Jesus Shows Us How to Live a Holy Life
The Gospel of Matthew
Matthew 23:1-12
Sermon by Rick Crandall
(Prepared January 26, 2023)
BACKGROUND:
*Please open your Bibles to Matthew 23. As you know, Jesus was in Jerusalem to die on the cross for our sins. The city and surrounding villages were crowded with over 2 million Jewish pilgrims there for the annual Passover Feast. (1)
*Early that week, Jesus went into the Temple to drive out the moneychangers and dove merchants, because they had turned the Court of the Gentiles into a den of thieves by cheating the pilgrims. Then in Matthew 21:14-16, "The blind and the lame came to (Jesus) in the temple, and He healed them. But when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that He did, and the children crying out in the temple and saying, 'Hosanna to the Son of David!' they were indignant and said to Him, 'Do You hear what these are saying?' And Jesus said to them, 'Yes. Have you never read, "Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have perfected praise"?'''
*The next day, Jesus went back to the Temple. Luke 20:1 tells us that Jesus was there teaching the people and preaching the gospel to them. That's when the elites of the city started a series of verbal confrontations with the Lord.
*God's Word goes into a lot of detail about these evil scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herodians who had united in their malicious hatred of Jesus Christ. Normally, the scribes and Pharisees were bitter rivals of the Sadducees and Herodians. That's because the Scribes and Pharisees radically enforced their man-made additions to God's Law. Sadducees rejected those laws, and the divide was so bitter that in Acts 23:10, Paul was almost pulled apart during a clash between these two groups. But the Sadducees were far worse in a different way, because they rejected the basic truth of God's Word.
*The scribes and Pharisees were also bitter enemies of the Herodians, because they were supporters of the non-Jewish family appointed by Rome to rule Palestine. But almost all of these men agreed in their venomous rejection of Jesus Christ. They were obsessed with His destruction, and had been plotting the Lord's death for months. (2)
*In Matthew 22, these evil men continued taking turns confronting Jesus, desperately trying to get Him to take a stand against God's Law, or their Roman conquerors. Of course, they miserably failed, because you can't trick God. And Matthew 22:46 ends the chapter by saying that "no one was able to answer Him a word, nor from that day on did anyone dare question Him anymore."
*Now in Matthew 23:1, Jesus began to speak to His disciples and the multitudes of people in the Temple that day. John Phillips explained that "Jesus was still in the temple court with His disciples gathered around Him, the multitudes spread out before Him, and the national leaders of Israel in the background. The leaders were still stinging at being so effectively silenced by the Lord. Already infuriated, they were willing to pay any price to get rid of Him. Now His scathing denunciation of their hypocrisy would sign His death warrant." Phillips said that, because in this chapter you will see Jesus on fire with righteous wrath against the wicked leaders who had twisted God's Law for their own selfish purposes. (3)
*The Lord was just getting started in today's Scripture, but in these verses Jesus also shows us how to live a holy life. Please think about this as we read Matthew 23:1-12.
MESSAGE:
*The first time I ever got sent to the principal's office was in the third grade. My best friend was Zach Smith. We lived close to the school, so Zach, my first grade brother and I used to ride our bikes to school. There were 3 old teachers in our neighborhood (at least 25 or 30 years old), and they walked to school together every day.
*One day, I don't know why, maybe we had seen an old World War II army movie with the planes dive bombing, but one day we decided to dive bomb those teachers. So we zoomed down the hill as fast and close as we could, and we let out a rebel yell as we sped by!
*That was the dumbest thing I had ever done in my life, -- up to that point. We were all in the principal's office about 15 minutes later. And I don't know why in the world I did that. But I was sure it was Zach's fault.
*Zach helped me get in a lot of trouble. Sometimes I would tell my daddy, "Zach did it first." Dad would reply, "If Zach Smith stuck his head in a fire, would you?" I was definitely following the wrong example.
*In these verses Jesus began to talk about some much worse examples: The corrupt religious leaders of His day. But here Jesus also shows us how to live a holy life.
1. FIRST: JESUS WANTS US TO REJECT THE MINDSET OF THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES.
[1] HE WANTS US TO REJECT THEIR HYPOCRISY.
*The Lord makes this truth clear to us in vs. 1-3:
1. Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples,
2. saying: "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.
3. Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.
*Gotquestions.org tells us that "Moses' Seat" goes back to Exodus 18:13, where "Moses sat to judge the people; and the people stood before Moses from morning until evening." In Jesus' day, the teachers of the law and the Pharisees had become the interpreters and enforcers of the law, so their place of authority was called "Moses' Seat," much like our judges are said to be "making rulings from the bench."
*The Roman Empire had given them authority to rule in these local, religious matters, but unlike Moses, many of these men abused their authority. They were teaching many things against God's Word. And back in Matthew 15:3, Jesus had already asked them, "Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition?" We can be sure that when Jesus told the people to obey all of their rulers' commands, He meant the commands consistent with God's Word. (4)
*Jesus was about to severely condemn the scribes and Pharisees for all of their evil ways. And here in vs. 3, He began to stress their hypocrisy. Jesus told the people, "Do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do."
*They were hypocrites. Ed Markquart explained that the English word, "hypocrite," comes from the Greek word, which means "actor." And many of the Pharisees in Jesus' day were good actors. If anyone was ever a religious fake, it was those Christ-rejecting Pharisees. They pretended to be genuinely religious, but it was all a sham, and deception. Like any good actor, they were all "make believe." (5)
*How hypocritical were they? In vs. 4 Jesus put it this way, "They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers." No wonder Jesus wants us to reject their hypocrisy.
[2] HE ALSO WANTS US TO REJECT THEIR HARD-HEARTED ATTITUDE.
*We see the scribes and Pharisees' hard hearts in vs. 4. Again, Jesus said, "They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders. . ." These cruel leaders didn't care a bit about the heavy burdens they were laying on other people. And it's important for us to understand how evil these scribes and Pharisees were.
*In Jesus' day there were only a few thousand Pharisees, but they held power far greater than their numbers. For over a hundred years they had basically been in charge of telling all of the other Jews what was right and wrong. By Matthew 12, the Pharisees were stalking Jesus, looking for any opportunity to accuse Him of breaking their man-made rules. In that chapter Jesus went into a synagogue and healed a man with a withered hand. But it was on the Sabbath day, and that was against their man-made law.
*Luke 6:11 tells us that the Pharisees were filled with rage, and Mark 3:6 says they "went out and immediately plotted with the Herodians against Him, how they might destroy Him." The Pharisees hated Jesus so much, they were working with their enemies to plot His death. You see, Jesus rejected all of the petty rules the Pharisees had added to God's Law. There were thousands of these regulations, like their ungodly law against healing on the Sabbath Day.
*About 1,400 years earlier, just before the Children of Israel entered the Promised Land, Moses spoke to them, and in Deuteronomy 10:12-13 Moses asked them: "What does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments of the LORD and His statutes which I command you today for your good?"
*God gave His Law to the Children of Israel FOR THEIR GOOD. But the Pharisees had corrupted God's Law by turning it into a terrible burden on His people. William Barclay gave this example: In Jeremiah 17:21, "Thus says the Lord: 'Take heed to yourselves, and bear no burden on the Sabbath day.'" But a "burden" had to be defined, so the scribes and Pharisees defined it as "food equal in weight to a dried fig, enough wine for mixing in a goblet, milk enough for one swallow, honey enough to put upon a wound, water enough to moisten an eye-salve," and so on.
*Then they had to settle questions like this: "Could a chair or even a child be lifted on the Sabbath Day?" Or would it be carrying a burden to do so? On and on the regulations went. (6)
*Thank God for the simple good news of the cross of Jesus Christ! It is based on the mercy, grace, and love of Almighty God. The gospel promises forgiveness and a full pardon for all who trust in our crucified and risen Savior. And it calls us up to the best behavior, because of what the Lord has done for us.
*Jesus never wants us to put the burden of petty legalism on other people. He wants us to reject the scribes and Pharisees' hard-hearted attitude.
[3] HE ALSO WANTS US TO REJECT THEIR LACK OF HUMILITY.
*The Lord described their spiritual pride in vs. 5-7:
5. "But all their works they do to be seen by men. They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.
6. They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues,
7. greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'"
*Phylacteries were little leather boxes containing 4 portions of Scripture. The Jews strapped these to their wrist and forehead in response to God's command to wear those portions of His Word as a reminder. For example, in Deuteronomy 6:6-8 Moses said, "And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart; you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes."
*Well, the Pharisees made special, oversized phylacteries to show how "spiritual" they were. They also liked the best places at the feasts, the best seats in the synagogue, and greeting in the marketplace, "Rabbi!" "Rabbi!" They proudly wanted to draw attention to themselves, and they thought they were better than everybody else. (7)
*Probably most Christians struggle with spiritual pride somewhere along the way. I have seen this many times in younger Christians. Let a student get on fire for God, and one of the first traps they fall into is looking down on the people they think they have left behind. But Jesus wants us to reject that kind of spiritual pride. This is the first great lesson for a holy life: Reject the mindset of the scribes and Pharisees.
2. BUT JESUS ALSO WANTS US TO GIVE GOD THE REVERENCE HE DESERVES.
*We must give reverence to God's unique place of leadership in our universe. Jesus teaches this truth to us in vs. 8-10, where He said:
8. "But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher (or Master), the Christ, and you are all brethren.
9. Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.
10. And do not be called teachers (or masters); for One is your Teacher, the Christ.
*Church: This is not a legalistic command from the Lord to never call anyone "father" or "teacher." We know this because other Scriptures in the New Testament use both of these words for people.
*For example, Ephesians 6:1-4 says:
1. Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.
2. "Honor your father and mother,'' which is the first commandment with promise:
3. that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.''
4. And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.
*And in Ephesians 4:11, Paul talked about God's gift of teachers to the church.
*Jesus was not giving us a legalistic command. Instead He was reminding us that there is only one King in God's Kingdom! The Lord wants us to give reverence to God's unique place of leadership. We all have earthly fathers, but there is only one Heavenly Father with a capital "F." We have many teachers in our church and community, but there is only one Teacher with a capital "T." And His name is Jesus Christ!
*Some people want to put Jesus on the level of other great moral teachers. That's why C. S. Lewis wrote, "I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Jesus. That is: 'I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God.'
*That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of thing Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg, or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.
*You can shut Him up for a fool. You can spit at Him and kill him as a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." (8)
*We must give reverence to God's unique place of leadership, but the scribes and Pharisees surely did not. They stubbornly rejected Jesus, not knowing they were disastrously cutting themselves off from the only true God.
*In Acts 7, the deacon Stephen appeared before many of these same men. There Stephen was on trial for his life simply because God was using him in powerful ways to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There in Acts 7:51, Stephen called out those hard-hearted men and said, "You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you."
*This is an amazing thing to me: That man can resist God. Animals can't do that. Think about the animals getting on Noah's Ark. They came two by two just as the Lord told them. Think about Daniel in the lions' den. Those lions weren't about to take a chunk out of him.
*Animals can't resist God. Neither can the weather. God caused it to rain for 40 days, and He stopped the rain in Israel for over 3 years. We also remember Jesus out on the Sea of Galilee in the middle of a terrible storm. But all He had to say was "Peace, be still," and even the wind and the sea obeyed Him.
*The weather can't resist God. Neither can the sun and the stars. God told the star of Bethlehem where to go. He tells all the stars where to go. And on the day that Jesus was crucified, the sun was darkened for 3 hours.
*None of these things could resist God. But for now man can resist and rebel. Man can say "no" to God. Joshua reminded us of this truth in his farewell message to the Children of Israel. In Joshua 24:15 he said, "And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD."
*Choose to serve the LORD God Almighty. We must put Him as the absolute first in our lives. This is the second great lesson for a holy life: Give God the reverence He deserves.
3. BUT JESUS ALSO WANTS US TO FOLLOW THE LORD'S HUMBLE PATH TO GREATNESS.
*All of us need to follow the Lord's humble path to greatness. And in vs. 11-12, He shows us how to do it. Here Jesus said, "But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself will be abased, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
*The only path to true greatness is humble service for the Lord. This is the path that Jesus took Himself. The Apostle Paul reminds us in Philippians 2:5-11, where he said:
5. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus,
6. who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God,
7. but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, and coming in the likeness of men.
8. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
9. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name,
10. that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth,
11. and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
*Paul tells Christians: "LET this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus." "LET this mind be in you." This expression tells us that God is already trying to develop this kind of humility in our hearts. And why? -- Because He wants us to be more like Jesus!
*But it can be hard to humble ourselves. Don Shula was the legendary coach of the Miami Dolphins for many years. Ordinarily he was known as a very humble man, but Shula told about the time his pride got the best of him.
*He and his wife went to a small town in Maine to avoid being noticed on their vacation. They went to see a movie on a rainy, messy night. And when they walked in, the people began to applaud. The famous coach whispered to his wife, "I guess there's no place we can go where people won't recognize me."
*Don sat down, shook hands with the man on his row, and said, "I'm surprised you knew who I am." The man replied, "I'm supposed to know who you are?" -- "We're just glad you came in, because the manager wasn't going to start the movie unless there were ten people here." (9)
*I also like the story about the man who was awarded a humility button from his church. Then they took it away from him, because he wore it. (10)
*We all can get lifted up with pride, but God wants to see humility in our lives. In 1 Peter 5:5-6, the Apostle wrote, "Likewise you younger people, submit yourselves to your elders. Yes, all of you be submissive to one another, and be clothed with humility, for 'God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.' Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time."
*God tells us to "be clothed with humility." And it's interesting to know that the original word for "be clothed" is found only here in the New Testament. This word doesn't mean to put on just any clothes. It means to put on a special scarf or apron that was only worn by slaves. Become a slave for Jesus. "Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God."
*Jesus wants us to have a servant's heart like His. But just because we are serving, doesn't mean we are there yet. If we are serving with bitterness, anger, or resentment in our hearts, then we are still heading in the wrong direction. Psalm 100:2 tells us to "serve the LORD with gladness," and that's what God wants us to do.
*This is the only path to true greatness. Humbling ourselves to trust in the cross of Jesus Christ, knowing that we deserve to spend forever in hell. And trusting that God loves us so much, He was willing to humble Himself to die on the cross for our sins. And now the Risen Savior wants to give us a life of humble service that makes us look like Him.
CONCLUSION:
*Most of the scribes and Pharisees missed it forever. But it's not too late for us. Jesus shows us how to live a holy life. Let's ask Him to help us, and He surely will. And if you have never received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, put your trust in the Lord. Ask Him to save you today, and get started serving the Lord.
(1) Sources:
-BARCLAY'S DAILY BIBLE STUDY SERIES - NEW TESTAMENT by William Barclay - Revised Edition - Copyright 1975 - First published by the Saint Andrew Press, Edinburgh, Scotland - The Westminster Press, Philadelphia, PA - "A King's Welcome" - John 12:12-19
-https://bibleportal.com/commentary/section/william-barclay/a-kings-welcome-john-1212-19-7786
-https://bibleportal.com/commentary/section/william-barclay/a-kings-welcome-john-1212-19-continued-7787
-https://biosidmartin.com/how-many-people-were-in-jerusalem-for-passover-when-jesus-was-crucified/
(2) Sources:
-WORD PICTURES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT by Archibald Thomas (A. T.) Robertson - Published in 1930-1933 - Matthew 12:14; Mark 3:6
-Got Questions: Who were the Herodians? - https://www.gotquestions.org/Herodians.html
-Got Questions: Who are the various Herods mentioned in the Bible? - https://www.gotquestions.org/Herods.html
-Got Questions: What was Herod's temple? - https://www.gotquestions.org/Herod-third-temple.html
-GotQuestions.com - "Who were the Scribes?" - https://www.gotquestions.org/scribes-Jesus.html
-https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jesus/Scribes-and-Pharisees
(3) Adapted from EXPLORING THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW by John Phillips, Kregal Publications, Grand Rapids - "Curses" - Matthew 23:1-39 - Downloaded to "Bible Study 6" from Olive Tree Bible Software, Inc.
(4) Sources:
-Gotquestions.org - "What is Moses' seat?" - https://www.gotquestions.org/Moses-seat.html
-Pax Romana, (Latin: "Roman Peace") - https://www.britannica.com/event/Pax-Romana
-ALBERT BARNES' NOTES ON THE BIBLE by Albert Barnes - Published in 1847-85 - Matthew 23:3 - Downloaded to e-Sword by Rick Meyers - Copyright 2021
-JOHN GILL'S EXPOSITION OF THE BIBLE by Dr. John Gill, D. D. - 1697-1771 - Published in 1746-1766, 1816 - Matthew 23:1, Matthew 23:3 - Downloaded to e-Sword by Rick Meyers - Copyright 2021
(5) Sermons from Seattle by Ed Markquart - Series A - Hypocricy of the Pharisees - Pentecost 24 - Matthew 23:1-12 - http://www.sermonsfromseattle.com/series_a_hypocricy_of_the_pharisees.htm
(6) Sources:
-https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisees
-BibleVerseStudy.com - "Who Were the Pharisees?" - https://www.bibleversestudy.com/johngospel/john7-pharisees.htm
-BARCLAY'S DAILY BIBLE STUDY SERIES (NT) by William Barclay, Revised Edition (C) Copyright 1975 William Barclay - First published by the Saint Andrew Press, Edinburgh, Scotland - The Westminster Press, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - "The Man Who Came by Night" - John 3:1-6 - https://bibleportal.com/commentary/chapter/william-barclay/john/3
(7) BARCLAY'S DAILY BIBLE STUDY SERIES (NT) by William Barclay, Revised Edition (C) Copyright 1975 William Barclay - First published by the Saint Andrew Press, Edinburgh, Scotland - The Westminster Press, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - "The Religion of Ostentation" - Matthew 23:5-12 - https://bibleportal.com/commentary/section/william-barclay/scribes-and-pharisees-matthew-231-39
(8) Adapted from C. S. Lewis, MERE CHRISTIANITY, pp. 55-56
(9) Source: "In Other Words" - Spring 1998 #2 - produced by Dr. Raymond McHenry - www.iows.net
(10) Cross & Crown sermon "Five Growth Attitudes" by James McCullen - 1 Peter 3:8
