Betrayal of the faith: How those who once professed faith in Jesus Christ have turned their backs on Him
Our previous lesson discussed the agony of betrayal, mostly from the point of view of how you feel when you have been let down by a friend. We touched the subject of Jesus’ betrayal by Judas, one who spent time with the Master. We see two sides of Judas – first his cold-hearted betrayal of the best friend, in Jesus’ own words below, one could have hoped for:
13Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. – John 15:13
and then the man who realised what he had done:
3Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, 4Saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that. 5And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself. – Matthew 27:3-5
When we read the above, we see that he repented of what he had done. Why then, was there no forgiveness for Judas? Simply this, and this is simply the most important aspect, that in his hour of remorse, Judas went to the wrong person(s) to admit that he had sinned! When he realised what he had done, he could have, and should have, gone to Jesus in faith, but he did not. Instead, he went to the very people who merely used him. For them, the bit of money they gave him was worth nothing. They were after a much bigger prize, and this Judas gave to them. There was no way they could forgive his sins, as they themselves admitted that only God can forgive sins:
7Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? who can forgive sins but God only? – Mark 2:7
In his hour of remorse, Judas did one thing right: he repented of what he had done, but he did not repent to the right person. This made all the difference and led to him dying unsaved. Had he repented in faith to Jesus, even if he was not close to the Saviour at the time, he would have been forgiven, no matter how big the betrayal was. Jesus makes all the difference; not people, not Jewish leaders, not a priest listening to you inside a confession booth. Judas’ story is sad indeed. Here we have Jesus’ own words that speak about him and his future:
12While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled. – John 17:12
We take from this that despite all the teaching he received, with the rest of the disciples, in the presence of Jesus for so long, Judas was never saved and thus his repentance meant nothing. Accepting the Son of God as Lord and Saviour is the most important decision you will ever make. If this is not done, no amount of understanding of sin, condemnation, and repentance can save you from being lost, as Jesus spoke of Judas, his friend, his betrayer.
What does this teach us? We betray Jesus every day when we sin. While we claim to have a relationship with Him, and in the spiritual sense share a meal with Him as Judas did physically, our sins, when not confessed, nullify the work that the Saviour did on the cross for us. Sin not confessed to Jesus is sin not forgiven. It is as simple as that.
What are we to do then? Think back on what you did in the hours before reading this article? Have you committed sin, knowingly, and are you trying to brush this off as “my nature” or “my personality”? Then you are still carnal, as Paul calls the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 3:1-3. A believer you may still be, but your spiritual growth is like that of a stone. Confess this sin to Jesus now. Name it for what it is. Call a spade a “spade” and not an “earth removing tool”. You see, we are quick to soften the name we give to sin so that it does not fall so hard on our ears. In this way we think that God will accept it. He does not.
The once-believing world around us is betraying faith in Jesus Christ in ways not thought possible in the past. Every day it just gets worse. I remember visiting Northern Ireland many years ago, and I was impressed by the church buildings of Belfast. This, I thought, is where I would hold services and tell people about God’s love for us. Then the cabbie, our taxi driver for the week who took us all over, told us that many of those churches are now used as warehouses. From the outside it may still look like a church, but inside it is dead. The believers who used to attend are either dead, have moved, or have given up. Dying is natural, and moving to another place is common, but giving up is betrayal. Jesus describes it this way:
9Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake. 10And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. 11And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. 12And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. 13But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. – Matthew 24:9-13
As we wrote in the previous article (Betrayal: When those closest to you let you down in the most dreadful way) those who are closest to you are likely the ones to betray you. In the reference above, these are not necessarily unbelievers that hate Christians, but rather those who were part of your inner circle. They were believers, like you. Why did they turn away? Jesus answers this – because iniquity shall abound. Iniquity is all the wrong things in the world, and these things will become more and abound – present in huge quantities.
We often write about the Earth’s population dying spiritually. Many cling to different religions or religious systems that claim to know the way to God, but there is no Way in their religion:
6Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. – John 14:6
Without Jesus as the way, they are doomed and are destined for eternal punishment. How sad then, that so many who once knew the Way, Jesus, and have walked the road of faith, have turned their backs on Him. Turning away from Him is not just a betrayal of a Friend, but of the entire plan of God for your life. The narrow path God has designed for us to walk to attain eternal life is experiencing fewer footsteps every day and has become almost deserted. The wide road that leads to damnation has become a massive traffic jam from which there seems to be little hope of escape. Pray that there will still be some who look to Jesus, and turn back.