Sermons

I'd ask you to turn to the book of Luke in chapter 11. The book of Luke in chapter 11, beginning in verse 37 up to verse 54. Luke chapter 11, beginning in verse 37. I'll read for us, pray, and ask the Lord's help to exposit his word.

“Now when He had spoken, a Pharisee asked Him to have a meal with him. And He went in and reclined at the table. But when the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that He had not first ceremonially washed before the meal. But the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but inside of you, you are full of robbery and wickedness. You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside make the inside also? But give that which is within as charity, and then all things are clean for you.

“But woe to you Pharisees! For you pay tithe of mint and rue and every kind of garden herb, and yet disregard justice and the love of God, but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and the respectful greetings in the marketplaces. Woe to you! For you are like concealed tombs, and the people who walk over them are unaware of it.”

Now one of the scholars of the Law answered and said to Him, “Teacher, when You say these things, You insult us too.” But He said, “Woe to you scholars of the Law as well! For you weigh men down with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves will not even touch the burdens with one of your fingers. Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets, but your fathers killed them. So you are witnesses and approve the deeds of your fathers; because it was they who killed them, and you build their tombs. For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute, so that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation.’ Woe to you, scholars of the Law! For you have taken away the key of knowledge; you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering.”

And when He left there, the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile and to question Him closely on many subjects, plotting to catch Him in something He might say.”

[Prayer] Let us pray. Lord, as a servant waits on the hand of a master, so we wait upon your hand, oh Lord. As your Word is exposed, may it expose our hearts to the reality of the Gospel, to the clarity of your prophetic word, to the wonder and excellences of your Son, crucified, died, risen, ascended, and now seated at the right hand of the Father. Lord, I ask that which You did not seek your people to hear, may I not speak it. And that which You desire Your people to hear, even though not planned by myself, You would allow me to speak it. May Jesus be glorified in the reading of His Word and the exposition of Scripture. In Christ's name I pray, Amen. [End]

Who asks the first question in the Bible? Who asks the first question in the Bible? It's actually Satan. He asked Adam and Eve in the garden, “did God really say?” The question was not one of listening. The question was not one of comprehension. The question is one of confidence. Did they truly believe that God had commanded it? The question was raised to question their confidence in the truthfulness of their claim.

Our passage this morning will seek, and I believe it answers, the question of confidence. Luke, as he writes the book of Luke, in chapter 1, in the first six verses, he gives the reason why he writes this book. He writes this book to his friend Theophilus. And to add clarity to what he's writing, he tells Theophilus that he writes this book, “that you might have certainty over the things that you have believed.” Luke's intention for the whole book is to strengthen the confidence of the believer.

Therefore, as I studied for this text, all 18 verses, with six woes and accusations, I left myself wondering, “how would you preach this text to a saint?” Jesus is addressing Pharisees, hypocrites, teachers of the law, those who have denied the authority of Scripture itself and replaced it with something different. As I kept on reading this text, it came very clear that the intention of the text is not to condemn your salvation.

My task this morning is not to add more doubts to the faith that you have heard. My task this morning is not to prove that some of you are Pharisees. My task this morning is not to prove that some of you are false converts, but the text will do that for us. The central reason why this text falls in this section is to illustrate the reality that you must base your confidence on Christ alone.

Luke writes this whole book to bring certainty, for you to be sure, not to be tossed and turned to and fro, but to have a clarity, a clarity that defines not only your profession, but even your practice. So, this morning, I moved from having eight points to having two. This morning, I want us to see in Luke chapter 11, beginning in verse 37-54, two reasons why Jesus must be the source of your confidence. Two reasons why Jesus must be the source of your confidence.

The first reason is “He is perfect in His practice.” It's verse 37-44. And secondly, “He's comprehensive in His judgment.” That's verse 45-54. Turn to your Bibles, look down with me, verse 37, as we see the first reason why you must source your confidence in Jesus. “He is perfect in His practice.”

Verse 37, Jesus has just finished speaking, and that's all the previous weeks, the sermons that have come to us. Jesus has alluded to prayer and what counts for prayer, what qualifies a Christian prayer. Jesus has addressed the demons. Jesus has addressed demon possession consistently. He has done an exposition of the heart for the Pharisees to see if their light is really light. I believe our Brother Riley preached the sermon, “A Light in a Dark Place.”

Jesus then has finished speaking and He is invited to a meal with a Pharisee. Jesus is perfect in his practice, read with me.

“Now when He had spoken, a Pharisee asked him to have a meal with Him. And He went in and reclined at the table, but when the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that He had not first ceremonially washed before the meal.”

The Pharisees were a sect in Jewish religion, the most powerful. What they were known for is the practice of the law. And also, in making sure that the rest of the Jews practiced the law. The Pharisees in Mark chapter 7 would traditionally wash their hands. I'll give you a scenery of this. If you've ever had dinner with somebody, this would be strange if you had dinner with a Pharisee. They would dip the whole arm up to the elbow in water, and then they would let their hands dry. This was for the reason that their hands should not be further defiled by touching cloth.

There were men who were versed in the Old Testament Scriptures, but they added a little more so the saints or the Jews would obey the law. So, Jesus, as He walks in this room, as they recline at this table, this one Pharisee invites Him. And He invites other Pharisees because they move in groups. And so, you can picture the scene at dinner table where all their hands are raised. As the water is dripping from their hands, they hear chewing.

They’re surprised that the religious practices that they hold so dear, the sacredness of not being defiled before a meal is finally defiled. If you were a servant in this house and you brought a bowl of water, Jesus probably told the servant to go back. There's a silence in the room as only one person is eating. The rest of them have their hands raised high in an expression of a pure religion, they have so convinced, is true.

Jesus is perfect in practice. He understands that it is not the things outside the body that defile the body, but the defilement comes from outside and pours out. Jesus is enjoying the meal. And the Pharisees are surprised. The Pharisees are surprised, to mean, that they're not simply wondering in amazement, they are wondering with judgment. In Luke chapter 7 verse 39, They say this about Jesus in their hearts, “if this man were a prophet.” I assume they were thinking the same of Christ, if He truly was the Messiah, “What is going on?”

Jesus is not bowing down to the social and acceptable means of the mealtime. They ceremonially believed that they could be defiled by anything throughout the day. So, before a meal, they made sure they washed themselves clean of whatever impurity they touched. The text, behold what it says with me. “And they marveled.” In other words, they were disturbed by Jesus' perfect practice.

I want us to understand this and pay close attention. The Pharisees were religious. The Pharisees were holy men, but they failed to see the perfection of the practice of the law, because their confidence was in their cleansing of the hands, not in God's provision of the law. See, the Pharisees are not so far from you and I. The Pharisees probably were fans of Jesus. At worst, they were foes of Jesus. But at worst, even worse, they were never followers of Him.

This type of practice was foreign to them because they never actually loved God. They appreciated the law. They talked about the law. They conversed in the law, but they never knew the heart behind the law. So, Jesus addresses them. The Pharisees, to put it in modern terms, loved to have a Christian bumper sticker. But for one day, they never bore a cross.

Jesus addresses them, in His perfect practice He turns to them, verse 39, but the Lord said to them, Luke highlights the title Lord in the book of Luke thirteen times. His emphasis is not that Jesus is simply saying this as one who does not want to do the law. The allusion to the Lord means He is sovereign over the law. Not above it, He is the one who made the law and so He speaks to them authoritatively about practice.

The Lord of the Sabbath speaks to those who are confused about the Sabbath. He says to them, “Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but inside you are full of robbery and wickedness. You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside of the cup also made the inside also?” Jesus does two things in this text. He speaks authoritatively about the law and its practice, but also, He speaks authoritatively over the human heart.

Jesus understands that the problem is not that they're just concerned with practice, it's that their insides are dirty. They can wash and wash and continue to wash some more but their insides are full of robbery and wickedness. And the same text in Matthew where Jesus calls them out for stealing from widows and stealing from the temple itself. If your confidence is in the deeds that you do for this church, if your confidence is in your contribution to the saints, your confidence is in the wrong place.

Jesus continues to help them understand this. Now as you read the rest of this passage, it becomes more severe as He continues, but I want you to note something in verse 41. Jesus gives them a command, “but give that which is within as charity, and then all things are clean for you.” Jesus is not only severe, He doesn't begin by first pointing out the judgment that's to come to them, He makes an invitation.

This is a turning point in this section of the text. Jesus is saying, “but give that which is within as charity, then all things are clean to you.” He’s alluding to Deuteronomy chapter 6. “Therefore, thou shall love the Lord with all your heart, with all your strength, with all your might, with all your strength.” I repeated that. Jesus' emphasis in this text is, Him as the perfect one who practices, desires your heart to be the wellspring of all practice.

Jesus is not interested in the superficial. He's not interested in the externals. Man looks at the outside, but God sees the inside. This One who has perfect practice is the source of confidence. Their confidence is in outward matters, in the doing of one, two, three, and the emphasis on A, B, C, but Jesus pulls them back and says, “therefore give that which is within.” The Pharisees would be at a dilemma, because what is within is robbery and wickedness. Without them turning from that, they can give nothing good. They can do no such good deed.

Let us bear in mind, have we replaced our confidence in Jesus for external things? Voddie Baucham, he has this illustration in his gospel presentation and he says this, I don't want to misquote him so I'll be very meticulous. It says, “you take a young boy to a strawberry patch. He eats and bites the juicy strawberry and loves it. The little boy grows up and he starts eating strawberry ice cream with all the synthetic sugars added.

Next you introduce the boy to toast with strawberry jam, with more sugar added. Finally, you introduce the boy to a slushie, which doesn't actually have any strawberry. And the compositions are strawberry chemicals. There's no strawberry in it at all. And then you take this young man after 20 years of not being at the strawberry patch, and you give him a strawberry. And the young man says, ‘this is not a strawberry, it's not sweet enough.’”

We are in the same danger. That the confidence of justification through Christ can be replaced by other things that look like justification. That the gospel would lose its savor because works have become so practical. External things have taken the place of prominence over the truth of scripture. To use that illustration, do you still find strawberry tasteful?

Jesus moves from assessing their practice to judging it. Notice with me, verse 32, “But woe to you Pharisees.” When you hear the word woe in scripture, as R.C. Sproul used to say, “jolt up,” stop for a moment. What is a woe? I know I'm in the South, so most people probably know what a woe is. But let me give you synonyms. Stop in your tracks. Ruin is coming. Seize what you're doing. The situation is bad.

This is the sound, the alarm in a fire situation. This is the warning, the siren that you pull to the side as a cop car passes by. This is Jesus saying, “wait.” See the judgment is coming and it's impending and it's clear and it's swift and it's just. The only way Jesus can make this woe, is if He is perfect in practice. If there is no flaw in His deeds, if His externals are clarified, sanctified and pure.

Woe to you Pharisees? Jesus, in other words, is saying, “the judgment is coming. I want you to pay attention.” Jesus can only make this woe if He Himself is perfect. And remember what I said, Luke calls Him Lord, so He's speaking authoritatively. Jesus is not unsure of whether judgment will come for them. He knows it's certain. He knows when it's coming, why it's coming.

And so, He tells them, “Woe to you Pharisees.” And this text is so rich. It's like trying to wrap your arms around the equator. I can't fully express to you the weight of judgment in this text, but I can show you what Jesus says to them. It still applies to those who are living their faith externally. Still applies to those who have trusted in their works. This judgment is coming. And since the world has not ended, it's still coming.

Jesus turns to them, verse 42, and He says, “For you pay tithe of mint and rue and every kind of garden herb, yet you disregard justice and the love of God, but these things you should have done without neglecting the others.” In Leviticus chapter 27, verse 30, the Lord demands that they give a tenth of their livestock and of their crops. What Leviticus 27 doesn't tell them to do is to tithe herbs.

Jesus is saying, in other words, “you're so concerned with tithing up to the point that you would ransack your kitchen, but you're not even committed to loving God and doing justice.” Jesus here is alluding to the reality that they trusted in their works to justify themselves before God. They were so superficial. The word there, notice with me, pure English, “But these things you should have done while not neglecting.”

The word neglect is to pass over. Neglect, in this wording of this text, is not a passive thing you do. It's not like somehow, I neglected to put the toilet seat down, there was intentionality. Jesus is saying, “you didn't somehow just forget to do it, you actually intentionally overlooked the justice of God and the love of God.” The Pharisees are not innocent bystanders. They are not well-meaning people who just forgot to love God. They never loved God from the beginning.

Jesus is saying, “your practice will not save you. Whether it's meticulous, acute, even if it costs you your whole kitchen, it will not save you.” What they were doing is making a God out of the things that are trivial. I want to give us an expression that I hope you take with you your whole life. “To whatever your heart is captured, your hands are bound.” Let me say that again. “To whatever your heart is captured, your hands are bound.”

In other words, you will do nothing contrary to what's in your heart. And Jesus is pointing out to them, you should have done justice. You should have loved God. Deuteronomy 6:5 again calls them to love the Lord with all their being. But without this perfect One, it is impossible. You cannot love God without Christ. Jesus is alluding to them their own depravity and the lacking of their thoughts.

We're prone to make gods out of trivial things. I'm a history buff, so I use a lot of history as I read text. In the 1600s, in the city of Nikon, don't ask me where it is, the believers there believed that they had to cross themselves with not just two fingers, they had to cross themselves with three fingers, and it had to be the right hand. And if anyone did not make that cross, they were thrown out of the church and damned as a heretic.

The foolishness of our hearts is that we can make gods out of our trivial obsessions to doing things. We can measure other people's confidence on the basis of what we expect of them and not the standards of Scripture. You can question, undermine, and even doubt other people's salvation on the basis of their works. As if they were ever saved by those works.

But Jesus is kind. He's severe, but He's kind. And He says, “but these things you should have done.” Jesus is not undoing the law, lest they think He is one who causes insurrection towards Yahweh, the king. He says, “you should have done these things.” By all means it's great to tithe everything you have but do not neglect the love of God. The Christian ought to have works that display faith. It doesn't mean I have faith; therefore, I shall not work, that's James. Jesus is saying, “have both.” One indicates the beauty and verity of your faith and the other showcases and extols the reality that you can actually live this life. Jesus does not make a division between faith and works. He says faith is a foundation. We need to see the works. Foolish is the man who would ever plant an orange tree and only glorify in having a tree but never seeing fruit.

But Jesus continues, as I chase the clock and the text. But Jesus continues, in verse 43. Jesus unfolds the Pharisees' love for status. If verse 42 is justification by works, verse 43 is justification by status. The Pharisees loved public appearances. In the Beatitudes that Jesus addresses matters of prayer and giving. He says, “they love to scream out their prayers and use lofty words that people might see them.”

They give and make sure everybody knows they've given. They love status. They love public approval. Notice what Jesus says, “For you love the best seat in the synagogue.” He's not addressing you guys in the front row. You're safe. In a synagogue, you would have chairs right behind me. And those would be the most prominent people. They would be the people that society has raised high.

I'm not going to mention, but we have seen it in some churches. Jesus is saying, “they love the places of royalty.” That their faith might be displayed to the Lord. And their faith might be displayed to the people as well. And they might be given love and praise. To take you a little more into the depth of the text. He says, “not only do you love a place in the synagogue, you also love greetings in the marketplaces.”

A Pharisee as he walked in the marketplace would still wear his ceremonial robe. There was no way you could have mistaken somebody as being a Pharisee. Everybody knew it. They had their Sunday clothes on Tuesday. Jesus is highlighting that their desire for status showcases their lack of understanding of what true righteousness in practice actually means. They had no care for actually obeying God, but they loved to seem as this people who are obeying God.

They wanted the social approval. I come from a culture that still respects pastors. I once saw a pastor, I'm not going to name him, who got out of a speeding ticket because he just said, “I'm a pastor.” Jesus offers two contexts that encompass all their life. Whether in the sacred, in the synagogue, or in the secular, in the marketplace, they desired status. They wanted a public display of their faith as if it was a confirmation of true faith.

They were culturally conservative. They voted right. They had the right bumper sticker. They wore the right t-shirts. They went to the right concerts. They watched the right entertainment. They posted the right content on Facebook. If our faith and our confidence is in how the public displays us, how much they affirm our righteousness, then we have received our reward.

You don't have to prove to the world you are a Christian. You are a Christian. Your confidence in your faith is not how much the public actually likes you. It's contrary to Scripture. No one ever liked Jesus who hated Him. The Bible even says, “none of us ever wanted God, we went astray, each of our ways, we desired to do what we wanted.” We never wanted Christ.

And Jesus has proven the point. Even if the public cheers, make billboards of you, if you do not believe in the purity of Christ's sacrifice and the reality and perfection of his work, it is meaningless. You have received your reward here. We must ground our confidence in Christ. And I'm not advocating that you be the guy everybody hates in the public. The testimony must be of Christ, not of your deeds.

Jesus continues, verse 44. As He addresses this false confidence and illustrates how He is the perfect One. I believe this is the chorus of this section. It's the crescendo. It's where the whole structure of argument glorifies Christ. Notice what Jesus says. Verse 44, “Woe to you, for you are like concealed tombs, and the people who walk over them are unaware of it.”

For us to appreciate this accusation and conclusion, we must understand the Old Testament setting. Luke is pulling from Leviticus chapter number 21 and Numbers chapter 18 and 19. I'm not going to ask you to go there, but it would be a fruitful study if you did. The worst kind of uncleanliness and defilement in Jewish society was touching a dead body. It meant that as the person who has been defiled, you could not enter the sanctuary because you would contaminate the sanctuary.

The priest would not touch your sacrifice because the priest needed to be ceremonially clean. The camp needed to be ceremonially clean. The only place you could find solace was outside of the camp. So, if you were touching a dead body, you would have to go out of the camp. You would have to kill a red heifer. Again, I'm in the south. This makes sense. And the blood of that heifer would have to be poured out. The heifer would have to be burnt and the ashes taken and put in water. And the water would have to be taken by another person and given to you, to purify yourself. All these standards and levels of purification needed seven days to be done. So, Jesus escalates, that they did not simply touch a dead body, they are the dead body. Jesus is saying, “without cleansing you are condemned to die.”

See in Isaiah chapter 6, we love the message that comes out in Isaiah chapter 6, as Isaiah beholds Christ on His seat, he says, “woe is me for I'm a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips.” The Old Testament demanded whenever anything unclean met Yahweh, it died. Therefore, as Isaiah is beholding the majesty of the Lord Christ, He says, “I am worthy of death because I have unclean lips.”

Now let's amplify it a little. These ones who are dead are standing before the Lord incarnate and they're still alive. This text is an illustration of mercy. Jesus continues to tell them, you're not only defiled and dead bodies, but you actually defile other people. Because when someone walked over a tomb, they also became defiled. Jesus is saying your works righteousness is not only a weed in the garden, it causes other weeds to grow.

The old adage proves true, “hurt people, hurt people.” But in this text, defiled people defile people. Jesus' exclamation that they are dead should ring a chord in our hearts. We can relate with this. We can relate with Ephesians chapter 2, right? Verse 8. Ephesians chapter 2 verse 1, “for you were dead in your trespasses and sins.”

Jesus is telling the Pharisees, since you are contaminated and you contaminate the people. Even if you enter the temple, you contaminate the temple. Even if you make a sacrifice, you contaminate the sacrifice. Therefore, the only person who can cleanse them is Christ. This text is an exclamation. Only He can cleanse. Only He is the remedy. Only He can, not simply cleanse them from their wretched uncleanliness, He can make them alive.

A missionary, a friend of mine, was telling me a story as he serves in India. He's been in India for 25 years. And he was telling me of a story, a story of snakes. We spent about 15 minutes talking about snakes. Usual casual conversation. And he told me about the Indian krait, which is a snake that during the day, kids actually kick it around and play with it, because it's nocturnal, it can't see in the day.

But during the night, because the snake is so small, it creeps up into the beds of the villagers and it bites them. And again, because it's so small, they can't really feel the bite. But it delivers the most deadly neurotoxin. As this person is in bed, their liver begins to try to remedy the poison. And so, the liver starts slowly dying. The cells are affected and they start to lose oxygen. And when the liver dies, it goes to the heart. And this person by morning is dead, and often no one knows why.

Dead religion works the same way. It creeps in slowly, convinces you your works are super great. I'm in California, so we use compound adjectives. It works the same way. It's convincing, it's slow, it's gradual. It doesn't wave its flag to say I'm here and I'm false. Maybe some of us have believed that our works will actually save us. And the sorrowful thing is you probably have taught it to your kids.

And so, you start corrupting the next generation. And if you're in a position of leadership, guess what? Your congregation starts to follow. And if you lead your Bible study, guess what? Your Bible study starts to follow. The implications of having our confidence, right in Christ, are massive. There's a reason why we call the church the body. If one organ is diseased, it affects the rest of the body.

Jesus addresses false practice. Because He is the perfect one. He's done it rightly. He is not defiled. He is the ultimate cleanser. But Jesus continues, which brings us to the second reason why Jesus must be the source of your confidence. “He is comprehensive in his judgment.”

Notice the text with me in verse 45, there's a shift, to a next set of people that address Jesus. “Now one of the scholars of the law answered and said to him, ‘Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us too.” I want to comment on that verse itself. And I want it to be practical. As I told you, a woe is a cry. Woe means stop, judgment is coming, pay attention. If you won't rectify the situation, you will die in your sins.

But the lawyer does not consider the woe, a judgment, what does he consider it as? An insult. He doesn't say, “you judge us, warn us, condemn us, rebuke us, woe us,” but he says, “you insult us.” A similar word that's used in our English language is the word hubris. He accuses Jesus of being arrogant, of being a know-it-all.

I want to ask a pointed question. When you are faced with Jesus' honest, fair and sovereign estimation of your heart, does it offend you? In Mark 11:6, as John doubts Jesus said, “and blessed is he who is not offended by me.” Our world out there, and sometimes we can buy into it, thinks Jesus is simply an insolent meddler. A nitpicker. One who's out to find the little flaws in our life. And sometimes we might be tempted, you might be tempted, to think Jesus is a nosy neighbor, an interrogator, an inquirer, an intrusive observer, an oppressor. Jesus is telling them, I can make judgments on your life, because I am the perfect judge.

If in this text the Pharisees are the ones who practice the law and the scholars are the ones who make the law Jesus goes a step higher and He is the one who judges. And so, He begins His judgments to the lawyers.  The lawyers probably were assuming the Pharisees deserved this but we're different. We're too sophisticated. We understand the mechanics of the law; they're just the laymen who do it. Does that sound familiar? Does it sound like pompous preachers who stand in pulpits and pretend as if the message does not apply to them?

Does it sound like those Christians who come to church and listen to the sermon because they want to apply it to their neighbor because there is no way it could apply to them? Does that sound familiar? That you hear a message for so-and-so and so-and-so, but never really for you. Why? Because you're a little more sophisticated than that. You've been at this a little longer. You've sat in those pews since they were benches. Now they're comfortable.

Jesus isn't wrestling them, bringing them out of their comfort, to realize you're not safe if you're not in Christ. He makes His judgments and again continues with the language of woes, impending doom. These warnings are coming to them fast. Jesus does not insult them. Jesus is warning them. Let's not misrepresent the demands of the commands of Scripture as if they are burdensome. They are Graces.

And so, we find the fourth woe, in verse 46, “Woe to you scholars of the law as well! For you weigh men down with burdens hard to bear and you yourselves will not even touch the burdens with your own fingers.” A false confidence lacks spiritual power. They can never actually help the people they instruct. They have no salvific ability. They cannot sanctify. They can't edify. They can't come alongside because they are also dead.

If you ever see two dead men carrying each other to the store, run. Jesus is saying, “they lay the law on you. They tell you all these instructions, but guess what? They can't do anything to help.” Jesus is helping them understand that in their sophistication of knowing the law, they actually can't keep it. Neither can they help other people keep it.

The problem that's being addressed here is that of legalism. They somehow believe more rules will make us more righteous. Right? More instructions on how to do instructions will help us keep instructions. If any of you have ever Googled a manual on how to put back a chair, and then Googled another manual, you know the manuals only make it worse. Especially for me.

Jesus continues to help them understand, an expert ability in knowing God's Word does not guarantee salvation. Knowing things doesn't help. I know karate. I can't do karate. Paul elevates this problem in the book of Colossians chapter 2. I want us to turn there. Because I want us to see the folly of what they're doing.

Colossians chapter 2. It's in the New Testament. It's next to Ephesians. Colossians chapter 2:23. I want us to understand what Jesus is telling them here. I'll even begin in verse 20. As Paul is talking to a believer, he says this, “If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees: “Do not handle, nor taste, nor touch?” These things, my Bible says, “Which deal,” but these things, “deal with everything destined to perish with use, which are in accordance to the commands and the teachings of men, which are matters having, to be sure, a word of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.”

See, you could do these things. You could fast three times a day, probably a week. You could abase yourself. You could sell all your belongings. We see the echoes of 1 Corinthians chapter 13. “Even if I gave my body to be burned by flames,” you could be martyred for these things. You can be persecuted, thrown out of churches, thrown out of places.

You can do all these things that are written here. But if you do not know Christ, it is meaningless. Further knowledge in theology is not going to save you. And I'm saying that at a very theologically astute church. If you do not know the person of the theology, the Perfect Judge, the Perfect Law Giver, if you do not know Him, all the laws you know simply add to your condemnation.

So, woe to you theologians! That's another interpretation of the word. I'm not just pointing at people. Woe to you theologians if you know the theology but never know the God of the theology? Woe to you if you espouse more knowledge and more knowledge and tell people more things and things, but you do not know the one who gave the law. He is comprehensive in His judgments. He is the Perfect Law Giver.

So, if you continue to build more laws, more rules, and some efforts to help God's commands be bearable, you communicate that God's commands are unbearable. You communicate to your kids, to your society, to other people that the adjustments you make to God's law are inspired. You say your laws and your rules are much better than His. You bar people from the kingdom of God evermore by adding more stumbling blocks.

So, when you see children obey your parents, leave it there. Because that's the command. And how you come alongside the children obeying the parents is the wisdom. When a Scripture says, “love your wives and live with them in an understanding way,” you do that. You don't find means and ways to explain how your wife doesn't make sense, that was never part of the command. Besides, you don't make sense yourself.

When in a workplace it says, “you submit and work. Do not pilfer, nor steal. Do not argue. To say, “but they are an unjust boss.” That was never part of the command. You have no leeway to undo the commands of God because outside of them you are condemned by them. But this one is the complete, comprehensive, perfect judge Himself. Therefore, obedience to His commands come joyously to the saint because we know the Law Giver.

His mercy abounds evermore. Even when we fail to meet the law, He justifies us. But the law is no longer a means of our condemnation, but the means of our joyous participation. So, we can have confidence that He's a comprehensive judge.

Our fifth woe, verse 47. If you are still in Colossians, I'd ask you to go back to Luke chapter 11, verse 47. I'll treat verse 47 up to verse 51 as one thought and one unit. Jesus says, “you built tombs of the prophets but your fathers killed them.” Now, might be a little tricky to tell you guys that you built tombs to the prophets. I didn't see any monuments of Elijah when I was flying into Texas.

But start to understand the context where Jesus is in. In the city of Jerusalem in the south just outside the wall they had built a monument that celebrated all the prophets. The monument was supposed to be a representation of all the work the Lord had done through the prophets in the nation of Israel. Jesus is calling them out, to help them understand their own depravity.

These tombs that were built for prophets were actually seen as good things. They affirmed God's continual presence in the nation. But Jesus actually condemns them for building the tombs. Notice with me in the text, verse 48 uses very legal language, “So you witnesses, you are witnesses and you approve the deeds of your fathers.”

Jesus tells them that their strict observation of these laws, their desire to be publicly affirmed, their love of external things align more with the people of the Old Testament who rebelled than the prophets who spoke God's Word. The key facet of this whole set of verses is actually one of a coming judgment. Jesus continues to show them how and why.

In verse 49, it says, “For this reason the wisdom of God,” in Matthew, He says actually Matthew 23:34-36 says, “I”, meaning Jesus is the wisdom of God, if you want to understand, your Old Testament a little more, Proverbs chapter 8 illustrates the wisdom of God at the foundation of creation. Jesus is aligning himself with the wisdom of God as being the impersonation of the wisdom of God. He's not only able to judge because He knows the law, He's able to judge because He is the wisdom of God. Notice furthermore, Jesus is charging their blood, the blood of the prophets to them. Verse 39 says, “I will send to them prophets and apostles and some they will kill and some they will persecute.”

I want us to get a little technical, not too much, Jesus is saying, arguing, He's arguing “judgment is coming.” But before you see the impending judgment, He wants to prove why it is actually deserving. At this rate, I'd ask you to look at your Bible, not me. And let's structure the text together. He repeats Himself with the intent of showing divine correspondence.

As verse 49 says, “I will send out prophets.” In verse 51, it says, “from the blood of Abel to Zechariah,” Jesus and Yahweh are doing the same thing. They're both sending. Jesus sends his prophets. Yahweh sends Abel and Zechariah. The prophets align with Yahweh. The apostles align with Christ. Christ aligns with God.

He's arguing for His deity here, and I want you to understand that He is not a weak deity. Notice with me in verse 50. Their blood will be charged against this generation. And notice in verse 51 again, ‘the blood of Zechariah and Abel will be charged to this generation.” Jesus alludes to the judgment of God in the Old Testament and the judgment of God in the New Testament to bring together a unified understanding of who the judge actually is.

And He will judge comprehensively because the will of Yahweh in the Old Testament and the will of Yahweh in the New Testament are unified in the one person, Jesus Christ. This text is an extolling beauty of the wonder of the person of Christ and the person of God and the unity of working in the Trinity. This is it. This is the culmination. He says, “you will be charged and I will judge.”

He came as a lamb; He will come as a conquering lion. Oh, He came as a baby, He will come adult grown on a white horse with your names tattooed on his thigh and a sword coming out of his mouth to judge the whole world. Now I want you to still be in Luke and I want you to circle back. Go back to Luke chapter 11 in verse 2, I believe my Brother Beau preached this text.  I want you to see the application of this verse itself. And He said to them, “when you pray, say this, “Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come.” See, when Jesus alludes to the impending charge of the blood of the saints and the blood of the prophets on this generation, He is saying, “when My kingdom comes, I will judge you.”

See, we think of the Lord's Prayer and we think of the idea of thy kingdom come as a sweet, savoring return of our Christ, as a joyous celebration and entry into the kingdom. But guess what? There's another side to it. On His coming as judge and the whole wrath of God will be poured out on this world to anyone who ever went vile against His will.

Jesus is coming as king when He tells his disciples, “Thy kingdom come.” He's not simply referring to a celebration and a joyous exaltation. He is referring to the full wrath of God that will burn this existence and usher us into a glorious one. Oh, He is the perfect judge. And we can have confidence. Whatever sorrows ail you now, whatever persecution disturbs you now, He will come again. And He will judge.

You either seek His return or you fear it. To put it in more modern terms, some of you are going to end up holy and some of you are going to end up hot. That's what this text is saying. But Jesus isn't done with this, lawyers and theologians, verse 52, this is what He says, at the culmination and end, He says, “Woe to you scholars! For you have taken away the key of knowledge you yourselves did not enter.” They have corrupted the interpretation of Scripture. James chapter 3 would remind us, “not many of you should become teachers because you will receive a stricter judgment.”

You, in the name of religion, this is what Jesus is saying, this is what MacArthur writes in his commentary, you, in the name of religion, in the name of the Old Testament, in the name of God, in the name of righteousness, in the name of the holiness, prevent people from salvation. This is the ultimate discredit of their practice. They neither know the truth, nor can they actually lead people into the truth.

Every normal person understands our society cannot function without the truth. Jesus makes a judgment call in this text. And if you are a believer, this is a judgment call He would never make on you. You have received the key to knowledge. You have embraced the knowledge. You rejoice in the knowledge. And you will be confirmed by that knowledge.

And the opposite is true. What does this look like if it's not true? 2 Timothy chapter 3:1-6 says, “You are always learning, but never able to come to a full knowledge of the truth.” We who are contemporary theologians need to keep this to heart. If the truth that you love makes you callous of the God that He proclaims, you're in danger. You're in danger. Woe. Stop. Reflect. Seize the doing. Pursue the person, not your works.

As we come into Holy Week, Stephen Moffatt told me I should do this. As we come into Holy Week, he emphasized that I am to prepare you by telling you all the woes and difficulties so that he can come in and teach you the Gospel. In verse 53 and 54, as we come into Holy Week, Palm Sunday as it has been declared by many traditions.

I want us to think of verse 53 and 54 in that perspective. Anchor your hope, your faith, and confidence in He who is the Perfect Practitioner. He does and practices perfectly. He judges perfectly. He is the perfect judge.

But verse 54 and 53 point us to another quality. He is the perfect sacrifice. “And when they left there, the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile and to question him closely on many subjects, plotting to catch Him in something He might say.” Our Savior would go to the cross and die. You would think that as a perfect practitioner, as a perfect judge, they would love Him and embrace Him, but they actually kill Him.

I'll leave you with the last word from John Bunyan. As Christian and Hopeful are on their way to the Celestial City, as they are walking on the way, the road gets difficult. And they see a man called Vain Confidence. Vain Confidence walks away from the path and starts heading in his own direction. The two of them pursue him and they shout after him, “young sir, where are you going?” And he says, “I am going to the Celestial Gate.” Both Hopeful and Christian, not knowing any better, pursue him. Then Confidence falls into a pit made by the prince of that land. And as they shout to him, “Vain Confidence, Vain Confidence, where are you?” They only hear groans and weeps. You, if you are in Christ, are not Vain Confidence. You are Christian. You are Hopeful. Only if your confidence is founded on Christ. Let's pray.

[Prayer] Heavenly Father, thank You for the exposition of Your word. I pray and trust, Lord, that You spoke to Your people, that You offer them certainty on their journeys marked with so much uncertainty. That You offer them confidence, You offer them hope and joy, and for those who do know You, Lord God, You help them reflect on why their confidence is vain and only leads to destruction. In Christ's name I pray, amen. [End]

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