Here’s my longer sermon notes from this morning’s Metro Christian Centre service (dated 24th November 2024), continuing our series flicking through some of the epic scenes of Mark’s gospel.
You can also catch up with this via MCC’s YouTube channel (just give us time to get the video uploaded).
‘I am the thorn in your crown | But You love me anyway | I am the sweat from Your brow | But You love me anyway | I am the nail in Your wrist | But You love me anyway | I am Judas’ kiss | But You love me anyway’
—Sidewalk Prophets[i]
READ: MARK 14:27-52 (NET)
‘ET TU, BRUTE?’
According to Mumsnet.com, Noah is the most popular baby boy’s name of 2024 in the UK, and Olivia is top of the baby girl’s list.[ii]
They’ve held that spot for a couple of years, but, as we all know, names come and go in popularity and for all sorts of reasons.
Within the current top ten, there’s even a bit of a revival going on with some older names: Florence, Ava and Ivy, along with Arthur, Oscar and Theodore are all in the current top ten.
But some names never seem to make a revival.
Certain names tend to be avoided.
In one of my roles as an engineer, I worked with someone called Joseph Stalin. He also had a colleague called Julius Caesar. Honest! I’m not making this up. They both lived and worked over in Manilla, in the Philippines.
There’s nothing wrong with the name Joseph—I know several Josephs. But in many European countries, you generally won’t find people combining the name Joseph with the name Stalin. We would be uneasy about that.
There’s an Old Germanic name that means means ‘noble wolf’—it inspired admiration. The name has been around for thousands of years and has such a rich heritage that it has variations in French and Old English.
Prior to World War II, it was an extremely popular name in Germanic countries; you would have met many lads bearing the title ‘noble wolf’, or ‘Adolf’ as it’s pronounced. Since the very negative events surrounding the war, however, that name has been filled with a whole new meaning entirely and the name Adolf is now considerably rare.
I suppose the name should be reclaimed, its nobility re-inaugurated. But, and let’s be honest here, you would be a very brave parent to give your child that name.
I’ve never met an Adolf.
If, walking down the street, you or I bumped into someone who introduced himself as ‘Adolf’, it would, weirdly (because we are weird), cause us to have reservations and a kind of disapproval. I doubt our faces would contain the surprise.
In our heads, we’d be saying, ‘What were their parents thinking?’
In the same way, no one really names his or her child Judas.
It’s variant, Jude, is still popular—it’s currently numbered 32 in the list of baby boy names.[iii] But while Jude is cool and fashionable (everyone is happy to hang around with someone called Jude), Judas is akin to naming someone Adolf.
I’ve never met a Judas.
The name comes with a lot of baggage. In the Greek it means ‘praise’ (deriving from the Hebrew name Judah), but this is no longer what we associate with it.[iv] Because of this story, and the infamous ‘kiss of death’, the name has become synonymous with treachery and untrustworthiness.[v]
These days, it is more of a slur than a name. A slur we do not use for our enemies, but one that is strictly reserved for those we thought of as friends. Because it is only friends—those we have trusted, those we have shared ourselves with, those we have confided in—that are capable of betrayal.
Betrayal is a wound that bleeds for a long time.
As the writer, Ann Voskamp puts it, ‘It’s harder to give forgiveness to a close friend, than to someone who never was a friend. Because: When trust was deep, the feeling of betrayal is deeper.’[vi]
Apparently, the poet and artist William Blake said something similar, remarking that is easier to forgive an enemy than a friend.
The psalmists, those ancients of Israel who distilled the vastness of human experience into song, grasped this pain.
In Psalm 55, David writes, ‘It is not enemies who taunt me— | I could bear that; |it is not adversaries who deal insolently with me— | I could hide from them. | But it is you, my equal, | my companion, my familiar friend…’[vii]
In Psalm 41, David again writes, ‘They visit me as if they were my friends, | but all the while they gather gossip, | and when they leave, they spread it everywhere. | All who hate me whisper about me, | imagining the worst. | … Even my best friend, the one I trusted completely, | the one who shared my food [my bread], has turned against me.’ [viii]
Psalm 41 is particularly relevant to this scene—a foretaste of it, really. Before the passage we read, Jesus, about to share the last supper with his disciples, echoes those words of David’s, stating that one of those sharing his food with him, dipping bread into the same bowl as him, would betray him.[ix]
Jesus knows the bleeding wound of betrayal.
He’s certainly not alone in Scripture.
The prophet Jeremiah experienced the betrayal of his own family.[x]
David, in Psalm 55 above, is lamenting the betrayal of his own son and one of his closest advisors.[xi]
Joseph knew the betrayal of ten of his brothers, along with others who, in his tragic tale, use him and then forget about him.[xii] We even get a hint of Joseph’s story here, in Mark 14, with an innocent naked man fleeing the scene, leaving his linen clothing behind.[xiii]
With the setting of a garden, there is also a hint of the time when Adam betrays Eve, in the garden of Eden, blaming her and God for his own voluntary actions.[xiv]
And, of course, there’s the famous betrayal of Genesis 4; where Cain misuses the bond of family to lure his brother, Abel, into a field where he then murders him, turning a pasture into a field of blood.[xv]
Scripture records all these betrayals because, sadly, betrayal is embedded in the human story. And so, when God becomes flesh, this is the story he enters.
For those of us who have ever experienced betrayal, it has a scarring effect. There’s something about it that lingers in the human psyche.
Betrayal cuts deep, possibly deeper than any other wound. So deep, that I can far too easily recall the faces of those who have betrayed me. The experience of betrayal has left me more guarded, more defensive, less vulnerable. It’s a wound I revisit in order to make certain that I do not relive it.
In spite of this, here is God incarnate, voluntarily entering into one of humanities’ most historic and deepest of wounds. Having foreseen this would happen, God decides to be betrayed, becoming vulnerable, allowing himself to be led like a lamb to the slaughter to save us.
As someone else put it, Jesus is ‘Forsaken by all, in order that all who believe in him would never be forsaken!’[xvi]
Another way to put it is that God is betrayed in order to embody how loyal and trustworthy he is to us.
How extraordinary!
PASSED OVER
To bring this back to Adolf Hitler (and I never thought I would ever say that sentence in a sermon)…
How odd is it that, to the Western mind, the name Judas is avoided on a similar level than the name Adolf?
One man is responsible for orchestrating the horrendous massacre of millions, the other for betraying Jesus with a kiss. For us, both names bristle with villainy.
This says more about us than it does the text. In the text, Judas is not the only one to betray Jesus.
The word betray in the Greek (paradidōmi, παραδίδωμι) means to ‘hand over’, or to be ‘handed over’, ‘delivered’ into the power of somebody else. And within the story of Jesus’ forsakenness, the story of the arrest, trial and crucifixion, Jesus is handed over by everyone.
On the eve of the Passover, he is the ultimate hot potato, passed from one set of hands to another, abandoned and betrayed from one person to next.
Judas ‘betrays’ Jesus to the chief priests, true.
But, the disciples ‘betray’ Jesus by falling asleep, running away and, in Peter’s case, drawing a sword in the heat of the moment and denying him three times.
The mob that arrests Jesus ‘hands him over’ to the Sanhedrin for a rigged trial. The Sanhedrin then ‘hand over’ Jesus to Pilate.
Pilate, according to Luke’s gospel, then ‘hands over’ Jesus to Herod, who then delivers him back to Pilate because Jesus won’t play his parlour games.[xvii]
Pilate, the one person with the authority to stop the whole charade, washes his hands of the episode, ‘handing over’ Jesus to the whims of the crowds. The crowds, some of whom were singing Jesus’ praises just a few days earlier as he entered into Jerusalem on a donkey, now turn on Jesus. Given the chance to set him free, they choose Barabbas, the insurrectionist and freedom fighter, instead, ‘handing’ Jesus back over to Pilate to be crucified.
Pilate then ‘hands over’ Jesus to be flogged with a lead-tipped whip, before turning him over to the Roman soldiers to be crucified. Before crucifying him, however, the soldiers pass Jesus over to their whole battalion, who proceed to crown him thorns, mock and beat him. Only when they have had their fill do they lead Jesus away and hand him over, using nails, to the excruciating agony and death upon the cross.
The cross represents the ultimate betrayal. The cross is where we, humanity, hung God, where we murdered and executed God.
Creation despising and rejecting her Creator.
Humanity lynching her Saviour.
Sin having its way.
Yes, Judas is a part of this, to be sure. But this insidious act is not the act of just one man. As Jesus said it at the start of the passage we read, ‘All of you will desert me’[xviii]
Yet, Judas is the name that it is all pinned on.
In a twisted way, it helps us to hang all this on the one man (we do the same to Jesus, in a sense). It helps us distance ourselves. ‘We would never be involved in such an act! We’re not in that category of people’, we vow, with all the sincerity of Peter’s plea of loyalty to Jesus.
Even though we know it isn’t true, we have this knack of dividing the world up into ‘bad’ and ‘good’ people. It’s more comfortable for us to conceive of Judas as being beyond the pale, as a ‘bad’ person’, a category far removed from most of us, where he resides with all the other obvious villainous people within history, like Hitler.
None of us, we feel, are like Judas. We tend to think of ourselves as the ‘good’ bunch. We may not be perfect, we’d own up to this. Sure, we have our ‘short comings’, but we don’t mess up like the ‘bad’ people do. It’s the ‘bad’ people who are racists and sexist. It’s the ‘bad’ people who steal and betray. It is the ‘bad’ people who drop bombs.
The ‘bad’ people, we feel, know they are bad and relish doing bad things.
The thing is, as many others have pointed out, only in fairy tales and kids cartoons do the evildoers see themselves as villains and own that title, knowing their souls are black. Only in fairy tales do the bad guys relish at the thought of doing evil things, cackling as they do so (mwahahaha).
In real life, things are not so simple. Hideous things have happened, not by people knowingly plotting evil while stroking white cats, but by people believing they were doing the right thing, people who believed they were the good people.
I’ve said this before, but Hitler didn’t think of himself as a villain, but a saviour, someone doing good for the good of the world. That’s a thought that should send a shudder down our spines!
Right now, if you asked Putin if he is a bad person, if he believes he’s on the ‘naughty list’ this year, I’m sure he would say ‘no’ with all the conviction you and I would say it with if someone asked us if we were ‘bad’.
As the writer, Alexander Solzhenitsyn said it, whilst pondering the nature of evil from within a Russian gulag, ‘To do evil a human being must first of all believe that what he is doing is good.’
He goes on to say, ‘If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And no one wants to destroy his own heart.’[xix]
I’m speaking of myself here, too. I am included in this. I’m not immune to this just because I’m a religious person, or because I am a pastor.
I’ve had a number of people over the years, from work mates to family, say to me, ‘Tristan, you’re a good man.’ And I just shake my head, saying, ‘no, I’m not.’
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not up to something on the sly (of course, that’s exactly what I would say if I was up to something on the sly, mwahahaha). But I know what lingers in my heart. Or, at least, I delude myself into thinking that I know what lingers in my heart. I’m not a self-loathing creature (most days, anyway), but I am a sinner saved by grace.
I’m capable of treachery.
I’m capable of wounding people.
I’m capable of handing over Jesus.
I’m capable of crucifying God.
And I’m capable, with the right ideology, of doing all of that while believing I am doing ‘good’.
My life should be about Judah, praise. But I’m more like Judas than I care to admit. After all, lest we forget, Judas didn’t start off with any intention of betraying Jesus. He started with the intent of following him.
The line cuts through every heart, even a believer’s heart.
The New Testament writer James picked up on this as he spills ink describing the destructive capability of our tongues. He writes, ‘Sometimes [our tongue] praises our Lord and Father, and sometimes it breaks out in curses against those who have been made in the image of God. And so blessing and cursing come pouring out of the same mouth’[xx]
And that’s just a typical Monday morning!
Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not wanting any of us to suddenly be suspicious of everybody else, be that the person you’re sat next to or the person you’ll drink coffee with. I am not saying we are all Hitlers, or that we are totally depraved, either. We are a mixture of contradiction.
I’m simply saying that there are no ‘good people’ or ‘bad people’ as we understand it; that this “list” we collate and curate in our heads, keeping ourselves distant from the evils and monsters of the world is a work of fiction. There are just sinners in need of grace.
For those who have ever read The Witcher book series, or seen the TV show on Netflix, I like how the main character and monster-hunter, Geralt of Rivia says it; ‘People like to invent monsters and monstrosities. Then they seem less monstrous themselves.’[xxi]
I’m not saying that there are not monstrous and barbaric things happening in our world, there certainly are. I’m simply suggesting that we can’t be trusted to decide who the monsters are.
Think of it this way: If a survey, a confession list of sorts, got sent to every home in the world, asking people to add their own name to it if they were a monster, the list would be returned with no names on it whatsoever.
If, however, a list got sent out asking you to add the names of all the monsters you know of, the list would be returned overflowing with culprits.
What’s more, because of our prejudices and inclinations, our grudges and gripes, that list would include people who shouldn’t be on it.
Again, we can’t be trusted to decide who the monsters are.
MONSTERS AND WITH PITCHFORKS
The evidence for this is in this passage.
The mob show up with Judas, and they’re all carrying swords and clubs. It reminds me of those scenes in the Frankenstein movies, or Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, when the villagers gather together with their pitchforks.
They approach Jesus as if he is a monster, as if, at any moment, he’s going to go wild and turn ravenous. They obviously expect Jesus to put up a fight.
How wrong could they be!
Jesus has done nothing to raise such a monstrous expectation. He’s been doing the very opposite, in fact—he’s been doing good!
He’s been healing the blind, curing the leper, making the lame walk. He’s been gathering together the broken and weary, the marginalised and the hated, and sitting with them, eating with them. He’s been teaching about the way of God, day after day. He was doing that in the synagogues of Galilee, and in Jerusalem he’s been openly teaching in the open courts of the temple. He has fed the masses, calmed the monstrous raging seas, raised the dead, and even cast the monstrous and demonic out of people.
He is humanity’s greatest benefactor. But here they are, treating him like a villain.
Jesus, rightly, upon seeing this militant crowd, says, ‘Am I some dangerous criminal, that you come at me armed with swords and clubs?’[xxii]
The word criminal, is not some common robber. It means insurrectionist, rebel. They are coming at Jesus as if he the leader of violent revolution.
To be fair, that’s what many people expected the Messiah to be—a military fighter who would raise arms against Rome and kick them out of Israel. Jesus’ own disciples have expected this.
It’s why Peter corrected Jesus on the way to Jerusalem, when Jesus was talking about dying.[xxiii] It’s why James and John were asking for seats of power and privilege next to Jesus as he approached Jerusalem.[xxiv] It’s why Peter draws the sword, slicing of an ear—he’s not expecting the rebuke that Jesus gives him when he does so, as recorded by Matthew.[xxv]
It could also be why Judas ultimately betrays Jesus: Maybe Judas has clocked on that Jesus is not a fighter, the Messiah he wants Jesus to be and has just given up on him; or, maybe Judas has organised all of this hoping to kick things off and to bring the fighter out of Jesus.[xxvi]
Either way, the kind of revolutionary leader they expected Jesus to be, or think he is as they approach him with their weapons or as they draw their weapons, is the kind of Messiah that Jesus has steadfastly refused to be.
Having said that, he is a revolutionary.
‘What Judas and those with him do not understand is that Jesus is indeed leading a revolution, but it is a different kind of revolution, and a much greater one than history has ever seen.’[xxvii]
Jesus has constantly been talking about the Kingdom of God. I know, we hear those words, and our minds instantly leave earth and disappear somewhere else.
But that’s not the case. He has come to bring about the Kingdom of God on earth. A ‘kingdom’ is an administration, a way of ordering things, and the Kingdom of God reorders everything completely.
Whenever revolutions happen in our earthly kingdoms, all they really do is change the people at the top, while the priorities remain the same. The rulers change, but the rules don’t. They’re not real revolutions; it’s still people seeking power, money, political clout, etc., and often using violence to get it.
But Jesus isn’t about just putting a new set of people in charge, he is changing the priorities, changing the agenda. It’s not about rank or recognition anymore; if you want to be great, serve. It’s not about power and wealth, it’s about the power of co-suffering love.
When you read his Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes in particular, you will see a set of values in stark contrast to the manifestos of most powerhouses.
As Tim Keller described it, Jesus’s whole life, his teaching, his miracles, his passion, is Jesus saying to us, ‘”My Kingdom is not of this world. It’s completely different: I’m going to put others ahead of myself. I’m going to love my enemies. I’m going to serve and sacrifice for others. I’m not going to repay evil with evil; I’m going to overcome evil with good. I will give up my power, my life…. My revolution comes without the sword; it is the first true revolution.”’[xxviii]
Jesus is not the monster, and yet we put him on the monster list. This scene of his arrest exposes how monstrous we can be; treating the Prince of Peace like a criminal. Yet, even in the midst of this aggressive mislabelling, Jesus keeps responding with compassion, meekness, humility and grace.
Jesus’ ministry says something vital about the nature of true kingship; power is given so that the powerless can be protected and cared for.
I suppose, because of this, His Kingdom is also dangerous, too. It’s a direct challenge to all other false claims and false uses of power. No wonder the powerful in his time found Jesus to be such an irritant.[xxix]
We still find him to be an inconvenient irritant.
Even I do.
Like the crowds replying to Pilate, we often reach for the ‘freedom fighter’, Barabbas, over the Prince of Peace, Jesus.
Which one would you want Putin to meet with today?
Which one would you choose to send into Gaza?
Which one would you want by your side when you fall out with your neighbour?
Which would you send to your betrayer’s house?
Judas, Peter, and this mob, are not the only ones who fail to grasp what Jesus is about. We all do.
It’s so easy to treat Jesus like a mascot to my kingdom or political agenda. It’s so easy to want a God who would just bless and prosper my plans and aspirations. It’s tempting to conceive of a God who is more akin to a rabbit’s foot, a genie, or a sponsor.
However, Jesus calls you and me into a Kingdom-of-God life; we are called to pick up our own crosses and follow him.[xxx]
I’ve often betrayed Jesus, abandoning him and handing him over whenever His Kingdom has got in the way of my kingdom. I’m far too quick to also pick up a pitchfork when Jesus’ agenda doesn’t scaffold mine. There’s been plenty of times when I have rather ran away naked, with my own skin intact, abandoning Jesus, than be associated with the one who taught, ‘blessed are the meek.’
I’m not alone in this. We are all in the company of Judas, Peter, and the rest of humanity.
ON THE NIGHT
The comforting news, the good news for you and me is that Jesus doesn’t give up on us, but keeps on extending his grace.
Many years after these events, Paul, in 1 Corinthians, would describe this night as ‘The night when Jesus was betrayed.’[xxxi]
Paul’s writing about the last supper and the importance of communion as a community, as a body of Christ. He is writing to believers that are divided among themselves over who is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ at this Christ thing, as if some are deserving of God’s forgiveness while others are not. They’ve totally forgotten the grace of God and how none of us deserve it.
Paul speaks into this divisive rabble who are raising their pitchforks against each other, telling them that ‘On the night when Jesus was betrayed’ he took something.
If you didn’t know what that something was, what would you assume?
On the night that he was betrayed, he took a sword?
On the night that he was betrayed, he took an army?
On the night that he was betrayed, he took his betrayer’s life?
No. On the night he was betrayed, he took bread. And he broke it and he shared it.
Instead of breaking his betrayers, instead of handing his betrayers over, Jesus gives himself to be broken for his betrayers. Instead of pouring out the blood of his enemy, he allows his enemy, you and me, to spill his blood for our sake.
‘On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”’[xxxii]
Notice the given here—it’s not taken.
Jesus gives himself to us, for us.
We are all more like Judas than we think. We have all done things that can’t be undone. We are all living in the consequences of things that can’t be undone by us. But Christ has done something for us, too. It is this we remember.
On the night he was betrayed—by Judas, by all of those people, by us—Christ offers grace and forgiveness.
What does Jesus do to those who betray him?
He loves them.
He invites them to his table.
He gives his life for them.
I don’t know what name you are known by, of what names you’ve been given by others (especially the person you cut up in traffic the other day). I have no way of knowing what names you give yourself, especially when you are on your own. If you’re like me, maybe they are ‘unworthy’, ‘unlovable’, ‘stuck record’, or ‘hopeless case.’
But, I will pass on to you what I do know—something that was passed onto me: There is a name that is higher than all names; a name we can call on for salvation; a name that redeems all names—the name of Jesus.
Look to that name and find life, hope and forgiveness.
Let that name fill your life with a whole new meaning.
‘If you, God, kept records on wrongdoings, | who would stand a chance? | As it turns out, forgiveness is your habit, | and that’s why you’re worshiped.’
–Psalm 130:3-4 (MSG)
ENDNOTES AND REFERENCES:
[i] Sidewalk Prophets, You Love Me Anyway (2009)
[ii] Mumsnet.com, ‘Most popular baby names in the UK 2024’
[iii] Ibid, correct at the time of writing.
[iv] Judas is the Greek variant of the Hebrew name Judah. Like the way our names ‘modernise’ over time with the influx of cultures, this seems to be true also for ancient Israel. Judas seems to have been a popular name among Hebrew families, a contemporary way of naming your child Judah. According to Mark 6:3, one of Jesus’ brothers had the name Judas. In the same passage, he is also said to have had a brother called Jude, another contemporary variation on the name Judah. Jesus’s own name is a contemporary variation on the older name, Joshua.
[v] Something I learnt while prepping this message: the phrase ‘kiss of death’ entered into our English vernacular because of this story in the Garden of Gethsemane. I know, it’s a random fact. But it may be helpful as a conversation starter at your Christmas work’s do this year ;P
[vi] Ann Voskamp, BETRAYED? HURT? You Can’t Miss This on Holy Thursday
[vii] Psalm 55:12-13, NRSV
[viii] Psalm 41:6-7, 9, NLT, brackets mine. The original Hebrew refers to ‘eating bread’.
[ix] Mark 14:17-21
[x] Jeremiah 12:6
[xi] Psalm 55 is thought to refer to David’s experience with the rebellion of his own son, Absalom, who enlisted the help of David’s advisor, Ahithophel (2 Samuel 15)
[xii] Joseph’s story can be found in Genesis 37 to 50. His encounter with Potiphar’s wife and his shirtless escape is mentioned in Genesis 39:6-18.
[xiii] Many commentators, along with tradition, state this naked escapee to be the gospel writer himself, Mark. Though he wasn’t a disciple, this is his way of saying, ‘I was there’. Like the disciples, he doesn’t portray himself with any nobility—he fled, too. He was even prepared to leave his linen bed clothing behind and flee home naked, rather than be caught with Jesus.
[xiv] Genesis 3:12
[xv] Genesis 4:1-12. Again, this story is echoed here in Judas’ treachery. Both Matthew and Luke (Matt. 27:1-9, Acts 1:18-19) speak of the ‘Field of Blood’ bought with the silver paid to Judas. This, as Matthew states, fulfils the words of Jeremiah (Jer. 32:6-9) and also Zechariah (Zec. 11:11-14).
[xvi] William Hendriksen, New Testament Commentary, Mark (The Banner of Truth Trust, Edinburgh, 1975), p. 599
[xvii] Luke 23:1-12
[xviii] Mark 14:27, NLT, Italics mine
[xix] Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago (Abridged Edition), p. 77
[xx] James 3:9-10 (NLT)
[xxi] Andrzej Sapkowski, The Last Wish
[xxii] Mark 14:48 (NLT)
[xxiii] Mark 8:31-38
[xxiv] Mark 10:35-45
[xxv] Matthew 26:52
[xxvi] I prefer the latter, as it explains his remorse later on when Jesus is condemned to die, feeling he had betrayed an innocent man (Matthew 27:3-4)
[xxvii] Timothy Keller, King’s Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus (Hodder & Stoughton, An Hachette UK Company, London, 2011), p. 188
[xxviii] Ibid, p. 189
[xxix] Jane Williams, The Art of Advent (SPCK, London, 2019) p. 72
[xxx] Mark 8:34
[xxxi] 1 Corinthians 11:23
[xxxii] 1 Corinthians 11:23-24 (NLT)
TRISTAN SHERWIN 
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