Holy Wednesday (2026)

Betrayal & Arrest of Jesus

Good evening, my fellow adulterers. And a blessed Wednesday in Passion Week, my fellow Apostates.

Now, don’t be alarmed. I’ve not discovered any of your secrets that you dind’t want me to know. Why do i call you this? because we all are. Happy Judas Wednesday

Today is the day when we meditate upon Judas’ betrayal. and you know, I’ve always appreciate Judas and the disocurses surrounding him.

and all this talk reminds me of Hosea

Story of Hosea is this. Hosea is a prophet. and, like another, who deals wiht the same topics of picturing God’s relationship to His people as a couple, in which God’s people are adulterous harlots, abandoning their faithful husbamd, he serves as a sermon prop to illustrate the point. Playing the role of God, the faihtful, forgiving, ever-sacrifically loving husbamd. And so God tells him to go marry a sexually lose liberated woman, a wife of whoredom (he says) and have with her children of whoredom (your own? those of other men? its unclear). And what happens? exactly waht youd expect. she cheats on him. he stays wiht her. she cheats on him again. he stays wiht her. She gets bored of His faithfulness. she leaves him. he persues her. she doesnt want to be persued, she tries to repulse Him from her wiht greater sin: she becomes a prostitute. he persues her. She goes further, she starts PAYING HER CLIENTS to sleep wiht her. Her whoredom knows no bounds. She delights in her destruction. SHe hates herself. he persues her. He loves her. she doesnt want him. he persues here . And yet again - the Lord said, “Go again. Show love to a woman who is loved by another man, a woman who keeps committing adultery. Show love just as the LORD loves the people of Israel, even though they keep turning to other gods

What is this story? - its your own. You are the whoring wife.

You say “no!” - no? And yet have you not chased after other gods? to find pleasure and rest in that which is not Christ? have you not followed after satan and listened to the voice of temptation? Have you not gone back out of this sanctuary to chase after the worship of money, pleasure, sex, fun, and wealked your own self-exalted way? haven’t we all been doing this the whole time?

We say, yes but we beleive! do we ? Do we believe when we fear death? Do we believe when we suffer anxiety or worry that God does not wil the best for us? That His grace is not enough for us? Do we believe when we fear that maybe He was never real to begin with? Or that He does not love us , becuase of the amount of sin in us? Do we believe in Him when our fears take root, and our doubts take hold? DO we believe in HIm when we sin? no. for as James says, - one who sins, is like a man who, looking into the mirror turns away and immediately forgets what he looks like. Forgets who he is. forgets waht he’s for. Or like Jeruss, who saysd He who comits sin is a slave to sin, but whoever the Son sets free is free indeed, and as Paul, having been set free , - do not submit again to the yoke of slaverty,- and yet we do jsut what which paul describes as a Dog Rerutnrin to lap up its own vomit when we go right back to the sin, death, and hell that God in His love has saved us from.

We were those from the valley of dfry bones, RESURRECTED TO LIFE, who have willed against God to immediately put the spirtual gun to our head and pull the trigger. For there we are, day after day, tying the noose of sin, the noose of unbelief, the noose of despair, the noose of anxiety around our necks and threatening to jump like Judas. For we who have been resurrected do not like living. We would rather have remained dead. We say “NO” - no? Was it not the Israelites freed from slavery who said “Oh, that we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat and when we ate bread to the full! For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” Is it not we who do the same?

And so we say, - i am ashamed. We have sinned, been wicked and done evil; we have rebelled and turned from your commandments and your laws. 6 We have not obeyed your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, our ancestors, and all the people of the land. 7 Justice, O Lord, is on your side; we are shamefaced.

We say. I do not deserve this. And that much is true.

We say , - I am ashamed to be loved by Him.

Why? Becuase i cannot return His love back to Him. I cannot stop trying to hurt Him. I cannot stop leaving Him. I cannot stop rejecting Him. And yet His loves does not waver for a second. I killed Him, and He returned back to me eternal life. We took from Him our pound of flesh, and offered it to us as a feast. We sold Him, - and wiht the price of His being sold for slaughter, He bought us.

I am ashamed to be loved by Him. It hurts to be loved like this by Him. It burns. And its burning purifies.

And this wil be no different tomorrow , on Maundy Thursday - where Jesus gives His flesh and blood to those He knows will abandon HIm. To those He knows will renounce HIm, leave Him, forsake Him. Does it stop Him? Does it stop Him from dying for them? DOes it stop Him from suffering to forgive themn? From gifting His entire life on the cross for them? Taking their sin on HImself for them? - no. Not for one second.

You know, wiht all of the dialogue and discourse around Judas, and this business of people asking, waht i think are honestly good and fun questions to ponder. Is Judas in hell? DOES HE HAVE TO BE? Could God have had mercy on Judas?

Regardless of the answer of what was and is. - the reality, - i think, is more pressing for us.

If only Judas KNEW , . - IF ONLY HE KNEW WHAT HE BOUGHT FOR THE WORLD WITH THAT SILVER.

if only he knew what he bought. If only he knew. That Christ took on his sins too. If only he knew, that he did not need to bear this guilt alone. If only he knew he held on a few more days…

3 When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver 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

Friends, it is tempting for us, to, like so many in our world, hate judas. And scorn him. Use his name as an insult to others. To hate adutlers. To spit at the idea of them. But God does not. He loves them with an unmeritted and undeserved love. Both. He takes Judas’ sin upon Himself and dies for the death of the one who sold Him and the one’s who crucified Him. He marries the adulterous harlots that make up His church. He persues us as we run. Forgives us as we sins, and loves us as we Hate. For even when we are fiathless. – He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.

And so, we meditate upon Judas today. Let us remember, when we meditate on judas. We meditate on ourselves. When we meditate on Hosea’s wife hormer. We meditate on ourselves. When we meditate on evil, and sin, and that which out to be hated – we mediate on ourselves.

And let God loves us anyway.

And now He says to us: A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have this love for one another.”

And again, - I tell you, love your enemy, and do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who hurt you, - that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. Then you shall be perfect. Just as your Father in heaven is perfect.

So, have this mind of Christ in you, Who, being in very nature God,

did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

7 rather, he made himself nothing

by taking the very nature of a servant,

being made in human likeness.

8 And being found in appearance as a man,

he humbled himself

by becoming obedient to death—

even death on a cross!