Finding Life in a World of Death

“I Am the Resurrection”

(Matthew 23:25-28, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, May 25, 2008)

Matthew 23:25-28 ²⁵ "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. ²⁶ You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. ²⁷ "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people's bones and all uncleanness. ²⁸ So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

Introduction – Hypocrites

No one wants to be thought of as a hypocrite. We don’t like people who have lots of pretense in one direction when their lives seem to move entirely in another. The outward sweetness that some people show seems too much for us. Of course, it is possible to be too frank. We ought to be reasonably civil. In our household growing up we were taught that if you could not honestly say something nice about someone, then you should say nothing. This doesn’t always turn out to be the right thing to do, but then it is not necessarily completely virtuous to immediately say exactly what comes into your mind on every topic. Even when we have something critical to say to a friend, something true and important, we should prayerfully consider the right time and the place to make the comment.

In any case, we put a high value on being “real” with people, and we don’t have much appreciation for those who are syrupy sweet, who want to seem nice to everyone, especially when we suspect that inside they are full of criticism. This is one kind of hypocrite, but it is not the Pharisee kind of hypocrite. The Pharisees were not playing over-nice. They were playing the game of over-holy or over-righteous. That is even less appealing than over-nice. God is not at all impressed with this game, and He is never fooled by our act. The Pharisees were big at over-holy. No one can actually be too holy. The game is a pretend game. You play it by making a show of being outwardly holy. Being outwardly holy does not turn out to be a pathway to true increases in real holiness.

Outside the cup (25)

Jesus uses two illustrations to make His point here. The first has to do with the custom of the ceremonial cleansing of dishes, and the second with a practice for avoiding uncleanness through exposure to a grave. We read more about clean cups in Mark 7:4. In addition to special ceremonial hand-washing traditions, the Pharisees had many traditions, including special techniques for the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.

We have no way of knowing for certain exactly what the accepted practice of ceremonial cleansing was in the day of Christ. It must have involved some kind of cleansing of what Jesus calls the “outside” of the cup. While it is possible that He is making a distinction between the external surface of the cup versus the internal surface that touches the food, it is more likely that He is contrasting the whole cup or plate versus the contents of the cup. Whatever the exact procedure was, it is beyond dispute that the Pharisees had a special procedure for the ceremonial cleansing of cups and plates, and that this was a matter of common knowledge among the disciples of the Pharisees, since it would have been a very frequent procedure, particularly when bringing in new pottery from the outside world. The point is that it was an external ceremonial regulation, and to not abide by this kind of rule would have been viewed as a violation of divinely-ordained traditions that had come from generations of rabbinic reflection. After many years of rabbis thinking about these matters, the Pharisees apparently had quite a lot to teach people about how you ought to clean cups and dishes before you used them.

Inside the cup (25)

Jesus goes on to say that the real problem is what is in the cup. The cup is full of greed and self-indulgence. The word translated “greed” here can mean “robbery,” and the word translated “self-indulgence” also means “a lack of self-control.” It does not make a difference what ceremony you used to make the cup clean if you use it to drink down an unhealthy mix of robbery and gluttony.

What could it mean that Jesus is talking about things like greed, robbery, self-indulgence, and gluttony being inside a cup? It could be that He is talking about how the Pharisees came to have their food and drink, and how their self-focused lives were driven by sinful desires. Which is the greatest danger, that God would be offended because you did not adequately cleanse the outside of a cup that may have once been touched by a gentile, or that God would be offended by the way that you covet what others have and then find immoral ways to get what is not yours?

Cleaning the cup (26)

Jesus is using this illustration of a well-known custom that people would have seen many times if they lived around the Pharisees. He is referring to this custom to make a point about the Pharisees themselves. He is not fundamentally criticizing their ceremonial practices so much as He is criticizing them. They were like the cup; cleaned so well according to their traditions, but the stuff on the inside was filthy and they did not seem to care. They just gulped down all that sin as if it were no problem at all, as long as the vessels were cleansed the right way.

This kind of blindness is a scary concept. It seems obvious that they needed to be cleansed from the inside, from the depths of their hearts, but like any of us who make a big point of external rules, those things push away from our minds deeper considerations that should be our first priority when we get serious about our sin. Our biggest problem is not the external things. It’s our greed, our robbery, our self-centeredness, and our gluttony. It’s about why we get our food and how we get our food, and not about our dishes or our cups. This is an especially serious problem if we use our excellence in externals to try to convince ourselves and our fellow Pharisees that we do not have any problem on the inside. If we have no problem on the inside, then Jesus died in vain. But we do have a problem on the inside, and Christ is well aware of it. We need a solution. How can I be clean inside and out? Through the holiness of Christ and His death on the cross; this is the only solution for us.

Whitewashed tombs and the resurrection (27-28)

The last two verses are similar. We start again with a well-known Pharisaic practice, and Jesus uses that, again, not so much to criticize the ceremonial practice as to illustrate the deeper problem. There was apparently a custom of clearly identifying tombs by whitewashing them so that the pilgrims who came into Jerusalem would not inadvertently become ceremonially unclean. If they were unclean then they could not celebrate the Passover.

At the very moment that Jesus was using this illustration the city was swelling with people from all over who had come to celebrate the Passover. The graves were whitewashed like a warning sign to people, but Jesus was saying that they were also a powerful illustration of the Pharisees. Like those whitewashed graves the Pharisees had two problems. First, they were ugly on the inside. They were unclean in ways that were bigger than anyone could see. They had untamed hearts. It is not right to steal things from widows. It is not right to proudly demand the positions of honor everywhere. It is not right to be filled with adulterous impulses and actions. It is not right to scheme together in order to murder the Son of God. The Pharisees were examples of lawlessness. This ugly inside was compounded by their second problem. They had a showy, fake, and self-righteous outside. They were like those tombs in a way. They sounded a trumpet about their ceremonial obedience and their charity. They wanted everyone around them to know that they were spotless according to the Law. They were in fact lawless hypocrites.

These were the facts about the Pharisees. The facts about Christ were entirely different. First, He was utterly beautiful on the inside. His soul was unstained by Adam’s sin, and unstained by any evil thought, word, or action of His own. Everything connected with his holiness was perfectly beautiful. Second, regarding the way He presented Himself to others, he was entirely humble, true, and merciful on the outside. He was beautiful and real. This is the greatest kind of beauty. It is a natural soul beauty that is not produced by some fake exterior. This is our Savior, and this is the One who then went to the cross and died for our Pharisaic sins. We have had much sin on the inside and much pretense on the outside, and Jesus died for us.

I want to leave you with some thoughts concerning His resurrection. The actual description of Jesus coming from death to life is something that we have no record of. We have eyewitness accounts of Him dying, and of his being dead and buried in a tomb. We have eyewitness accounts of Him being alive again on the first day of the week. What we don’t have is any witness of the moment of his going from being a dead body in a tomb wrapped in grave clothes to then being alive in a resurrection body. It is as if that experience is covered over with a shroud of some mystery and decency. Like His other miracles, we know that it had to have happened, but we don’t know exactly how it happened.

It is something to consider. A lifeless body being given all the signs of life, not just of any kind of life, but a new life, an immortal resurrection body life… What a joy to contemplate! We do have descriptions of this happening to us. Ezekiel has a vision of a valley of very old dry bones. The bones become reconnected. The muscles and tissues are restored and the spirit is returned to the bodies. All of this happens by the Word spoken. Whitewashed tombs may be an appropriate symbol of the death that comes from Pharisaic religion. An empty tomb and a new healthy, living, wonderful, eternal, resurrection body is the right symbol of what Jesus brings. Which one do you want? I want the living one. I will give up the showiness of fake holiness now, God help me, if I can have the blessing of a living spirit, some true holiness of life, and the sure promise of participation in the blessing of a resurrection kingdom. Jesus is risen! His doctrine is the teaching and preaching that brings life. Everything else brings death.

Questions for meditation and discussion:

1. Explain the Pharisaic custom and Jesus’ use of the clean/dirty cup imagery in verses 25-26?

2. Compare this with the Pharisaic custom and Jesus’ use of the whitewashed tombs imagery in verse 27?

3. Verse 28 refers to appearing righteous to others. What sort of people would Pharisees want to impress and why?

4. What is lawlessness? Is lawlessness still a relevant concept after Christ has perfectly fulfilled the Law?

My Tithing Sermon...

“Thoughts for Those Who Are Not Well”

(Matthew 23:23-24, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, May 18, 2008)

Matthew 23:23-24 ²³ "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. ²⁴ You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!

Introduction – More trouble for blind guides

In the previous verses our Lord referred to the scribes and Pharisees as blind guides. Earlier in this gospel, Jesus had explained what that phrase meant when He was speaking about the Pharisees. He said, “If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.” Jesus pronounces seven woes upon these men in this chapter. As He goes to the cross He is determined to teach His disciples that, whatever points of shared doctrine there are between Pharisaic religion and the way of the cross, the two lead in very different directions and they have very different destinations.

The Pharisaic way ultimately leads followers low by insisting on going up high first. Everybody on that train ends up falling into a pit. At least that’s the way that the imagery of blind guides works. Along the way they may seem like they are the very mountaintop of holiness. The way of the cross leads followers on high by insisting on going down low first. Jesus is leading us into the kingdom of heaven, but He goes there through the worst suffering that anyone can face. This is His way to glory. It is also the way for anyone who would follow Him. The Pharisaic way seems like a great path to exaltation, but by taking that road both the leaders and deluded followers fall into a pit.

If you think of the true pathway to the kingdom through faith in Christ and a life of the suffering of the cross, it does not seem like much of an appealing advertisement. Yet our inability to accept this way in the depths of our hearts probably has much to do with our feelings of dissatisfaction. Our problem with that system is two-fold. First, we want heaven to be as worldly as all our idols, and second, we insist that the world be as trouble-free as heaven. Neither of those things will do. We accumulate an attachment to idols here on earth that we are secretly hoping to be able to take with us after we depart. On the other hand, we want all of the joys and comforts of heaven right now, and if we don’t get them, we wonder whether God is really doing His part. This is the world. It is not heaven, and it is not an easy place to live. Heaven is coming and it is full of the presence of the real God. Train your hearts for heaven by loving the real God more day by day, but do not expect that your life is going to be easy here. This is still the world after the fall of Adam, and there is still much pain and sorrow in our current condition.

Tithing our spices (23)

As those who believe in the resurrection promises of God, how are we to live in this world now? The Pharisees had that figured out. They had settled into a tangled web of religious customs that seemed designed to prove to themselves and to anyone else who might care to know, that they were not guilty of violating the traditions of holiness that had been handed down by the rabbis. One of those traditions with some biblical basis was the practice of a very exact tithing, even down to the spices that you grew in your garden.

Tithing is an ancient religious practice, where you give a tenth of what you have been given back to some greater giver as a testimony of your complete loyalty and deference to the one that receives the tithe. Abraham gave a tenth of his spoils of war to Melchizedek as a way of saying that Melchizedek was greater by far than Abraham. When Jacob had a dream and saw a ladder reaching up to heaven with angels going up and down on that ladder, he made a vow to God that if God would provide for him during his time away from home, Jacob would give back to the Lord a full tenth of all God gave to him. This was not some bargain he negotiated with God. It was an expression of worship whereby Jacob was saying to God, “Everything I every will have is from You and it all belongs to You. In testimony to this fact I give You the tithe.” The tithe has always been part of a larger system of being faithful with our blessings. That system has always insisted that every good gift and every perfect gift is from above.

In the history of Israel the tithe was part of the Law that God gave through Moses. This was a portion of His system for taking care of Levites, priests, visitors, widows, and orphans. It was one of a number of laws that had to do with supporting religious worship and extending mercy to those who were in need. The Pharisees in their teaching on tithing made a point that they even tithed on their spices, and they taught their followers to do the same. Why would anyone teach that you should tithe on your spices, if not to show you through that specific point how exactly he followed this practice of tithing? “We Pharisees are not loose about our giving like some other people are. The way we see it, you should even give a tenth of your spices to God.” People who love to talk about how exactly they give to God may just want to make sure that you know about their righteousness in that area of their life.

The law of the tithe was not the only law of sharing wealth in God’s system. Deuteronomy 14 and Leviticus 27 are two places in the Law where tithing regulations are explained. Two other provisions of mercy are described very near those passages. One is the Sabbath year. Every seventh year debts were to be forgiven. The second was the Year of Jubilee. After seven cycles of seven years each, there was a final year when land was restored to the poor who had been forced to sell it in order to live. It was also the year when Hebrew slaves were set free. Those who had to sell themselves to stay alive were given their lives back again. These provisions of the Law could be significantly more costly than tithing your spices. If the Pharisees were so intent on following the Law, they might have wanted to focus on these two laws. It appears that these provisions of the Law were never carefully followed the way that they are written in the Bible. Those who have wished to follow at least the Sabbath Year regulations have normally done that in symbolic ways that allow life to go on as normal while using some accepted system to make it appear that observant Jews were still following the various religious laws on this matter.

Giving to God is an act of worship. The interesting thing about laws that specify duties of worship is that they always mean much more than we may first assume. Tithing is an example of this. When you give to the Lord ten percent of whatever gain He has brought to you, it is not because you are paying your taxes and that’s just the tax rate. If that were the case, then the poor widow who was putting in all that she had was not to be commended. She should just give ten percent. The reason why she was commended by Jesus is that in her devotion she was showing what tithing was really about. Tithing is not a way of saying that the Lord is due ten percent of your increase. Tithing is a witness that the Lord owns one hundred percent of your increase. He gave it, and it is all his. Like all worship laws, it finally points to the fact that God owns everything. What does it mean when someone tithes their spices, but finds ways to get around the Sabbath year and the Year of Jubilee? It means that they don’t really understand the first thing about tithing. They may just be trying to impress other people.

The weightier matters of the law (23)

This kind of game is much harder to play when it comes to duties like justice, mercy, humility, forgiveness, faithfulness. These things are much harder to quantify. They were a part of the Law that the Pharisees tended to ignore. They were also a part of the Law that Christ obeyed perfectly. Why did Jesus go to the cross? He was perfectly satisfying the demands of the Lord’s justice for you. You deserved death. He took your death. He could have satisfied God’s love of justice by simply bringing eternal punishment upon you, but then He could not have fulfilled His great desire to show mercy. In terms of walking humbly with God, the cross is the supreme example of it. Here the Son of God has lowered Himself for us so that we might be brought high into the presence of God. He reached down so low for us in order to bring us to the highest heaven in Him. Through this cross He achieved for us everything necessary for our forgiveness, and He was utterly faithful to the plan of the Father. Through the cross, our Lord showed a wonderful devotion to the weightier matters of the Law.

What we ought to have done (23)

It was also through the cross that Jesus showed a real understanding of tithing. He gave one hundred percent. He went beyond the symbol and gave the full measure of His devotion. The joyful giver is not looking for proof that he has done his part because he gives ten point zero percent. The joyful giver knows that he has never given his all to God from the very depths of his heart, but that this is what Jesus did for us. Therefore he gives, and he is happy. There is nothing wrong with tithing, even on your spices. There is something wrong with thinking that you have actually fully obeyed the tithing laws of God in the fullness of what they really mean, especially when you do not keep the more costly provisions of the Law having to do with the care of those in need among you.

Medical advice… (24)

To take pride in your tithing, and then to miss the beauty of the cross, is to miss the weightier matters of the Law, and to be blind to the way that they have been obeyed by Christ, and by Christ alone. This is not good for your spiritual health, because it leads you to overestimate your goodness, and to miss the goodness of the One who died for your sins. The cross is for people who know that they are not well. They are sick, and they need a doctor. Here is some quick medical advice for anyone who wants to follow God. Don’t swallow a camel. By the way, if you do decide to swallow a camel, there is really no need to strain out every gnat. Both of these animals were unclean under the Old Testament Law. If you parade the fact that you tithe your spices and then ignore justice, mercy, and faithfulness, then you are doing something that is not good for you. You have swallowed a camel. No need to mention how careful you are about the gnats. The amazing thing about the Pharisees is that they swallowed a camel and had absolutely no sense of any stomach ache. They thought that they were in perfect health. There is only one Man who has ever been in perfect spiritual health. For our sake He took our sin sickness upon Himself. Let us give Him the credit He deserves. We were not all that well. He took away our guilt and shame. In Him we have life.

Questions for meditation and discussion:

1. What is tithing and what does it represent?

2. How is it that there are some parts of the Law that are weightier than others?

3. What kind of life of law-keeping is Jesus insisting on and how does it differ from the Pharisaic way?

4. What makes the gnat/camel comparison funny? What are we to learn from this humorous comment?

Who makes you holy?

“Eyes to See”

(Matthew 23:16-22, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, May 11, 2008)

Matthew 23:16-22 ¹⁶ "Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.' ¹⁷ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? ¹⁸ And you say, 'If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.' ¹⁹ You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? ²⁰ So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. ²¹ And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. ²² And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it.

Introduction – Woes…

In this chapter of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus has some important things to say about the scribes and the Pharisees. These teachers of the law and this religious party that was especially focused on issues of law-keeping were mentioned with repeated use of the word “woe” by Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This is a way of pointing out in a most serious way that someone is facing big trouble, normally from the hand of Almighty God, for what he is doing. Jesus uses this word seven times in this one chapter, in all cases against the scribes and the Pharisees.

In the Old Testament a woe was not something that was always pronounced on someone else. Remember that the prophet Isaiah, when he saw the glory of God in the heavenly counsel said this: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” Isaiah felt the weight of his own sin when He was in the presence of God, so he pronounced a woe upon himself. As we go through these passages in Matthew 23, it should not be very surprising to us if we find ourselves on the wrong end of a woe here or there, since we too are very capable of being like the Pharisees in ways that are not spiritually commendable. If that happens to you, remember what happened to Isaiah when he pronounced a woe upon himself. Isaiah 6:6-7: “Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said: ‘Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.’” That burning coal from the altar in Isaiah 6 stands for the only thing that can really atone for our sins and cleanse our consciences, the blood of Jesus Christ sprinkled upon our hearts by the power of the Holy Spirit. Our deepest sins are forgiven. It is our privilege to walk now in newness of life, and we only can do that as God makes us holy.

Blind guides (16)

Our passage today contains the only “woe to you” in Matthew 23 not followed by the words “scribes and Pharisees.” Instead Jesus uses the unflattering and humorous image of “blind guides.” This is not the first time that Jesus used this expression to refer to this group. At an earlier point in His ministry, when they were questioning His disciples about why they did not do the ceremonial washings that were a part of the Pharisaic life Jesus corrected them sharply. Some of Jesus’ disciples seemed concerned that the correction might have been too much. They said to Him, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?” This is how He answered that concern: “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up. Let them alone; they are blind guides. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”

That incident came up because of something about which the Pharisees had expressed concern. The difference in Matthew 23 is that Jesus is now on His way to the cross. He is taking these precious moments of remaining teaching time to condemn the Pharisaic way in the strongest terms possible. Before He dies for sinners, Christ wants us to know in no uncertain terms that there is no continuity between where the Pharisees would lead their disciples, and where Jesus is leading His disciples. The Pharisees are leading their disciples into justification by law-keeping. Jesus is leading His disciples to the cross, to justification by Christ, and to a life of true holiness. The Pharisaic way is the way of a blind guide leading other blind people into a pit that brings no life. The Christian way is the way of a Savior leading sinners to light and life through His own death and resurrection.

The temple and the gold in the temple (16-17)

The difference in these two ways can be seen in the various specific provisions of the Pharisaic code of conduct. In the verses before us, the issue is one of speech. The question is this: Are there ways of making a verbal commitment where your sworn word need not be considered a real promise? Is there a way that your “Yes” can actually mean “No” if you end up needing it to mean “No” rather than “Yes.” The Pharisees have ways of doing this very thing, more by their accepted practice than by their written traditions. Jesus, on the other hand, insists that your “Yes” be “Yes” and your “No” be “No.” How did the Pharisees justify their position? They said that the weight of your swearing depended upon the thing by which you swore. Therefore, if you swore by the temple in Jerusalem, it was nothing. But if you swore by the gold in the temple, you were bound by your oath. There are several problems with this. The biggest problem is that the ninth commandment against false witness, properly understood, prohibits lying. The eighth commandment prohibits stealing. To make a promise like this with the intention of having a built-in technicality as a way out of that promise seems to be lying and more than likely also involves some form of stealing. A second problem is the one that Jesus addresses. Is the temple somehow less important than the gold in the temple? Does the gold make the temple holy, or does the temple make the gold holy? The Pharisees seem to show here a preference for the gold above the temple. Isn’t it interesting that zeal for gold did not consume Jesus, but zeal for the temple did consume Him?

The altar and the gift on the altar (18-19)

The second example is very similar. The altar was the place of sacrifice in the Old Testament. As the temple made the gold holy, the altar made the offering holy. To value gold and man’s offerings as more important than the temple and the altar of God, suggests a man-centered and worldly way of looking at temple worship. The worshipper needed to think about things based on what they really meant. The blood of bulls and goats sacrificed on the altar in the temple could not actually take away the guilt of sin. Nevertheless these were very important pictures of a coming blood sacrifice that would remove our guilt. The true and final sacrifice would be the offering up of Christ through His death on the cross. We are told in 1 Peter 1:18-19, “You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.” Christ purified the heavenly sanctuary for us, making the way for us to be with God. This is of far greater worth than gold, or anything else that man ever offered in the temple in Jerusalem. Jesus is saying in this passage that the Pharisees do not know where real holiness comes from.

Oaths and God (20-22)

God does not lie, and He does not need to do anything to prove to men His truthfulness. Nevertheless, when He wanted to assure us of something, as a matter of accommodating our weakness, the Lord did make an oath. In that oath He assured us that Christ would be our priest and king forever. Since there was nothing greater that He could swear by, He swore by Himself. The fact is that any oath that we could ever make always leads us back to God. Every promise that we could make by anything holy will eventually lead us to the Creator and Sustainer of all things, and the only one who can sanctify anything or anyone. The Pharisees seemed to act as if the holiest thing was the last thing they touched, as if they were holiness. But anyone knows that it is not holy lie and steal. We can never devise ways for us to be systematically untrue, but somehow spiritually OK. This is what the Pharisees did in the way that they used oaths. The fact is that anyone who swore by anything in the temple ultimately swore by the God whose presence in the temple made the temple holy. Ultimately all oaths go back to God. The Lord no longer inhabits a temple in Jerusalem. Jesus is in the real temple sitting with His Father, and we are God’s temple in Christ. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. He makes You holy.

The scribes and Pharisees were blind guides. Their practices and philosophies could never lead us into the heavenly sanctuary. They suggest that life is all about money and our own offerings. They do not rejoice in the one sacrifice for sin, because they did not adequately see their own sin or their need for a perfect sacrifice. There are certain solemn occasions that even today call for us to make an oath. We do that when we take on some office, when making wedding promises, or in joining a church. We do that to recognize the importance of the occasion, and we do it in the name of God, reminding ourselves that we are in the presence of a holy God. We never use our oaths as a way of lying, for we know that whether we use the form of an oath or not, our “Yes” must always be “Yes” and our “No” must always be “No.” This was not only something Jesus taught, it was something He did.

When Christ agreed to come to earth as the Sacrifice that purified the way for us to be with God in heaven, he said “Yes” to His Father. He meant what He said. God has sworn by Himself concerning the matters of our eternal salvation. How serious was Christ about His promise to obey the Father for the salvation of sinners? He was obedient even to the point of death on the cross. That would have been the occasion for a lesser man to back out of his promise. This example of faithfulness has obvious implications for us. Paul writes in Philippians 2:5-11:

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Jesus is holy. He is the way of holiness. The Pharisees were blind guides. They could not see that they needed God to make them holy. May the God who sanctifies us through the blood of the everlasting covenant make you holy.

Questions for meditation and discussion:

1. What is an oath? How was it used in Old Testament times? Are we allowed to make oaths today?

2. How did the Pharisees use oaths? What does this reveal about their intentions?

3. In the examples given, what things did the Pharisees view as most serious? What does this tell us about them?

4. What does God view as most important in heaven or on earth? How does that inform our speech?

Can Law-Keeping Be a Gate Into the Kingdom of Heaven?

“The Door to Heaven”

(Matthew 23:13-15, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, May 4, 2008)

Matthew 23:13-15 ¹³ "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. ¹⁵ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.

Introduction – The Missionary and the Message

There is an inescapable connection between a missionary and His message. By “missionary” I am not referring only to those who go to a foreign land. Anyone who brings a message, a new philosophy, or a new way of life to those who do not yet share that perspective is a missionary, even if he lives and dies in the same town without ever leaving its borders. For the message of such a missionary to have any credibility with others there must be some obvious agreement between the words that a man speaks and the life that he lives.

I was struck last year during a visit to an economically-challenged country to see run-down shack-like buildings by the side of the road with old rusty signs advertising those places as “miracle centers.” It seemed to lack credibility. A health and wealth preacher who does not have enough to feed his family does not serve as a very convincing advertisement for the miracles he claims to bring. That example may seem slightly humorous. It is not as funny to think about the fact that a preacher of righteousness and joy through Christ could reasonably be said to lack credibility if he is habitually miserable and eminent in sinfulness. What is the message that our lives speak to others who know us? We are missionaries of a kind to anyone who wants to inquire. Do our lives speak the same message as our words? We believe the Bible, and we are willing to tell others about it. What is the message of the Bible, and what is the message of our lives? Is there anyone who has a message that fits refreshingly well with his life?

Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! (13, 15)

The teachers of the Law (scribes) and the larger group with which they tended to be associated (the Pharisees) had a message that they eagerly taught to others. Their message was one of law-keeping, but their lives were lives of law-breaking. For this reason they were called hypocrites, and a “woe” was pronounced upon them, which is an ancient way of saying that such a person or group should expect some very serious trouble from Almighty God. The concept of a hypocrite is something that comes to us from the world of Greek drama. A hypocrite was someone who was acting or playing a part. A great actor does not always have to play the same type of part. He has learned to put on the mask for the role that he is playing, and to change his voice and mannerisms to match each role in an excellent way. By the way, it is this studied pretense that makes drama a very inappropriate medium of communication for someone who brings people a message from God. We don’t need actors to bring us a gospel message. We need people who are so earnest about what they are saying that they are willing to die for it. The trouble is that some preachers and teachers who claim to represent God are actually actors, even though they may not be aware that they are playing a part. This was the problem with the scribes and Pharisees. They did not consciously put on skits when they sat in Moses’ seat, but their preaching and teaching was an act.

You do not enter the kingdom of heaven yourselves (13)

The Pharisees fancied themselves as gatekeepers for God, but they refused to go into the kingdom of heaven through the only gate that God provided, the Lord Jesus Christ. Even though many Pharisees would eventually embrace the truth of Jesus the Messiah, they almost all rejected Him during His earthly ministry. They had a different gate to heaven that they were using. That gate was the gate of law-keeping.

After the fall of Adam, there was no way for his descendants to enter the kingdom of heaven through law-keeping. We come into this world with a massive demerit in the failure of Adam to abide by the law that God had revealed in the garden. Adam’s sin was representative for all of his posterity. For that reason, even the most law-abiding follower of God, if he is entirely descended from Adam, has zero possibility of entering the kingdom of heaven through law-keeping. There was an additional problem with the particular way that the Pharisees were pursuing law-keeping. They had taken it upon themselves over the centuries to change the law, and to prefer their own traditions of law interpretation to the actual Law of God from the books of Moses. This was a very natural temptation for the school of thought that suggested that there was a way to resurrection blessings through law-keeping. Our problem with law-keeping is certainly not limited to Adam’s sin. Our consciences accuse us of law-breaking all day long, if they are still working at all. Therefore there is a great temptation to reduce the demands of the law in such a way that the law is seen as largely ceremonial and outward. This is what the Pharisees did. That is how they could play the part of the law-keeper so well. They gave their all to teaching that way of life. Nonetheless, it was not such an easy thing to really be a law-keeper. If you think that the way to heaven is through the gate of law-keeping, there is much pressure to hide all of your law-breaking. The goal is to convince others, convince yourselves, and even to convince God of your great obedience. You may be able to fool others, and you probably can fool yourself, but it turns out to be much harder to fool God.

When God sent His Son to be the only gate to heaven, He was not at all fooled by the Pharisees’ hypocrisy. He knew that they were law-breakers, because he knew why he was going to the cross. If law-keeping could be a gate into the kingdom of heaven, then Jesus’ death on the cross would have been completely unnecessary. In fact Jesus coming to earth as the Son of God would have been completely unnecessary. We did not need Jesus to come and do miracles in order to teach us the Pharisaic way. There were many others who were teaching that system, and many people were listening to them. Jesus came to us as the second Adam, conceived by the Holy Spirit, and without the guilt of Adam’s sin. To that spotless perfection He added no sin of His own over the course of His perfect life. Then He died the death of a sinner as our Substitute before God. Jesus came to be the One Gate to heaven through His life and death. You enter God’s Kingdom through Jesus alone. The Pharisees refused to go through that gate.

You do not allow others to enter the kingdom to heaven (13)

Not only did they refuse to enter the kingdom of heaven through the Jesus gate. As much as they were able, they were trying to stand in front of that gate in such a way that others could not enter either. In John 9 we learn that leaders of the Jews had decided that anyone who would confess Jesus as the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. The Pharisees were the most influential group of leaders in the synagogues. These were places where daily and weekly worship of God happened, but when God the Son came, the Pharisees wanted to remove anyone from the synagogue worship who rightly saw Jesus as the Messiah. They blocked the way into the kingdom.

You travel across sea and land (15)

It was not that the Pharisees were against evangelism. They went everywhere with their particular understanding of the law-keeping gateway to the life of resurrection blessing. They believed in making converts through their version of good news. They just had a profound disagreement with Jesus concerning what the good news really was.

What was the good news that the Pharisees brought wherever they went? “You too can be Jewish. You need to take upon yourself the yoke of the Law as it has been interpreted through our traditions, and then you will be good like we are.” “We have kept the law from our youth. Be like us and keep the law the way that we do. Do this and you will live.” The first problem is that they were not truly doers of the Law. They were very selective in their focus upon the outward and ceremonial, and they added to the law. They accused Jesus of being a law-breaker because he healed on the Sabbath. Jesus accused them of being law-breakers because they robbed widows, committed adultery, and flattered themselves as obedient because they knew the Pharisaic way. You be the judge. Who was the real law-keeper? Was it Jesus who opened the eyes of a blind man on the Sabbath, or was it the religious leaders who plotted to kill Jesus because He made the blind see on the wrong day of the week and raised Lazarus from the dead?

Children of hell and the Door to Heaven (15)

The account of the resurrection of Lazarus from the dead is amazing. Of course the miracle was amazing, but I am talking about the way that people reacted to the miracle. When Jesus called Lazarus out of the tomb, some people believed. After all, he had been dead for four days. But others went straight to the religious leaders. It was then that a key official said that it was expedient that one man should die so that the nation could live. They claimed to have concern about what the Romans would do if someone was doing things like raising the dead, but had they come to grips with the simple fact that Jesus had given life to a man who had been dead in a grave for four days? Where is the amazement? There is none. There is only self-righteous anger leading to murder.

It is very important what religious door you walk through. The Pharisee came with a missionary message and so did Jesus. Look at the message and look at the life. The Pharisee and Jesus cannot both be right. The first is a hypocrite. He makes a big show of his law-keeping and he turns his converts into self-righteous people who are heaping more judgment upon their souls with their arrogance and sin. He is a religious actor. Then there is Jesus. Who can rightly accuse Him of sin? Look at what He came to do, and tell me if it isn’t the very highest definition of love. Look at the man who had the power to give sight to the blind, and then look at the people that only hated the blind man who had been healed. Look at the man who called forth His friend Lazarus from the grave, and then look back at the men who wanted to kill both Jesus and Lazarus as a result of what had happened. Look at the group that only wanted to do whatever was necessary to get rid of the man who has resurrection power in His voice. Who is the Law-Keeper? Who is the Gate to heaven? Who is the Messiah? Behold the man! Behold the God-Man! Jesus.

Questions for meditation and discussion:

1. What is a hypocrite? Why is this word associated with the scribes and the Pharisees?

2. How did the scribes and Pharisees obstruct the entrance of people into the kingdom of heaven?

3. What motivated Pharisees in their missionary zeal?

4. What was it about Pharisaic teaching and behavior that made them and their converts fit for hell?