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Wednesday 4 February 2009

John 13:18-30

The next two sections focus on the failure of two of Jesus' disciples. One would end up killing himself, the other became the leader of the church. First we have Judas who would betray Jesus.

Jesus knew that Judas would betray Him, now He tells His disciples, quoting from Psalm 41:9. To betray someone who had given you a food was a terrible thing to do in the culture of the day. Jesus' prime concern was for His disciples, and He was looking beyond the cross to what would happen afterwards.

Jesus did not take the betrayal lightly, for He was troubled in spirit. The betrayal hurt Him. The whole matter of the crucifixion deeply troubled Jesus, yet He went through with it, and was able to walk through the events in faith, fulfilling the task given to Him by the Father. We can go through difficult situations, and we will feel the anguish of soul. This is normal, but it does not mean that we cannot get through it. Our natural reaction is to wish that the pain would go away, but our focus needs to be to obey God in the midst of the circumstances.

The disciples were shocked at Jesus' revelation. Peter asked John (John was probably the "disciple whom Jesus loved) to ask Jesus who the betrayer was. Jesus revealed indirectly that it was Judas.

When Jesus gave the bread to Judas "Satan entered him". The devil had persuaded Judas to betray Jesus, and now the final decision was made. Judas left "and it was night". Jesus had been speaking a lot about walking in the light while it is still day, so we can take this phrase as meaning more than it was dark. The devil and the world were about to do what they intended to do.

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