More Rebukes and Warnings

We're doing a series on the life of Christ and we are to the point now we've been doing this for over a year. So we're at the point where we're within the last few months of his ministry, probably four months or so before Jesus dies. He has been spending some time in and around Jerusalem. So he is right in the teeth on the home turf, if you will, of those who are most fiercely opposed to his ministry. And who are actually seeking whatever opposition or whatever means they may to do his, to do away with his life to killing. They're seeking any opportunity possible to do that. So there's a great deal of animosity, hatred against the Lord Jesus in this time. But Jesus is still, even in the midst of that, still taking time to instruct his disciples. And so that's the reason for the title of this evening. And we are in Luke chapter 11, by the way, so you might want to find your place there. The title of this evening, more rebukes and warnings because Jesus is rebuking the Pharisees, but then he turns to warn his disciples about what is happening and to warn them about what they must be ready to face. Because they will continue to face opposition even after he is gone. In Luke chapter 11, verses 37 to 54, Jesus is rebuking strongly the Pharisees. We introduced that story last week by describing the setting, the issue that drew the reviews. Now the issue that drew the rebukes was a dinner invitation. Jesus is invited to dinner by one of the Pharisees, verse 37 says, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him. So he went in and reclined at the table. And the scene is this, all the Pharisees are lining up to do the ceremonial washing of hands before they go in. And we talked about that a little bit last week. This was not a hygienic thing. This was not a washer hands before you eat kind of thing. This was a ritual ceremonial cleansing that they had established. Mark's Gospel, you remember, tells us that it was part of the tradition of the elders. And it not only included the hands, but it included the pots and the pans and everything else that would be involved in the meal, had to be cleansed a certain way. And here's the point. The Pharisees and the religious leaders believed that such cleaning would make them religiously clean. Ceremonially clean before God. It would spiritually cleanse them if they went through this ritual. That's what they believed. And so Jesus is going to go right in the teeth of that and fly in the face of that. While they're lining up to do this, Jesus kind of works his way through and goes on and sits down. And so when they come to the table, Jesus is ready to start in on them. Remember we said last week that the reason he has been invited, Pharisees are there. We'll find later that scribes are also there, the experts in the law. Jesus has been invited so that he could be the main course. They were ready to tear into him. And Jesus turns the tables on him as we've seen so many on them, as we've seen him do so many times. And actually gives them, if he's going to be the main course, he will give them a case of indigestion that they will never forget. And that's exactly what he does. So that's the setting. Jesus starts writing in verse 42 with the first of six woes. Now whenever in the Bible you find these words woe, it means judgment, condemnation. It's not just woe, back up, be careful here. It's not that kind of woe. This is a pronouncement of God's judgment. So this is very serious. This is very direct. And six times Jesus will say, God's judgment on you. God's judgment on you. God's judgment on you. So these religious leaders, I mean this was, I can just imagine they were sitting there at this meal like, shell shocked with what's happening. And we'll see how they responded at the end. But in so doing, in the substance of these rebukes, Jesus basically gives us six signs of hypocrisy. Because Jesus is going to nail them for their hypocrisy. Remember, they've come in, they've washed them to ceremonial cleansing thinking that makes me right with God. And there's all kinds of hatred and wickedness in their hearts. They want to kill him. And so Jesus is going to show, he's going to rip off the mask of hypocrisy and show what's really in their hearts. Now the thing that is a value to us about this is to recognize that whenever Jesus is warning about hypocrisy, none of us, none of us, whenever we come to the Scriptures, should ever think, okay, that's good for the other guy. Whenever we come to the Scriptures, we ought to always be looking at our own hearts. And finding out, okay, is there any of this in me? Not, oh boy, give it to them, Lord, they need it. Now, is there any of this in me? So I'm going to ask myself that question tonight. And I hope you will do the same. Is there any, are there any of these signs of hypocrisy in me in my heart? What do I need to be careful about? The first sign of hypocrisy that Jesus gives is being more careful about religious duty than heart attitude. More concerned about religious duty than heart attitude. You can see it there in verse 42. Woe to you, God's judgment on you, Pharisees, because, here it is, you give God a tenth of your mint, rue, and all kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter, in other words, the justice and love of God, without leaving the former undone, the tithing of these plants. Now, do you know what mint and rue and garden herbs are? You probably know what garden herbs are? These are, in Bible times, these would be small little plants that you wouldn't necessarily plant in your garden, but they would be herbs that you would probably plant along your walkway, or maybe at the edges of your garden. The herbs that you might use in the preparation of meals and so forth, but not certainly the main course, not the main vegetables that you would grow in a garden. This is kind of the sideline stuff. This is the little stuff. Now, what the Pharisees did is they took God's law very seriously about tithing. In fact, God's law was very specific about this. Look at this verse in Leviticus chapter 27, verse 30. Here's what the mosaic law stipulated, a tithe of everything from the land, whether grain from the soil, or fruit from the trees, belongs to the Lord. It is holy to the Lord. So a tenth of everything you grow belongs to God. The Pharisees are so meticulous about that, that they are going to give a tenth not only from their gardens, not only from their fruit trees, but the little herbs that grow along the walk. We're going to give a tenth of those, too. We're not going to miss a thing. They were sticklers for the law. Now, not all that's bad, is it? I mean, they were taking very seriously the law of God. God's word said to do that. But Jesus pointed this, you are such sticklers for the law that you won't even miss a little garden herb in your tithing. But you miss the weighty or matter of the law of the Old Testament teaching, which is the condition of your heart. Justice, do you treat people with justice? Do you treat people fairly? The love of God, mercy, compassion. Do you treat people with compassion? He says, basically, you're sticklers for observing the outward, the external, making sure everything is done right, religiously, all your religious duties are right, but you've forgotten the heart of things. Justice in your heart, the love of God. Now, I need to ask myself the question, how do I do that? How do I do that? I'm not asking you to confess how you do it, but how do other Christians do this? How do we put the emphasis on religious duty rather than the issues of the heart? Any thoughts? Yes. I think that's one instance. This is what people should wear to church. Right. Right. Yes. I remember when we started our contemporary service, there was a radio preacher in this area that took me to task for that. One of the things that he said, I didn't hear it. This is reported to me, was, I don't want people with green and blue hair coming to my church. I thought, well, that's exactly what we want. We'd love to have folks that are from the fringes, maybe of society coming. Casting crowns has a great line in one of their songs that says, sometimes we forget that God has to change her heart before he changes her shirt. That's the point that Al's making. We're so sometimes clued into what people are wearing that we forget about their hearts. Let's get people saved and growing in Christ and he'll take care of some of those other things. That's one way. There are lots of other ways. We could probably spend half the evening on this. But anytime we think in terms of rules and regulations and do this and don't do that and so forth, more than the heart than we've missed about. If we focus on those things, we can become hypocritical by putting the emphasis on the external observance, all the rules and regulations without thinking about anyone's heart. The second sign of hypocrisy in verse 43 is craving attention. Look at what Jesus says. He says, whoa to you. Judgment on you, Pharisees. And here's the second reason because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and greetings in the market places. Let me explain what Jesus is talking about. It helps again to understand a little bit of the culture, to understand what's happening here. The most important seats in the synagogue were typically the front seats and they were reserved for the leaders in the synagogue and they typically would face the audience. And so you've got people coming in. In many cases, kind of being ushered in as the leaders to these front seats and the Pharisees relished the pomp and splendor of being escorted to the front as you will. And sitting like kings, surveying the commoners out there and kind of basking in the recognition of who they were. That's the idea that Jesus is getting across here. You know, we get to be noticed and seen by all the ordinary people. That's the idea. They love that. They crave that kind of attention. What about the way that they will not allow? Right. Okay, there's a certain amount of that which is, which is true. For instance, priests, priests were considered religious leaders. They had different dress that they used in the observance of the temple ceremonies and so forth. The elders, which the Pharisees, some of them would be the elders, the men who were considered leaders. There were elders in every town. Those people would be looked up to and they would sit in the seats of judgment and the city gates, the court and that kind of thing. There's a certain amount of that respect which is due to them. What Jesus is pointing out is these guys had crossed the line to where they looked for that. They want that and they bask in that rather than rather than than it being given to them rightly by others. They're looking for ways that they can kind of like peacocks, strut their feathers and be seen by everybody. There's a difference in someone who has a position of authority and being recognized for that. That's legitimate. There's a difference in that and someone who is preening for the audience. Someone who is looking for the acclaim and relishing that. That becomes an issue of pride. During the time that Jesus was stolen from the Pharisees, I don't know. I can't remember the reason you think that there was a different person. They were few and far between. I don't know. I don't know. I can't remember the first person. If I remember any of Jesus' words, the previous straight speech, I remember it was when he went from his work to the one that came and stopped talking out what he was doing. There were a couple that were at least among the Sanhedrin, whether they were Pharisees or Sadducees, which party they were of Nicodemus. Evidently was a man who really was honest about the truth and ended up becoming a follower of Christ. It's clear by the time of Jesus' death. The Pharaoh of the Pharaoh was another who made... We don't know that he was a Pharisee, but he was obviously a wealthy man who had some pool and rank and position. There may have been a few, but by and large, the Pharisees had gotten to the point where all they were concerned about was their position, how people saw them, and making sure everybody stuck by the rules. That was pretty much the Pharisees of that day. They were supposed to be servants and they surely did not feel that way. Yes. Well... The fact that they loved to pray loudly in public and go to a woman and reach the bells before they gave her time to the office was... Exactly. Those are other examples of the fact that what they did, they did to get attention. They craved the attention of other people. And even Jesus mentions here also in verse 43, they loved not only the important seats and synagogues, but the greetings in the marketplaces. And the idea is not they enjoy being around people and handshaking and things like that. What he's talking about here is they love people recognizing that they just showed up. And so everybody kind of, look who's here now and they love that. They love that kind of attention. And that's the idea. Their passion is not for others, it's for themselves. Their passion is not to help other people. Their passion is to make sure that other people recognize them. Let's polish our image any way we can. I want to be seen as above the crowd. That's the idea that Jesus is saying, God's judgment on you for that kind of an attitude. Now we need to be careful because we need to ask ourselves the question, why do we do what we do? Whatever it may be, anyone in a position of leadership, anyone who is preaching, teaching, leading, singing, praying, serving, playing an instrument, whatever, whatever it may be. Anyone who is in any kind of position of receiving attention of being up front needs to make sure where the heart is. Is there a desire to put on a performance, to preem, if you're able to look good, to make sure everybody recognizes you, or if that's what's in the heart, then God is looking at that and saying, you're just a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites. So we only ask ourselves that question, are we craving attention? Is that why we do what we do? Again, Jean brought a good balance to this. There's nothing wrong with giving recognition to people in proper places of leadership, nothing wrong with that. But a verse just came to mind that kind of addresses this balance, Proverbs 27, too, let another man praise you and not you yourself. There are two sides to that. We're not to seek praise for ourselves, but there's also the allowance that other people may do that. And if they do, sometimes the worst kind of pride is trying to deflect all praise and trying to make sure everybody understands you really think you don't deserve that, you're so humble. Let another man praise you, okay, let that go by, but don't let it go to your head and don't begin to praise yourself. I think that's maybe a good balance there. Craving for attention. The third sign of hypocrisy, verse 44, is contaminating others with our influence. This is very interesting the way Jesus says it. Verse 44, woe to you because you are like unmarked graves which men walk over without knowing it. Now again, without understanding a little bit of the culture, it's difficult to grasp what Jesus is saying. Do you remember in the mosaic law that if you came in contact with a dead body, you were considered ceremonially unclean, you couldn't go to the temple and so forth? Well, that would be considered the case if you came in contact with a grave. So what would happen during the time of Passover in Jerusalem? People would whitewash graves because some of them were unmarked. So they would put whitewash over the top of family graves so that no one would unintentionally walk over top of a grave and become ceremonially unclean or contaminated or defiled by coming in contact with a grave. So that's the thing Jesus is talking about here. He's saying, you Pharisees, you're like unmarked graves. People are coming into contact with you and becoming defiled, contaminated because of your influence. The influence you have on people, the way you impact people is a contaminating influence. You're defiling people, those who follow you. And obviously, we can see that because they were turning people against Christ, weren't they? So obviously, anybody following them was being contaminated spiritually and not helped. So again, we have to ask ourselves, is our influence on others, wholesome, godly spiritual, or is it contaminating? When people come into contact with us, do they leave negative, critical, cynical about spiritual things? Or do they walk away refreshed in their spirit, encouraged? See what I'm saying? When people come into contact with us, is there a contaminating influence or a wholesome, godly influence? And if we claim to be the people of God, but people who come in contact with us walk away contaminated in their spirit, then there's something wrong. And that's a sign of hypocrisy. It's a sign that we claim to be followers of God, but we're actually hurting people more than we're helping them. That's not good. So that's a sign of hypocrisy. Any comment or question there? The unmarked grave comment. Okay, fourth sign of hypocrisy is demanding more from others than we are willing to do. Demanding more from others than we ourselves are willing to do versus 45 and 46. One of the experts in the law answered him. And this is how we know that at this meal, there were also scribes there. It was not just the Pharisees, and Jesus was not just invited to a particular man's home, and it was just the two of them, there are scribes there too. So you can tell Jesus is kind of being set up. Here, remember, they're looking for ways to trick him up and trip him up, or trick him into some mistake as regards the Old Testament law. So that's why you got all these experts in the law there. Try to catch him in something. Well, one of the experts in the law answered him, teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also. And I love what Jesus does. He turns to him and starts in on the experts in the law. Now, the next three woes are to the scribes. So this guy says, Lord, you're insulting us too. Jesus said, you ain't heard nothing yet. Man, we're coming in on you now. Here's three woes for you scribes. So he gives him the first one in verse 45, verse 46, Jesus replied, and you experts in the law. Woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them. Now, here's the point. What he's saying to these experts in the law is you're demanding more from them than you're willing to do yourself. You're expecting obedience to all these man-made traditions and rules that you have. Like the one you just tried me to do when I came in this evening, tried to get me to do, you know, doing all that eggshell full of water down your wrist, and then this way, letting the drip off that ceremonial washing, you tried to get me to do all that stuff. And I wouldn't do it. You try to get people to do all that kind of stuff, and you find ways around all the traditions. Remember Jesus earlier in Matthew 15 would take them to task on the fact that you're the Old Testament law required that you take care of your parents. And the Pharisees had gotten around that by saying whatever was supposed to be given to our parents, we're going to say that was dedicated to God. And so we don't have to do that now. See, they found ways to get around some of their own traditions and laws, even the law of Moses. So they pressed them on everybody else, but they found ways to conveniently excuse themselves. That's a sign of hypocrisy. Whenever we demand more from others than we are willing to do ourselves. Whenever we condemn other people for their sins, but don't look at our own, then we're hypocrites. And that's really easy to do, isn't it? We can condemn people for this sin, and that sin and the other sin, and all the time have issues in our own lives that we're just not dealing with. So Congress and insider trading. Right. Yeah. Any time you make laws for the other people, but get around them yourself, that's kind of thing Jesus is talking about. And that is a mark of hypocrisy. We can certainly do that religiously, too, and in spiritual things. Okay, let's go ahead and look at the fifth one. The fifth one is in verses 47 to 51. This is really an interesting one. And that is a faking spirituality when our hearts are full of sin. Faking spirituality when our hearts are full of sin. Notice how Jesus says they do this in verse 47. So you testify that you approve of what your forefathers did. They killed the prophets, and you build their tombs. Because of this, God and His wisdom said, I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill, and others they will persecute. Now, here's Jesus' point. You build tombs for the Old Testament prophets. You do these things to make it look like you're really concerned about honoring the Old Testament prophets. But I'm sending you prophets and apostles now. You're going to kill them. You're going to persecute them. They're following in the line of the Old Testament apostles, and you'll do to them the same thing your forefathers did to the Old Testament prophets. Now, you make it look good, you make it look like you would honor the prophets, but the prophets I'm sending you, you do the same thing your forefathers did. You kill them. And obviously, even worse than that, who are they wanting to kill above anybody else? The Lord Jesus. He is the culmination of all the Old Testament prophets, Sidney. He's the one that, I mean, you know, the book of Hebrews says, in the past, I spoke to you in many different ways through many prophets and so forth. But in these last days, I've sent my son. I've spoken to you in my son. He's the culmination of all the revelation of God. They want to put him to death. So I think it's for that reason. Jesus says what he says next, and this is, this is very tough. And it almost sounds unfair, but I think when you realize that who Jesus is, this is what he's saying. Verse 50. Therefore, this generation will be held responsible for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the beginning of the world, from the blood of able to the blood of Zachariah who was killed between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, this generation will be held responsible for it all. That sounds overly harsh, doesn't it? By the way, able in Zachariah, it sounds amazing because it sounds like A to Z, you know, from prophet able to prophet Zachariah, you're guilty of all the, but actually Jesus is not talking about the alphabet. He's talking about chronologically. Abel was the first person ever killed in the Bible, right? By his brother, Cain. And it was done for religious reasons. It was done because Cain couldn't stand the fact that God favored Abel's sacrifice. Zachariah was the last prophet, not the prophet Zachariah at the end of the Old Testament, but there's a man named Zachariah in 2 Chronicles 24. If you know your Old Testament history, you know that the history part of the Old Testament goes up through 2 Chronicles and Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. And that's the latest historical part of the Old Testament than the other books take place either before or during that same time, but the last prophet in the Bible to be recorded as being killed as a man by the name of Zachariah in 2 Chronicles 24. So you got the first one, you got the last one, and basically Jesus is saying, the first one and the last one, and everybody in between, every prophet killed in the Old Testament, I'm holding you responsible for. Now, is Jesus saying that you actually are guilty of all of those murders? I don't think so, because that would go against what the Bible teaches that every man is responsible for his own sin. And you know, you're not held responsible for someone else's, but I think what Jesus is saying in light of what he's just said about you try to make it look like you honor the Old Testament prophets by building tombs for them, but I'm sending you apostles and prophets and you want to kill them. And even more so, the one who is the fulfillment of all the prophets, you want to put the death. And so because of that, you are guilty of the whole mess. If you would want to kill the greatest prophet of all, then your guilt is as great as if you had killed all the Old Testament prophets. I think that's what he's saying. You're guilty of, you have that much guilt because you're wanting to put the death, the Son of God, and his apostles and prophets. So your guilt, if you compare it to the guilt of all of those who killed the Old Testament prophets, is as great. You're just as guilty as if you'd killed them all. I think that's the point. And so basically, Jesus is saying, you're faking spirituality because you're building these prophets, tombs, making it look like you're, you love the Old Testament prophets. But in your heart, you hate anybody who goes against what you teach, including the prophets. I'm sending you and me myself. So faking spirituality when their heart really is full of sin. Again, we need to ask ourselves, is that true of us? Do we clean up good on Sunday when we come to church, but really our hearts are full of sin through the week? You know, it's easy to live like people who go to confession once a week. It's easy to live that way. It's easy to think, well, I can live any way I want to and then I can wipe the slate clean on Sunday morning. And what Jesus is saying is, that's a fake. That's just a fake. It's hypocrisy. There's one other sign of hypocrisy. We've got to move on, although we don't have any children to pick up tonight. One more sign, it's verse 52. And it's this, obscuring the grace of God, obscuring the grace of God. He says, what do you experts in the law because you've taken away the key to knowledge? You yourselves have not entered and you have hindered those who were entering. Now, in what sense would the experts in the law be taking away the key to knowledge? What does that mean? Teaching false doctrine, okay? All right? Anybody else? Okay. Dampening other people's enthusiasm for learning, turning them away when they're seeking truth. All right? Very good. Okay, I think both of those are true and a part of what we're talking about here, what Jesus is talking about. Okay, the experts in the law, what was their job? What were they supposed to be doing? Scribes, what were they supposed to be doing? They were supposed to be the ones that studied the word of God, the Old Testament, and opened it up for people to understand. Please remember that people did not have copies of the Bible in their homes in those days. That just wasn't available. You had copies of scrolls in the synagogue, but you didn't have a copy of the Bible at home. And so people were dependent on their religious leaders to help them understand the scriptures. I mean, these people literally held the key to knowledge. They could open the door to the scriptures. And so that was their job. And when they gave, like Walt said, false teaching. I mean, that's a heinous crime when you're responsible to be the one the people are depending on for opening up the scriptures, but you're not teaching it right. You're giving them false teaching. And when you're dampening, as Jean said, your enthusiasm for the truth by all of these man-made rules and regulations that were piled on top of Scripture, so that you had to dig through 20 layers to even get to the scriptures. That's a travesty. And that's what Jesus is saying. You've taken away the key to knowledge. You, yourselves, have not entered. You've become so warped by your own emphasis on your traditions that you don't even know what the scriptures teach anymore. You yourself have not entered knowledge. And you hinder those who are trying to enter who really want to know the Bible. They want food from God's Word and what you're giving them is all this layer upon layer upon layer of tradition and rules and regulations. That's sheer hypocrisy. And whenever, whenever we do that, whenever we add to Scripture, then we're guilty of doing the same thing. So Jesus is warning them about hypocrisy and very, very strong terms. Six times. The judgment of God beyond you because of this, he says, to these religious leaders. Now, with each of these six woes, let me tie it together here, with each of these six woes or pronouncements of judgment, Jesus is stripping away another layer of their hypocrisy. He's unmasking them. He's taken the mask off. Now, they're trying to put on this religious front and Jesus has just stripped it away so that people can see the wickedness in their hearts. The hearts of the religious leaders. And they hate him for it. They hate him for it. Look at their response in verse 53. When Jesus left there, this is a meal now. Jesus is left the dinner. The Pharisees and the teachers of the law began to oppose him fiercely and to besiege him with questions waiting to catch him in something he might say. That besiege him fiercely or oppose him fiercely and besiege him with questions. Those are very strong terms that oppose him fiercely. The word fiercely means actually terrifying or violent. I mean, no longer will they make any pretence of being kind. No longer will they make any pretence of engaging in civil conversation with Jesus. Now, the gloves are off now. This is bare knuckle stuff. I mean, they're going after him and they're not going to make any pretence of being kind anymore. They're going to dig into him fiercely opposing him violently going against him and trying to catch him in something he might say so that they can arrest him and put him to death. And they will eventually feel that they're successful in doing that about four months down the road. But they're already looking for anything they can do to catching. If you can get this picture, they are thirsty for blood and they will stalk him hungrily looking for any opportunity to pounce on him and destroy him. Put him to death if they can. They are going to hungrily strike at him. I mean, that's that's the terminology here. The fierce opposition and besieging him with questions. So these don't sound like very spiritual men, do they? I think Jesus has revealed them for who they really are. Who they really are. This is really what's in their heart. Their hearts are full of hatred and and desire to kill. And Jesus has just stripped off all the religious layers to get down to what's really in their hearts. He's exposed them for who they really are. And you know, that kind of light when it it exposes darkness, I mean the little roaches are scattered and everywhere. And these guys, the wickedness of their hearts, their dirty hearts has been exposed and it's not very pretty picture. I said when we started this passage that this is one of those times when I think Jesus eyes were set and his voice was very definite and strong. And I think you could see his anger. What anger's God is hypocrisy. And when Jesus is angry in the gospels, it's always at this. It's always at this. This is not a picture of Jesus that is usually drawn by the artists. This is not a side of Jesus that the artists like to portray. Typically he's carrying a lamb or holding a child on his lap or healing someone and those acts of compassion and tenderness do form a very strong part of our Savior's character. But there is another side to his character and it's good for us every once in a while to see it. And that is that Jesus hated hypocrisy and it angered him to the point that he would rip the layers off and reveal and expose people for who they really were and do it in a public setting if need be. And that's a side of Jesus that is good for us to see because it helps us to see what righteous indignation really is. What holy anger really is. There is a time to be angry at sin and that which misleads people spiritually. That's what God gets angry at. And that's kind of thing we should get angry at too. Don't ever think this is an excuse for us to be hard-hearted and cruel and nasty toward people. That's not the scene here. But God does erupt angrily at religious hypocrisy. That's the one thing that gets you angry. And it's a good lesson. Good lesson for us. Any other comment or question before we go? Alright, let's pray.