas.

 

      “He did not say this because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; as keeper of the purse, he used to help himself to what was put into it.”

 

      For the price of a suit of clothes, Judas sought to feed his greed and he betrayed his Teacher.  He traded life in this world for life in the world to come.

 

      Judas’ life and desires are a blatant disregard for the promise which God gives to us.  A promise we acknowledge in the first article of the Creed.  The psalmist so clearly speaks of this promise when he writes these words of hope and faith.

 

      The eyes of all look to you,

            and you give them their food at the proper time.

      You open your hand

            and satisfy the desires of every living thing.

      The LORD is righteous in all his ways

            and loving toward all he has made.

      The LORD is near to all who call on him,

            to all who call on him in truth.

      He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;

            he hears their cry and saves them. Ps 145:15-19

 

      How often we fail to trust the Lord as he asks us to trust him.  It is a daily struggle for us to beat back our sinful doubt and mistrust that God will meet our needs.  There is a tension in our thinking that God does not really know or understand what we need.  So we rashly move ahead with our own plans seeking to serve ourselves, which is truly nothing but an ego trip for us. 

 

      How many remember Frank Sinatra’s theme song?  What was the title?  Listen to the final verse of this hymn sung by the sinful ego.

 

            For what is a man, what has he got?
            If not himself, then he has naught.
            To say the things he truly feels;
            And not the words of one who kneels.
            The record shows I took the blows -
            And did it my way!

 

      By the way, do you know what the definition of ego is?  If you want to have a simple definition for the word, remember that ego means “ease God out.”  E G O, a simple acrostic that pulls no punches and tells it like it is just like the song Frank Sinatra sang. 

 

      Look at Judas.  He eased God out of his life.  In fact, Judas turned the Lord of life over to those who also wanted to ease God out of their lives too.  Yet, again, we see that Lord foresaw these selfish actions and covered them with Jesus’ selfless sacrifice upon the cross.

 

      We may seek to ease God out of our lives, but God seeks to ease us into His life.  He does this through bringing us to repentance and contrition.  He bids us to bend our knees in order to break the bondage of our sinful egos.  He desires us to see that if we only have ourselves, we have nothing.  Yet, if we look to Him in faith, we have everything. 

 

      We have everything because God gave everything for us.  Our sinful egos urged our Savior up the path to the hill where he would suffer death and humiliation.  Our sinful egos bound the Lord of Life in the chains of death when he was crucified on the altar of the cross.  Yet the cross is also the mark of God’s great love for us.  It is where God gave everything for us that we would have everything in His Son.  The cross is where God eases himself back into our lives.  For, in that cross our sinful egos are cleansed of sin and restored to righteousness.

 

      The cleansed ego then sings of the One whose life effected such a change with these words.

 

      Glory be to Jesus, Who in bitter pains

      Poured for me the lifeblood   From His sacred veins!

 

      Grace and life eternal In that blood I find

      Blessed be His compassion, Infinitely kind!

 

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  Amen.