1. If the tragedy of any man's life consists in the contrast between what he is and what he might have been, between depths to which he has fallen and heights to which he might have risen, there was never doom so tragic as his who, terrible contradiction! was at once the Apostle and the betrayer of his Lord. For to what had he been called? What was it that he might have been? One of the twelve precious stones on the breast-plate of the everlasting High Priest; one of the twelve foundations of the Heavenly Jerusalem, one of the twelve Apostles of the Lamb, even of them that in the regeneration, in the new heaven and the new earth, should sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel; one whom in all ages and throughout all the world the Church should have held in highest honour and most thankful remembrance, as of those who stood nearest to her Lord when He sojourned among the children of men. Such he might have been; and what is he? A name which is beneath every name, the darkest blot in the page of human story; and, when we seek to pierce into the awful darkness beyond, we know only that One who knows all destinies, and who measures all dooms, declared of him what He never in so many words declared of any other, “It had been good for that man if he had not been born.”
2. Called to be an Apostle! What a magnificent opening for usefulness! But we never find the traitor, Judas, mentioned foremost in any work of love or bringing others to Jesus for healing of soul or body. When the crowds were fed he was there, and helped to distribute food as he was bidden. But though treasurer of the party, it was not Judas who offered to go and buy food. It would make too large a gap in his hoard of savings, if it were possible. The miracle itself might seem to confirm his hopes of an earthly kingdom. The crowds were very anxious to make Jesus a king. It must have been a disappointment to Judas when the Lord hurried the disciples into their boat and sent them away, evidently lest they should lose their heads with the crowd and try to force on Him assumption of temporal sovereignty.
The only time when his voice was heard was in grumbling against Mary for wasting precious ointment on her Lord. Think of all that his opportunity meant-hourly companionship and conversation with the sinless Son of Man, always so gentle, kind, forgiving, and moreover wise and firm, a leader who could command reverence as well as love. Judas's nature was too cold and calculating to have much enthusiasm roused in him. The harvest of his earthly expectations was blighted; the summer of his life was ended, and he was not saved. One hope only remained-to enrich himself amid the wreck of Christ's fortunes, and he grasped at it; and lo! the pelf for which he sold his soul burnt his fingers. As blood-money it was hateful to him. He flung it down before the chief priests who had paid it over to him, and went and hanged himself.
3. Because Judas did not profit by the fellowship of Christ, he was the worse for it. For that double effect always attends contact with Christ. It is either a blessing or a curse. Fire softens wax, but it hardens clay; air nourishes the growing plant, but it helps to corrupt and destroy the cut flower. So the influence of Jesus, which was changing the fickle Peter into the man of rock and the hot-tempered John into the Apostle of Love, was making Judas capable of the crime of history. Yes, the very purity and holiness of Jesus did but harden Judas and intensify his hatred of the good he saw but would not follow, until he was prepared in the madness of his hate to betray Jesus to a cruel death. And that same solemn lesson Judas teaches to us. Privileges unused become curses.
Judas heard all Christ's sermons.1 [Note: Thomas Goodwin.]
Why does St. John love, and why does Judas fail? No complete answer can be forthcoming. The reply lies in the inscrutable mystery of the human will. Both had the same opportunity, both were open to the same influences. But the one set out to be what God intended him to be, and let the warmth of family love, the strength of the Baptist's affection, and the indescribable power of the love of the Son of God enter in, expand, develop, and enrich the self. The other had a plan of his own. He would make his mark, satisfy his stirring ambitions; and so, being ever restless, ever craving to find some new opportunity, he only had occasional glimpses of love, never got really warmed by it, never felt its stimulating power; and at last the light went out, and darkness and his own place were all he knew. Judas sought to win his soul and lost it; St. John lost his soul for Christ's sake and found it. The one became less and less of man, the central activities that Love keeps going gradually slackening, and at last stopping altogether; the other grew day by day into the perfect man, through the expansive power of that inner fire of love that was fed continuously by the love of Christ.1 [Note: G. H. S. Walpole, Personality and Power, 169.]
