Son of Perdition

“While I was with them in the world, I kept them in your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the scripture might be fulfilled.” -John 17:12

As I write this, I find myself agitated by a young man sitting not far from me. I can vaguely hear the tone in which he is speaking (about selfies); I see the beanie half cocked back on his head with a lone patch of solidly spiked hair, sternly standing two inches from his forehead. I noticed him immediately when he walked in here 10 minutes ago, strolling smugly into my presence, all the while looking anxiously around with a paranoia I am all too certain is nothing more than total insecurity. I have to admit, from first glance I wanted to bring his swagger level down a few notches by way of a few slaps, and perhaps a headlock with a noogie to mess up that perfect little patch of hair he probably spent too much time working on this morning (or more likely noon, which is when I assume he probably got out of bed this morning). This poor soul couldn’t even look me in the eyes as he took the chair from the table I’m sitting at, much less ask permission. I don’t know what offended me more, the fact that he had so remorselessly taken the chair from my table, or how proudly he presented it to his company that he had found an extra chair for their third from that whopping three feet away. It’s quite hilarious to me to be sitting here feeling this way about this kid, because it is just a reminder that the issue I am about to present is one that is so wired into the fabric of my life, I can only present in a manner of utmost humility.

Anger, and bitterness come naturally to me. Perhaps it’s the fact that I have been a card carrying “Cynic of all things” for as long as I can remember. As a college student at a Christian University, I scoffed at the artificial boundaries of moral conduct I was forced to uphold. Now, living in a town known for being of a liberal persuasion I scoff at the lack of structure or discipline in which so many people attend to their affairs. It’s hard to admit that the cynic in me was only fabricated as a defense against the anger, unforgiveness, and bitterness I have held onto for many years. I have questioned the motives of those who impose a moral code on others, as well as the motives of those who seem to impetuously live by no moral code whatsoever; using both as evidence for the belief I have held that people can neither be counted on, nor trusted. I could give you the laundry list of people who have let me down, and betrayed my trust, and if you’ve been so lucky as to hear one of my opinionated rants about someone I don’t trust, I’m sorry. Clearly, I have developed a response to betrayal that has lined my life up to simply expect that I will be betrayed by anyone that does not fall perfectly in line with my boundaries. I have no reason to mistrust the old gentleman sitting at the table in front of me with his unkempt white crown, because somehow I can’t imagine an old guy with khaki pants and Nike Shox doing me any harm. I certainly wouldn’t trust the kid with the beanie and spiked hair to watch my computer if I went to the bathroom, because I’ve heard the stories of kids “just like him” that steal things all the time. Where would we be without our stereotypes?

I have been betrayed in ways that have cost me friendships, jobs, relationships, and possessions, but never have I been betrayed in a way that has cost me my life. I decided, that since I have such a hard time getting through bitterness over such small offenses, I would dig a little deeper into the response of Christ when he was betrayed. You could probably ask anyone who has had any exposure to the story of Jesus the name of his betrayer, and they could tell you. He is perhaps one of the most villainized characters of history, and his name is the standard label for a traitor. Looking deeper into this scapegoat of scapegoats, I think I have bit off more than I can chew. Initially, I only wanted to see how I can better respond when I am betrayed, and how I can forgive past betrayals in a Godly way. What I have found is more of a picture of my own heart than I ever cared to see, and a picture of Christ I could never have seen without the revelation of myself I am forced to come to grips with.

"And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might kill him, for they feared the people.
Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve.So he went his way and conferred with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray Him to them.And they were glad, and agreed to give him money.
So he promised and sought opportunity to betray Him to the absence of the multitude."      -Luke 22:2-6

Jesus had amassed such a fan base, and a following, that to arrest him, the opportune moment would be necessary to take him when there would be little defense for him to call upon. Someone familiar with the private schedule would be a necessary asset in gaining access to Him. Maybe it was a love of money; maybe it was disdain for the difficult teachings and works of Jesus that lead Judas to become a vulnerable candidate to betray Christ. Whatever it was, Judas was the figure of a celestial conspiracy, as “Satan entered” into his life, and compelled him to betray the Man whom he had followed so closely.

“It is an awful consideration that one of the apostles proved a son of perdition. No man’s place or name in the church, no man’s privileges or opportunities of getting grace, no man’s profession or external performances, will secure him from ruin, if his heart be not right with God; nor are any more likely to prove sons of perdition at last, after a plausible course of profession, than those that like Judas love the bag; but Christ’s distinguishing Judas from those that were given him intimates that the truth and true religion ought not to suffer for the treachery of those that are false to it.” -Matthew Henry Commentary on John 17

Each of the four gospels produces an account of Jesus, in the midst of the Passover feast identifying His betrayer. I imagine each of the twelve, in this moment, was forced to consider hard his motives for calling this man Master, as he began to explain the bread of His body, and the cup of His blood, which would be broken and spilled in suffering. Suddenly, the man who had spoken of fishing, and feeding, and healing, and performing miracles, was speaking of death, suffering, and betrayal. One of His own would betray him to death. Yet, in the midst of all the miracles, the healing, the teachings, the truth, and the connection to the Father, which Jesus had shared with them, one of them would betray Him. How could it be that one so close to Jesus could betray him? How could one so close to him and so zealous in his relationship deny him three times? Christ was a man with friends, but He was a man with enemies. Even the humblest man purporting principles of peace and love has enemies, and even a man of honor and position in a cause may very well stand in opposition to that very cause. It is fitting that following the Lord’s supper in Luke 22:24-30, Jesus has to explain to His disciples what true greatness looks like, as it has nothing to do with honored positions or titles, but in service. Could this be the door of pride that allowed Satan to enter Judas? 

“What warrant they were armed with; they came from the chief priests, and elders of the people; this armed multitude was sent by them upon this errand. He was taken up by a warrant from the great Sanhedrin, as a person obnoxious to them. Pilate, the Roman governor, gave them no warrant to search for him, he had no jealousy of him; but they were men who pretended to religion, and presided in the affairs of the church that were active in this prosecution, and were the most spiteful enemies Christ had.” -Matthew Henry Commentary on Matthew 26.

"Now his betrayer had given them a sign, saying, “Whomever I kiss, He is the One; seize Him.”Immediately he went up to Jesus and said, “Greetings, Rabbi!” and kissed Him.
But Jesus said to him, “Friend, why have you come?” Then they came and laid hands on Jesus and took Him." -Matthew 26:48-50

I have used many words to describe those who have betrayed me, and even for those I assumed would betray me, and friend has never been one of them. Judas had been a friend, a close companion, but that was over now. He was now a villain, a traitor, and a fool! If there was a man in a moment that deserved to be destroyed by a legion of angels, this was it! He walked in with such swagger; “Greetings!” he says. Friend? He calls him friend? In Luke’s account, Jesus says “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” (Luke 22:48).

No response.

No explanation of his conduct could have justified what Judas had done, nor did Christ press the issue. Judas was wrong, his actions finished, betrayal complete. Nothing more needed discussed. Jesus had said all that had needed said in calling him friend. Judas had completed his role in the story; there was no need to bring back a condemned character, or to resurrect a completed role. What if the reason I can’t let go of anger and betrayal, and the trust issues that come with it are because I am unwilling to let go of those who have committed them? Maybe I can’t let them leave my story because I want justice. I want to see them “get theirs.” What if those experiences were not meant to drive me further from my fellow man, but to drive me closer to Christ himself?

What if Jesus confessing Judas as his friend in the midst of betrayal was the single most condemning and simultaneously compassionate thing He could have done?

If I am hanging on to bitterness, and not willing to forgive those who have betrayed me, I am betraying the very heart of Christ. In my anger, I am open and vulnerable, and inviting the same spirit of Satan that had taken hold of Judas. I might as well be walking arrogantly to Jesus, and sealing my betrayal with a kiss when I refuse to forgive.

“It was the devil’s work, who thought hereby to ruin Christ’s undertaking, to have broken his head; but it proved only the bruising of his heel. Whoever betrays Christ, or his truths or ways, it is Satan that puts them upon it.” “It is hard to say whether more mischief is done to Christ’s kingdom by the power and policy of its open enemies, or by the treachery and self-seeking of its pretended friends: nay, without the latter its enemies could not gain their point as they do.” Matthew Henry Commentary on Luke 22.

 Overcoming bitterness and anger does not come from forgiving the offenses of others against me, but by remembering the ways in which I have betrayed Christ, and remembering that He still calls me friend. In this, I find His condemnation, and His compassion. He has entrusted me as one of His own with suffering because He would have me be more like Him. Every sin is an offense against Him. Every act of bitterness, every cynical thought is the foothold that Satan desires to maintain. My demonstrations of affection for Christ are a kiss of betrayal when I am unable to let go of offenses against me. When I feel betrayed, I am actively becoming the betrayer.

“And the Lord said, “Simon, Simon! Indeed Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat.
But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to me, strengthen your brethren.”But he said to Him, “Lord, I am ready to go with you, both to prison and to death.”Then He said, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny me three times.” -Luke 22:31-34

Oh that I were so lucky to have only denied Christ three times. I feel as though I have denied Christ for three years…..at a time…..nine times…..I wonder if I haven’t denied Him with the simple essence of my life. I think Satan wants me wrapped up in myself, and seeking my own desires above the desires of Christ for me. I think he wants us arguing, and hurting, and betraying each other, so that we will focus on our own hurt, and cry to God about the injustices of our lives. I think as long as we are focused on the sin in the world around us, we will never deal with the sin within ourselves. Jesus prays for Peter, that his faith would not fail, and that he would strengthen his brothers. Faith is the crux of what Christ requires. He restores Peter because of His faith, before Peter even has denied Him.

“I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should deliver them from the evil one.They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truthAs You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify Myself that they also may be sanctified by the truth.I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word;That they all may be one, as You Father are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.
And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one:I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.” -John 17:15-23

So what does this mean for the son of perdition? Would Christ let one of his own outside of His protection to be tempted and turned by the evil one? It seems as though Judas was given the ability to choose Christ, or the reward of His betrayal. For thirty pieces of silver the Son of Man was betrayed to death. In Matthew 27:3-5 we see the only account of what would become of Judas. It appears as though Judas realizes the severity of his offense, perhaps is released from the power of Satan, and tries of his own accord to rectify his wrong. He returns the silver to the chief priests, and expresses grief over having betrayed an innocent man. His attempt is turned away, and in a fit of rage, he throws down the silver in the temple, and leaves to hang himself. 

I have felt the weight of sin that has been unbearable to my soul, and felt as though there is nothing on earth that would turn God’s ear to hear my pleas. I have tried to rectify my sin by good works, or by trying to undo a wrong, but this is not the path that God intends. The path to redemption runs by way of relationship with the Son of God. The road to perdition is one of offense, anger, and unforgiveness. One voice sounds out of offense and mistrust, and says that the boy in the beanie needs to be chastised and judged. The other voice sounds out of forgiveness, love, service, and redemption. The voice I choose to listen to may redeem me. The voice I choose to listen to may condemn me. The voice I choose to listen to will most certainly define me.

Lord, sanctify us by your truth. 

Dying to Live, and Living to Die

I can’t quite put my finger on the exact moment this thought truly started to take up residence in my mind. It seems as though it’s an old familiar thought, which for the better part of the last decade has been dormant in my conscience. As a teenager, I could scarcely imagine life as an adult. It was nerve racking, mysterious, and truthfully, not the slightest bit attractive. Perhaps I’m in the minority of those adolescents who did not pine for freedom and independence; perhaps because I was in the minority of adolescents who recognized those terms only meant responsibility and accountability. There was a period of months as a seventeen year old, where I toiled with anxiety and depression over the impending death of my childhood. It was one of the darkest times of my life, and I despaired at the very thought of living.  Death, it seemed, was an ultimate escape from the toil and trouble of life. I wish it was as easy as saying I gained self-esteem, pulled myself up by my intellectual and emotional bootstraps, and found within myself a reason to live. I didn’t. I sought death; I fixated on what it would take to end my life. I fought for an end to the struggle in my heart and mind. Somehow, I failed, and in that failure, I found exactly what I was searching for. Hope.

He will swallow up death forever,
And the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces;
The rebuke of his people He will take away from the earth;
For the Lord has spoken.
Isaiah 25:8

I was recently driving through a freezing rainstorm in the hills of Kentucky, headed up I-75 between Knoxville and Lexington. As rain fell to touch the freezing surfaces, I could see ice rapidly forming on my windshield. I grew up in Michigan, and learned to drive in extreme road conditions, but even a northern boy like me knows you don’t play around with freezing rain. More and more, I was picturing and imagining the scenarios that would lead to my death. Perhaps it would be a patch of black ice that would send me careening off a cliff. Maybe one of the hot rod truckers (who were apparently uninhibited by the conditions) would lose control and crush me in my little car (I knew I should have kept that truck). Most of all, I was begging, pleading, praying, “God, don’t let me die in Kentucky.”

 "It was as though God was writing my life in volumes, and He had thrown away the bookend I tried to impose upon His story."

In the reflection of that moment, I see that where, and when, and how I die have some meaning to me. Given the way I have lived the last few years, I suppose going out on the road would probably be the second most fitting way I could go behind being mauled by a bear or bitten by a venomous snake. I guess, what I’m getting at is that how, where, and when we die becomes a freeze frame of our life that stays attached to the memories of us for those we leave behind. I think back to the times of hopelessness I felt as a teenager, and the silent darkness I inhabited, and what a shame it would have been if the frame of my life had been frozen in that moment. How sad if my life were framed in what was a temporary season of selfishness and misguided despair. It was as though God was writing my life in volumes, and He had thrown away the bookend I tried to impose upon His story. The story was not done yet, and in that I found hope and pain. Now, as I approach the mystery and excitement of the next decade of my life, I wonder what is next in this story. Driving through mountains, and squaring off with bears, I wonder, “Is this the bookend, God?”

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
Psalm 23:4

Reading fiction is a challenge for me, because when the author does not write the story how I would have written it, I put it down. I take over the authors’ story, rewrite the authors’ characters, and impose my biases into the story. It is because of this same pride, I try to write my own story, and try to change those around me when they are not written the way I want them to be. So I don’t know if it is death that I fear, as much as it is that I will die having not been a willing participant in Gods’ story. As I drove a dark, icy mountain road, I wasn’t afraid that my life would end, I’ve felt as though everything since seventeen has been borrowed time anyway; I was afraid that I would die in my lie. In those moments it seemed most imminent, I loathed the clothes I was wearing, I hated the car I was driving, I was embarrassed by my attitude that week. I was incredibly aware of the motives of my life when facing death.  I was aware of how hard I had worked to drive a nice car. I was aware of how much thought I had put into the appearance of the clothes I was wearing. I was aware of the thoughts of disdain I had for people around me, and of my own selfishness in my interactions with them. I was afraid that more of my life had been devoted to trying to write the story myself than in letting the author and finisher write it for me.

Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?
Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.
For he who has died has been freed from sin.
Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,
Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him.
For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that he lives, he lives to God.
Romans 6:3-10

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.”
“For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”
“For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?”
“For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His father with his angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.”
“Assuredly, I say to you, there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.”
Matthew 16:24-28

What I am learning to see, and more importantly to act upon, is that there is meaning in both life, and in death. As a teenager, I learned not to seek death, and as a twenty something, I have learned not to seek life, but to echo what Paul wrote to the Philippians, “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). What I still need to learn is that living in Christ is not the same as living for me. Christ made no simple demand when he said to deny self. It is to my shame that I live with the memory of selfishly seeking to end my own life, and I confess it so that Christ might use it for His glory. There is a long way to go, and many things to unlearn that have been picked up along the way. I feel the weight of a culture that has despiritualized the human experience, and told me that I can find answers within myself. Self-esteem, self-reliance, self-actualization, self-centeredness, self-glorification, and a myriad of other “self-“ terms are thrown around haphazardly, as we each try to write our own story, and seeking all sorts of “self-help” gurus for counsel when we can’t reconcile the fact that we never fully have control of our own plot. Each of our stories started without our consent, it is continued outside of our supreme control, and it will end in spite of us as well. We fight each other, scheme, and step on each other in an attempt to gain more and more control of our lives, and every second we spend living for ourselves we create what could be the final frame of our lives. I don’t want the final frame of my life to be highlighted by the clothes I wear, the car I drive, the place I live, or the relationships I have. I want my final frame to glorify the one in whom I have found a reason to live, the one in whom I find refuge and hope. I want my final frame to glorify my author, my creator, my God.

I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O death, where is your victory?   O death, where is your sting?”The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
1 Corinthians 15:50-58