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The Bible’s Old and New testaments give us many examples of characters whose lives had tragic life changing happenings and some whose life ending could be accurately characterized as a tragedy. Some examples from the Old might include Cain, King David, Samson, Lot, Ahab and Jezebelle.  From the New Testament, the woman at the well, and the lady caught in adultery to mention just a couple. Perhaps none is more tragic than Judas. Imagine a man who had the opportunity to spend about three years travelling with Jesus, seeing the miracles, and listening to the teaching of the master. But somehow the life change never happened. The lust for thirty pieces of silver and the things that it could buy finally enticed him to sell out the Lord to the religious authorities who were happy to oblige.  But Judas had a turn around. These words are from Matthew chapter 27 verses three and four and are interesting.

 When Judas, who had betrayed him, realized that Jesus had been condemned to die, he was filled with remorse. So, he took the thirty pieces of silver back to the leading priests and the elders. “I have sinned,” he declared, “for I have betrayed an innocent man.” “What do we care?” they retorted. “That’s your problem.”

            Judas’s admission of sin sounds quite like King David’s from many centuries before. But notice the words from the leading priests and elders. “That’s your problem”. I’m not sure they fully understood the significance of their words, but they were absolutely true. Not just for Judas but for all of us. We all have sinned (Romans 3:23) and so we face the same sin problem that Judas faced. Judas apparently didn’t understand that the death of Jesus would present an opportunity to have his problem solved. His guilt was so strong he tragically committed suicide.

We who have heard the gospel understand that our sin problem can be resolved by asking forgiveness, believing Jesus did pay the penalty for our sin, repenting, ie change the course of our lives, and resolving to live for him.  I hope and pray that you have done that. But even if you have, we have a second sin problem, the problem that our human nature can take us into sin as we live out our day to day lives. In his first letter, John reminds us of that: “If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth”. And he reminds us that Jesus is still able and willing to forgive us of those sins. “But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.” Thank God for this provision but it can easily become an excuse to live carelessly and neglect the call to holiness. John also speaks about ‘living in the light’. Let’s be determined to live in the light of his Word and the light of the Spirit allowing him to identify any darkness in our life and lifestyle and in so doing make progress to our holiness goal.                                                                Pastor Dave