Have You Seen Him?

The earliest memory I have of him was his birth. His cry was clear and loud, even though his body was so small. As a child, he would make fortresses out of blankets and branches and involve all of the neighborhood boys in games of war. So normal, so much like the others. How was I to know?

As a youth, he seemed to grow overnight – both his limbs and his mind. When my son was 13, we lost our ancestral homeland. Soldiers came one night in the dead darkness and took it, just took it! The army had taken notice of our olive grove, and needed it (they said). Suddenly, his passion for playing war became all too real. He knew there would be no inheritance – it had been taken from him, from us. 

At 14, he met a group of young men who were as frustrated as he was. Zealots, they called themselves. Riff-raff was what I called them. These men would gather at night and plan violent acts of insurrection. They used our religion to stoke the fires of rebellion in the hearts of other young men. Dangerous stuff.  Their weapon of choice?  Rocks. My boy and his friends would sneak up behind the Roman garrisons and throw stones at them. What were they trying to prove?

I remember in those years he would come home in the morning, a few fresh bruises on his face, and I would dress his wounds.  I know he had his reasons, we all do, but why did he have to get involved in something so dangerous?

Something changed in him when he was 22. He met a healer and teacher, from Nazareth (of all places), who had been travelling throughout Judea with a small band of loyal followers. My son heard him speak and decided to leave the Zealots, he told me it was because they were “thinking too small”. This new teacher, this Jesus, was preaching about the realm of God that was to come.

There was so much about this man that kept my son spellbound. Every time they encountered the hungry, Jesus would compel the crowd to care for them. When the sick and diseased came to him, Jesus didn’t run away like one of our priests, but he prayed over them – and somehow people got better! He was always telling stories; they made you think about what it means to be a child of God.

So my son became one of them. He put down the rocks and picked up a pair of sandals. Not much to go with, but Jesus told him that somehow the Lord would provide for them. Eventually he was given the huge responsibility of taking care of the group’s modest travelling purse. As a young man without an inheritance, this trust placed in him was extraordinary. And that wasn’t all – because Jesus taught them so much about what it means to forgive someone, to minister to them – his father and I thought this would become his life’s work. We have been so proud of Judas lately.

Were he and the others always successful? No, I heard plenty of stories about them getting kicked out of villages. I know that part was frustrating. But for a mother to see her son grow from a hooligan to what he was becoming was a gift.

Which is why, on this night, my heart is breaking. The stories that keep flooding in tonight, betrayal… deception… treachery! I don’t know what I could have done differently, or where his father and I went wrong. We didn’t raise my son to be a thief and a liar and a sell out!

Are you judging me?

Something had to change his heart, what it was I may never know. Maybe it’s true that Jesus is taking longer than he though to usher in the realm of God.  My biggest fear tonight is that Judas has done something horrible. 

If it is true, if he has betrayed Jesus, something had to have snapped.  There must have been a reason. He loved him! I know he did! He would talk about him all the time. He must not have done what they are saying, it’s all lies. My stomach is churning, and I don’t know where to find my son. Have you seen him?