Saturday, September 15, 2012

Saturday, September 15th

Today's passage from the Chronological Bible In a Year Reading Plan is Daniel 4-6
Today's scripture focus is Matthew 23:13-39


13 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.
15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as you are.
16 “Woe to you, blind guides! You say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it means nothing; but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ 17 You blind fools! Which is greater: the gold, or the temple that makes the gold sacred? 18 You also say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it means nothing; but if anyone swears by the gift on it, he is bound by his oath.’ 19 You blind men! Which is greater: the gift, or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 Therefore, he who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And he who swears by the temple swears by it and by the one who dwells in it. 22 And he who swears by heaven swears by God’s throne and by the one who sits on it.
23 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. 24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.
27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
29 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. 30 And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your forefathers!
33 “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? 34 Therefore I am sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. 35 And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. 36 I tell you the truth, all this will come upon this generation.
37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. 38 Look, your house is left to you desolate. 39 For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”


After exposing the Pharisees as false spiritual leaders, in this passage Jesus pronounces judgment on them and curses them.  MacArthur goes through this passage in this sermon.

v13 - He curses them for keeping people from entering the kingdom of God because of their false spiritual leadership.
v15 - He curses them for not only keeping people from entering the kingdom, but perverting them into accepting their false religion and in so doing, ushering them into hell
v16-22 - He curses them for their lying and deceptive hearts.  They had developed a system to evade the truth but still appear pious.  For ex - they would promise something and swear by the temple that they would keep that promise, only later they would break it with the excuse that they had only sworn by the temple and not by the gold in the temple, so it didn't really count.  Kinda like kids who cross their fingers behind their backs.  Liars!  They were the blind leading the blind, lying all the way but still trying to appear pious.  God is truth.  God hates lying.  We are to be people of such integrity that others know that our "yes" means yes and our "no" means no.  Here, Jesus almost deals with the stupidity of such lying, not even the obvious immorality of it.  I mean, it's absurd and illogical to claim that the gold of the temple is greater than the temple. The gold is nothing. The only reason it's of any value at all is because it's in the temple which is only of any value at all because it's where God dwelt.
v23-24 - He curses them for their hypocritical giving. They were tithing their produce (as they were required to) but right down to their kitchen spices because they thought it made them look so pious, but then completely overlooked the more important matters of justice, mercy and faithfulness.  Micah 6:8 He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you?  To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Yes, you should tithe (properly, not ridiculously) but what you should really be concerned about is justice, mercy and faithfulness.  The false religious leaders had done the complete opposite, and it's like they were straining out the gnat (the smaller of the unclean creatures) and swallowing a camel instead (the largest of the unclean creatures).  It was hypocritical and ridiculous.
v25-26 - He curses them for being concerned about their ministry looking pious on the outside, but in reality they were completely taking advantage of people through extortion, excess and greed.
v27- He curses them for being like white-washed tombs. They would put white wash on the tombs so that people wouldn't accidentally touch them and defile themselves.  So, on the outside these tombs looked bright and pure and white - but on the inside they were tombs.  Just like the Pharisees who appeared righteous and pure, but inside were corrupt and dead.
v29 - He curses them for pretending to be so much better than everybody else.  They're big into memorializing the saints and heroes of the past and claim that they would never do what they're forefathers did - kill the prophets of God.  Meanwhile, what are they plotting right then?  To kill the very Son of God! And in v32 he simply means - do it. They were planning to murder the greatest prophet of all time.  Go ahead. No, they weren't any better, if anything they were even worse.
And in v33 he damns them to hell.

What should a true spiritual leader do?  Well, the opposite of all of these things!  They should bring people to heaven, make them righteous, lead people into truth, serve people, make holy anyone they touch, humble themselves and recognize that they are the least of the chiefs of sinners.

What kind of leader are you? Remember we are all leaders.  Primarily and especially to our children.  But also to all those walking in faith alongside us.  How will we lead?

And then come some of the saddest words in the Bible.  God removes His hand of protection from His chosen people because they have rejected Jesus Christ.

MacArthur gives a history of the persecution the Jewish people have endured since the time of Christ and it is truly horrific.  And the reason for it is because they had rejected Christ, and so God removed His hand of protection.  And Satan targets the Jews more than any other people because they are God's chosen ones.  But God will always preserve a remnant, and obviously, individual Jews continue to come to Christ.

Yes, these are furious words of judgment.  But here we also see God's incredible compassion and intense grief.


Let me just say to those of you who tend to be hard-line Calvinists, I find no absolute determinism in this verse. I find no fate here. I find no predetermined destiny here without thought for a response. I find here that God would, but you wouldn't. That's what I find here. And somewhere in the midst of that incredible apparent paradox of sovereignty and volition, we've got to see this passage. "I would," He says. "How often I would have gathered, but you would not." And every soul that spends eternity outside the protection of God, every soul that spends eternity in hell is there because they would not, they would not.
The gospel gives no place for absolute determinism....There's no determinism there. I would, but you would not. Man's choice, don't ever forget it theologically, man's choice is as much a part of salvation as is God's choice. You would not. You would not. And anyone who goes to hell goes there because they would not, they would not. In this sense, grace is resistible and every person responsible....
So here Christ rejected Israel because Israel rejected Him. Now may I add again as I said earlier, the gospel is still opened to individual Jews. On the day of Pentecost 3,000 Jews were saved. Later on, many thousands more were saved. Jews have been saved throughout all history. They're still be saved today. There are still many of them whose hearts are opened to the gospel of Jesus Christ. God will always have remnant. Individual Jews can come, but as a nation, God has removed His hand of blessing, and they're exposed... So sad, so heartbreaking. You say, is that end? Bless God it isn't the end....
"I say unto you, you shall not see me anymore." Stop at that point. Jesus says, I'm gone. This is the end. Farewell from your Messiah. Your rejection is final and it was proven final because when the apostles came and preached after Christ was gone, they wanted them dead too. Nothing changed. It's the end of the call for Israel. They refused the grace of salvation when it was offered to them. His mission to them as Savior as a nation has ended. You want see me anymore, I'm gone.
That's the end. You say wait a minute. That's the end? Is that the end of Israel? You shall not see me anymore. Period, paragraph. Is there where the verse ends? It doesn't end there. If it ended there, it would dramatically change all of our doctrine, all of our theology. It'd be over with. I'll tell you something else it would do. It would make us doubt that we could ever trust God again. Because if He said to that nation, you will never see me again, then He's just broken some pretty strong, some pretty strong promises.
My Bible tells me in the Old Testament that He promised them that He would regather them. That ultimately he would be their Savior. That ultimately He would be their king. That ultimately they would come into a relationship with Him. That ultimately all the promises and covenants would come to fruition. If my Bible ended at the word henceforth or anymore, and there's nothing more for Israel, I've got to rethink the whole Old Testament and the character of God who made promises He's now not going to keep, but it doesn't end there.
It says this, what's the next word after henceforth or no more? Until, not unless, but until. "You're not going to see me anymore until," now there's hope in that..."Until you shall say blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord." ...That was a cry meant to identify the Messiah. ..In other words, you're not going to see me ever again ...Until you recognize me as your Messiah.


One day, Israel will recognize Jesus as their Messiah.
Zechariah 12:9-10  On that day I will set out to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son. 

Israel's history is going to get worse and worse.  But when the cup of wrath is finally poured out, God will turn the tables and destroy the nations that come against Jerusalem and pour out on Jerusalem the spirit of grace.  The blinders will finally come off and they will mourn because they will realize that they have killed the only son, the firstborn, the Messiah. And they will realize that all these long years of intense suffering has been the result of rejecting their Messiah and there will be intense mourning. And then God will wash the nation clean and they will see Him, and they will be regrafted in.

What does it have to do with me? Just this, listen to me. If God has chastened and punished and cursed by abandoning His own beloved people Israel, what do you think is going to happen to you if you reject Jesus Christ? Do you think you'll fair any better who are not His people? Don't be proud. This lesson of a nation in history can be reduced to a lesson for a man and a woman in this moment of time. For it must be said to you as well, if you love not the Lord you are cursed. The principle is the same whether a nation or an individual. You make a choice. The Lord seeks to gather you into the safety of His love and salvation. Will you or won't you allow that to happen? He would, but in so many cases you would not. And bring upon yourself the same abandonment you're left to Satan's devices. 

What an incredible intense passage!

Tomorrow's scripture focus: Matthew 24:1-25
Tomorrow's Bible In a Year Passage passage: Daniel 7-9

1 comment:

Miriam said...

Wow. Excellent information here. I love it when I read a passage and I get about 30 or 40% of it, and then I learn so much more from the post. Thank you!