Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Tuesday Thought – April 8, 2014

Good Morning Friends,

“I told them, ‘If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.’ So they paid me thirty pieces of silver. And the LORD said to me, ‘Throw it to the potter’ -- the handsome price at which they priced me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the LORD to the potter.” (Zechariah 11:12-13)

500 years before the birth of Jesus, Zechariah prophesied about the price of His betrayal and what would happen to the money. This passage is clearly a prophesy that was fulfilled in the actions of Judas. He betrayed Jesus and the Jewish leaders paid him the price they thought his betrayal was worth: 30 pieces of silver. (Matthew 26:15)

When Jesus was condemned, Judas felt deep sorrow for what he had done. Some think that Judas believed he was forcing Jesus to reveal Himself as King. But that wasn’t the outcome of his betrayal! Well, actually it was, but not in the way that Judas thought it would happen. It was through death and resurrection that Jesus was revealed as King, not through ascending an earthly throne by military might or miraculous power.

Judas brought the money back to the priests, letting them know that what he had done was wrong, probably hoping they would stop the condemnation of Jesus. (Matthew 27:3) But the priests had already received what they wanted and would have nothing to do with Judas. So he threw the money into the temple. (Matthew 27:5) The priests took the money and bought a potter’s field that would be used to bury strangers. (Matthew 27:7)

And so, even Judas and the priests fulfilled the prophetic word of the Lord. They didn’t scheme to fulfill it, but God used them, even against their own knowledge to demonstrate that He knows the future.

His, by Grace,


Steve

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