Breathingbook

Hi y’all. Greetings from my infamous blog. This is a post I previously made on my first few attempts at blogging on Dec. 14, 2009, so I wanted to put it back up. I’m going to change the date to reflect that. I mentioned in another post how I changed Hosting providers so my new blog site went down for a while. Btw, on these references I’m using the ESV version.

I’ve been studying in the book of Luke and yesterday I came across Lk 22:3 where the Bible says “satan entered into Judas”. Well, since Christians are not able to be possessed by the devil or demons (because we’re indwelt by the Holy Spirit), I thought I’d address the question: if Christian’s can’t be possessed by demons or satan, then what happened to Judas?

Judas was not only a Christian, but also a recognized apostle when this happened. If ever true believers would want to believe any leader would above messing up, being greedy, sinning against or betraying our Lord Jesus, it would be an apostle, right? Well, er, truth is that even though Judas was an apostle that didn’t mean he was somehow above temptation, greed, or any other fleshly sin. We’re ALL sinners save by grace. We all battle our fleshly desire to sin daily Phil 3:12-15.

So we know for certain this was not possession, because Christians cannot be possessed. Possession is a type of “indwelling;” a taking up of an abode; “abiding.” The Holy Spirit enters into every believer at the time of their acceptance of Jesus Christ as their Savior 1 Cor 12:13 and takes up abode in us. What’s that abode or indwelling like? Well, it may be impossible for an earthly father to place His likeness, DNA, or characteristics into an adopted child, but not for God! Our Father places His Holy Spirit into us at our new birth as believers and that’s the indwelling that makes us more and more like Jesus every day. On top of that, He is with us through His Spirit in a supernatural way.

So if Judas was enslaved, what is enslavement? Rom 6:16 reveals what happens to a believer when they allow themselves to become “pawns” in the hands of satan. In fact, Romans 6 – the whole chapter – discusses this type of enslavement which can happen to any believer when they are led astray. Enslavement can come upon believers anytime we are led astray by our lusts Jam 1:14,15 or made slaves to anyone else but Jesus.

Judas’ troubles, after all, didn’t begin over night. We know he stole from the money bag Jn 12:6. We also know the Lord Jesus obviously knew about Judas’ problem, but he not only did not excommunicate Him, but loved Judas and surprisingly continued to allow him to control the money bag. I think perhaps Judas misread the tolerance, patience and kindness which the Lord had towards him Rom 2:4, as being some sort of blindness or leniency, rather than the forebearance God grants all of us from time to times, and so that error in not repenting for his wrongs led him straight to apostasy and hell.

Enslavement appears to be a temptation we all need to be aware of for we’re all warned to keep on our toes and stay alert Mat 24:42-51.

Peace out to you, fellow believers. May the Lord Jesus keep you from enslavement. God bless.

Loris