Robert Furrow
00:00:00 - 00:00:25 What is the deal with Judas Iscariot? Jesus chose him, and yet he betrayed Jesus. And then his betrayal was foretold in the
Old Testament. And Jesus said it would have been better had
he never been born. Was Judas predestined to betray Jesus today
on hot topics? Yeah. Robert Furrow
00:00:26 - 00:07:02 Hi, This is Robert Furrow and welcome the
hot topics. We answer Bible questions and your questions
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bell beside it so you could get all of our new videos. The comments section is open below. We would love to hear from you. Let's take a few minutes to consider Judas
Iscariot before we talk about whether or not he was predestined to betray Jesus. First of all, he had one of the greatest privileges
of all times. He was one of the chosen disciples. Could you imagine? I've asked people often if you could be anyone
in the Bible besides Jesus, Who would you be? And quite often it's one of the disciples. For me. Personally, it doesn't matter which one, except
I wouldn't wanna be Judas Iscariot. But if I could be one of the disciples seeing
the miracles of Jesus. Think of the things that Judas saw. He saw people healed. He heard the teachings of Jesus. He saw the miraculously things happened. He saw the seas calmed. And yet he betrayed Jesus. The second thing to consider is that Jesus
knew all along that Judas was going to betray him. In John 6 70 it says, Jesus answered them. Did I not choose you? The 12 and one of you is the devil. He also identified Judas as his betray er
when he gave him the piece of bread in John 13 26. The Scriptures even give us prophecy about
Judas. Psalms, 41 9 says Even my own familiar friend
in whom I trusted who ate bread at my table, has lifted up his heel against me. This is speaking of a friend of David's Ah
Hipfl, who sided with Absalon when he tried to take the kingdom from David when Absalon
failed. Ah Hipfl, who had backed Absalon, hung himself. It's interesting that he was a foreshadow
of the type of Judas who sat at the table, ate bread with him and betrayed him and ended
up hanging himself is well. The Bible also tells us in Zachariah 11, 12
and 13. Then I said to them, If it is agreeable to
you, give me my wages and if not, refrain So the wages wade out to 30 pieces of silver,
and the Lord said to me, Throw it to the Potter, that princely price they set for me. So I took the 30 pieces of silver and threw
them into the house of the Lord for the Potter. This plays out exactly in the life of Judas. After the anointing in Bethany by Mary, the
sister of Martha. Judas goes to the men of the high priest and
he works out the wages and they pay him 30 pieces of silver. After he hears that Jesus is condemned, he
throws them back into the temple. They are gathered together, and either by
Judas or someone else, they buy the piece of land that Judas hangs himself on. Like they took down the body of Jesus and
couldn't anoint it for those next couple of days because it was the Sabbath. The same thing was true about the body of
Judas that hung on that tree and he would have bloated and either the rope broke or
branch broke. Or someone cut it down on the Bible says in
the Book of Acts that he fell headlong onto the ground and burst open. That was the end of Judas, and many of these
things were four Told about him now it's also good for us to point out that he was not a
sincere disciple, Jesus said. He was a devil from the beginning. He was also a thief. He also sold Jesus for 30 pieces of silver
because he wanted the money. People talk about what his motives were, and
although we can't see into his heart, if the Bible says he was a thief and he sold him
for 30 pieces of silver, that was at least part of his motives. But he was not a sincere believer, and that's
important for us to understand Now. Finally, on the night that Jesus is arrested,
Judas betrays him with a kiss, and Jesus says, you betray me with a kiss and then they arrest
him and Jesus goes off to suffer and pay the price for you and me. So the question is when He walked into that
garden and he gave Jesus that kiss. Was he doing it because he was predestined
to do it? Was there no way out for him? Did he have no free choice? Listen to what Matthew, 36 24 says The son
of man indeed goes just as it is written of him. But woe to that man who the son of man is
betrayed. It would have been better for that man had
he not been born since it was for told that Jesus would have a betrayer and what kind
of things would happen and Judas played that part. Is Judas responsible for what he did? The answer, of course, is yes. But there are those who believe that he had
no free will, that Judas was predestined because they were written about him. Romans 8 29 tells us that who God for new,
he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. Now I've seen a lot of people do a lot of
fancy footwork on the word for known. And the word for known there in the Greek
literally means to four. No, they try to make it say something different. They try to figure out a way to do that. But it literally means two for no. Even people who are trying to say that God
doesn't predestined because of this for knowledge will admit that that word means two for no
what the Bible is telling us, there clearly is that God knows everything that's gonna
happen the beginning from the end. He's living outside of time, and we are going
through time. And just because he's living outside of time
and can write about it doesn't mean he takes away our choices. If you take a football game to watch later
and then you sit down to watch it, all of those guys have already done it. It's already come to pass, but they had their
free will. God predestined us who are going to choose
him because we know that he's going to choose us. And he predestined Judas according to what
he knew the decisions that Judas would make. This is an important point for us to understand. Otherwise, we make God out to do bad things
that God predetermined bad things to happen. I realized that we're getting deep into the
weeds of Calvinism and Armenian is, um, and I don't believe in either. I realize there are people to try toe, put
you in a box and make you one or the other, but I believe that God is sovereign. I believe that goddess so sovereign that he
could give you a free will. He is so sovereign that he could give Judas
a free will and still have hiss sovereign work done out of the free will choices that
Judas made. I realized that that may be a little bit complicated,
but I believe that is true. John 6 44 says that we cannot come to Christ
unless the father first draws us. Robert Furrow
00:07:02 - 00:10:13 That's an important distinction because it
tells us that God's the initiator of salvation and that if you have become saved because
God drew you, God was the one who called you. But remember, God chose Judas as well. But Judas never chose to follow him. The question is, is, does everyone that is
drawn by God have to follow God or does God allow man to have a free will? I believe that God makes a choice to draw
him into himself, and I believe that men make a choice as to whether or not they will follow
him, the Bible says in Proverbs 14 12. There is a way that seems right into a man,
but the end thereof, his death and Galatians 67 and eight says, do not be deceived. God is not mocked for whatever a man SOS that
he will reap for. If he shows to the flesh from the flesh, you'll
reap corruption. If he so chose to the spirit from the spirit,
he will reap life. These are the results of the decisions that
we make in our lives. If we want to say that God predestined all
of our movements, even our sin or predetermines them, then we're taking away the plane teaching
in Scripture. The Bible says that if you believe you will
be saved, the Bible could have said God makes people believe in order to be saved. But the Bible didn't say that, and there's
all kinds of passages that you have to do something to. You have to massage it in some way to try
to make it fit into that theology. The Bible says. Whoever believes can be saved. The Bible, says God desires that all would
be saved and all would come to the knowledge of the truth. So what is the will of God? The will of God is that all would be saved
and all would come to the knowledge of the truth. But because God loves man, he gave them free
will. He gave them a choice so that they are not
a robot that has toe love them. But they have a choice to love them. And if they don't love them, then they have
the consequences that are a result. From that, Judas becomes probably the best
example of this. God was able to write down the things that
Judas would do because God for new them and he loved them. Think about it. Jesus gave Judas Communion the cup of the
new Covenant. He washed Judases feet. He didn't out him to the other disciples. He continued to reach out to him and love. Judas had every opportunity to make good choices,
but he didn't do it. And because he didn't do it, those things
were written down about him. And then he fulfilled God's will. God's purpose. And that's exactly how it works. We make a decision whether or not will follow
him. And if we follow him, then we will fulfill
the sovereign will of God. And if we don't follow him, will fulfill the
sovereign will of God as well. I want to say to those of you who are reformed
or those who are Calvinistic are those who believe in the acronym Tulip that I have no
animosity towards you who believe such things. I believe that you are brothers and sisters
in Christ. I believe that you love Jesus. Our salvation does not hinge on these things. I just think it's important for us to understand
how the Bible is written and how we should approach it and that what the Bible says is
more important than our theology. I hope this has been helpful to you. If you like this video, then click the like
button. We'll see you next time on hot topics
