Judas
Drama
Who Is This Man -- This Jesus?
Fifteen Dramatic Lenten Monologues
Object:
(He hurries along the road, clutching a bag full of coins, looking determined, but feeling a combination of anger and guilt as he encounters the audience.)
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said. "Leave everything and follow me!" he said.
(stops and turns to audience) That's easy enough for him to say; not so easy to do! Follow him where? At what cost? And what have I gotten out of following him? Not much, I can tell you that!
It's like a lot of what Jesus says. His words sound good and the crowds love to hear them, and maybe in the heavenly kingdom they could work. But not in the real world, not in a harsh land suffering under the Roman yoke. Turn the other cheek? Walk an extra mile? Give someone your cloak if you have two? Sounds good, but you'll just be taken advantage of. What if the other guy doesn't believe in Jesus? He'll take what you give him and just keep it for himself, and then come back for more because he figures you're an easy touch. And I can assure you, the Romans won't pack up and leave this country if we love our enemies as Jesus taught. If we love them too much, they'll like it here and want to stay!
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
Well, I did follow him! From Cana to the Transjordan, from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea, through godforsaken Samaria to Judea, from Nazareth to Jerusalem. I followed him for almost three years now, wherever he went, but look where it's gotten me: nowhere! That's where! I'm no better off now than I was three years ago when he first told me to follow him.
I don't know why he even called me to be one of his disciples that day -- there were plenty of other guys to choose from who would have given anything to follow him. I was in the synagogue that day, listening to Jesus teach, and like everyone else, I was impressed. After the service dismissed, Jesus looked at me, and walked right up to me and said to follow him, that I had a special place among his disciples, and had something important to do. I have no idea what he meant by that now, but when I first heard him say that, it sounded exciting! Here was Jesus, the teacher everyone was talking about, saying he wanted me!
It's not like he asked everyone to join his inner circle of disciples; he kept it small on purpose. The twelve he called us, just like the twelve tribes of Israel. He didn't take volunteers. To each of us he said, "You have not chosen me, I have chosen you!" which is pretty heady to hear. Can you imagine how I felt when he told me that? All those people who were clamoring to be seen with Jesus, and he chose me. Of course I left my job -- sold it to my partner at cost -- and took to the road as part of Jesus' team.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
I saw a chance to get ahead in the world, to be respected and honored, and taken care of without a lot of backbreaking work. If Jesus should turn out to be the Messiah, then I was in on the ground level, and he would certainly reward me with a high position in his new government, maybe minister of the treasury.
So I followed. Right away, I took on the disciples' money purse since the only other disciples who had handled money before was Matthew. Since he had been a tax collector, well I didn't think we should trust him that much, even though Jesus had chosen him, too. People would give us a coin here or there so we could buy food, and I handled all the payments with those donations. Although we always seemed to have enough to live on, the treasury never seemed to grow. Jesus never seemed concerned about it. He just taught us to pray for our daily bread. I would have liked to have a few extra days' money in reserve, you never know when you might need it.
The truth is, if Jesus had wanted to, we could all have become very wealthy, indeed. All he had to do was charge people for those miraculous healings he was already doing! Physicians make a good living off their remedies and poultices -- and they're not nearly as effective as Jesus. How much do you think people would pay to be able to see again? To walk again, to have their hearing restored, or to be free of leprosy? How much would that man, Jairus, have paid Jesus to bring his daughter back to life? Plenty, that's how much. That guy was loaded, the ruler of his synagogue, but Jesus did it for free! It was frustrating for me to see Jesus miss golden opportunities to earn some serious gold.
Once, I thought he was finally getting it, when a rich, young ruler came to Jesus and asked what he had to do to inherit eternal life. When Jesus told him to get rid of his wealth, I got excited, because here was a chance for us to help the man by taking his wealth off his hands for him! But Jesus didn't ask for the money. He told the ruler to give it to the poor. Can you imagine that? What do you call us -- wealthy? After that, I gave up on our little band growing rich and started to use some of the coins from our purse for some of my personal needs.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
But he didn't go anywhere! Sure, from one dusty little village to another, up a hill, or back and forth across the Sea of Galilee. Nowhere important until now, when we arrived here in Jerusalem. Even now, he's not taking advantage of our being here to gain supporters. When we arrived in town on Sunday, a huge crowd met us along the road and cheered Jesus. They laid palm branches at his donkey's feet and shouted, "Hosanna!" which means, "Save us now!" What an opportunity to finally gather an army to take over and rule this place, but what did Jesus do? He went to the temple and proceeded to anger the very religious leaders whose help he needed, and his chance to seize power has all but evaporated like a mirage in the Negev desert.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
You can follow Jesus if you want, but be warned -- the road isn't easy. There will be sacrifices, and you'll be led places you may not want to go. You won't have the money or life of comfort we all want, and you may find people looking down on you. You may find yourself persecuted and hunted.
As for me ... I have followed Jesus this far, but no farther. If I stay with him, at best I'll be eating dusty roads for years to come; at worst, Jesus will get arrested and I'll go to prison with him. I had to do something to protect myself and look after my own interests, so I took matters into my own hands. (holds up bag of coins)
My hands like the feel of my future. (hefts the bag a couple times) Thanks to the generosity of the chief priests and a little arrangement between them and me; well, let's just say that my future is looking as bright as thirty pieces of polished silver.
So go ahead and follow Jesus, and I'll follow my own path. Then we'll see who's got the better future! (exits, smirking)
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said. "Leave everything and follow me!" he said.
(stops and turns to audience) That's easy enough for him to say; not so easy to do! Follow him where? At what cost? And what have I gotten out of following him? Not much, I can tell you that!
It's like a lot of what Jesus says. His words sound good and the crowds love to hear them, and maybe in the heavenly kingdom they could work. But not in the real world, not in a harsh land suffering under the Roman yoke. Turn the other cheek? Walk an extra mile? Give someone your cloak if you have two? Sounds good, but you'll just be taken advantage of. What if the other guy doesn't believe in Jesus? He'll take what you give him and just keep it for himself, and then come back for more because he figures you're an easy touch. And I can assure you, the Romans won't pack up and leave this country if we love our enemies as Jesus taught. If we love them too much, they'll like it here and want to stay!
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
Well, I did follow him! From Cana to the Transjordan, from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea, through godforsaken Samaria to Judea, from Nazareth to Jerusalem. I followed him for almost three years now, wherever he went, but look where it's gotten me: nowhere! That's where! I'm no better off now than I was three years ago when he first told me to follow him.
I don't know why he even called me to be one of his disciples that day -- there were plenty of other guys to choose from who would have given anything to follow him. I was in the synagogue that day, listening to Jesus teach, and like everyone else, I was impressed. After the service dismissed, Jesus looked at me, and walked right up to me and said to follow him, that I had a special place among his disciples, and had something important to do. I have no idea what he meant by that now, but when I first heard him say that, it sounded exciting! Here was Jesus, the teacher everyone was talking about, saying he wanted me!
It's not like he asked everyone to join his inner circle of disciples; he kept it small on purpose. The twelve he called us, just like the twelve tribes of Israel. He didn't take volunteers. To each of us he said, "You have not chosen me, I have chosen you!" which is pretty heady to hear. Can you imagine how I felt when he told me that? All those people who were clamoring to be seen with Jesus, and he chose me. Of course I left my job -- sold it to my partner at cost -- and took to the road as part of Jesus' team.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
I saw a chance to get ahead in the world, to be respected and honored, and taken care of without a lot of backbreaking work. If Jesus should turn out to be the Messiah, then I was in on the ground level, and he would certainly reward me with a high position in his new government, maybe minister of the treasury.
So I followed. Right away, I took on the disciples' money purse since the only other disciples who had handled money before was Matthew. Since he had been a tax collector, well I didn't think we should trust him that much, even though Jesus had chosen him, too. People would give us a coin here or there so we could buy food, and I handled all the payments with those donations. Although we always seemed to have enough to live on, the treasury never seemed to grow. Jesus never seemed concerned about it. He just taught us to pray for our daily bread. I would have liked to have a few extra days' money in reserve, you never know when you might need it.
The truth is, if Jesus had wanted to, we could all have become very wealthy, indeed. All he had to do was charge people for those miraculous healings he was already doing! Physicians make a good living off their remedies and poultices -- and they're not nearly as effective as Jesus. How much do you think people would pay to be able to see again? To walk again, to have their hearing restored, or to be free of leprosy? How much would that man, Jairus, have paid Jesus to bring his daughter back to life? Plenty, that's how much. That guy was loaded, the ruler of his synagogue, but Jesus did it for free! It was frustrating for me to see Jesus miss golden opportunities to earn some serious gold.
Once, I thought he was finally getting it, when a rich, young ruler came to Jesus and asked what he had to do to inherit eternal life. When Jesus told him to get rid of his wealth, I got excited, because here was a chance for us to help the man by taking his wealth off his hands for him! But Jesus didn't ask for the money. He told the ruler to give it to the poor. Can you imagine that? What do you call us -- wealthy? After that, I gave up on our little band growing rich and started to use some of the coins from our purse for some of my personal needs.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
But he didn't go anywhere! Sure, from one dusty little village to another, up a hill, or back and forth across the Sea of Galilee. Nowhere important until now, when we arrived here in Jerusalem. Even now, he's not taking advantage of our being here to gain supporters. When we arrived in town on Sunday, a huge crowd met us along the road and cheered Jesus. They laid palm branches at his donkey's feet and shouted, "Hosanna!" which means, "Save us now!" What an opportunity to finally gather an army to take over and rule this place, but what did Jesus do? He went to the temple and proceeded to anger the very religious leaders whose help he needed, and his chance to seize power has all but evaporated like a mirage in the Negev desert.
"Come, follow me!" Jesus said.
You can follow Jesus if you want, but be warned -- the road isn't easy. There will be sacrifices, and you'll be led places you may not want to go. You won't have the money or life of comfort we all want, and you may find people looking down on you. You may find yourself persecuted and hunted.
As for me ... I have followed Jesus this far, but no farther. If I stay with him, at best I'll be eating dusty roads for years to come; at worst, Jesus will get arrested and I'll go to prison with him. I had to do something to protect myself and look after my own interests, so I took matters into my own hands. (holds up bag of coins)
My hands like the feel of my future. (hefts the bag a couple times) Thanks to the generosity of the chief priests and a little arrangement between them and me; well, let's just say that my future is looking as bright as thirty pieces of polished silver.
So go ahead and follow Jesus, and I'll follow my own path. Then we'll see who's got the better future! (exits, smirking)
