Few things cut more deeply than betrayal, whether in a business relationship, a friendship, or a marriage. Mark describes the meal which is both the Last Supper and the first Lord’s Supper as taking place in the context of betrayal. Mark 14:12–26 warns you of the sin of betrayal, summons you to heed the gracious warning Christ gives, and comforts you with the Savior who gave himself for you.
Beware of the sin of betrayal. The Son of Man will go just as it is written. Unlike many betrayals we experience, the Son of Man knows what is happening. He had foretold his betrayal, Mark 10:34. It is written (Psalm 41), and he goes as it is written. He is determined to fulfill the work the Father has given him. Psalm 41 may reflect the rebellion of Absalom and the betrayal by David’s advisor, Ahithophel, see 2 Samuel 15. It is David’s anguished cry over the treachery against him — but the Spirit of the Christ was at work in David as he wrote so that the Psalm becomes also the expression of the Lord. And though Jesus knew it was happening, that did not diminish the pain of the betrayal. This was one of the 12 who had been with him from early in his ministry, Mark 3:19. The Son of Man is moving towards the cross — and the action of Judas is a step in that journey. Although important to this event, Judas is not a major character in Mark’s account. Jesus wants a last few hours with his disciples before his death.
Your sin involves betrayal. Judas betrayed the Son of Man. He turned against the Messiah. We can speculate about the process of change in a disciple selected by Jesus. But whatever the process of disillusionment (was it finding out that there would not be the kind of kingdom Judas expected?), Judas had a crucial role in the arch-crime of history. It was the murder, not only of the only perfectly innocent man who ever lived, but the One who is the God-man, the Messianic Redeemer. As we will see in a moment, Jesus warns Judas severely. Dante’s Inferno pictures Judas in the innermost ring of the lowest level of hell, being gnawed by one of the three mouths of Satan, along with Brutus and Cassius, the betrayers and murderers of Caesar. Some have suggested that Dante was reflecting on the fractured state of Italy by placing Caesar’s betrayers there. The Bible doesn’t tell us just what the punishment of Judas in hell is, nor how it compares to other rebels against God. But it somehow strikes me the wrong way to put any other treachery on the same level as that of Judas. This sin breaks table fellowship. The Passover was a meal that celebrated God’s deliverance, the peace that he gave his people following their slavery in Egypt. Fellowship at a meal indicates peace. Look at Genesis 14 and the mysterious priest of Salem bringing bread and wine to greet Abram returning from battle. Jesus quotes Psalm 41:9 with the reference to betrayal by one who shared table fellowship, dipping his hand into the same common bowl as the Savior. Yet, in a sense, the sin of Judas was not unique. Was the betrayal all that different from what Peter did that same night, following his abandonment of Jesus (despite Peter’s protestations to the contrary) he denied his Lord three times, even calling down curses on himself? To some degree, much of our sin involves an element of betrayal. We know better than Judas did who Jesus is and what his work in our place involves. Yet we still turn against him in sin, despite knowing that it grieves him. We blot out of our minds whom we are sinning against as we satisfy the temptation of the moment. And Judas, as Ferguson suggests, is the man who continues in sin, not realizing that you can sin your way out of the grace of God. Sin ensnares and entangles, twining around you until you lose any desire to repent. We flirt with sin–and it has the power to destroy us.
“He whose parent is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who does His will, has eaten His bread and will live eternally. But whoever is born of ‘the father, the devil’ eats the food of Satan….” “The sop which Jesus gives has the same effectiveness as the Word which God gives. That Word, also, never returns void; it achieves whatever pleases God and quickly effects the purpose for which God sent it. That Word forces choices upon men. It converts men, or it hardens them. It makes men bow, or it stiffens their necks in haughty obstinacy.”
K. Schilder, Christ in His Suffering, p. 176
But Mark’s account moves on. Pay attention to the gracious warning Christ gives. Heed the severity of the warning. Jesus predicts the betrayal, warning against it. And each of the disciples (Judas apparently included) asks incredulously, “Surely not I?” Jesus does not paint Dante’s graphic picture of torment. But he pronounces woe on that man, and understates: it would have been better for him had he not been born. As you appreciate that the essence of hell is separation from the love and favor of God, exposure only to his wrath and judgment, understand that the warning of Jesus applies to any who persist in rejecting the grace of God in Christ. Mark’s Gospel is a warning to anyone who thinks of himself as one of God’s people and yet continues to walk in persistent disobedience.
“Judas is the example par excellence of the man who believes that he can never sin his way out of the grace of God. We should remember him if we ever think we can decide the point at which we will stop sinning. Sin deceives as well as hardens. It leads us to that great hardness of heart and blindness of understanding which ignores the last amber light. Ultimately even the warnings of the Son of God through his word are silenced.
Sinclair B. Ferguson, Let’s Study Mark, p. 228
But in the warning is grace. Cast yourself on God’s grace. What if Judas had not seared his conscience? What if he had not allowed his greed and disappointment to harden himself against Christ’s warnings? What if, instead of asking, “Surly not I?” he had snatched his hand from the dish, thrown himself at the feet of Jesus, wept with the kind of tears that Peter shed late that night after the cock crowed, and cried, “Lord, it is I who have betrayed you! Can you still forgive me?” Would the Lord who forgave and restored Peter, the Savior who assured the thief on the cross who cried for Jesus to remember him (but who shortly before had joined his partner in mocking the Man crucified between them), would that Lord withhold forgiveness from a repentant Judas? No, it didn’t happen that way, and we need to be careful about speculation. At some point, unmarked in this Gospel, Judas leaves to reappear with those who arrest the Savior in the Garden of Gethsemane. The point is, the Savior warns you with the goal of summoning you to repent, to turn seeking his forgiveness and grace. Don’t avoid the warnings of Scripture. They are not hypothetical. They are real warnings to real people–us. And they are intended to drive you to the Savior. Mary, not her real name, who professes faith in Christ and seeks to follow him, heard a preacher tell her that the warning of Revelation 21:8 meant that she is lost, because she is guilty of those sins. Mary is living in fear of Christ’s return, for she hasn’t grasped in the way that she should, that the death and resurrection of Christ cleanse us from our sins, 1 Corinthians 6:9–11.
How can you be reassured? Look at what happens next.
Entrust yourself to the Savior who gave himself for you. Look to Christ in his death. Jesus points to the sacrifice he is about to offer for the sins of his disciples. He takes bread, breaks it, and says, “Take, eat. This is my body.” And he takes the cup, echoing Exodus 14, he calls it his blood of the covenant, and give it to them to drink. This is not a meal for super-saints. It is for sinners, sinners who know their guilt, and who turn to Christ. Scripture doesn’t give us an absolute answer as to the presence of Judas. But Peter, boastful, weak, about to swear that he never knew Jesus, Peter is there and partakes. James and John, who with Peter are about to doze instead of watching and praying with the Lord in the Garden, are present and partake. And those three and all the others who are about to flee in fear, partake. The sacrifice Christ offers covers your sins. And if your sins are covered by his blood, the meal is for you. Your treachery is covered by his work in your place. Mary, and you, need to understand and to trust in the work of Christ that provides complete forgiveness.
What Christ says and does looks even beyond his suffering and death.
Rejoice in your continuing fellowship with the risen Savior. Earlier in the meal Jesus had said that he was going as it was written. Now, having predicted his betrayal and having warned Judas, having instituted the meal that, by faith and the working of the Spirit in the Word takes us to Christ, now he speaks of the immanence of his death. He will not drink a cup of wine with his disciples again before his death. His death for sinners is at hand. But he will drink the cup anew in the kingdom of God. His death is not the end of the story. And that is why the Lord’s Supper, though indeed a memorial of his death, is much more than a memorial. It summons you to believe the good news that Jesus spoke, it calls you to continue to trust him. And it presents in visible form the fellowship that we have with the Savior who is no longer dead, but who lives and in whom we live. Your fellowship with the risen Lord speaks of the new life which you, as a new creation, have in him. You have died with Christ. You now live with him. Instead of calling you betrayers, he calls you his people, his brothers and sisters.
There was treachery and betrayal at the table as Judas reached into the bowl with the Savior. Though warned, he continued on his path of disobedience and unbelief — and perished. But at that same table the Savior spoke the good news of his death and resurrection in the place of sinners. He presented himself as the One whose blood cleanses you, the people of his covenant, of the guilt of your treachery and betrayal. As you heed his warning you experience, not judgment, but forgiveness and grace.
