Matthew 2024

Matthew 26, 69.

Now Peter was sitting out in the courtyard and a servant girl came to him. You also were with Jesus of galilee, she said, but he denied it before the mall. I don't know what you're talking about. He said. Then he went out to the gateway where another servant girl saw him and said to the people there.

This fellow was with Jesus of Nazareth. He denied it again with an oath I don't know the man. After a little while, those standing there went up to Peter and said, surely you are 1 of them. Your accent gives you away. Then he began to call down curses and he swatter them I don't know the man.

Immediately, a cock crowed. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken. Before the cock crows, you will just sown me 3 times, and he went outside and wept Italy. Early in the morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people made their plans how to have Jesus executed. So they bound him, led him away, and handed him over to pilot the governor.

When Judith, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returns the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. I have sinned, he said, for I have betrayed innocent blood. What is that to us? They replied as your responsibility. So Judith threw the money into the temple and left, then he went away and hanged himself.

The chief priest picked up the coins and said, It is against the law to put this into the treasury since it is blood money. So they decided to use the money to buy the potter's field as a burial price, as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then what was spoken by Jeremiah, the prophet was fulfilled. They took the 30 pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter's field as the lord commanded me.

Thanks, thanks Thomas. And, good evening, everybody. Good to see you. My name's Chris. I'm 1 of the elders here.

If anybody doesn't, doesn't know me. And, yeah, really warm welcome to you, particularly, you know, if it's your first time. Yeah. I'm on. Yeah.

There we go. Yeah, particularly if you if it's your first time or, you know, you haven't been with us many times for your, you're very, you're very, very welcome. Just to say, it is question time afterwards, and, and this this sermon could throw up a few. And if all the elders suddenly run out the door at the end, it not because they're afraid they're gonna be put on the spot and exposed. They they do have an elders meeting, so the majority will be will be doing that.

But but please do say, stay. And if you have any questions, please do please do ask, you know, don't feel shy. And it doesn't have to be on this sermon. It can be about anything that we've been doing in the recent evening services, or or or morning. Let me pray.

And then we'll we'll get started. Father help us now as we as we come to your word, your, your word is full of stories and tales, of the human heart, and we we see all kinds of things in in other people that we can see in ourselves. And so we do pray that that tonight as we go through this, you hold the mirror up to us, and we we, we get to spend a little bit of time just being on honest with ourselves and examining ourselves. So we pray that in your name, our men. Well, I can't promise, that this is gonna be a particularly cheery sermon, given the given the subject matter, but what it what it lacks in lightness, hopefully it makes up for in in a bit of emotional depth and weightiness, and and and like all dark situations, often it's the case, isn't it?

The the darker they get, the brighter the light shines at the end. And so hopefully we see that. But anyway, welcome to 1 of the great tragedies. Welcome to 1 of the great tragedies. In scripture, in any writing, really, you have 2 men, friends, brothers, almost.

You have multiple betrayals. You have bloody and death. It's it's like an ancient Greek, tragedy or a Shakespeareian drama in in many ways. And there's a there's a lot of ironies in this in this passage. There's times when it's almost darkly funny, in in in a weird way.

Now, now when you come to a passage like this, as, as I already said, it it can be tempting to just dive straight into some big questions about the things that the passage throws up, big theological questions? Like, is it fair that that Jesus chose Peter and Judith seems to be doomed to destruction? Could judas have chosen differently? And walked a different path, or is he simply going down the path that's been laid out for him? Is it possible Judith repented?

These are these are quite natural questions you might find yourself asking, and by all means do ask them. And and we'll touch on some of these as we go through, a bit later on. But before we do that, before we get into that kind of a discussion, we actually need to do something else. We we need to try and get into the heads of Peter and Judith, as as as much as we as much as we can. You know, they say, don't judge someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes.

So we need to try and walk a mile or 2 in their shoes and try and empathize with them a little bit. Feel what they're feeling. See what they're seeing. Experience the the the the the the event as they experienced it. If if we can do if we can do that.

And so to understand this passage, you actually have to look at the build up to it. This passage in isolation needs a build up. You need to understand the context. It's key. So we're going to spend a bit of time thinking through the day leading up to the points to understand how we are, where we are, and why Peter and Judith's stories play out the way they they do here.

And, you know, having been having been sort of living in this day for a couple of weeks, I think the overwhelming feeling I've had is just 1 of sadness and pity for both of these men, actually, for both of them. Of course, there's room for things like anger and disappointment and hurt to be mixed in. But overwhelmingly, I just find it to be such a sad sequence of events, for different reasons. So let's, let's get into this sad story, shall we? Let's begin with Peter.

So Peter's day. Let's rewind a bit. It's it's been a been a roller coaster day for Peter. This 1, hasn't it? Maybe the most momentous day of his life.

Because when he started it, he was blissfully unaware that it was any different from any other day. And of the term that their lives are are about to take. The day in question is the day of the passover meal. The day on which the passover lamb had to be sacrificed such let that sink in, for a while. So there's preparations to be made.

The day is about preparing the passover lamb to be sacrificed. That's significant. And it begins innocently enough with Jesus telling them to go into the city meet a certain man at whose house they're gonna eat the passover together. That's the disciples. And there, you get Peter's first twist of the day because as they settle in for the meal in the evening, Jesus drops the bombshell that 1 of them is a traitor.

1 of you in this room with me is a traitor, and the room I imagine goes as silent as this room just was. Peter shifts sun easily in his seat before joining in with a growing protest, surely not me, lord. Surely not me. And so they they eat the rest of the meal, and following the meal, they go on what must have been a a pretty solemn walk up to a a garden in an olive grove that we know as gethsemane, a place where they often went to to pray. And on the way comes the second twist of the day.

Jesus tells them that not only is there a traitor amongst them, but that every single 1 of them will fall away this very night. And it's already the nighttime. So within the next couple of hours, all of them are gonna fall away. And Peter's like, I've I've had enough. No way.

Not me. These guys might, but not me lord. I would never, never desert you. Even if I if I have to die for you, I'm with you till the end. And then Jesus looks him in the eye and says something to him so specific that it should have just made him not say another word for the rest of the day, really.

Before the rooster crows, so before dawn, which is not far away, you Peter will disown me 3 times. 3 times. 200 percent more than any of these others is how much you're gonna assign me. Now it's already been a long, emotional day, I should imagine, and they get to this garden. Jesus goes off to pray somewhere asking to keep watch, and Peter falls asleep deep, and then comes the third twist of the day.

Peter's woken by Jesus 3 times. 3 times, you know, Peter who would die for Jesus and go with him to the bitter end is the same Peter who can't even stay asleep to watch for the impending doom that seems to be coming their way. And no sooner than Jesus wakes him up, then there are a group of soldiers and armed men are upon them. But not only that they're being led by 1 of his best friends, a brother to him. Before he's even had the chance to wipe the sleep out of his eyes, there stands judas accusing Jesus If you know, if if you heard the sermon from Peter a couple of weeks ago, he kisses him, like, proper full on, kisses him to identify who Jesus is.

And Peter's watching this, trying to make sense of this. What's going on? Am I really seeing it? Is this a mistake? Am I misunderstanding?

But it sinks in? No. It is what my eyes are telling me it is. Judith is Judith betraying him. And now here, Peter really comes into his own, doesn't he?

And and depending on which way you you wanna look at it, this could singularly be the greatest act and equally the the most terrible act Peter commits all rolled into 1 thing, but, you know, leaving aside what he's about to do. Because true to his words, Peter's, I mean, he's a man of passion and zeal and a much stronger emotions, isn't he? He's a man of action, and, I'll die for you Jesus. And so from out of nowhere, he whips out a sword and lops off the chief, priests servants here. Now I've got theories on how you only lop an ear off and, you know, don't do any other damage, but you can ask that in question time if you like.

But clearly, the intent was to kill the guy. You don't just chop an ear off by accident. He was aiming for the head. Now, no doubt that was quite a satisfying moment in Peter's mind, to, to begin with. And guess, like men, in the room, don't don't you feel this?

Have you ever sort of, like, have you ever thought, isn't there some part of you that just thinks, yeah, glorious death in battle? That would be an awesome way to go out, you know, drawn up on your hill, last stand, shoulder to shoulder with your buddies, dead and dying enemies at your feet, and you're like, right, come on. We're gonna die defending this hill. Everything that's near and dear to us is behind us, better than just going out in a bed. Right?

I imagine Peter's got something like this on his brain as this is going, as this is going on. I'll die on this hill for you, Jesus. But Jesus sharply rebukes him. Another twist. Put it down, Peter.

What are you doing? Don't you stop what needs to happen next? I'm the 1 who's gonna die on a hill for you. It's a bit like the earlier get behind me Satan moment because Peter's constantly trying to stop Jesus going to the cross constantly, unwittingly. Why?

Because he loves him. Because he loves him. You see something of Peter's heart, and it's he doesn't want it to come to harm. And he's got it totally wrong, but you sort of can't help but love him for it, can you? And so we, we fast forward.

We reach the night, the middle of the night, the early hours, the small hours of that of that day, really, the next day, actually, and the beginning of our our passage tonight. And Peter's trailed along behind the arresting crowd back to the temple, and he's managed to get inside, which, you know, kind of takes a bravery all on its own, right? He's gone into the heart of the beast. He's surrounded by enemies. You know, he's in enemy territory here.

He's on his own. He's isolated. And it's cold. And Peter has settled in to warm himself by a fire in 1 of the temple courtyards. Trying to keep to himself.

Don't look anyone in the eye, Peter. Keep to yourself. Keep your head down. Don't get caught now. You can sort of feel his heart thudding in his chest.

Can't you sure that people must be able to hear it? Is studying so loudly. Every fiber in his body, I imagine wanting to run from that place, but he wants to be near Jesus. He wants to be near Jesus. He wants to see what's happening.

If he can, but he he's in the next courtyard. So he just sits there in hopes that no 1 recognizes him. And then a young servant girl walks past, and the words he fits You were also with Jesus of galilee. It's, she's not talking to me. Is she?

Yeah. You you were talk you you were with Jesus of galilee. He's a shut up little girl. Shut up. Shut up.

Don't listen to her everyone. She's just confused. Not me, don't know what she's talking about. And eventually she goes away and leaves them to it, and people are sort of murmuring around him. And so Peter thinks, okay, fine.

I'm gonna move. I'll go over to that gateway over there and, change his location. And, as soon as he gets over there and tries to settle into the shadows, another servant girl spots him. Hey, everyone. This guy was with Jesus.

He's a, where are these servant girls coming from? And why do they all know who I am? And so he ups the ante? I swear on my it's like calling down oaths, you know. It's like I swear on my granny's grave.

It wasn't me. It wasn't the man. Don't know what you're talking about. I don't know him. But some of the other people hanging around in the gateway, well, they they hear what he says.

They hear how he talks. And I don't know what hanging around in gateways were so popular anyway, but they go. And they they say, hang on a sec. Your accent, you're not from round here. You're a northerner.

You're a northerner. And if you don't know Gallalee's some way north of Jerusalem. And at this point, the true, he basically turns into a scouser, and I'm annoyed that Tom's not here. Sorry, Saf, it's lovely avenue here, but if we had Tom, we could have a bit of fun with this, because he's, you know, he starts calling down curses and his strange, barely, intelligible accent. And he's like, look, I don't know the man.

I don't know him. I don't effing know him what you effing talking about. And he just, I don't know him. I never knew him. And in the rooster crows, and Jesus' face and voice, fill his mind from only a few hours ago, you'll disown me before that rooster cries, and he flees, and he weeps and weeps.

What a difference a day can make? From celebration to misery in less than 24 hours, what a significant day, and he had no idea it was coming. So that's Peter's day. What about Judith's day? Well, Judith's day started largely the same as Peter's and carries on in the same way, mostly, but Judith isn't oblivious to the events of the day.

We know from Luke that he'd already met with the chief priests, and he'd agreed to hand Jesus over, and he has his 30 pieces of silver. Now 30 pieces of silver, if you're wondering is equivalent to about 4 months wage just 4 months wages. That's what he was willing to betray Jesus for. Interestingly, 30 pieces of silver is the price for compensation if you were to kill someone's slave accidentally. 30 pieces of silver.

The price they put on Jesus' head is the same as that of a dead slave, just 4 months wages. That's what they think he's worth. That's what Judith is willing to sell him for. So he's going back into the city to set up the passover meal with the other disciples, except he's on actually a different mission to the rest of them. He's on high alert for the opportunity to slip away and give away Jesus' position.

So his day is loaded with intent, but no 1 else really sees that to all intents and purposes. All the other ones just, you know, then they're none the wiser. No 1 except Jesus, of course. And this is where Judith gets his first twist of the day, much the same as Peter. They sit down for the feast.

Jesus tells him that he knows there's a traitor amongst them, and like Peter around the fire, you can almost hear Judith's heart thudding in his chest. He's now surrounded by enemies. He's now in enemy territory. He's hoping no 1 knows that it's him. You It's his throat constricting blood rushing to his cheeks and ears, clammy hands.

Adrenaline's kicking in trying to control the shakes. I mean, fair play to him for keeping his core here. He has definitely been rumbled, and he knows it, but cool as anything. He says to Jesus, surely not I rabbi. Interestingly, all the others said, surely not I lord.

So that gives you a a brief glimpse into, into where Judith's hearts at with Jesus and the relationship. Surely not I rabbi, and Jesus simply replies, you've said so. You have said so, Judith. Surely, not you. You've said so.

It's it's slightly ambiguous. It puts the ball in Judith's court big time, and he might even be left wondering, is he is he really onto me I don't know. See, maybe I've got away with this. Maybe he doesn't know. Either way, things are hotting up.

And so he finds the first opportunity to slip away. The last time he'll ever be amongst the 12, The last time he will ever be counted as a disciple of Jesus. He slips out into the night, takes a deep breath of the cold air and heads in the direction of the temple where he gives up the location that he knows Jesus and the disciples will be at. And so fast forward to the mount of olives to gethsemane, Judith at the head of the soldiers on the way to make the arrest on his way to face his friends what's going on in his heart and his mind here. How is he approaching this on his way to face Jesus to kiss him?

To hand over the man he's been following for 3 years of his life, who we seem to do incredible things. And with trembling hands and lips, he approaches him and kisses him and how he holds it together here. I don't know. How'd you do that? And as Peter's days falling apart, Judith is kind of reaching its climax or so he so he thinks.

And you can you can imagine the rage and the fury and the betray trail in the other disciples' eyes as they observe, Judith doing the unthinkable. He has to he has to feel that coming his way. It's enough to make Pete try to kill a man. You know, there's a there are intense emotions flying around here. And so skip forward, and we're back in tonight's passage.

So whilst Peter was outside disowning Jesus, Judith has been watching the trial of of of Jesus from just next door. It's now very early in the morning, and the verdict has come in condemned. It's condemned. He's a blasphemer. Is condemned to death.

Now, here's the second twist of the day for Judith. The verdict does not make him happy. Anything but look look down, he was struck with remorse a thunderbolt of remorse goes through him. Like, 1 of the slaps across the face that Jesus has just endured, Judith suddenly comes to something resembling his senses. Perhaps, perhaps he just thought that they might just tell Jesus off, rough him up a little bit, chuck him in prison for a bit, let him go, and that'll be that.

I'll have my 30 pieces of silver, 4 months pay. I've got the money bag as well. I'll take that with me when I go, and maybe he thought that was all that was gonna happen. But this has gone too far. Things are spiraling.

Way beyond perhaps what Judith had expected or intended or wanted, I don't know. And isn't that just the thing though? You do a deal with the devil. And before you know it, you're in way over your head. This is what sin does in our lives.

I have sinned, he says in verse 4, but I have betrayed innocent blood. He can see exactly where this is going. It's headed for blood. And he tells the chief priests as much and tries to hand back the money. And now credit where credit is due, that took some bravery considering the situation to stand up to the chief priests who are in murderous mood Peter couldn't even face down a couple of servant girls.

Judith is standing up to the chief priests and the elders. And the language he uses here, it's legal language. He's accusing them and implicating himself. Inocent blood. I have betrayed innocent blood.

Inocent blood cries out to justice. Cries out to god for justice. You you get it all throughout the old testament. Going back as far as Cain and Abel, blood cries out in deuteronomy in the cities of refuge, corporately, together as a people, you betray innocent blood if you refuse to help people in. It's throughout the Psalms.

He's saying Jesus' death violates god's justice. He's innocent and the responsibility for it isn't just mine. It will be yours too if you kill him. And their response, if you know anything about what these guys were like, is exactly as you would expect it to be. They are not fit to be anywhere near the priesthood or any kind of ministry.

They're more like mafia dons than anything else boss. And they're really like Judith. They're in it for the money and that kind of thing, and their response is exactly that. They wash their hands of it. Don't know what you're talking about.

They wash their hands of Judith. They wash their hands of responsibility for Jesus' death in much the same way pilate's about to. And Judith is the 1 speaking accurate theology here. I've sinned. I've betrayed innocent blood.

But they're not interested. It's a disgrace. They've set him up, and then they've just left him hanging. That's what the world has to offer. So he chucks the money at them and runs instead.

Another fairly noble deed, you might say. He runs away from them. He runs away from Jesus. He runs away from the other disciples. He's alone, isolated, completely without anywhere left to turn, and so he takes the only option left to him, or or so he perceives.

And he tragically hangs himself. There's, there's a quote from, I wouldn't say I love this quote. It would be a weird thing to love this quote. But I find it helpful. It's, it's from the last great mughal emperor in India, a guy called Arangzeb.

He was around about 17 hundreds, that kind of time. And at the end of his life, he said this, and he he's a Muslim. Was a Muslim and says this, strange that I came into the world with nothing, and now I'm going away with this stupendous caravan of sin. I came with nothing, and all throughout my life, I've acquired sin. I have sinned.

And wherever I look, I see only god. I've sinned terribly, and I do not know what punishment awaits me. I I guess something like that may be going through Judith's head. I have sinned God seems to be at every term, and where can I run? What can I do?

Who can I go to? I'm out of options. Now the important thing to understand we do have to touch on this, and I know it's a sensitive subject, but we do have to touch on it in this passage. It's hard to get around it. The important thing to understand about suicide in the ancient world is that it is a very different thing to today.

It was almost never really framed in terms of mental health, depression, and such, but had more to do with honor, shame, loss. So it was more to do with exposed failure. Loss of your role in life, loss of your status, and could even be seen as the honorable thing to do in certain situations. That's the way the Romans and the Greeks viewed it. In Jewish culture, that's not so not so normal.

But it could be viewed as the honorable thing to do is to fall on your sword. Just go on. That's where we get the expression from. Fall on your sword. Better to die than live a life dishonored, a life with no future, no hope for redemption.

And it's impossible to say for sure, but that kind of seems to be where Matthew, takes us in in in some ways. He doesn't say anything really about Judith's mental state, just that he feels remorse. It's just a matter of fact. As though Judith couldn't imagine mercy in his future, and so the best thing for me to do is to cease to exist. It's just shocking, isn't it?

It's so sad. Or perhaps perhaps he even thought maybe just maybe if I offer my life God might have mercy on me. He might forgive me. I don't know. We don't know.

We gotta be careful with this part of the story because we don't know what passed between Judith and god in those final moments, but all we can say for sure is what we do have, and that it appears that he turned on himself turned in on himself with his sin rather than turn to Christ. And there's a finality to his story. This is Judith's last day. There are no more days for Judith after this. But that isn't quite the end of Judith's day, that's the way of putting it, because the chief priests have the small matter to attend, to of what to do with the silver that is chucked back at them.

It's blood money, they say. I've shed, I've betrayed innocent blood. This is blood money, they say. It's against the law to put it in the treasury. What are we gonna do with it?

I mean, how ironic can it get? They happily admit their own guilt by saying the money is morally tainted it's blood money, but they refused to accept that they attained it by using the money to entrap and condemn an innocent man. They cannot put the blood money into the treasury because it will contaminate everything it touches, except for their own consciences, it seems. So they take it and buy a field and use it as a graveyard foreigners. And in time, that becomes this kind of, memorial, as Matthew tells us, it's called the field of blood to this day.

And you know what? It's still called the field of blood to this day. It's still there. They're pretty sure they know that this is the field it's talking about. There's now a monastery built on it.

It's still a memorial. It's almost like Matthew is saying, look, you can bury strangers here but you cannot bury the truth. The blood cries out from the soil in demands justice, which is exactly what the blood of Jesus is gonna bring. Justice, forgiveness, judgment, And the passage ends with the prophecy of Jeremiah, which states about as explicitly as possible what was gonna happen. They did not know their scriptures these men.

They did not know. They're not fit to be doing the jobs that they're doing. And really, they're they're unwittingly playing out their parts in this this tragedy. So there, you you you have 2 stories Let's look at some comparisons as we try and draw some of this stuff there to together because there's there's a lot of stuff. We can't do it all, but we can do some of it.

You've got 2 men, 2 days live side by side, 2 different outcomes. Both disciples, both friends, both the son Jesus. They both fulfill the words of prophecy. In many ways, they're the same in this passage. They've both sinned terribly.

And you know what? If it was up to me and it was just based on this passage and I had no other information, I'm on Judith's side. Sounds shocking to say that, doesn't it? But I am. Judus has a shocker for the majority of the day, but in the end, he stood up to the chief priests.

He defends Jesus' innocent, 1 of the very, very few people who does, amazingly, through the money back, the blood money, And you could argue, in the end, goes and does the honorable thing, and he's a man of integrity, at least, if nothing else. Sad as it is. But Peter, on the other hand, started strong, had all the promises, I'll do this for you, Jesus. I'll die for you. I'll go with you till the end, but steadily unravels throughout the day, to the point where he can't even withstand servant girls.

He washes his hands of Jesus, publicly disowning him multiple times, and is reduced to a gibbering wreck by the end of the day, and you sort of almost feel like, put yourself together, man. On what basis does Peter deserve to be forgiven here? The answer is none that I can see. If it was up to me, I'd find more basis to forgive Judith here. So what's going on?

Well, that's all just on the surface level. And when you dig a bit deeper into the hearts of these 2 men, you see you begin to see that there are major differences between Peter and Judith, and those differences are the things that really matter for us. So what what do we see? How firstly, we see a mistake versus a pattern. I think that's a really important point to make a mistake versus a pattern.

1 was premeditated. 1 was reactionary. 1 was intended 1 just happened in in the moments. 1 did it for money, for personal gain, 1 did it out of fear, and maybe just not not really thinking about it. I mean, we've all been in those situations, haven't we?

On the spot, you put on the spot and you end up spouting out a bunch of nonsense that you don't really believe yourself. You never intended to say, and you can't even really quite believe that you said that, and you're annoyed with yourself afterwards because I should have said this. John, in in his gospel is, he gives us probably the most clues about Judith, I think. He's writing as he does quite some time after the events. He's very disparaging about Judith throughout the whole of the gospel, and I think that gives us a lot of clues, but he says in in chapter 12 that he was a thief from the beginning.

We always knew he was a thief, Judith. Yeah. We always knew it. He always had his hand in the money bag. He was always trying to scam people.

You know, why we let him look after the money? I don't know. But but he was always he was always helping himself. See, the clues we get about Judith and the picture we get is that he was in a settled pattern of unrepentancing. Mistakes, yeah, they can do great damage.

They really can do great damage depending on the severity, but they are just that. They're mistakes. They're not the norm. They don't actually reflect where your heart may be that. You just made a mistake.

We make mistakes, don't we? We all make mistakes. Cattens on the other hand are indicators of hearts that are going seriously astray, or were never on the path in the first place. Patoms more than mistakes tend to be what end relationships over time. Lots and lots of low level patterns can actually build to end something that was once beautiful, big mistakes.

They can be worked through. So that's mistakes versus patterns. Second, what do you run to? Well, Peter turned to their sacrifice, Jesus, and Judith turns to his own himself. Both run from Jesus, both fled the temple, but only 1 turns back in the end.

And when you look at what it is that stops Peter in his tracks in this passage, and brings him to his senses, it's the words of Jesus, isn't it? It's the words of Jesus that makes him stop and realize and understand and go, I I I'm I'm so sorry. I've made a mistake. I've done what you said I was gonna do. I didn't want to do that, but it's the words of Jesus that reach him.

And bring him back. Whose words are you listening to? Who are you running to? When you have sinned, when you have failed, when you are guilty, Who do you run to? The friend of sinners, do you run to Jesus, or do you run away from him?

It's it's it's so like what we were hearing this morning if you were there. Do you run to his death? Or do you run to your own? They are really the only 2 options that you've got here. 3, repentance versus remorse.

Now this is this is a really telling, clue from Matthew in the passage because obviously written in Greek originally, and there's a word he uses here, and it's not the word that is used throughout the new testament when repentance is being talked about. That word is meta Norway, which means to turn to change direction, but Matthew uses a different word. He uses a word metamalomai. Which means regret remorse. It's not repentance.

Remorce is not the same as repentance. It it just means you regret it happened, you know, you regret things went that far. You regret your actions led to what they did, but it it doesn't signal true heart change just because Judith feels remorse doesn't mean that he loves Jesus, just means, oh, I didn't mean that to happen. And you could even say Jesus is innocent. You know, you could make an objective decision and say, yeah, I I don't think Jesus should have been put to death actually doesn't mean you love him, doesn't mean you're trusting in him.

Judith is more in line with Kain than anything else here as he flees from god's presence and says this punishment's too much to bear. That's more like Judith. Real repentance, this Greek word metaneo means you hate the sin in your life and you're running away from it and you are running towards Jesus, the only 1 who can deal with sin. It's who do you run to, where do you take your sin? Repentance be remorse.

Fourth thing, and this is this is the last, the last thing, and then we'll, we'll wrap up on on another day. The fourth thing is disciple or devil. Are you a disciple or you a devil? Jesus said to his disciples sometime before this, 1 of you is a devil. What a thing to hear.

1 of you is a devil. He says it outright early on in John's gospel, and he knows who he's talking about He always knows who's gonna betray him. And we're told multiple times in John's gospel that Satan influenced Judith and that he was receptive to it because he didn't believe because he never believed He didn't listen to the words of Jesus. And so if you don't listen to the words of Jesus, the only other option you have in this world is to listen to the words of the world. In other words, listen to the words of Satan because he's the he's the ruler of this world for a time.

Judith is an example here of how you are wide open when you are living with unchecked unrepentant sin in your life and how that can suddenly flare up and spiral out of control. It's like it's like you've left the front door wide open and anything can come into the house. At any moment. And sadly, many of us here in this room have experienced devils we thought were disciples, and it's tragic. It's absolutely tragic, but the signs are always there.

The red flags are always there. John admitted he always knew Judith was a thief. There were red flags. There were signs using his position to get his hands on the money. Jesus was his meal ticket for 3 years.

You see, we can we can be hidden in plain sight looking exactly the same while secretly guarding arbitrary trail present amongst the disciples, but not transformed. Is that anyone here today? Because if that applies to you here today, you are in peril. Take the heat, like, heed the warning of Judith, and I I beg you to turn and repent and take your sin to Jesus. The big difference between a devil and a cycle is in which direction you run-in whose words you're listening to, when you've got it wrong, when you have failed, where do you go, where do you end?

Do you have more days? Or is today the last. I think that really is the crux of what this passage is is is saying to us. It's serving as a warning to Christians when they sin and equally to 1 repentant hearts to turn to Christ. Now, I don't really wanna just leave it there because leaves us in a fairly dark place, doesn't it?

Although there's a lot of hope in all of those things. But I wanna take us to another day or maybe a few other days Because ultimately, the biggest difference between Peter and Judith is that Peter has a future, and Judith doesn't. And and we've got nothing else to go on, but we know what happens to Peter. We see his trajectory from here on out. So, after the women go a couple of days later to the tomb, find the stone rolled away.

Who's the first disciple running into the tomb? Is Peter. He's running towards where Jesus was. He's not running away. He's still got this hanging over him.

He's running towards him. Where, let me take you to another day Let's fast forward around another 40 days later. You know, Peter's decided to go out fishing, he's with the other disciples, a bloke standing on the shore. So why don't you chuck the net over that side and see what happens and they haul it in. It's a massive catch.

And then John goes It's Jesus. That man's Jesus. And Peter, true Peter whips off his coke dives in the water, swimming towards Jesus. He's going towards the man. He's moving towards him and on the beach, you get that beautiful scene that John closes his whole gospel with of of Jesus, restoring Peter to the 12.

Saying, go and look after my sheep then, Peter, do you love me? Yes. You know I love you. Then look after my sheep. Do you love me, Peter?

Yeah. You know I do. What else do I have to do? Then look after my sheep. Do you love me, Peter?

I just said I do. I love you. It's an amazing scene. It's a really heartwarming scene because you see In Jesus, there's full forgiveness. Peter never really stopped moving towards him.

He might have wavered. He might have made mistakes, but he never did. And Jesus never let him go. And then we know that 10 days after this, Peter delivers an absolute stonker of a sermon. And, if anything is ever gonna get you killed, that is a sermon that will do it.

It genuinely is. And he preaches it fearlessly, and thousands of people are converted around that time. And then we have his writings in the new testament. We can see the fruit of, that his life of repentance and and listening to the words of Jesus and running towards him, moving towards him bears. The last thing Peter Peter writes is but grow in the grace and knowledge of our lord and savior Jesus Christ.

To him be glory now and forever, amen. Grove, Peter, who's often all over the place. Go and just keep going with him. Grow, grow with him. Keep running to Jesus, everyone.

And he will grow and use you for his kingdom. You made a mistake. Run to Jesus. You've done it again. Run to Jesus.

You're having doubts. Run to Jesus. All of these things can be taken to him. Because the cross, and what he did there on that hill is bigger than all of them. Way bigger, and he will grow you and use you for his kingdom.

Compared to to to Jesus' Judith' last words I have sinned and then know more. Well, that's quite a difference, isn't it? Let's pray. Lord than heavenly father, we, we confess that so often, we, we like Peter, rely on our own strength. We think we are stronger than we are.

We we think we are better prepared than we are. We're more courageous, and yet small situations can undo us. In a heartbeat, we we can we're fallible. We make mistakes. We we can make mistakes over and over again, and and we just wanna take a moment now.

Maybe for maybe for the next 30 seconds or so, just to just to bring those to you to turn and move towards you, with with our sin, it's all we can bring to you. Finally we thank you that you are, you are powerful to save, that Jesus' whole mission was to forgive sinners, that he is a friend to us. Help us to move towards him in all situations in life now and forever. Our men.