The harshest sermon ever preached, part 1

Sermon for the week of Judica – Lent 5

Hosea 9:1-9 + Matthew 23:13-22

Turn your minds back to Holy Week, Tuesday afternoon, as Jesus continues His harsh sermon against the scribes and Pharisees. Last week we heard the introduction of Jesus’ sermon, spoken to His followers about the scribes and Pharisees. Now, He turns directly toward those scribes and Pharisees and rails against them in what can only be called an angry tirade, pronouncing upon them woe after woe, curse after curse (that’s what “woes” are, curses). And as we consider this evening the first four of the eight woes Jesus pronounced upon them, remember, His passionate curses are not directed against His penitent and believing followers, but against the unbelieving ministers of His Church who have done such great spiritual damage to His beloved flock. Hear your God’s anger at them, and in it, hear your God’s devotion to His precious sheep.

The first curse: But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men. For you neither go in yourselves nor allow those who are entering to go in. How had they shut up the kingdom of heaven, both for themselves and for others? By teaching that keeping the Law was the way to earn a place in God’s kingdom. This is something we have to watch out for, because a lot of Christians out there have been taught that keeping the Ten Commandments is the way to heaven. “If we just keep the Commandments, we’ll be fine! If only we put the Ten Commandments in our schools, then the children will learn to be godly and righteous!” No! The only way for anyone to be godly and righteous in God’s sight is by trusting in the Lord Jesus for mercy, because of how we have broken the Ten Commandments. The crime of the scribes and Pharisees lives on today, and so does Jesus’ curse against those who believe and who teach that good works are the way to eternal life. They are not the way. Jesus alone is the Way. Once a person enters by the Way, then, yes, good works should and will follow, and the Commandments have their proper place in the life of the Christian, not as the way into God’s kingdom, but as the code of conduct within God’s kingdom.

The second curse: Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you shall receive the greater damnation. How did they devour widows’ houses? By showing no mercy to them in their time of need. By making sure they didn’t get justice in court because the Pharisees favored the rich over the poor widow. They took advantage of the poor widows, because they could get away with it. Meanwhile, they stood up in front of the people of Israel and made lengthy prayers to God, showing everyone how righteous and religious they were. But it was a pretense, Jesus says. They were only pretending to be righteous and compassionate. The word “hypocrite” literally means pretender, one who is putting on an act. But God sees through every pretense. And for those who behave as the scribes and Pharisees did, there will be “greater damnation,” because they commit their sins in the name of God, and convince people that God favors them and their behavior. For that, they will suffer in the lowest pits of hell.

The third curse: Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, you make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves. The scribes and Pharisees did their version of “evangelism,” apparently, going out and seeking to bring people into the Jewish religion. And, if it had been the pure Jewish religion which taught people to humble themselves before God and to seek His favor through the promised Messiah, that would have been great. But that’s not at all what they did. Instead, they brought people into the Church and then turned them in self-righteous, nose-in-the-air people who were even more snobbish and merciless than the Pharisees were. In your lifetime, you have probably seen or heard of church people who fit that description to a tee, to the point that, in some people’s minds, it has become a caricature of what it means to be a Christian. Always been on your guard against such hypocrisy, so that it can never be said about you! Because having Jesus describe a person as a “child of hell” should send chills down such a person’s spine.

The fourth curse, and the final one before us tonight: Woe to you, you blind guides, who say, “Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing. But whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor!’ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? And, you say, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing. But whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is guilty.’ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift? Therefore whoever swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it. And whoever swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it. And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it. Oaths and vows were regulated by the Law of Moses. They were to be taken only in God’s name, calling upon Him as the One who would judge the liar or the oath breaker. By extension some people were taking oaths with the Jerusalem temple or God’s altar as the witness, not unlike how presidents take their oaths of office with their hand on a Bible. But the Pharisees had introduced these strange human ordinances and traditions, claiming that an oath taken on the temple or on the altar wasn’t binding. Only an oath taken on the gold in the temple or on the sacrifices on the altar was binding! These may seem like minor technicalities to us, but that’s kind of the point. Jesus is pointing out just how foolish the Pharisees had become in their micro-managing and regulating of everything, to the point that God and His Word were left behind in the dust, because they had made the life of God’s people all about following their made-up little laws instead of focusing on God and His temple and His Word. And God was fed up with it, because those blind Pharisees were blindly guiding God’s precious sheep to their destruction.

This is a harsh sermon, and Jesus isn’t done yet. As I said earlier, the curses aren’t directed at the penitent believers who have put their trust in the Lord Jesus. It’s directed at the hypocrites. But in exposing their hypocrisy, He is exposing the sin that infects all of us, showing us again why we can’t save ourselves, why we can never rely on our works, but must rely on Him alone to save us by His innocent suffering and death. He’s also warning us, because the sins of the Pharisees are all-too-common among those who have become religious, because the more religious we become, the more devoted to God and His Word, the less we participate in the blatant sins of the unbelievers, which is good. But then what can too easily happen is that we start to think highly of ourselves and our goodness, and that’s a recipe for disaster for the Christian. Trust in the Lord Jesus, never in yourself. And take comfort in His sermon against the hypocrites, because it’s your salvation that moved Him to preach it. Amen.