Beware Of The Scribes.

BEWARE OF THE SCRIBES.

Luke 20:39-47, Luke 21:1-4.

The Sadducees had been ridiculing belief in the resurrection by asking a hypocritical hypothetical question based on their own favoured Scriptures. Jesus had rounded off His answer by arguing that, according to Moses, death is not the end because Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are still alive to God (cf. Exodus 3:6)! “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto Him” (Luke 20:27-38).

“Then certain of the scribes answering said, Master, thou hast well said” (LUKE 20:39). Being believers in the resurrection themselves, they delighted themselves in the thought that Jesus was on their side. And what a reasonable, well thought out answer He had given! We can almost imagine them smiling to one another, and nodding their heads in approval.

After that ALL of Jesus interlocutors ceased from their questioning: Sadducees, priests, and Herodians on the one side; and scribes and Pharisees on the other (LUKE 20:40).

1. How can David call his son Lord? (Luke 20:41-44).

At this point, Jesus took over the agenda. There are times when we need to stop speaking, stop questioning, and start listening to what God is saying in His Word. Jesus asked, “How say they that Christ is David’s son?” (LUKE 20:41).

Jesus was willing to challenge his challengers within the presuppositions of their pompous religiosity. That Christ is David’s son, they might have all agreed, is easily proved from the Hebrew scriptures (cf. Isaiah 11:1; Jeremiah 23:5; Ezekiel 37:24).

“And David saith in the book of Psalms, ‘The LORD said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand, Till I make thine enemies thy footstool.’” (LUKE 20:42-43). This is a quotation of Psalm 110:1. Jesus astonished them with the following question, arising as it did out of their own Scriptures: “David therefore calleth Him Lord, how then is He his son?” (LUKE 20:44).

Jesus showed up the inadequacies of His interlocutors’ perceptions. More than David’s son, He is David’s Lord.

2. Beware of the scribes (Luke 20:45-47).

What Jesus now said to His disciples was also for the benefit of ALL the people, since they were also there listening (LUKE 20:45).

“Beware of the scribes,” Jesus began (LUKE 20:46).

The robe of a Scribe was a legitimate badge of office within the context of his place of employment: a bit like the cap and gown of academia today. However, some delighted to show off their robes wherever they went. They enjoyed the attention it drew in the market places, causing men to pay them deference.

They loved to sit in the best seats in the synagogues, and the choicest places at feasts. As to the first, such partiality is totally inappropriate in the assemblies of the church (cf. James 2:1-4). As to the second, such behaviour where one is an invited guest shows a complete lack of humility (cf. Luke 14:7-11).

Some Scribes also “devoured widows' houses” warned Jesus (LUKE 20:47a). The Scribes were the lawyers of their day, supposedly applying the law of Moses: but were they perhaps lining their own pockets at the expense of vulnerable widows? Were they condoning a system of religion in which the widow was a victim, giving her last penny to line their pockets (cf. Luke 21:2)?

“And for a pretence they make long prayers. These will receive greater condemnation” (LUKE 20:47b). Jesus teaches elsewhere that those who pray ‘to be seen of men’ (cf. Matthew 6:5) ‘have their reward’ - in other words, their prayers will not reach heaven, but only the ears of the men they are seeking to impress. And as for the length of our prayers, they should lack the ‘vain repetitions’ and ‘many words’ by which ‘the heathen’ think they will be heard (cf. Matthew 6:7).

3. The widow’s two mites (Luke 21:1-4).

Jesus was out in the Temple courtyard, watching people throwing their money into the trumpet-shaped receptacles designed for the collection of financial gifts and offerings (LUKE 21:1). Jesus knew better than anyone that the offerors were putting part of their earnings into a system that had outlived its usefulness, and that the very stones of the Temple would soon be removed from that place (cf. Mark 13:2). Jesus had come as One greater than the Temple (cf. Matthew 12:6), to fulfil all that the Temple stood for (cf. Matthew 5:17).

One impoverished widow - perhaps one whose house had been devoured by the acquisitive Scribes (cf. Luke 20:47) - put in only two small copper coins (LUKE 21:2). Jesus was merely stating the facts and figures, so to speak.

He said nothing of the fact that she, having ‘cast her bread on the waters’ would ‘after many days find it’ (cf. Ecclesiastes 11:1). Nor of the fact that she, having sown her seed, would receive back thirty, sixty, a hundredfold, or whatever (cf. Matthew 13:23). He said nothing of the fact that ‘God loves a cheerful giver’ (cf. 2 Corinthians 9:6-7); nor how, if there is a willing mind, the gift is accepted according to what one has, and not according to what one does not have (cf. 2 Corinthians 8:12).