“Then
the Lord said to him, ‘Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and
dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness.” – Luke 11:39
The story is told of a zoo that was famous for its great variety of
different animals. One day the gorilla died, and to keep up the appearance of a
full range of animals, the zookeeper hired a man to wear a gorilla suit and
fill in for the dead animal. During his first day on the job, the man made some
feeble efforts to move and act like a gorilla. But as he tried to move
convincingly, he tripped and fell over a perimeter wall and ended up in the
lion exhibit. He began to scream, convinced his life was over…until the lion
spoke to him: “Be quiet, or you’re going to get us both fired!”
It’s not
very often that we run into people pretending to be apes or lions, but every
day there are those around us who pretend to be much nicer on the outside than they really are on the inside. And far
too often these individuals are quick to criticize others’ bad behavior while
ignoring their own internal rottenness.
We have a word to describe such people: hypocrites.
In Luke
11:37-44, Jesus tackles hypocrisy head-on. And I’ve got to warn you: For some
of us, his words sting a little. For others of us, his words sting a lot!
The passage
begins with an invitation to dinner. One of the religious legalists (aka, a
Pharisee) asked Jesus over to his house for a meal, and Jesus accepted his
invitation. But as Jesus made a beeline from the front door to the dinner
table, the Pharisee was shocked. Jesus didn’t join the other dinner guests in
their traditional hand-washing ritual before dinner. Now, this wasn’t a matter
of hygiene – it was purely ceremonial. For several generations the Jewish
legalists had prided themselves in their meticulous observance of legalistic
traditions that their forefathers had added to the Old Testament. Sadly, strict
adherence to these rituals had become a litmus test for religious sincerity,
and the Pharisees were the biggest promoters of this religious snake oil. On
this occasion in Luke 11, Jesus had had enough. So, he spoke up and leveled 3
warnings against the Pharisees for their hypocritical legalism.
Warning
#1: (v42) You major in the minors. Jesus challenged the Pharisees’ priorities. They spent
considerable time counting out 10% of every seed and herb in their garden to
give as their tithe. Meanwhile, their neighbors were suffering injustice and
God was not being worshiped. What a travesty! The Pharisees had reduced their
relationship with God to a list of rules, and it had backfired. Just as a
healthy marriage cannot be reduced to a list of rules to follow, our
relationship with God cannot boil down to a “Top 10” list either. The Pharisees
believed that they were in God’s favor because they split hairs over the most
insignificant religious acts. But they were dead wrong! God is much more
concerned with love, compassion, justice and internal righteousness than He is
with seeds and herbs.
Warning #2: (v43) You put your reputation before
your character. In Jesus’ day the seats in a synagogue worked a
lot like the seats at Dodger stadium. The seats up front were the VIP seats,
and the seats in back (in the “nosebleed section”) were cheap seats for the
unimportant people. Guess where the Pharisees always wanted to sit? You guessed
it—in the front row where EVERYONE could see them and be impressed by them. The
Pharisees had somehow forgotten what God had taught the prophet Samuel in the
days of King Saul: “Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at
the heart.” Warren Wiersbe says it so well: “Reputation is what people think we
are, character is what God knows we are.” Therefore, since our character is
what’s most important to God, it must be what’s most important to us as
Christ’s followers.
Warning
#3: (v44) Instead of helping people, you’re harming them. In
verse 44, Jesus compare the Pharisees to unmarked graves. According to Numbers
19:16, any Jew who touched a dead body would be ceremonially unclean for a
whole week. Because of this, the Jewish people would walk far out of their way
to avoid touching any grave or tomb. Yet Jesus told the Pharisees at the dinner
table that they themselves were unmarked graves and tombs. In other words, when
people came to the Pharisees to receive godly counsel and sound biblical
teaching, what they actually received was ungodly counsel and false teaching.
Instead of moving people closer to God, the Pharisees actually pulled them away
from God. Instead of blessing people, they corrupted them.
Sadly, in First Century Israel the Pharisees were doing more
harm than good. It was bad enough that their hypocrisy had corrupted their own
relationships with God. But their hypocrisy was actually corrupting the whole
community as well. Innocent bystanders were being defiled by their teaching.
And Jesus knew that when this happens, judgment day will be especially severe
for these toxic teachers and leaders.
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