Beholding Jesus

Jesus came to Earth to die for our sins, but He also had an active ministry while He was here. He healed the sick, raised the dead, and even turned water into wine. Jesus made wrong right. He is the ultimate good and through Him we have all of our strength. We can take no credit.. we owe it to God. This chapter was part of one of Jesus’ last sermons in the synagogue before the last supper, and His crucifixion. His “final address” if you will.

23:1- 5 Jesus spoke to the multitudes and disciples… (there had to be scribes and Pharisees present)… He commands the multitudes to respect the scribes Pharisees, because they sat in Moses’ seat. They were to follow their direction, but not to follow their example, because it was contrary. (Do as I say and not as I do?) Funny how this represents a lot of parents nowadays. Jesus explains that they “bind heavy burdens that are hard to bear”, while they will not move them with “one finger”. They speak tough truth! Tough righteousness! And yet they will not touch it with one finger. The works that they do, are only to gain credit from man. The purpose of their doing this work was not to be righteous before God, but to be righteous before man! They love the credit of man. What was the reaction of this message by the people? They were shown to be let down by their leaders. The leadership of their nation was exposed to be hypocritical. They had the word knowledge right, but no revelation, not enough to change their lives. It is one thing to have head knowledge, as I have had. These scribes and Pharisees grew up with knowledge of the Christ, in fact, were waiting for Him! Because they had head knowledge, and pride, so much so to blind them from the one thing they were looking for! How dangerous is pride! They end up, in the “interest of the nation” end up crucifying Jesus.

“If we cannot turn to them? Who can we turn to?” Perhaps a feeling of desperation and need for things to be made right! The Pharisees and scribes, since they were just described as loving the opinion and pride of man, were probably completely embarrassed. Exposed. Naked. Maybe some of them began to see the desperation of their souls?

I think that was Jesus’ intention. But most of them hardened their hearts even further, as the same people were about to crucify Christ. They were looking for the Christ, but were blinded by their pride.

23:6-12 “…they love the best places in the synagogues.” They love the titles. They love the recognition. “…Rabbi! Rabbi!” But Jesus says One is your teacher. He who is greatest will be your servant. He who is greatest will lead by example, and not by word alone. He who is greatest will care genuinely. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled. Whoever cares about himself more then others will be stripped of his false image of righteousness. Whatever can be shaken will be shaken, out of the goodness of God’s just and righteous heart.

23:13-29 “…Woe to you!” They are hypocritical. Jesus shows them how. Again, how they were not convicted and quickly moved to change is beyond me. Pride is blinding! They shut up the kingdom, not going in, and stopping others. Devouring widows houses as a pretense to pray. Traveling for missions, making simple converts, and then by example leading them astray into lies and deceit. Swearing by the temple as if its worth nothing, but swearing by the gold as if its worth more. Misplaced priorities are revealed. Your heart focus truly shown! That people would have more focus on things of the world then things of God. Money is the root of all evil. How often does this happen in the church today? Strict about tithes but missing justice, mercy, and faith. Straining a gnat and missing the camel. Again, priorities? The root of evil hiding behind so-called “righteousness”. Its an appearance, but a white washed tomb is still full of bones.

23:29-35 – Jesus calls out the scribes and high ranking religious officials on so called honor of the prophets. They honored their graves saying “Oh if only it was in our time, we would not have been so blind! We would not have persecuted you!”. In reality, they were about to crucify God’s son.

Who was a lot harder to miss then any other prophet in existence! He had just raised Lazarus from the dead! What could have moved them to such blindness? Misplaced priorities and pride?

The desire for power so great that they were not willing to give it up? To the point where the more that the people exalted Jesus, the more they wanted Him dead. Like Saul who, was so jealous for attention that He wanted to kill David. The call to servanthood, I think, could be there for protection against this level of mind numbing pride. What if the Pharisees’ motivation was to serve the people? To be lowest?

23:31-39 – Jesus goes prophetic on ‘em! They were witnesses against themselves! They were hypocrites! How Jesus must have longed for these who knew the Bible so well in and out to come to the realization of who He was! They were so close. But they had pursued knowledge of Him in pride for themselves. I must be careful of studying to Bible to be the next hotshot preacher! Wicked! Pride drove Satan against God and brought complete insanity. Who stands against God? I dare not let my pride get to that point. I must chase servanthood for my own safety! As much as I feel the call to lead, I must never forget the danger of allowing pride room in my life. Pride and money, in this chapter, are the roots of the Pharisees and scribes downfall. Jesus predicts prophets, wise-men, and scribes enduring killing, scourging, and crucifixion by their hands. Jesus laments over this. He describes His love for Israel and finished by saying this: “See! Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’”.

What is interesting is that shortly after that Israel was destroyed as a nation. In the last century they were recognized as a nation again. What does this mean? Christ is not coming back to Israel until the religious leaders declare that He comes in the name of God. (ref. Psalm 118) Two centuries ago we would have considered this prophecy impossible. But God’s word never returns void (as history has proven!). When the religious leaders declare this from the platform, we will see Jesus again! Until then, may we learn from their example and not be blinded by our own pride.

Day 1 Matthew 23: 1-12:

As I was reading the beginning of this passage (versus 1-12) what stood out to me is how it easy it is to just see people from the outside appearance, like the Pharisee. It is by God’s grace that I am saved. It is by His grace that I am becoming sanctified day by day from things of the world such as pride, compromise, materialism, generational status, professional title and appearance, religious spirit and rebellion from God via the desire of the praise of man resulting in fear of man. 

I believe God that He is currently drawing a line in the sand with His mighty sword and stating to all who walk by, “She is Mine.” He is giving me victory from the past life that Satan had for me.  But, because of God’s great mercy, He has delivered me and is delivering me from a ‘good’ destiny in the world’s eyes. He is putting me back together into His original design for me which is His ‘best’ destiny. This is important to understand because we know that good is the enemy of God’s best and Satan will do whatever he can to get us to compromise and not become fully abandoned to follow after the heart of God, loving justice, righteousness and mercy.

Day 2 Matthew 23:13-33:

As I recap from yesterday’s reading, it is interesting to see that from the beginning of this passage, I see that Jesus is not afraid to rebuke the Pharisees and call them out on their sin of delighting to look at the outside appearance of man where as God sees the heart of man. Jesus is a bold as a lion when He does this as He states it in front of all who walk by in verses 1-12.   He specifically states that how concerned the Pharisees were about their appearance to the point that they not only followed the Old Testament law of Moses exactly as stated in Exodus 13:2-10 but made their tassels fringes from their garments to hang longer, longed for their title to be called out in the cities to draw attention to themselves.  Jesus desired to turn this method of thinking upside down.  He saw the pride that lies in their hearts, their inner motif for doing the things they did. Therefore, He opposed it. He despised it and was not afraid to call them out on it, for they exalted themselves over Him.

Today, I focused on versus 13-33. Honestly, it reminds me much, do I dare say, of people I know that desire to be more concerned about their speech in their prayers than their heart condition before the Holy God. They are more concerned about the kind of gift they received than the Giver who gave it. These people are more concerned with saying that we have tithed big in front of people they believe are important than helping a poor person buy groceries, and lastly, the Pharisee is more concerned with shunning the widow, leper or outcast from society to make himself look good, finding security in his money and his status than he is with looking within his own heart and making sure that he is right before God.  This is humbling to me as well as frustrating. It takes a Holy God, a God of Justice and Mercy, to break in and turn them upside down. 

Day 3 Matthew 23:34-39: 

Today, as I read this portion of the passage I began to see how serious Jesus is about bringing vengeance unto Jerusalem if they do not turn and repent and come back to their first love, not just stating it with their lips but being made anew, righteous within themselves. Because of their sin of killing off the prophets wise-men, and teachers, their city has been desolate and Jesus mourns over it. He makes it clear that Jerusalem will not see Him till they humble themselves and say, “Blessed be Him who Comes in the Name of The Lord.”

Because we have been grafted into His Kingdom, He also includes us into this picture. Though we may have a Christian title put on our Western church, if we truly do not live out the Christianity from the inside out, He will also say, “Away from Me, for you truly do not know Me.” His vengeance will also come upon us. However, He will welcome all who are humble, faithful and willing. This really spoke to me because I see how the Western Church in many ways has taken on the role of compromise. Some churches, such as the homosexual ones, have gone as far as kept the title but nothing more and have compromised with the faith in every other way. My response to this is one of humbleness, pleading mercy, not judgment for all to come back to know Him and fear Him and His Holiness.

Prayer: “If shakings need to come, then bring them God so that all may come to know You. May  You not turn away Your face due to our filthy sin of compromise. May we be a church that turns back to You so that You may look upon us, smile and say, “Well Done, Faithful, Humble One. You may enter in.”

Jesus is Bridegroom, the King, and the Judge. In this Meditation I will be looking at Him as the great Judge, the holy and worthy Judge who is worthy to Judge all and put them in their place. Jesus has the authority and the power to judge anyone and everyone because He is the pure and spotless Lamb, He has committed no wrongs, and He is worthy to be the great Judge.

In Matthew 23, it tells the story of when Jesus acts as the great Judge when He calls out the Pharisees and Bible Scribes, and judges them and exposes them for what they truly are, underneath all of the religious covering that they put on, which is nothing else but hypocrites who think and believe that they know everything and they always try to show out in public, but Jesus know how they truly are and He calls them out on it. Matthew 23 opens up by Jesus telling His disciples that the Pharisees do know what they are talking about and the do know scripture, so whatever they instruct the people to do, hat they should do it, but He made sure that He made it clear that He told His disciples to not do what they said according to the Pharisees motives and their works, because the Pharisees themselves do not put into practice what they say. This is the first part of the chapter and Jesus is already calling them out and judging them for who they truly are. Jesus is not judging them just because He does not particularly care for them, which is why most of the people on this earth that are not saved judge, but Jesus is judging because He sees what they are doing behind closed doors and He knows the big act that they put on to make themselves seem more high and mighty in the eyes of the public, He is judging them and calling them out because He wants to expose what they are doing and secret and how they really feel deep in their hearts. Jesus never judged or judges out of pure hate, He judges out of love because He cares about what we are doing and He sees how things are, and He sees on a deeper level than just the surface. Jesus judges out of love because He cares.

Many people would get offended at Jesus and at the Bible because Matthew 23 shows Jesus judging and using words like hypocrites. Many people would take that as Jesus trying to be a judge for the wrong reasons and that would make Jesus, Himself, a hypocrite, but that is such a worldly way of thinking. In fact, Jesus is not a hypocrite, as previously mentioned, He is worthy to judge and He is judging for all of the right reasons, many people’s vision is just so clouded by the worldly way of thinking, so they would take it for all of the wrong reasons. I need to strive and be like Jesus, I need to not have such clouded vision, so that I might see things the way God and Jesus sees them, for what they truly are, with no façade of the humanistic ways of this world that we currently live in. I need to constantly be praying for that. But back to the main point which is about Jesus, and Him being the holy, worthy, and great Judge. Jesus has great wisdom on the things we humans do not have an understanding for. He shows the people over and over in Matthew 23 what they are doing wrong and He brings what they are doing wrong, and what they are hiding to light so that they might see and change, however, this was not the case for the Pharisees, after the judging by Jesus, they became all the more angry with Him.

Later in Matthew 23, Jesus asks the Pharisees how they plan to get into the Kingdom of God, this coming after He has brought what was hidden in the darkness to light and He has called them out and shown them who they truly are and what they were truly about. He says the He will send His servants to them to help them understand, since they would not heed and take in the advice that Jesus gave them, but Jesus knew what they would do if He were to send people that might try and help the Pharisees and the scribes, and He called them out on that as well. He begins to prophesy after He judges them and calls forth things that will happen in the days to come because the Pharisees hearts were so hardened against Jesus and the things of Jesus that they wanted nothing to do with Him or anybody that was with Him or about His business, such as “prophets, wise men, and scribes.”

Jesus is holy and righteous. He is the great Judge and anyone and everyone falls under his jurisdiction when it comes to His holy and righteous judgment. We are not to think that we may above the judgments of Jesus, for we are underneath Jesus and His jurisdictions and He is the great judge who can bring us back into alignment and bring forth justice for us. Jesus is the great judge.

Meditation 5

Matthew 23

            In this passage Jesus talks about the Pharisees and teachers of the law.  He gives a warning, a warning that we are not to be like them.  Jesus talks about the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, how they do not practice what they preach.  They preach a message that brings with it many laws and regulations that are almost if not entirely unbearable.  Rather than leading by example they preach up a powerful and hard message and put it on others to fulfill while they themselves do nothing to help.  It is almost as if they enjoy burdening others, to keep them down so that they can not rise up and find out the depravity of what the Pharisees know. 

            I believe this is not out of anything more than fear.  The Pharisees know that they have it good, and they want everyone else to know.  I would venture to guess that they might have even doubted that God was real or at least as real as they claimed He was.  As a result of this they were scared that if everyone found out how little they knew that they would loose everything that made them distinguished.  To cope with this they made it difficult to please God in order that everyone else would be so busy trying to obey the law that they would not have time to question it. 

            Not only do they burden everyone else down, but they also lift themselves up, dressing really nice, sitting at the place of honor and so forth.  If they truly knew the God they claimed to serve they would have glorified God and humbled themselves.  Since they did not truly believe in God, however, they made them selves seem big.  They did this because they did not think it was enough to serve God, they also had to be exalted among men.  They were not content with God alone.  In order to get people to follow them they felt that they had to make it look like you would attain all of this stuff, they did not think God was a good enough reason.

            The first woe Jesus talks about is how the hypocrites (i.e. teachers of the law and Pharisees) shut the kingdom of God in men’s faces, and that they do not even enter in.  These hypocrites act as if they hold the keys to heaven.  They make it too difficult for almost anyone to enter into heaven.  It is almost as if because they know they won’t be able to enter that they make it as difficult as they can for anyone else, along the lines of if I have to you do to.

            Jesus then speaks about the second woe.  In this one He is again addressing the hypocrites, but this time He is addressing the fact that they go out of their way to win someone over and in the end that person is twice as lost as before.  This one speaks to my soul.  I hate how the western church with all its problems is going out to other nations and infecting them with an untrue humanistic gospel.   I am not sure that we are even truly saving anyone, I feel like we are giving them a false sense of comfort and deadening their spirits worse than they were before.  This is horrible.  I would rather that we get a true gospel from God and then go out and minister with the whole truth rather than a false one.

            The third woe is about the difference between God and ministry.  Jesus says that it is not good to focus on a ministry but rather we need to focus on God.  God without ministry is still God but ministry without God is nothing.  We need to reline our focus onto God the center of all and seek Him first and everything else will follow.

            Fourthly comes the woe about the difference between works and heart.  The hypocrites will tithe and do all the religious acts out of duty, and forget entirely about the heart of the matter.  It is not so much about what you do but instead why you do it.  It is about love, justice, mercy and faithfulness.  Out of the heart comes godly works but with no heart the works are no more than that.  They have no eternal significance. 

            To go right along with this is the fifth and sixth woes, a warning not to be white washed tombs.  Again it is not about what goes on, on the outside but what goes on, on the inside.  It is easy to make the outside look good it just takes practice, but to make the inside clean takes a true work.  If the inside is clean, cleanliness will come out and make the outside clean.

            The seventh woe is a warning to us all.  The teachers of the law and the Pharisees walked around saying that if they had lived in the time of the prophets, that they would have believed them.  Jesus said that, no they would have rejected them just as the people did back then.  How often have we thought this, that if we hade lived in the time of Jesus we would have accepted Him whole heartedly?  The truth of the matter is this; we would most likely have rejected Jesus just like the majority of the people did.  We are no different than anyone else on our own.  We are just as fallen, sinful and dead in our soul as everyone else on our own.  It is only by the grace of God through the strength of the Spirit that we are able to say yes.  This verse should keep us humble; no one is excluded from this verse.

            When Jesus was teaching about the teachers of the law and the Pharisees He might as well have been talking about me.  I pray that Jesus gives me the grace to live a life above, or rather below, so that I might be found pleasing in His sight.