At least three times Jesus told the twelve that he would be betrayed, be arrested, suffer, and die. They heard him, but they didn’t understand him. Even after the Passover meal, where Jesus used the bread and cup to point to his death, the twelve couldn’t yet grasp why Jesus’s blood would have to be poured out for the forgiveness of sins. They wouldn’t really understand who Jesus was and what he was doing that Passover Week until after his resurrection and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The twelve didn’t understand Jesus, but one of the twelve did something worse than misunderstand. He betrayed Jesus. Judas! Even though Judas was one of Jesus’s closest friends and traveled with him for three years, he loved money more than he loved Jesus. And he was paid thirty pieces of silver from the Jewish leaders to betray Jesus. How terrible! The Jewish leaders wanted Jesus so they could kill him. How totally terrible! Judas betrayed Jesus because Jesus wasn’t the king he was looking for; the Jewish leaders wanted to kill Jesus because he was claiming to be the Son of God. Today’s lesson focuses on how Jesus’s enemies went after him and how his friends turned against him.