Date: March 31st & April 3rd
Preacher: Pastor Ashley Rosa-Ruggieri
First Reading: Isaiah 43:16-21
Psalmody: Psalm 126
Second Reading: Philippians 3:4b-14
Gospel: John 12: 1-8
What comes to your mind when you hear Judas’s name? Do you immediately think of betrayal or have ideas of condemnation? Are your initial thoughts of all the ways that Judas did not act as a disciple should have acted? Do you consider him selfish or greedy or disloyal? There may be some of you that still hold compassion for Judas, even knowing the stories that have been told about him, but the author of the John’s Gospel is certainly not of the same mind.
Our Gospel passage today falls soon before Jesus will embark on the events we now commemorate during Holy Week. There is a sense of impending tension among the people of today’s story, information that we know, but of which those in attendance at this meal in the story are not yet privy to. Because the events to follow have not happened yet. Still, John writes this passage after the events to come have passed, and he is not kind, compassionate, nor forgiving when it comes to Judas.
The comments written by John in today’s story have always read a little bit petty to me. As if John could not imagine Judas wanting any good to be done in their community because of how he will soon betray Jesus. And so, since Judas could not possibly be saying these things because he actually cares about the poor, John writes his own explanations of Judas’s intentions. This week as we have entered into the second half of Lent, as we continue to reflect and repent and journey to the cross that Jesus bore and the power of death that he destroyed through his resurrection, I wonder if we might take a second to consider the ways that we are present in this story
This week’s petition of the Lord’s Prayer is “lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” The first part also has a version that says, “save us from the time of trial.” Either way, the first part is asking for God’s guidance through trials and temptations and the second asks for God’s protection from evil. Simply by praying this prayer we admit to ourselves, one another, and God that there are trials, temptations, and evils that we are ill-equipped to handle on our own. Whatever form these take in our lives, we do our best to combat them, to push through them, to eradicate them, but sometimes we feel like we cannot do it on our own. This is where God comes in, God defends us from the accusations, and conflicts that berate us, shields us from the evils that would gladly consume us. Much like Jesus defending Mary after she is condemned by Judas for her gift to Jesus. Maybe we are like Mary in this story. The gift she brought and bestowed on Jesus was out of love and reverence for her Lord, anointing his feet and then wiping them with her hair. An intimate gift that puts her in a vulnerable place. Sadly, the moments of vulnerability that we experience are often the easiest times for trials, temptations, and evil to overwhelm us with the lies that we are unforgivable, unlovable, unworthy of respect. And so, in this story we see Jesus, stepping into the conversation, and praising Mary for this gift that she has bestowed, and dismissing Judas’s accusations against her. Still, is it possible that we are sometimes Judas in this story?
What I mean by this is, what about the times where we let our own ambitions, temptations, and ability for evil get in the way of loving our neighbor? Judas is often given a bad reputation because he was tempted by money and power and gave into those temptations. The repercussions of giving into those temptations was a betrayal of Jesus. And yet, when Jesus joins all of his disciples, including Judas, for the Passover meal before his journey to the cross, he serves everyone at that table. Sometimes it can be easy to look at the decisions of others and place judgment on their lives because its not the same decisions we would have made ourselves. Today, I would encourage each of us to consider that there are points in our owns lives where we give into temptation, where we face trials, where evil has invaded our actions, and the decisions we make might not be the same as someone else. And in those moments, do we not hope to be free of the judgement of others? When we pray, “lead us not into temptation, save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil,” we join together in a collective act of admitting that we cannot handle everything alone, and we know that God has promised to be with us, especially in those times.
But, when we consider these petitions and then hear the passage from the Gospel of John today, I pray that we can remember that we have the capacity in our lives to be Mary, and Judas. We also have the capacity to be Martha or Lazarus who were also there at that table in the midst of the trial happening in their midst. Each of us has the capacity to be vulnerable, to be attacked, to be judged, to give into temptation, and still we have a Gospel that says you are always forgiven, and never forsaken by God. When John wrote this Gospel story, he seemed to be quite intent on painting Judas in the worst possible light. As someone who could not have cared for the poor, as someone who was self-righteous, as a thief. But if Jesus could correct Judas in this moment, defending Mary, and share a meal with him in just a few days knowing the betrayal that would soon occur because of Judas’s actions, then maybe one evil that we ask God to deliver us from is the inclination to judge someone without compassion rather than forgive them. That certainly is an evil that I hope God can help deliver us all from.
We are drawing ever nearer to the end of Lent and the season of Easter, and so I offer each of us this blessing as our journey to the cross continues, and soon comes to a close. May the God of Mary deliver us from evil and the powers that belittle us. May the God of John save us from the trials that push us to judge our neighbors without compassion. May the God of Judas lead us not into temptation, and offer us forgiveness when we are tempted nonetheless. We ask all this in the name of the one who created us, redeems us, and stays with us even now. Amen.