In 1974 Coca Cola came out with a commercial song called It’s the Real Thing. This little ditty took the airwaves by storm for several years and had everybody in the country humming the tune and pattin’ their feet. “It’s the real thing … what the world wants today,” the young people sang. And so it is today. People everywhere are looking for something real …”the real thing.”

Click the link below, pat your foot along with me, and listen to the song. Then click back into today’s Dose of Encouragement as we start our week with a question. How do you know “the real thing” when you see it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDSnjjdGh5M

LYING LIPS

“The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in those who tell the truth.”

Proverbs 12:22

What happens to a person who hears the truth, rejects it, but then pretends to believe it? One look at the life of Judas Iscariot will show us.

“But Judas Iscariot, the disciple who would soon betray him, said, “That perfume was worth a year’s wages. It should have been sold and the money given to the poor.” Not that he cared for the poor – he was a thief, and since he was in charge of the disciples money, he often stole some for himself.”

John 12:4-6 (NLT)

John 12:4-6 gives us the key; Judas was a pretender. He pretended to believe what Jesus taught, but he didn’t. He pretended to be a God follower, but he wasn’t. He hung around for what he could get out of it personally. Judas was more interested in his own agenda than he was in the purpose to which Jesus had called him. The deceptive hypocrisy led to his utter destruction.

In that day many believed Jesus had come as a conquering king to rescue them from the politics of the day – from a king that oppressed the people. Judas even liked that Jesus fed the hungry and healed the sick, but he was more interested in how Jesus could benefit him personally and bring to pass his personal and political agenda. He liked what he thought was this new up and coming political leader could do to pad his own pockets. So he pretended to believe.

But, when Jesus would do or say something that didn’t match Judas’ agenda, he would show his disapproval. In John 14:22 he questioned Jesus’ motives when he asked why He wouldn’t reveal who He was to the whole world – right then. Within days of John 12:4-6 above – the encounter with Mary’s perfume and his displeasure with Jesus’ answer – Judas went to the very hypocrites Jesus had rebuked. There he secretly offered to hand Jesus over for 30 pieces of silver. And so he did.

He sold his own soul to pad his pockets with 30 pieces of silver. He insisted on his own agenda instead of God’s for 30 pieces of silver. He was so certain his political agenda was right, that for about three month’s wages, he turned his back on God.

In this climate of political unrest, let us ask ourselves, “Is my own personal agenda worth turning my back on God’s Word and plan – for any price?”

“Oh Lord, let me hear your voice and your voice alone –

not that of my own or any other person jockeying for positions of authority

in this deceived world in which we live.”

Until tomorrow,

Your Traveling Companion

Brenda