Tuesday – “Missing the Point”
(Matthew 26:6-13)
3rd in a series on “Passion Week”
Introduction:
Adventures in missing the point! There’s a story by Dennis Tice that shows with certain originality how people can miss the point. It’s called: “Did Adam and Eve Have Navels?”
“Did Adam and Eve have navels or a blank spot where it should be?
Do other folks lie awake at night or is it only me?
"Thinkin’ about the question that plagues all mankind
"Hmmmmmmm
Belly-button fuzz wuzza part of creation, how could I be so blind?
"I think I’ll start a church someday to preach this creed of mine
Cause Adam and Eve had navels and I’ll prove it at the end of time.
"Sure ‘God is love’ and ‘Jesus saves,’ but what about this truth?
I found the answer just last year in 1st John chapter 2
"Seek out the truth, the truth will set you free
Wait upon the Lord in all sincerity
And then you’ll reach the highest level of Christianity
When you become a Navelist, your eyes will finally see
"That Adam and Eve had navels, I’m telling you today
Yeah, I’m splittin’ hairs for Jesus and that makes it all okay
"And I’m going to take you deeper than your eyes can currently see
I’m splittin’ hairs for Jesus for more spirituality
"I shared this truth with all the land and navelism grew
A thousand members growing strong (cause I preach salvation too)
"But now the church is splittin’ over some technicality,
Did their buttons go in or pop out, how picky can they be?” (Max Lucado, And the Angels Were Silent, The Final Week of Jesus (Multnomah: Sisters, Oregon, 1992), 94-95).
Missing the point can lead to a vicious cycle of misinterpretations, misunderstandings, and vain pursuits. Denominations and various other church movements through the centuries have staked their claim on a sliver of truth in God’s word that sets them apart from the rest. The problem is, however, that the Christian faith isn’t merely about debating God’s foreknowledge of events yet to come, or whether you baptize by full emersion or sprinkling, or whether you believe in “once saved, always saved” or backsliding.
God’s people are to be a unified people. We are to be a people striving to live in community together under the jurisdiction of Christ. But this is where we miss the point! We fail to realize that what really matters is that we all agree that there is only one God of all creation who is eternally existent in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That Jesus Christ was God incarnate. That he suffered and died for all of humanity, taking the sin of the world upon himself, and that anyone who believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
We fail to realize that what’s really important is that we all agree that Jesus rose from the grave on the third day after his death, and that before he ascended into heaven he commissioned all believers to go into the world and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit teaching them to obey all the commands that he gave us. This is where we miss the point!
As we get into our discussion today, I want us to look at specific people or groups of people that missed the point completely about who Jesus was. In contrast to this, however, I also want us to look at one person who didn’t miss the point, but rather lavished Jesus with an anointing that verified his Messiahship.
One of the first groups of people to miss the point about Jesus was:
• The Pharisees:
Matthew 22:15-17 (NLT)
Then the Pharisees met together to think of a way to trap Jesus into saying something for which they could accuse him. [16] They decided to send some of their disciples, along with the supporters of Herod, to ask him this question: "Teacher, we know how honest you are. You teach about the way of God regardless of the consequences. You are impartial and don't play favorites. [17] Now tell us what you think about this: Is it right to pay taxes to the Roman government or not?"
Jesus had just driven the merchants and the money changers out of the Temple and the religious leaders were incited with anger and frustration because of this. And they didn’t waste any time either. They began to plot and work on a serious plan to trap Jesus. They were trying to find anything to accuse him of for the purpose of taking him into custody. So they devised a plan to trick him based on his loyalties.
Taxes were a sensitive topic in Jesus day. (Not much changes with time does it?) The question that the Pharisees posed to Jesus was one that placed him between a rock and a hard place.
According to William Barclay, there were three distinct taxes that the Roman government placed on the people. "There was a ground tax that was taken which was one tenth of the grain, and one fifth of the oil and wine which a man produced. There was the income tax which was one percent of a man’s total earnings for a year. And lastly, there was a tax called the poll tax which was paid by males between the ages of 14 – 65, and females between the ages of 12 – 65 and was the equivalent of just over a day’s wage" (William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series, The Gospel of Matthew, Vol. 2 (Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, Kentucky, 1975), 272). The poll tax is what was in question here.
To us, this doesn’t seem to be that tough of a question, but considering the circumstances surrounding Jewish customs and loyalties this put Jesus in a very compromising position.
First, if Jesus said it was unlawful to pay the tax, the Pharisees would have reported him to the Roman officials as a rebellious, rabble-rouser who was instigating trouble and disloyalty of the people to the Roman Government. If he said it was lawful to pay the tax, he would stand discredited in the eyes of the people. Barclay says that, “Not only did the people resent the tax… they resented it even more for religious reasons. To a Jew God was the only king; their nation was a theocracy; to pay tax to an earthly king was to admit the validity of his kingship and thereby to insult God. Therefore the more fanatical of the Jews insisted that any tax paid to a foreign king was necessarily wrong” (The Daily Study Bible Series, The Gospel of Matthew, Vol. 2, 272).
But Jesus was wise to their trickery. He understood what was happening. And because he could see beyond the questions and into the hearts of men he was able to answer with swift and cunning onslaught of soul-piercing truth. Listen to what happened:
Matthew 22:18-22 (NLT)
But Jesus knew their evil motives. "You hypocrites!" he said. "Whom are you trying to fool with your trick questions? [19] Here, show me the Roman coin used for the tax." When they handed him the coin, [20] he asked, "Whose picture and title are stamped on it?"
[21] "Caesar's," they replied.
"Well, then," he said, "give to Caesar what belongs to him. But everything that belongs to God must be given to God." [22] His reply amazed them, and they went away.
The Pharisees had missed the point completely. They neglected to see the trees for the forest. Jesus had been giving them glimpses of the kingdom of God for over three years, and because of the evil and wickedness in their own hearts they were blinded to the truth. The responsible God-fearing person has an obligation to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God; this requires both loyalty to God and loyalty to the state. We owe God our lives, and it’s to him that we are dedicated first, but we also owe a great deal to our government for the protection and welfare they provide for us.
Jesus cut the Pharisees to the quick with his response because they were completely off base to begin with. They had been living lives of corruption and deceit, or they would have known better that: life is more than money, taxes, politics, and power; it’s about giving, loving, caring, and sharing all for the sake of Christ
When divisiveness rules the heart there are no boundaries to the evil it can cause. The Pharisees missed the point, and so do we when we allow our selfish ambition and desires grab hold of us and blur the knowledge of the truth.
There is another group that missed the point:
• The Sadducees:
Matthew 22:23-28 (NLT)
That same day some Sadducees stepped forward—a group of Jews who say there is no resurrection after death. They posed this question: [24] "Teacher, Moses said, 'If a man dies without children, his brother should marry the widow and have a child who will be the brother's heir.' [25] Well, there were seven brothers. The oldest married and then died without children, so the second brother married the widow. [26] This brother also died without children, and the wife was married to the next brother, and so on until she had been the wife of each of them. [27] And then she also died. [28] So tell us, whose wife will she be in the resurrection? For she was the wife of all seven of them!"
Now, in order to understand this passage better, we must understand something about the Sadducees. They were the high, aristocratic group of Jews which held their beliefs only in the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament) as truth. The Sadducees were the governing class of Jews who held positions such as “high priest” and were readily willing to cooperate with the Roman government when needed.
Because they believed only in the first five books of the Old Testament as truth to live by, they did not believe that there was life after death due to the lack of direct evidence stated in these books. This is where they differed from the Pharisees. Because the Sadducees didn’t believe in life after death, they definitely did not believe in the resurrection of the dead, thus, the ludicrous nature of the question they asked Jesus. They asked Jesus, what was to them, a bogus question.
Jesus, in turn, counters their question with the real nature of their inquisition. Listen to his response:
Matthew 22:29-33 (NLT)
Jesus replied, "Your problem is that you don't know the Scriptures, and you don't know the power of God. [30] For when the dead rise, they won't be married. They will be like the angels in heaven. [31] But now, as to whether there will be a resurrection of the dead—haven't you ever read about this in the Scriptures? Long after Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had died, God said, [32] 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' So he is the God of the living, not the dead."
[33] When the crowds heard him, they were impressed with his teaching.
The reason our minds can’t conceive of what heaven will be like is that it is so completely more than what we can possibly understand.
We live in a fallen world where evil runs rampant, where sorrow and pain are prevalent, and where death and dying are a reality. We can’t even begin to fathom a world without the realities we know. Relationships on earth pale in comparison to the relationships we’ll have in heaven because there will be no hint of selfishness or evil desires; there will be no attempt at personal gain. Rather, our relationships will be full and complete under girded by the strengthening power of God weaving us into a community of oneness and perfect unity.
The Sadducees missed the point, because they misunderstood what real relationships should be. They also missed the point because they didn’t believe in life after death, though the truth was right in front of them all along. God is a God of the living, not the dead!
Another unlikely group to miss the point was:
• The Disciples:
Matthew 26:6-16 (NLT)
Meanwhile, Jesus was in Bethany at the home of Simon, a man who had leprosy. [7] During supper, a woman came in with a beautiful jar of expensive perfume and poured it over his head. [8] The disciples were indignant when they saw this. "What a waste of money," they said. [9] "She could have sold it for a fortune and given the money to the poor."
[10] But Jesus replied, "Why berate her for doing such a good thing to me? [11] You will always have the poor among you, but I will not be here with you much longer. [12] She has poured this perfume on me to prepare my body for burial. [13] I assure you, wherever the Good News is preached throughout the world, this woman's deed will be talked about in her memory."
[14] Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve disciples, went to the leading priests [15] and asked, "How much will you pay me to betray Jesus to you?" And they gave him thirty pieces of silver. [16] From that time on, Judas began looking for the right time and place to betray Jesus.
I love what William Barclay says about these particular verses of scripture. Barclay entitles this section commentary, “Love’s Extravagance” and in this he refers to the seemingly wasteful act of this precious and expensive perfume being poured all over Jesus’ head.
The disciples had lost sight of the law of love that Jesus had shown to them over the time they had spent together. They had missed the point of his coming, and had somehow neglected to remember who he was.
They saw this simple sacrifice of love as poor stewardship, but Jesus reminded them about the coming events that would forever define them and the world as they knew it to be. Jesus was on his way to the cross, and this act of love was an anointing for his burial. The disciple’s resentment of the actions of this woman blinded them to the bigger picture of the scene that was unfolding before their very eyes. They had completely missed the point!
To add insult to injury, Judas carried his misunderstanding of who Jesus was to a whole new level of impropriety for he would be the one to betray Jesus and hand him over to the authorities to be tried and crucified.
But what of the person who understood? What of the person who discerned with great certainty who Jesus was..?
• The Woman:
“According to Reuters news agency, Daniel Lehner and his wife Remy, were married December 12, 1993. Evidently they believe in doing up anniversaries in a big, big way. Before they even celebrated their first anniversary, they made plans for how they would celebrate their second. They made plans to go to one of their favorite plays – The Phantom of the Opera, by Andrew Lloyd Webber – which they had already seen many times.
“But just going to the play was not enough to express their love. They wanted to make a grand gesture. So, more than a year in advance, they bout tickets for every seat in the house of New York’s Majestic Theatre for December 12, 1995. That’s 1,609 seats.
“With that date still more than a year away, how do you think they celebrated their first anniversary? That’s right. They went to see The Phantom of the Opera.
“Daniel and Remy evidently love each other – and this play – deeply. As they have demonstrated, one of the marks of passionate love is extravagance.
“When Jesus walked the earth, there were people who expressed their love to him with extravagance, and Jesus calls us today to love him with an extravagant love” (Craig Larson & Leadership Journal, 750 Engaging Illustrations for Preachers, Teachers, & Writers (Baker Book House: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1993, 1996, 1998), 156).
Read with me again:
Matthew 26:6-7 (NLT)
Meanwhile, Jesus was in Bethany at the home of Simon, a man who had leprosy. [7] During supper, a woman came in with a beautiful jar of expensive perfume and poured it over his head.
This woman got the point! A seemingly obscure woman, who, if not for the fact that she poured this expensive perfume on Jesus’ head, would have been overlooked in the crowd. She understood that Jesus was more than just a Teacher, more than just a Prophet, more than just a Healer; this Jesus was a man sent from God. In fact, this precious act of anointing was more than a proclamation of her admiration for a mere man; it was an act of sincere devotion to none other than, the Son of God.
She must have known that he wouldn’t get the proper burial he deserved, for anointing with sweet smelling perfumes was reserved after a person had died. However, if a man was convicted and executed as a criminal he would have been left for the vultures or thrown in a pit to forever be forgotten. As most of us know Jesus was tried, falsely convicted, and crucified as a criminal. This woman knew his time was coming to a close. She got the point. Even when he had told his disciples several times before that he was going to die, they missed it… but she didn’t.
Conclusion:
I close with a quote today from William Barclay who aptly says this about the extravagant love of the woman who got the point’,
“…there are times when the common sense view of things fails. On this occasion the voice of common sense said, ‘What waste!’ and know doubt it was right. But there is a world of difference between the economics of common sense and the economics of love. Common sense obeys the dictates of prudence; but love obeys the dictates of the heart. There is in life a large place for common sense; but there are times when only love’s extravagance can meet love’s demands. A gift is never really a gift when we can easily afford it; a gift truly becomes a gift only when there is sacrifice behind it, and when we give far more than we can afford” (The Daily Study Bible Series, The Gospel of Matthew, Vol. 2, 330).
