(Ben Chidester)
Matthew 23 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, 3so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. 4They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. 5They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, 6and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues 7and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others. 8But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. 9And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. 10Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. 11The greatest among you shall be your servant. 12Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
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. 15Woe 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.
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.’ 17You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? 18And 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.’ 19You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. 22And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it.
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. 24You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!
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. 26You 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. 28So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
29“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, 30saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. 33You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? 34Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, 35so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. 36Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
37“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 38See, your house is left to you desolate. 39For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”
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We saw in yesterday’s passage how the Pharisees, blinded by their zeal for the minutiae of the Law, had lost sight of its true essence. They had lost sight of the forest for the trees, as we say, and as a result had gotten the Law completely backwards. In the woes that Jesus here pronounces on the Pharisees, he calls them out for the many evils that had manifested from their backwards thinking.
Jesus’ rebuke is strikingly severe. But we must remember that he was not here rebuking a believer who was genuinely mistaken or who was merely wrong in his own private thinking. The Pharisees had set themselves up as teachers of the Law. Their errors did not affect only themselves but were spread by their teaching to the whole of God’s people. They were leading God’s sheep astray, setting up their own laws and teachings in place of the very Law of God.
This passage can be a cause for fear. Jesus’ rebuke is so severe – I don’t want it to be directed at me! For those of us in positions of teaching, whether pastors, Sunday school teachers, children’s teachers, or parents, there is indeed a warning here for us. We must always examine our teaching, to be certain that we are not teaching as law what is in fact our own preference or idea. This can be especially relevant to parents. Sometimes our own traditions or values are so ingrained into us, that it is tempting to present them to our children as if they were divine law. It is not wrong to have our own “house rules” – parents have been given authority by God to govern their children. But we must always be careful to differentiate between what we expect of our children as their earthly parents and what God expects of them as their Heavenly Father.
But while this passage is strikingly severe, I hope it is also a source of comfort – comfort in knowing that God is very jealous that we know him truly and that any wrong teaching or thoughts not be given a foothold in our minds and hearts. Jesus is severe toward wrong teachers because he cares for his sheep. If you discovered that a teacher at school was filling your child’s impressionable mind and heart with deceitful lies and evil thoughts, wouldn’t you respond swiftly and sternly, out of love for your child? Wouldn’t you earnestly strive to root out any and every source of falsehood that might infect their heart and their thinking? Jesus feels a similar protective spirit for us. He longs that we would know him truly and will not allow anyone to lead us astray. He will not let any falsehoods, whether from a false teacher or from the devil himself or even from our own deceitful heart, confuse us about the love, care, and affection he has for us. Take comfort in knowing that Jesus is watching over your heart and mind and defending you from every untruth about him that any might try to implant itself therein.
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An audio version of each devotion will be posted on our church podcast “Life Together at CRPC,” which is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube.