In most of our churches this week it's Passion Week or Easter Week. Perhaps Pam Sunday

was on your mind yesterday. Jesus coming into Jerusalem and being hailed as King. Five

days later there would be an official notice posted on his cross by command of the Roman

Governor. Jesus, of Nazareth, the King of the Jews. It would draw loud protests from religious

leaders, but it was still there when he breathed his last. It's one of the most distinctive

things about the four gospels that they devote so much space to this one week. Matthew

devotes about a quarter of his gospel, Mark three eighths of his gospel, look about

a quarter, and in John it's almost half of the gospel that's devoted to this one week.

No week in Jesus life is given such detailed coverage and there are so many different

strands in the story. I want this week to pick up just one of them, although it's got

five threads woven into it. To be more exact I want to reflect on some of the people we

see encountering the Lord Jesus during Passion Week. And I want to begin today on the dark

side. I mean Judas Iscariot. His name probably means the man from Kirioth, although some

of thought it might mean the knife man. Whatever the origin of the name there was certainly

something of the night about him. Like the Old Testament's Jeroboam the Son of Nebat,

Judas constantly drags behind him the ball and chain of the words, who betrayed him.

Years ago in a sermon I referred to Judas as an apostle and I was roundly corrected

by a lady at the church door. Judas was not an apostle, she insisted. But actually she

was wrong, he was. And therein lies both the mystery and the tragedy. As Jesus put it

as earliest John chapter 6 verse 70, did I not choose you, the twelve? And yet one of you

is a devil. There is something mysterious as well as tragic about Judas Iscain. Paul

speaks about the mystery of iniquity and it was surely at work in Judas Isc betrayal.

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