Betrayed (Luke 22)
If you’re a church planter, you are going to end up feeling betrayed. Probably multiple times. (By the way: If you’re not a church planter, you are going to end up feeling betrayed. Probably multiple times.) You’ll have some guy you invest in and think of as a future leader suddenly leave for a different church. You’ll have some lady in your church start spreading rumors about you. Someone will lie to your face.
And that is a low and painful place. It’s one thing to be wounded by an enemy, but when you’re betrayed by someone you trust? Dante, in the Divine Comedy pictured levels of hell, with the more severe spots reserved for those with the worst sins. And who is in the deepest level of hell in Dante’s work? Traitors. Those who betrayed people who trusted them.
That’s what is so nice about Luke 22. When you get betrayed, and you’re in pain, and you feel like no one understands, remember that Jesus does. Throughout Luke 22 he is betrayed repeatedly, and so we have a Savior who can sympathize not only with our weaknesses and temptation, but also with our pain. And that matters.