Betrayed for Me, Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. The picture of salvation is you were floating face down, already dead in the water, and Jesus picked you up, put you in the life raft, and brought you back to life. It is entirely by grace, the gift of God, not of work, so that nobody can boast. You see, we're not saved because of how committed we were to Jesus. Nope, all of us were Judas.

We're saved because of how committed Jesus was to us. Welcome to Summit Life with pastor, author, and theologian J.D. Greer. I'm your host, Molly Bidevich. Let me ask you a question. What is your most prized possession? A car, a signed baseball, maybe a piece of jewelry? Could you put a price tag on it? It's well known that Judas betrayed Jesus for only 30 pieces of silver, but Jesus actually told the disciples that they would all have a price tag and fall away, sending a message that all of us, even at our very best, still fall short and need a savior. Be sure to tune into the end to learn more about how Summit Life is giving 50% of all donations this week to meet the needs that are emerging from the war in Ukraine.

Give us a call at 866-335-5220 or visit us at jdgreer.com for more information. But now let's rejoin pastor J.D. Greer as he teaches on the free gift of grace. Let me say you and a friend decided you were going to rob a bank and on the way to rob the bank, you stopped by another friend's house and the friend said, I'm not going to let you do that and grabs both of you by the shirt. Your other friend wriggles free and rips his shirt, goes off and robs the bank, but you remain held by your friend and he won't let you go. Well, your one friend goes and robs the bank and gets arrested. Can you really boast later about not having committed the crime? No, because what was in his heart was in your heart.

It was your friend's restraining grace that kept you from doing it. That's what God has done for us. He put graces that kept the sin in my heart from growing into fruition and destroying me. Yet y'all, even with all of these graces, even with all of those, I still had a price whereby I sold Jesus. Betrayal and a willingness to sell him out for a price was in my heart, just like it was in Judas's.

His may have been more spectacular, but like the Puritan John Owen says, the seed of every sin is in every heart. At the end of the day, our salvation, the Bible teaches us is solely by grace. Paul says by grace, which means unmerited favor, nothing about you, goodness in God's heart, not goodness in yours. You've been saved through faith. Faith means trust in what God has done to accomplish your salvation, not on what you will do.

And not even that is from yourself. By the way, in Greek, that word that right there is written in a way that it points to the entire phrase, which means that even the faith to trust in Jesus is a gift of God. It's something that God puts in your heart. It's the gift of God, not of works.

None of it's of works so that nobody has any reason to boast at all. Your salvation from start to finish belong to God. I've told you sometimes we get this idea of salvation, like, you know, we're drowning in our sea of sin and death and we look off into the distance and there's Jesus in a lifeboat and we think that's my savior there. And so we swim over to him and we're like, Jesus saved me. And he throws us a life raft and he pulls us in the boat and hallelujah, Jesus, what a save. That's not the right picture of salvation. The better picture of salvation is you were floating face down already dead in the water and Jesus picked you up, put you in the life raft, and brought you back to life. That's what Paul is saying in Ephesians 2. It is entirely by grace, every single bit of it was a gift of God, not of works, so that nobody can boast. You see, we're not saved because of how committed we were to Jesus. Nope, all of us were Judas. We're saved because of how committed Jesus was to us. Hallelujah. Thank God. Okay.

That's your first question. Judas is us. Number two, why did Judas betray Jesus? Why did he betray Jesus?

Short answer, he was disappointed with him. Judas had expectations about the Messiah that Jesus didn't meet. Now, again, I want you to see Judas is not alone in this. All the disciples had problems with Jesus.

They all doubted him in this way. Peter, you know, Peter got angry with Jesus. I'm like, Jesus, you're confused.

I don't know what you're doing. Jesus, why aren't you doing this? In fact, it got so, you know, kind of virulent in his arguing with Jesus that Jesus finally calls him Satan. And I don't know, in Jesus's list of insults, that's got to be one of the highest ones, right?

You know, when he calls you Satan, that's like as bad as it gets. That's Peter, John the Baptist, whom Jesus thought of as the greatest preacher ever to live, right? John the Baptist, Luke chapter seven, goes through a time after he baptizes Jesus where he says, Jesus, are you really the Messiah?

Because all these expectations I had about what you were going to do, you're not doing. Thomas, you know, obviously was like that. Or here's one of my favorite examples of this that shows you all the disciples are in this category. In 1928, after Jesus had resurrected from the dead and spent 40 days with the disciples eating, talking, walking, showing them his nails and his nail scars and his hands and his feet, he says he brings them out to the mountain where he's going to ascend. He stands on the mountain and he begins to ascend. This is Matthew 28, 16. He begins to ascend.

Matthew 28, 17. And when they saw him ascending, some worshiped but others doubted. I'm like, guys, he's floating in the air. And they're like, ah, I don't know. I saw the David Blaine special.

I'm not really sure if this is like legit right here. How could you doubt at that moment when he's floating in the air? Here's why. It is because what Jesus was leaving undone on earth was so confusing to them, they still couldn't get their minds around it. Why were the Romans still in charge? Why was evil Rome still oppressing the Jew?

Why was there still injustice? If he's really the Messiah, why is the world such a mess? You see, those questions are legitimate questions. And they're questions that all of the disciples of Jesus had. Like most Jews, Judas had assumed a couple of things about the Messiah. Number one, Judas wanted a Messiah who would punish evil and reward the righteous. Jewish people were waiting for a Messiah that would deliver them from the oppression of Rome and punish the wicked.

And there's nothing wrong with that. We are right to cry out to God for deliverance from oppression and injustice, but Jesus shows up with a different agenda. The first time Jesus announces his Messiah ship.

You know what it is? Luke chapter 4. Jesus is 30 years old and he's in a, let's see, a church service, a synagogue service at his local synagogue. And there was a point in the service at which they allowed people that just have something on their heart to come up and talk to everybody. And so Jesus stands up and walks forward and says, I've got a word. And they're like, okay, you know, and he walks up and he takes the Isaiah scroll and he opens it up to Isaiah 61. And he reads this, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he's anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives. He said, liberty to those who are oppressed and proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. And all the Jews said, amen. That's us. We're the oppressed.

We're the discriminated against. And one day Messiah came to the Lord against and one day Messiah is going to come and he's going to whoop hiney or whatever. They all spoke well of it. They all patted him on the back and they're like, man, you're going to make a great preacher one day and we really love to hear you preach because you just make us feel good and uplifted. All right.

So far, so good. But then he goes on in his sermon. His sermon, Luke says, goes on like this. In the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months and a great famine came over all the land, Elijah was sent to none of them, none of the Israelites, only to Zarephath and the land of Sidon to a woman who was a widow. In other words, there were lots of people who were hungry during that time period, but God only sent Elijah to do a miracle in the home of a Gentile woman who was not even a Jew.

He goes on. There were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha and none of them was cleansed but only name in the Syrian. Lots of people had leprosy during the time of Elisha, but Elisha only healed one of them and it was the head of the enemy army.

It would be like today if there was a nationwide plague and all of our children were dying and God chooses the only person that he heals is the grandson of Osama bin Laden. Well, they weren't expecting this turn in Jesus's sermon, so all of a sudden Jesus starts making the point that instead of showing up to punish evil and reward the insiders, Jesus came preaching grace to outsiders and that made everybody mad because when you think you're a rule follower, nothing makes you madder than when God rewards those who don't follow the rules as well as you think you do. And so the crowd listening to the sermon that morning went from patting Jesus on the back to they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built so that they could throw him down off of the cliff. Now, I've gotten some bad reactions from sermons that I've preached before.

I've never had that happen. I've got a few nasty emails, but nobody's ever tried to throw me off a cliff because I have no idea what to do with this verse. Verse 30, but passing through their midst, he went away. I don't even know what that means.

I mean, is that like a Jedi mind trick? He was like, I'm not the droid you were looking for. I don't know what it means, but he just walked through their midst and said, this is not the time for me to die. Jesus's message was that all of us at our very best fall far short and need a savior. We are all alike, wicked before God, both oppressor and oppressed. Both of them have sinful hearts that need to be redeemed. We're all outsiders who need to be rescued. Thank God he extends grace to outsiders because that's the only kind of people that there are.

Thank God he saves really bad people because there are no other kind of people. But Judas didn't want to see this about himself. Judas preferred to see himself as somebody who was better than other people, somebody worthy of respect, somebody who was in the upper crust of morality and worthy to be rewarded. So he missed the message of a crucified Messiah altogether.

You know who did get this? You know who did understand it? The woman who came in to anoint Jesus. She was so overwhelmed with love and gratefulness to him that she washed his feet with her tears. In a similar situation with another woman, Jesus explained the reason that people like her love me so much is that they realize how much they've been forgiven of. What he meant was not that she actually had been forgiven of more than the disciples but she realized she had been forgiven of a lot and that made her love Jesus.

You know what that means? The reason some of you are so apathetic when it comes to love for Jesus, the reason your love for Jesus is so weak is you have such little awareness of how desperate your condition was when Jesus saved you. So number one, Judas wanted a Messiah who would punish evil and reward the righteous. The woman understood the Messiah came to bestow grace because there were none righteous. Number two, Judas wanted a Messiah who would bestow power and riches. He was looking for the Messiah to give him the good life.

The woman understood that knowing Jesus was the good life. Judas's reaction to the woman anointing Jesus is very revealing. He thinks that the perfume poured out on Jesus was wasted and in one sense he was right. Puritan theologian Jonathan Edwards said that the thing that is so shocking about Mary's act was its total uselessness. I mean think about it, it was useless to Jesus. He didn't need that expensive of an anointing. It smelled good for a few hours and then it was totally gone.

Ten thousand dollars down the drain for just a smell for a while. It was useless to Jesus. It was useless to Mary. Mary did not need to earn favor from Jesus.

You know how we know that? Mary was the sister of Lazarus who Jesus raised from the dead and John 11 makes very clear that Jesus loved that family and was very committed to them and had promised them that he would be with them forever and they would spend forever in heaven with him. So they've already got that promise. So it's not like she's doing this so that she can get in better with Jesus. She's already got his favor.

No, that act only served one purpose and that was for her to declare her love for Jesus and to put his worth to her on display so that she could say as loudly as she could, you are worthy and you're worth 10 billion bottles of these kinds of perfume. You're listening to a message titled Betrayed for Me on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Let me remind you that for this week only we are giving away 50% of all gifts given to Summit Life in order to help provide shelter, food, clothing, medicine, transportation, pastoral care, and other assistance for displaced people in Lviv, Ukraine. Simply go to jdgreer.com or give us a call at 866-335-5220 to make a donation. This is a tangible way to get involved with a trusted partner in the gospel so join with us today by generously supporting this effort to bless. Now let's return to today's message with Pastor J.D. For Judas, Jesus was just a means to an end. He's thinking if I follow Jesus then he will give me power and riches. But for Mary Jesus was the end.

Knowing him was the riches. Judas served Jesus to get things. Mary gave up anything in order to know more of Jesus. Judas says you know what if Jesus is not going to get me riches and power and health and wealth then what good is he? Mary says we're the whole realm of nature mine that we're a present far too small. Love so amazing so divine demands my soul my life my all. Jesus paid it all all to him I owe sin had left a crimson stain he watched it white as snow. See Judas thought of Jesus as useful.

Mary thought of him as beautiful. Something that is useful you use as a helpful tool to obtain something else you really want. So if Jesus is useful to you then he's useful as means to heaven, a good marriage, health, career success, but something that's beautiful to you you love in and for itself. Right? A tire iron is useful to me so I keep one in my car at all times. It's useful to me because of what it can do for me in a moment that I need it.

Right? And if it breaks I throw it away. My wife and my children are beautiful to me. I don't keep them in my life because of what they can do for me. I'm not like I'm gonna keep you around as long as you hold out the promise that one day you'll be able to earn me you know several million dollars.

I keep them around because they are beautiful to me. Judases find Jesus to be useful Mary's find him beautiful. That means that you can tell whether you are a Judas or a Mary by how you respond when life disappoints you. When life disappoints you if you say God this may not be my preference and this hurts like crazy and I don't want this but God if you can use this to help me know you more and if you can use this for your glory to help others know you more and others see your worth I'll gladly take it because knowing you is a better treasure than an easy life. If that's what you say in the midst of suffering then you are a Mary.

In fact maybe write it down this way how you respond to suffering and pain is the measure of your understanding and your embrace of the gospel. You see if you get angry with God when you go through a time where life disappoints you and you say God you're not keeping up you're into the deal. God if you don't start giving me what I want health a boyfriend a raise whatever then Jesus maybe you're not really worth following. If that's the attitude of your heart you're probably Judas.

Jesus is only a means to an end for you. See I've got a feeling that there's a number of you listening to me right now that you're at a crossroads in your life. Lots of things are going wrong in your life and times are hard and you've asked God to help you out but things are not resolving yet and you're like you're like God are you even there feel confused you even feel angry at God God why is this happening to my parents God why is this happening to me and you're asking Jesus are you even really worth following and I want to tell you with Mary he is but not because of the things he can do for you tomorrow he's worthy because of who he is that you will possess for all of eternity. I got a letter from a summit member who was telling me that this year she was unexpectedly diagnosed with a very serious type of cancer that caused her whole life to change and she had to go through a number of chemo treatments and she said at first I struggle with anger to God because why was he letting this happen and I had so many things I wanted to accomplish.

She said but you know what happened? She said I realized that God answered a lot of prayers I've been praying over the years for him to give me joy because when he had finally rattled some of my foundations he let me learn to have joy in him and I've been praying for a lot of people in my life to come to know Jesus and I wasn't getting anywhere with them but all of a sudden through this cancer I've had a chance to talk to a bunch of them at a whole different level about who Jesus is and she says I even led one of them to Christ on my porch just the other day and then she concluded her note to me by saying this she says hard does not equal bad, hard is hard. I wouldn't choose hard for anything but it was a good thing because it changed my heart in good ways and knowing Jesus is worth going through all these hard things in the world that is the heart of a Mary.

Knowing Jesus is worth all going through all these hard things and I would take him over everything. Y'all in summation Judas represents a religious approach to God. I serve God to get things from God and I expect to be rewarded for my behavior. Mary is the person who understands the gospel.

I deserve nothing but God has given me everything in Christ and Christ is a treasure worth losing everything else for. Y'all the praise that Jesus gives to Mary is incredible. Her sacrifice meant so much to him that he said that her story is going to be a permanent fixture in the gospel story that shows us what a gospel response actually looks like. In fact I like to think of when Jesus left that dinner and went to the Garden of Gethsemane and then went on into the trial that night and then was beaten and then ultimately crucified that the scent of that perfume from his hair and his feet was still probably filling his nostrils.

Right that sweet smell still bringing joy to his heart. In fact I wonder if that's what the writer of Hebrews is referring to when he says that for the joy set before him he endured the cross. The joy of redeeming Mary, the joy of being in love with people like Mary was what brought joy to his heart. It was so meaningful to him that his praise for it was the highest he gives to anybody in the Bible. The praise for her is incredible but the verdict on Judas is devastating.

All it still sends a chill through my body. It had been better for him and he had not even been born. You know the only way that statement is true is if he's talking about Judas going to hell forever. If Judas was just annihilated, if he just ceased to exist then that statement wouldn't make any sense. Because if you know at the end of our lives if we're not Christians if we just start stop existing you'd say well at least you got to experience life one time.

At least you got to experience some good things in life. I'm sure Judas had some good things that he experienced but the only way that statement is true is if Judas went to hell forever and he's still there. What a terrible thing for the Lord Jesus Christ to say about your life. Yet that is God's verdict on every Judas. That is every person who does not surrender fully to Jesus without condition. That is his verdict on those who do not consider him the ultimate treasure.

On those who will not give up everything to follow him. It's like Puritan Jeremy Taylor always said. He said you know God threatens terrible things for those who refuse to be insanely happy in him.

Is this you? What a terrible thing to say about you. Be better for you for you never to have even been born. After Judas left they took the Lord's table and I'm going to show you that the Lord's table actually represented the last offer that Jesus gave to Judas to turn from what he was doing and to embrace Jesus and to receive him. Now listen what's interesting about this is that Judas was not present for this part. Jesus waited till after Judas left and one of the things that shows us is that this is a celebration only for believers.

That's what Paul says in 1st Corinthians. Only believers should take of the bread and the cup but here's what's amazing. Jesus did offer to Judas, we saw it, a portion of the Passover bread. You see right before Judas left they were at a point in the Passover called the Korek and the Korek was where they took this piece of bread and they dipped it in the bitter herbs which represented captivity to sin and you would dip it and it represented like most things in the Passover God's deliverance from the bitterness of sin. Here's the kicker listen the Jewish tradition was that the host of the Passover would offer this piece of bread that had been dipped in the bitter herb he would offer it to somebody who was very close to him very special to him usually a child and what you were saying to them when you offered this one piece of bread to them is you are very special to me you're very special to me and God's salvation is for you. Jesus of all the disciples he could have given it to he offered that piece of bread that said you're special and I love you he offered that to Judas and what he was saying is Judas you don't have to do this. Judas you're special to me. Judas I'm going to die for you if you will receive me and Judas stood up rejected Jesus's offer and walked out. You see if you're not a believer Jesus is actually offering the same thing to you.

He is offering the same thing to you he is holding out the offer of salvation to you if you'll just receive it. Our mission here at Summit Life is simple to dive deeper into the gospel message and to help others do the same. This week we have the privilege of raising money for relief efforts in Ukraine. 50% of every dollar given between April 4th and April 8th will be used to meet humanitarian needs through the Ukrainian Baptist Theological Seminary who's a trusted partner of Summit Life. Recently Pastor Jadie had the opportunity to talk with Yaroslav Piž, the president of the seminary in Lviv, Ukraine.

Let's hear just a piece of their conversation. Why don't you tell us here the two or three ways that you would want your American brothers and sisters praying every day for you all there in Ukraine. That's very simple thank you for the good question. The first thing please join us and pray for a miracle. It will take God to it will take God to end this war not us. The second thing we need resources and funds to do what we're doing so now we're helping refugees then we need to help them with humanitarian aid and stuff like that so that's funds if you can help us with that that would be very very needed. And the third thing please pray for us.

The war will be over and I really hope that we will remain humane because when war comes you become angry but I don't want us to become bitter. We need spiritual health. We need spiritual strength to face all that uncertainty. You can be an answer to that prayer when you give today. Call 866-335-5220 or visit jdgrier.com to give your gift today. We'll send you a copy of Pastor JD's new resource called Listen Up 10 Devotions from the Parables of Jesus as our way of saying thank you. I'm Molly Vidovitch and I hope you'll join us tomorrow when Pastor JD continues our new teaching series and shows us how necessary it was for Jesus to be abandoned for me and for you. Join us Wednesday for Summit Life with JD Greer.