No More of This

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE

NO MORE OF THIS

Luke 22:47-51

47 While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him,   48 but Jesus asked him, "Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?" 49 When Jesus' followers saw what was going to happen, they said, "Lord, should we strike with our swords?" 50 And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear. 51 But Jesus answered, "No more of this!" And he touched the man's ear and healed him.

NIV

What was in the mind of Judas when Jesus called him out as a betrayer? To be called the betrayer of the Messiah, the one that Judas had no doubts about as being the anointed one of God, must have stuck at Judas’ heart. Yet, the darkness within him, the influence of Satan was upon him and caused Judas to be this deceitful betrayer to come as a friend, by offering a kiss. This makes us wonder whether we betray Jesus, or as we will see Peter denying his association with Jesus, when we fall into temptation, or we should say, enter into temptation by yielding up our hearts it. What bothers us the most is that we consider ourselves a friend of Jesus, or at least, He calls us a friend. Perhaps because of our humanity, we cannot help but commit sin from time to time, maybe as a normal course of life. We get upset, we don’t forgive, we gossip, we harbor ill feelings toward someone, or we get jealous or envious of another. There are all sorts of ways we could sin and not even think of it as sin, but just living in this corruptible human form. But with all our knowledge of the scripture, and all our experience with Jesus, we would think we would know, without a doubt, when we fall short, unless we are deceiving ourselves, so not to think we do or say anything wrong, or sinful. When we sin, are we in some form, betraying the trust of Jesus? Then we hear Jesus, “No more of this” when a disciple acts out of anger lashing out against one of the men coming to arrest Jesus. That disciple was one of those beloved followers of Jesus and yet he committed that grievous act of sin against another man. Could we be more aware of our failures? We have all we need to keep ourselves from falling, including the Spirit, but do we forget and just give in to that temptation that Judas entered into or the one that disciple entered into. Jesus said, “No more of this”, and that should be that.