Why did Judas decide to betray Jesus? Well, he had bought into the Kabbalistic teaching that the messiah would be a Jewish man endued with supernatural power. This power would make him immortal and so powerful that the Roman Empire would be crushed and he would restore the kingdom of Israel and rule the entire world.
Judas had seen the awesome power displayed by Jesus and clearly believed the He was the Kabbalistic messiah. So when Jesus spoke about dying for the sins of mankind and being killed on a cross, it was an insult to the Jewish idea of the messiah. Judas therefore wanted to force Jesus to abandon his teaching of suffering and instead become a militant messiah.
He was operating under the expectation that Jesus would display His supernatural power the moment He was arrested. You can imagine his horror when Jesus did not resist arrest and was instead condemned to die on a cross. Judas betrayed Jesus because he believed a lie and it will be the same toward the end times as Christians betray one another; in fact, our worst enemies will be those from our own families.
Sermon Outline: https://eaec.org/sermons/2015/RLJ-1508.pdf
RLJ-1508 -- AUGUST 9, 2015
TRUTH AND LIES Part 3: Partnering with the Devil
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