Peter and Judas
Matthew 27:1-10
September 27, 2009
NOTE: THE ME/WE/GOD/YOU/WE FORMAT IS FROM ANDY STANLEY’S BOOK, "COMMUNICATING FOR A CHANGE."
Me: I hope you don’t mind if the sermon’s a little shorter today.
My original intent a couple weeks ago was to combine today’s passage with the section just after it, but as I was working through it, I realized there was stuff in here that I didn’t think would wise for us to skip.
It’s important, but it won’t take me as long to share it with you as some things do, okay?
I’d like to start my time here today by sharing one of my less-than-stellar moments growing up.
I was in high school, either a junior or senior, I can’t remember which.
My dad and step-mom were out of town, leaving my older step-brothers and me to have the house to ourselves.
As was our custom, we partied. Lots of people, lots of alcohol, and even some pot.
While I was drunk one of those evenings, I stole a couple traffic signs – a stop sign and a yield sign.
I threw them in the trunk of the car the folks had left and basically forgot all about them.
A few days later I came home from some activity and saw the signs next to the front door of the house, and my heart sank.
There was no way my dad didn’t know I had those signs, although there was a chance he didn’t know how I got them.
I found out in a hurry that he did know.
I went downstairs to where my dad was working on a gun. He was a gunsmith in his free time.
I can’t remember all the conversation, but I remember that he told me some men stopped by his office that day and told him they thought I had stolen those signs.
Since Dad didn’t know anything about them, he denied I had them. But since then he had found them in the trunk.
I knew there was no way around it, so I told him that I had taken them, that I was drunk (telling him THAT wasn’t easy, either), and that I was sorry.
His response was that I would have to return the signs, of course, and that my name would go on federal report.
He grounded me for a week, which now that I think about it was an awful light punishment.
Well, I gotta tell you. Going on federal report didn’t bother me a whole lot. Being grounded didn’t bother me much, either.
What hurt was knowing that my dad was going to have to call these guys the next day and tell them I had the signs after all.
I had shamed my dad. That hurt. My dad didn’t deserve that from his oldest son.
We: I mentioned last week that all of us have failures, and some of us have some real beauties.
Someone once said, “I have many regrets, and I’m sure everyone does. The stupid things you do, you regret if you have any sense, and if you don’t regret them, maybe you’re stupid.” (1001 Quotations that Connect, Zondervan)
But how we respond to those failures can make all the difference in whether we can move on and still have a meaningful, significant, and purposeful life.
The shame and sorrow of past failures can either drive us away from God or to Him, and that’s a huge difference.
Judas and Peter serve as great examples of that. And in our time together, I hope that if there is something that might be holding you back, you’ll be encouraged today to come to Christ and let Him heal your heart.
God: We return to the gospel according to Matthew, after a 2-week break.
Today we’re going to look at the difference between how Peter responded after denying Christ and Judas after he betrayed Christ.
A few weeks ago we looked at how Peter reacted after talking big about how he would stand with Jesus no matter what, then running after He was arrested and denying he even knew Jesus just a little while later.
In today’s passage, we see how Judas responds to his realization that he had sinned against Jesus.
Matthew 27:1-10 (p. 704-705) –
1 Early in the morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people came to the decision to put Jesus to death. 2 They bound him, led him away and handed him over to Pilate, the governor.
Jesus had already had been on trial throughout the night and these guys had already decided that He was worthy of death.
But to stay within their law, they couldn’t come to a formal decision until daybreak.
But remember, the Jews couldn’t actually carry out a death sentence, so they needed the Roman governor to convict Him of a crime against Rome that carried the death penalty.
The Jews had convicted Him of blasphemy, but that doesn’t hold water with the Romans, so as we’ll see in a later passage, they tried to get Him convicted of treason against Caesar.
Let’s pick it up in verse 3 –
3 When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4 "I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That’s your responsibility."
5 So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
6 The chief priests picked up the coins and said, "It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money."
These chief priests felt no guilt in giving Judas money to betray an innocent man, but when Judas returned the money, the priests couldn’t accept it because it was against the law to accept money paid for murder.
True to character, they refused to break certain laws while overlooking their own gross sins as they planned the murder of an innocent man! (LACNT)
7 So they decided to use the money to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. 8 That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. 9 Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: "They took the thirty silver coins, the price set on him by the people of Israel, 10 and they used them to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me."
Both Judas and Peter had failed Jesus. Both of them wept bitterly after they did so. But their sorrow brought them to different ends, and that is where the lesson is for us today.
Let’s look at Judas first.
It says in verse 3 that he was “seized with remorse.” And that remorse caused him to return the money he had been given to betray Jesus.
He understood that he had betrayed innocent blood, and it cut him to the core.
Matthew talks about Judas’ “remorse” but appears careful not to suggest that Judas repents of the sin.
The word “remorse” in Greek is different from the normal word “repentance.” “Repentance” means a change of mind that leads to a change of heart either generally or in respect to a specific sin.
“Remorse” means to experience feelings of regret.
The words can overlap, because a person who repents and chooses a different pattern of behavior will also often experience regret.
“Remorse” here indicates that Judas’ feeling of guilt brought an act of restitution but does not actually produce real repentance. (NIVAC)
His remorse – that sorrow – drove him to suicide.
Just because you’re sorry for your sins doesn’t mean you’ve repented of them. It doesn’t mean you’re going to change anything in your life.
For some, being sorry just means you’re going to try harder to not get caught next time.
“Next time I won’t leave a signed deposit slip with the teller when I rob a bank…”
That wasn’t the case for Judas, but that’s the case for a lot of people.
Peter’s remorse, on the other hand, led to something entirely different.
Instead of suicide, Peter’s sorrow led to restoration by Jesus, because it was followed by repentance.
Matthew doesn’t whitewash Peter. He mentions a number of Peter’s failures in his gospel.
But he focuses on Peter as an example of the way in which Jesus takes everyday men and women, with all of their strengths and weaknesses and all of their successes and failures, and transforms them into His kind of disciples – people who follow Jesus with their lives and not just their lips.
Matthew also focuses on Peter as an example of the way that Jesus takes everyday disciples and transforms them into His kind of leaders – leaders who stumble and fall on occasion but who, when they learn to fix their eyes of faith firmly on Jesus, are able to lead His people. (NIVAC)
Peter broke down in weeping, and later, during one of Jesus’ meetings with the disciples after His resurrection, accepted Jesus’ commission to continue the work He had called him to do, and he would end up becoming the leader of the church.
The stories of Peter and Judas provide a huge contrast.
We see in Peter the weakness of humanity and in Judas the guilt and spiritual consequences of rejecting Christ.
Both had fulfilled Jesus’ predictions for them, yet they responded quite differently.
Peter wept, repented, and was restored; Judas had remorse, but killed himself. Forgiveness was available from the Master, but Judas did not pursue it. (LACNT)
When I stole those signs, I could have reacted by running away from my dad for turning me in and grounding me.
But I couldn’t. I knew Dad loved me. And because I knew he loved me, I could count on him to forgive me, which he did.
And you can bet that I worked hard to not ever hurt him like that again by my stupidity.
My sorrow led me to repentance.
You: The main application for today is this:
Don’t let sorrow over sin lead you away from Christ and into despair.
Judas allowed his remorse to lead him to the conclusion that there was no longer any hope for him.
And that hopelessness drove him to take his life.
Yes, you will be in sorrow over sin. You should be.
But where you let that sorrow lead you is essential to your spiritual health.
1 John 1:9 is one of my favorite verses of Scripture. One of my friends calls it, “The Christian’s Bar of Soap.” Read this aloud with me, please.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
I bring up this verse a lot around here, because I want people to know that forgiveness is available for everyone who will take it, because of what Jesus did on the cross.
If you allow your sorrow to lead you to repentance and confession, then you can experience what Peter got: forgiveness and restoration.
So that’s my invitation to you today.
We all fall short, we all blow it sometimes, and maybe you’re sitting here today and your heart is breaking because you think God can’t love you or forgive you, and you’re ready to just give up and live a life of despair and regret.
Let me tell you something: that’s not what God wants for you.
He wants you to find the forgiveness and restoration that comes when you let your sorrow lead you to Him.
So if that’s you – let Him have it. Confess it to Him and let Him cleanse you of the guilt and shame, so you can move on to the full life Jesus says He wants you to have and that He came to earth to give you.
We: Folks, I think that one of the greatest gifts we can give the world is for them to see that because of Christ, we don’t live in despair because of our failings.
Christ, like He did for Peter, comes to us and says, “I love you. I have a job for you. You’re valuable to Me and my Kingdom.”
So let’s show the world that this is true for this fellowship of believers.
Let’s pray.
