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Had He Only Waited

"Judas would have become one of the most powerful witnesses for Christ, had he only waited three days." ~ Adam Hamilton, 24 Hours that Changed the World

I have read Dante's Inferno twice for a class, once in my senior year of high school, and then again in my freshman year of college. In both settings, there was a debate among some members of the class about whether Judas should be in Hell, and if so, should he be in quite the intense spot he was placed in within Hell. After all, His betrayal was necessary for God's plan to redeem humanity, and according to Jesus' prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, he was destined to be lost. Why then, would Dante choose to place him in such a spot of torture in writing his epic poem?

I don't pretend to know where Judas's final destination is, and won't ever know it this side of Heaven. There is however, one factor that could justify the theory that it's a different place than the rest of the disciples: of the twelve, he was the only one who never saw the risen Christ and heard words of forgiveness from His lips. When he discovered why the chief priests wanted Jesus betrayed, he was so ashamed of what he had done that he threw the thirty pieces of silver at them and went out and hanged himself. I had never given this even a second thought until I read the quote above a few years ago while doing a Lenten study. After reading it, I began to think, What if Judas had lived?

I think many things could be different if that were the case. I feel he would have been quite vocal about having been forgiven, perhaps even more so than Peter and Paul were. Who knows, there could even be a Saint Judas's cathedral somewhere. While it is interesting to think about, it could also become a dangerous obsession if we think about it too much. There's no way to change the past, and even if we could, there's no guarantee it would be a change for the better.

A better response to this thought is for us to never give up, even when we think that we have gone too far to be redeemed. Had Judas waited three days, he would have been embraced by his Savior just like all the rest of the disciples. Jesus is still waiting with open arms to embrace all those who turn to Him and seek forgiveness. No one is too far gone to be saved, and though he didn't know it when he died, Judas was forgiven. The world might be a different place if Judas had believed what Jesus had told him and waited only three more days.

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