WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.080 Okay, we're going to look back this morning at chapter 23 of Matthew's Gospel, great 00:00:07.080 --> 00:00:10.160 chapter that we read together. 00:00:10.160 --> 00:00:18.160 I've entitled this sermon Desolation Row, which is a great Bob Dylan song, by the way, 00:00:18.160 --> 00:00:20.039 if you know his stuff. 00:00:20.039 --> 00:00:29.339 But it seemed to be quite an apt title because there is a sense of desolation in this chapter. 00:00:29.339 --> 00:00:32.320 But when we come to Scripture, and I'm going to remind you of this because I do it all 00:00:32.320 --> 00:00:40.320 the time, underpinning every sermon is the fact that we believe the Bible to be God's 00:00:40.320 --> 00:00:43.480 self-attesting word. 00:00:43.480 --> 00:00:46.019 It is God's revelation. 00:00:46.019 --> 00:00:47.519 It is... 00:00:47.519 --> 00:00:51.320 The great description of I think in the Bible is that it's God breathed. 00:00:51.320 --> 00:00:54.760 Okay, it's God breathed through human authors. 00:00:54.760 --> 00:00:58.480 And that's hugely important when we come to this or any other part of Scripture that is 00:00:58.479 --> 00:01:00.759 difficult and we'll make it... 00:01:00.759 --> 00:01:05.359 Maybe looking this evening at another difficult part of Scripture in Ecclesiastes. 00:01:05.359 --> 00:01:10.560 But it's important because the truth that's revealed in the Bible is the truth on which 00:01:10.560 --> 00:01:13.959 this universe is founded. 00:01:13.959 --> 00:01:15.640 And it makes very big claims. 00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:18.560 It never claims to be an insignificant book. 00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:27.400 It never claims to have marginal experiences or truth for us to consider. 00:01:27.400 --> 00:01:29.260 It makes big claims. 00:01:29.260 --> 00:01:34.120 And if you know people who disagree, or if you disagree with God's word, or if you don't 00:01:34.120 --> 00:01:40.940 believe God's word, then you need to come up with a working alternative to the big issues 00:01:40.940 --> 00:01:49.280 of life, to the issues of life and death and evil and good and right and wrong. 00:01:49.280 --> 00:01:50.520 There needs to be... 00:01:50.520 --> 00:01:52.840 This book deals with these issues. 00:01:52.840 --> 00:01:56.920 And it very much speaks into the confusion of life. 00:01:56.920 --> 00:01:59.480 This time and indeed at any time. 00:01:59.480 --> 00:02:03.439 And into your heart and into mine. 00:02:03.439 --> 00:02:07.960 So whenever we come a passage like this or preach in a passage like this, whatever else 00:02:07.960 --> 00:02:14.039 happens, and indeed whenever we're preaching or talking to others about God's word, it 00:02:14.039 --> 00:02:17.719 should never be dull. 00:02:17.719 --> 00:02:20.759 God forbid we preach dull sermons. 00:02:20.759 --> 00:02:27.560 Or that we share the truth about Jesus in a way that's boring for anyone. 00:02:27.560 --> 00:02:32.759 Because this is really dynamic truth. 00:02:32.759 --> 00:02:38.199 It's explosive truth that we have when we come to God's word. 00:02:38.199 --> 00:02:42.879 And there's two pictures here in this chapter that Jesus gives us. 00:02:42.879 --> 00:02:48.959 Jesus illustrates what He's saying and illustrates who He is in many ways with two pictures. 00:02:48.960 --> 00:02:54.599 The first one, not in order, but the first one I'm going to say is Jesus is a mother 00:02:54.599 --> 00:02:55.600 hen. 00:02:55.600 --> 00:02:58.800 Okay, we saw that earlier. 00:02:58.800 --> 00:03:01.560 Longing for the living. 00:03:01.560 --> 00:03:05.319 Longing for those in front of Him who rejected Him. 00:03:05.319 --> 00:03:10.560 But He also gives a picture of Himself as an undertaker. 00:03:10.560 --> 00:03:16.840 The seven woes are Jesus speaking as an undertaker, as it were. 00:03:16.840 --> 00:03:20.120 Those were the funeral laments of the day. 00:03:20.120 --> 00:03:26.199 And He is in these sections, He's not longing for the living, He's mourning for the dead. 00:03:26.199 --> 00:03:31.960 So that's the two pictures that we have that Jesus gives us here. 00:03:31.960 --> 00:03:38.120 And you need, and people who are listening and reading God's word always need to ask 00:03:38.120 --> 00:03:41.240 the question, what's it going to be? 00:03:41.240 --> 00:03:44.199 What's it going to be for you in your relationship with Jesus Christ? 00:03:44.199 --> 00:03:47.000 Is He longing for you as the one who's living? 00:03:47.000 --> 00:03:52.639 Or is He mourning over you because you're spiritually dead? 00:03:52.639 --> 00:03:56.959 Why do we have these two pictures here at this point in Matthew's Gospel? 00:03:56.959 --> 00:04:01.120 Why do we see Him responding to the scribes and the Pharisees, the religious leaders of 00:04:01.120 --> 00:04:05.679 His day and indeed the people who will soon reject Him? 00:04:05.679 --> 00:04:06.679 Why? 00:04:06.679 --> 00:04:07.959 Well, because He sees two things. 00:04:07.960 --> 00:04:14.080 He sees, in the first place, He sees the immediate future. 00:04:14.080 --> 00:04:25.439 Christ at this point recognizes and sees as He focuses on the people, He sees where their 00:04:25.439 --> 00:04:33.759 rejection is going to lead very soon in the world in which He was living, physically. 00:04:33.759 --> 00:04:41.339 He could see that in a few, maybe 40 years forward from this AD 70, there would be a 00:04:41.339 --> 00:04:47.879 terrifying destruction of Jerusalem, many, many thousands and thousands of people killed 00:04:47.879 --> 00:04:53.519 or forced out of Jerusalem forever. 00:04:53.519 --> 00:04:56.120 Jerusalem itself would be sacked and destroyed. 00:04:56.120 --> 00:04:57.800 And He could see that. 00:04:57.800 --> 00:05:07.240 He could see physically where the rejection was leading, great weight of centuries of 00:05:07.240 --> 00:05:10.199 rejection of God. 00:05:10.199 --> 00:05:17.840 But He could see more than that because the destruction of Jerusalem in many ways is a 00:05:17.840 --> 00:05:27.199 foreshadowing of a much more terrible future eternal destruction of which He was feeling 00:05:27.199 --> 00:05:31.000 the cold shadow as He moved towards the cross. 00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:33.039 The cross was coming ever nearer. 00:05:33.039 --> 00:05:40.759 He was heading towards the cross and all that that meant and He could sense the coldness 00:05:40.759 --> 00:05:44.519 of the forsakenness that the cross would bring. 00:05:44.519 --> 00:05:50.360 The physical separation was one thing, death, but there was a much deeper separation that 00:05:50.360 --> 00:05:51.360 He knew. 00:05:51.360 --> 00:05:57.600 He was experiencing on the cross, hell on the cross is what He experienced. 00:05:57.600 --> 00:06:06.480 And the warning He gives is therefore much more serious than just speaking about physical 00:06:06.480 --> 00:06:14.199 separation and death, but the spiritual separation that only God in Christ can bridge. 00:06:14.199 --> 00:06:21.719 And so there's this sense of which He recognizes and sees very, very clearly in this perfect 00:06:21.719 --> 00:06:25.759 vision He sees the desperate root of sin. 00:06:25.759 --> 00:06:31.800 And He sees the desperate cost of sin and the desperate reality of sin as being utterly 00:06:31.800 --> 00:06:39.639 destructive because what He sees is He sees that it's very depth, sin's motive will always 00:06:39.639 --> 00:06:43.839 make us want to kill off God. 00:06:43.839 --> 00:06:47.319 That's the seriousness of sin, you know, because I'm going to think of sin, you know, oh, I 00:06:47.319 --> 00:06:52.679 did a little lie, a little cheat, or a little do something here and there, saying a wrong 00:06:52.679 --> 00:06:53.679 word. 00:06:53.679 --> 00:06:55.279 No, He sees it as much more serious. 00:06:55.279 --> 00:07:00.719 Sin ultimately wants us to kill off God from our own experience and to allow ourselves 00:07:00.719 --> 00:07:03.399 to be Lord over our own lives. 00:07:03.399 --> 00:07:09.559 And He sees that and He knows that God in heaven, the great Holy Father can never exist 00:07:09.560 --> 00:07:17.439 in an environment where sin goes unchecked because its very focus is to destroy God and 00:07:17.439 --> 00:07:22.319 to destroy all that is good and loving and just. 00:07:22.319 --> 00:07:24.399 And of course we see that. 00:07:24.399 --> 00:07:29.879 We see that being outworked in the rejection of the people to Jesus, the only innocent, 00:07:29.879 --> 00:07:33.160 sin-free, holy man who ever lived. 00:07:33.160 --> 00:07:40.920 The religious leaders and the people moving from their misunderstanding when He comes 00:07:40.920 --> 00:07:47.440 in riding on a donkey, here's the great Messiah, to just a number of days later, crucify Him, 00:07:47.440 --> 00:07:49.240 crucify Him. 00:07:49.240 --> 00:07:58.600 Because it was inevitable, it's inevitable that sin, sin's ultimate reality is the destruction 00:07:58.600 --> 00:08:04.840 of God and killing off God as if that were possible. 00:08:04.840 --> 00:08:12.960 But sin, in the hearts of these people, and if we'd been there, it would have been no 00:08:12.960 --> 00:08:14.840 different. 00:08:14.840 --> 00:08:22.480 Sin in the hearts of people wanted Jesus and His whole innocent, innocent and love dead. 00:08:22.480 --> 00:08:30.520 But yet that same crucifixion became God's way forward. 00:08:30.520 --> 00:08:39.080 And His experience of hell on the cross becomes our root of salvation. 00:08:39.080 --> 00:08:49.159 So in this chapter He's really wanting to get across because He's beginning to see it, 00:08:49.159 --> 00:08:55.199 the reality of our estrangement from God and what it means and the greatness of the 00:08:55.199 --> 00:08:57.439 salvation He's offering. 00:08:57.439 --> 00:09:02.319 So what I think is when we read a passage like this, if you've been honest with yourself, 00:09:02.319 --> 00:09:08.759 okay, I'll be honest with you, I just don't get the seriousness of sin as I know that. 00:09:08.759 --> 00:09:13.519 And probably you don't either, I'm sure none of us do. 00:09:13.519 --> 00:09:22.000 And because if we did, we would love Him more and we would serve Him much more passionately 00:09:22.000 --> 00:09:30.039 and much in a much deeper committed way when we realized what He's redeemed us from. 00:09:30.039 --> 00:09:32.480 And I think we would love Him and serve Him better. 00:09:32.480 --> 00:09:37.159 So what's happening here, what's happening here in this chapter, there's a couple of 00:09:37.159 --> 00:09:40.000 things that are happening, at least I'm sure there's many more. 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:47.320 But Jesus is doing two things, Jesus in the first place is weeping, okay, Jesus is weeping. 00:09:47.320 --> 00:09:52.879 And so I'm doing this tonight as well, it's a bad policy, preachers that are learning 00:09:52.879 --> 00:10:00.519 to preach here don't do what I say, well maybe, if it's from the Word that's fine. 00:10:00.519 --> 00:10:04.000 But I'm going to the end of the chapter first, okay, and I'm doing that tonight as well, 00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:06.960 I'm actually going to the end of the book tonight, the Ecclesiastes. 00:10:06.960 --> 00:10:13.560 But the end of this chapter is the lament that Miriam read there at the end. 00:10:13.560 --> 00:10:20.060 Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, very famous lament, and he speaks about Him being like a mother 00:10:20.060 --> 00:10:24.680 hen longing for the people to come under His protection. 00:10:24.680 --> 00:10:29.040 Jesus is weeping, what a great picture, isn't that a great picture? 00:10:29.040 --> 00:10:30.040 Jesus weeping. 00:10:30.040 --> 00:10:36.600 You know, He's just brutally exposed the hard hearts of the religious leaders with damning 00:10:36.600 --> 00:10:42.159 truth about their condition, and we're going to look at that as well. 00:10:42.159 --> 00:10:45.360 And He goes on to give a very unflattering picture of Himself. 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:46.680 It's not very regal is it? 00:10:46.680 --> 00:10:49.000 It's not very king like a mother hen. 00:10:49.000 --> 00:10:54.800 It's not what you expect of a picture of God, a mother hen. 00:10:54.800 --> 00:11:02.960 It's a step beyond the undignified picture of the prodigal Father who tucks up His garment 00:11:02.960 --> 00:11:11.320 and guards His loins and runs out, not very dignified for a man of dignity of His time 00:11:11.320 --> 00:11:15.920 and place to go and see the estranged Son. 00:11:15.920 --> 00:11:21.879 But this takes it a step further, mother hen. 00:11:21.879 --> 00:11:24.360 And He said, but this is His instinct, isn't it? 00:11:24.360 --> 00:11:25.360 Protection. 00:11:25.360 --> 00:11:30.160 That's what a mother hen would do, and the story of the hen that died for the sake of 00:11:30.160 --> 00:11:31.320 her chickens. 00:11:31.320 --> 00:11:34.560 It's instinctive that they would protect. 00:11:34.560 --> 00:11:39.879 And what Jesus is saying, He's saying, is the Incarnation's God's instinct, it's His 00:11:39.879 --> 00:11:46.960 instinct as Creator, as Father, as Son, as Holy Spirit to protect and to redeem and to 00:11:46.960 --> 00:11:51.720 save and to buy back humanity made in His own image. 00:11:51.720 --> 00:11:57.560 And what's more than that, He's saying this way that He is going towards and across is 00:11:57.559 --> 00:12:03.439 the only way that He can protect us and save us and redeem us. 00:12:03.439 --> 00:12:10.639 So we look at the cross, for example, and we're back into kind of brutal territory, 00:12:10.639 --> 00:12:13.039 aren't we, when we talk about the cross? 00:12:13.039 --> 00:12:17.879 And people will look at that today, maybe modern 21st century postmodern humanity. 00:12:17.879 --> 00:12:23.439 We'll see what, it's just callus, it's rubbish, it's primitive. 00:12:23.440 --> 00:12:28.720 We don't need to believe in these kind of things today, it's made up. 00:12:28.720 --> 00:12:31.440 I always ask the question, it's made up, why? 00:12:31.440 --> 00:12:33.560 Well, why is it made up? 00:12:33.560 --> 00:12:35.060 Why would you make up this? 00:12:35.060 --> 00:12:41.080 Why would you make up the salvation of a crucified Jew as your hope for the world? 00:12:41.080 --> 00:12:44.240 Or, or it's true. 00:12:44.240 --> 00:12:48.960 And what Jesus is saying is that it's my divine instinct, it's the only way. 00:12:48.960 --> 00:12:51.680 Redemption could only come if I was just substitute. 00:12:51.679 --> 00:12:56.639 If I died in your place, if I took the wrath of God for your sin and died in your place, 00:12:56.639 --> 00:12:57.639 there's no other way. 00:12:57.639 --> 00:13:02.239 It's instinctive, trinitarian love provides this answer. 00:13:02.239 --> 00:13:06.439 We take that or we reject it. 00:13:06.439 --> 00:13:14.439 So He uses parental love, the outstretched wings of love to reveal His heart, that He 00:13:14.440 --> 00:13:22.360 grieves bitterly at those unwilling to come to Him for love and protection. 00:13:22.360 --> 00:13:29.920 And that's the picture of our salvation, you know, in our city, urban, our bay in life. 00:13:29.920 --> 00:13:36.040 Let's go along the Gorgiefarm, go along there and see the picture, see the kind of ongoing 00:13:36.040 --> 00:13:41.920 relationship of comfort, of strength, of love, of rescue, see it in these difficult times. 00:13:41.919 --> 00:13:46.240 You know, I think sometimes as men, sorry ladies, I'm just going to speak for a minute 00:13:46.240 --> 00:13:52.159 to the men, I think as men we struggle with that whole idea of God as a mother hen, do 00:13:52.159 --> 00:13:56.319 we, coming under her protective wings? 00:13:56.319 --> 00:14:00.319 We think coming to know Jesus, needing a Savior, it's kind of weak. 00:14:00.319 --> 00:14:06.279 And we're men and we need to be strong and we need to stand up and we need to be protective 00:14:06.279 --> 00:14:08.279 ourselves rather than needing protective. 00:14:08.279 --> 00:14:16.799 And that's fine, that's okay, but if you're drowning in the sea and the RNLI come past 00:14:16.799 --> 00:14:21.360 and they reach out a hand to you because you're drowning, you don't regard it as weakness 00:14:21.360 --> 00:14:23.360 to grasp hold of that hand. 00:14:23.360 --> 00:14:28.199 And as you're lifted up, you find it's a woman. 00:14:28.199 --> 00:14:29.959 You wouldn't feel weak because of that. 00:14:29.959 --> 00:14:35.959 You'd be full of gratitude because of the strength that has pulled you up from drowning, 00:14:35.959 --> 00:14:38.079 the strong hand of a rescuer. 00:14:38.080 --> 00:14:43.400 We ashamed as men, are we embarrassed to admit our weakness before the living God and that 00:14:43.400 --> 00:14:44.600 we need His rescue? 00:14:44.600 --> 00:14:45.600 Surely not. 00:14:45.600 --> 00:14:47.800 Please let not that be the case. 00:14:47.800 --> 00:14:51.040 It's 21st century men. 00:14:51.040 --> 00:14:57.040 Let's be men that are willing to recognize God's great redemptive power. 00:14:57.040 --> 00:15:03.360 Jesus is weeping, but Jesus also here is warning. 00:15:03.360 --> 00:15:05.200 Verses 1 to 36. 00:15:05.200 --> 00:15:08.200 That's the first section of the chapter, it's a tough read. 00:15:08.200 --> 00:15:10.200 I hope you found that a tough read. 00:15:10.200 --> 00:15:12.560 I certainly find that a tough read. 00:15:12.560 --> 00:15:15.080 And let's remember who He's speaking to. 00:15:15.080 --> 00:15:22.360 Verse 1, we're told, Jesus said to the crowds and to His disciples, that's to whom He was 00:15:22.360 --> 00:15:23.360 speaking. 00:15:23.360 --> 00:15:29.560 In other words, Jesus really is speaking to those who Matthew recognized as he read this, 00:15:29.560 --> 00:15:33.759 we're going to become the church, the New Testament church, both the leaders and the 00:15:33.759 --> 00:15:37.639 people of the New Testament church, and Jesus is speaking to them. 00:15:37.639 --> 00:15:45.200 And really what he's saying is, look, forget the old failed religious leadership and religious 00:15:45.200 --> 00:15:52.559 ideas of brokenness that have rejected God and the Messiah, even in the pretense of 00:15:52.559 --> 00:15:55.840 accepting Him, and recognize the kingdom of Him. 00:15:55.840 --> 00:15:56.960 Matthew's all about the kingdom of heaven. 00:15:56.960 --> 00:15:59.399 The kingdom of heaven is different. 00:15:59.399 --> 00:16:04.759 And he wants to leadership the disciples, and he wants the crowds, the people, to know 00:16:04.759 --> 00:16:12.639 it's not good enough to put new wine into old wineskins. 00:16:12.639 --> 00:16:15.799 There needs to be a radical rebirth in our thinking. 00:16:15.799 --> 00:16:23.720 So Jesus is warning, and he's contrasting the current failure of the religious leaders 00:16:23.720 --> 00:16:27.279 with the way he wants us to live in the kingdom. 00:16:27.279 --> 00:16:33.120 However, it's all about ministers and elders and people today. 00:16:33.120 --> 00:16:38.879 It's about us all, in other words, as we are in the kingdom of heaven. 00:16:38.879 --> 00:16:44.279 These religious leaders had all the privileges, but most of them had rejected the Messiah. 00:16:44.279 --> 00:16:48.799 They were moral, they were respected, they were powerful people, but they had closed 00:16:48.799 --> 00:16:49.799 hearts. 00:16:49.799 --> 00:16:52.559 They knew better than Jesus. 00:16:52.559 --> 00:17:01.039 So in Jesus exposing their heart traits, he is reminding us of why we need Him, and why 00:17:01.039 --> 00:17:13.000 in the New Testament church in 21st century Edinburgh, we should be very, very different. 00:17:13.000 --> 00:17:19.519 We can't, when we go to the Bible, simply choose the truth that we think is palatable 00:17:19.519 --> 00:17:22.039 to us. 00:17:22.039 --> 00:17:28.159 We can't, we ought to be challenged by the ease with which we select truth that we find 00:17:28.159 --> 00:17:35.399 easy, and we need to move beyond that as believers, find ourselves in the presence of the living 00:17:35.399 --> 00:17:36.399 God. 00:17:36.399 --> 00:17:39.159 So there's two sections here, very quickly look at that. 00:17:39.159 --> 00:17:41.759 Section one is verses one to twelve. 00:17:41.759 --> 00:17:45.920 Okay, if you've got your Bibles, you can look at that, if not look at it again. 00:17:45.920 --> 00:17:51.480 Verses one to twelve, where Jesus gives an overview, basically speaking about the attitudes 00:17:51.480 --> 00:17:56.160 of the scribes and the Pharisees. 00:17:56.160 --> 00:17:58.599 And really, I'm just going to let them speak. 00:17:58.599 --> 00:18:06.039 I'm not going to go through them in any detail, they are self-explanatory for the most part. 00:18:06.039 --> 00:18:12.000 But these attitudes reflect the spiritual deadness that was in the religious leadership 00:18:12.000 --> 00:18:16.680 of the day, in their willingness to reject Jesus. 00:18:16.680 --> 00:18:23.120 But they are attitudes that even for us as Christians, with remaining sin in our hearts, 00:18:23.120 --> 00:18:24.960 we need to root out. 00:18:24.960 --> 00:18:31.160 If you don't find the eye of Jesus piercing in this chapter, I'm not sure where you ever 00:18:31.160 --> 00:18:34.240 would. 00:18:34.240 --> 00:18:39.039 The eye of Jesus is piercing, as He speaks to us, and we need to let the truth sink in 00:18:39.039 --> 00:18:40.039 and apply it. 00:18:40.039 --> 00:18:44.720 I apply it, you apply it to our hearts, our lives, our attitudes to God, our attitudes 00:18:44.720 --> 00:18:49.319 to others, our attitudes to family, our attitudes to church. 00:18:49.319 --> 00:18:55.480 And see where you need to cry out, as I need to cry out for forgiveness this morning. 00:18:55.480 --> 00:19:00.839 So there's five things He says in this first section. 00:19:00.839 --> 00:19:06.039 The verse three, they didn't practice what they preached. 00:19:06.039 --> 00:19:09.440 Whoa, anyone here that wishes to be a preacher? 00:19:09.440 --> 00:19:12.200 Any preacher here, any preacher listening? 00:19:12.200 --> 00:19:20.200 Or that great, great, grave sin of not practicing, seeking to practice what we preach? 00:19:20.200 --> 00:19:24.039 Judgment will be greater for us. 00:19:24.039 --> 00:19:28.480 Secondly, they didn't care about making life hard for others. 00:19:28.480 --> 00:19:30.600 They didn't give them any help. 00:19:30.600 --> 00:19:33.080 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear. 00:19:33.080 --> 00:19:36.440 They lay them on people's shoulders, but they don't help them. 00:19:36.440 --> 00:19:39.240 They didn't care about making life difficult for others. 00:19:39.240 --> 00:19:45.000 I'm not sure how you would apply that today, maybe with the high standards of righteousness 00:19:45.000 --> 00:19:50.359 or morality that you expect your wife or your husband or your children or your friends to 00:19:50.359 --> 00:19:54.680 have, but you don't apply it in grace to yourself. 00:19:54.680 --> 00:19:59.680 Thirdly, verse five, they love to show off. 00:19:59.680 --> 00:20:01.839 They do all their deeds to be seen by others. 00:20:01.839 --> 00:20:03.359 Oh, it was great to be seen. 00:20:03.359 --> 00:20:05.640 They like to be seen in public. 00:20:05.640 --> 00:20:07.759 And maybe we like to show off. 00:20:07.759 --> 00:20:10.960 It's Christians show off a bit of intelligence. 00:20:10.960 --> 00:20:19.440 Show off in church, show off in the academy, show off in our studies, show off in our workplaces, 00:20:19.440 --> 00:20:23.119 because we feel that we've got much to show off with. 00:20:23.119 --> 00:20:25.720 But yet all, everything we have is God's gift. 00:20:25.720 --> 00:20:28.799 Is it no place for showing off? 00:20:28.799 --> 00:20:34.640 Verses six to ten, they love to have the place of honor at feast, the best seats in the synagogues. 00:20:34.640 --> 00:20:38.600 They love to be important and have status. 00:20:38.600 --> 00:20:44.440 Are you challenged by that? 00:20:44.440 --> 00:20:50.840 Wanting status, wanting significant, wanting a name for yourself, that's what they loved. 00:20:50.840 --> 00:20:57.560 And Jesus is saying, these are the things we don't make up the kingdom of heaven. 00:20:57.560 --> 00:21:00.400 These are the things we move from in the kingdom of heaven. 00:21:00.400 --> 00:21:06.400 And verses 11 and 12, the end of this first section, the greatest among you shall be their 00:21:06.400 --> 00:21:09.800 servant, whoever exalts himself will be humbled. 00:21:09.800 --> 00:21:17.759 They loved to be served, but they thought serving was above them. 00:21:17.759 --> 00:21:20.920 And that should not be the way for us as Christians. 00:21:20.920 --> 00:21:28.600 It should never be that we love people looking after and serving us in some kind of deserving 00:21:28.599 --> 00:21:40.799 way, but look down on the ordinariness, the sacrifice, the cost of serving. 00:21:40.799 --> 00:21:45.959 So that's the five attitudes really that he speaks about. 00:21:45.959 --> 00:21:52.519 And in section two, he just exposes their behaviors, its attitudes and behavior. 00:21:52.519 --> 00:21:58.920 And this is the pronouncement of his woes, his seven woes, mourning for their deadness 00:21:58.920 --> 00:22:00.920 spiritually. 00:22:00.920 --> 00:22:06.440 Behavior that he sees as sinful, that unchecked separates them from the living God. 00:22:06.440 --> 00:22:10.839 And similarly in our lives, he's in giving the negative. 00:22:10.839 --> 00:22:12.599 We don't see it now. 00:22:12.599 --> 00:22:17.639 In the old days, you used to see when you got photographs, you used to get the negatives 00:22:17.639 --> 00:22:18.639 with them. 00:22:18.639 --> 00:22:19.639 Don't get it. 00:22:19.639 --> 00:22:20.639 Get a packet. 00:22:20.639 --> 00:22:21.639 Remember that? 00:22:21.640 --> 00:22:26.240 You got the negatives at the front. 00:22:26.240 --> 00:22:28.160 And that's what Jesus is doing here. 00:22:28.160 --> 00:22:35.920 He's giving us the negative of what the kingdom of heaven ought and needs to be like by grace. 00:22:35.920 --> 00:22:43.320 So he says of their behavior, the first thing, I've got six, I've put two together. 00:22:43.320 --> 00:22:47.160 They blocked the way of the kingdom of heaven by the way that they lived and the way that 00:22:47.160 --> 00:22:48.960 they thought. 00:22:48.960 --> 00:22:49.960 Verse 13. 00:22:49.960 --> 00:22:52.440 You know, they shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. 00:22:52.440 --> 00:22:56.440 You neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. 00:22:56.440 --> 00:22:57.440 Okay? 00:22:57.440 --> 00:23:00.160 Now you broaden that. 00:23:00.160 --> 00:23:01.920 How are we living? 00:23:01.920 --> 00:23:03.279 How are we thinking? 00:23:03.279 --> 00:23:06.160 Are we causing people to stumble? 00:23:06.160 --> 00:23:09.480 Are we not giving them the opportunity to come into the kingdom? 00:23:09.480 --> 00:23:16.200 Are we by our attitude and our thinking living contrary to the principles and the life of 00:23:16.200 --> 00:23:19.840 the kingdom of heaven? 00:23:19.839 --> 00:23:22.799 The second one, very powerful. 00:23:22.799 --> 00:23:29.599 The danger of having a zeal for moralistic truth and powerfully persuading others to 00:23:29.599 --> 00:23:36.759 think similarly to you, but then they become as self-righteous and more hellish than you 00:23:36.759 --> 00:23:37.759 are. 00:23:37.759 --> 00:23:40.599 Now that's strong words. 00:23:40.599 --> 00:23:43.039 That's what he says in verse 15. 00:23:43.039 --> 00:23:46.480 He says you go, it's such a powerful word, isn't it? 00:23:46.480 --> 00:23:50.480 You travel over land and sea to make a single proselyte. 00:23:50.480 --> 00:23:54.360 And then when he does so, you make them twice as much a son of hell as you are. 00:23:54.360 --> 00:23:56.880 Now these are strong words. 00:23:56.880 --> 00:24:00.079 He's saying if we don't have Christ in our lives and we're trying to persuade someone 00:24:00.079 --> 00:24:04.640 to live the way we live, but we don't have Christ, we're making them twice as hellish 00:24:04.640 --> 00:24:09.839 as we are, because they will miss out on the grace and the goodness of Jesus, because we 00:24:09.839 --> 00:24:11.759 have also missed out on it. 00:24:11.759 --> 00:24:20.599 If we make people moralistic and religious and churchy so that they're divisive and self-righteous 00:24:20.599 --> 00:24:26.400 and separatist, we're children of hell. 00:24:26.400 --> 00:24:29.480 We're not children of heaven. 00:24:29.480 --> 00:24:33.079 And the third one is breaking promises and vows. 00:24:33.079 --> 00:24:39.119 In verse 16, you know, that whole section, 16 to 22, he talks about swearing, making 00:24:39.119 --> 00:24:42.519 vows and the gold of the temple and the temple. 00:24:42.519 --> 00:24:48.079 Basically what they were doing, they were using different standards of vows to be free 00:24:48.079 --> 00:24:49.079 to break them. 00:24:49.079 --> 00:24:53.000 In other words, if you swear by the gold of the temple, you've got to mark your word. 00:24:53.000 --> 00:24:58.159 If you swear by the temple itself, it's okay to just ignore it. 00:24:58.159 --> 00:24:59.159 So he was... 00:24:59.159 --> 00:25:01.519 There were double standards basically. 00:25:01.519 --> 00:25:03.519 Their word was not their bond. 00:25:03.519 --> 00:25:05.519 That's what he's saying. 00:25:05.519 --> 00:25:06.519 Truth. 00:25:06.519 --> 00:25:09.039 It's applicable, isn't it, to us? 00:25:09.039 --> 00:25:11.279 That truth is a mark of the kingdom. 00:25:11.279 --> 00:25:16.359 You know, in your workplace, in your home, and in our lives that we speak truth. 00:25:16.359 --> 00:25:18.079 You know, there's a word... 00:25:18.079 --> 00:25:19.440 You know I'm bad for making up words. 00:25:19.440 --> 00:25:20.799 You'd always tell me that. 00:25:20.799 --> 00:25:22.079 There's a word that society makes... 00:25:22.079 --> 00:25:23.639 I really hate this word. 00:25:23.639 --> 00:25:24.639 I hate... 00:25:24.639 --> 00:25:26.599 I see politicians using it now quite a lot. 00:25:26.599 --> 00:25:28.759 They say, well, actually we misspoke. 00:25:28.759 --> 00:25:30.039 No, you didn't. 00:25:30.039 --> 00:25:31.039 You lied. 00:25:31.039 --> 00:25:32.039 That's what... 00:25:32.039 --> 00:25:34.920 Miss-speaking is a strange word. 00:25:34.920 --> 00:25:37.080 Miss-speaking is not making a mistake. 00:25:37.080 --> 00:25:42.039 Miss-speaking is double-talk for saying, actually, I lied. 00:25:42.039 --> 00:25:45.560 But we don't like to use that word because it's so pejorative. 00:25:45.560 --> 00:25:49.000 And Christians should not be guilty of miss-speaking. 00:25:49.000 --> 00:25:52.960 We should not be guilty of making promises and not keeping them. 00:25:52.960 --> 00:25:55.640 Our word, not being our bond. 00:25:55.640 --> 00:25:59.440 We're not to be smart and polished but untrustworthy. 00:25:59.440 --> 00:26:00.440 Jesus... 00:26:00.440 --> 00:26:05.880 Jesus is negatively presenting the principles of the kingdom. 00:26:05.880 --> 00:26:12.160 Then the fourth one are priorities, you know. 00:26:12.160 --> 00:26:20.920 These guys, verses 23 and 24, they were just expert at tithing, you know, the mint that 00:26:20.920 --> 00:26:21.920 they had and that they used. 00:26:21.920 --> 00:26:25.160 They would take a tithe of it and they would use it mint and the dill in the coming. 00:26:25.160 --> 00:26:28.840 But they neglected the weightier matters of law and justice and mercy. 00:26:28.839 --> 00:26:31.759 In other words, their priorities were wrong. 00:26:31.759 --> 00:26:34.759 They cared only about the little things and not about the big things. 00:26:34.759 --> 00:26:37.839 Now Jesus is not saying, don't care about the little things. 00:26:37.839 --> 00:26:42.759 He's saying, care about the little things but don't neglect the big things. 00:26:42.759 --> 00:26:47.359 And he uses a great picture in the Aramaic as which he was speaking. 00:26:47.359 --> 00:26:52.000 It was words that were rhyming that uses, you know, you strain it on that but you swallow 00:26:52.000 --> 00:26:53.000 a camel. 00:26:53.000 --> 00:26:54.639 And it was kind of rhyming in the original. 00:26:54.640 --> 00:26:59.520 So maybe like for us it would be you strain out a midge but you swallow a mule. 00:26:59.520 --> 00:27:06.560 It was kind of something rhyming, almost humorous about it that he's saying it's ridiculous. 00:27:06.560 --> 00:27:12.440 You know, so sometimes in church we get all fussed about tiny insignificant things, you 00:27:12.440 --> 00:27:19.080 know, about the colours of stuff and about just little things maybe. 00:27:19.080 --> 00:27:23.520 But we ignore justice and mercy and grace and forgiveness. 00:27:23.519 --> 00:27:25.639 What are our priorities? 00:27:25.639 --> 00:27:28.519 What makes you, what riles you up? 00:27:28.519 --> 00:27:30.879 What do you focus your attention on? 00:27:30.879 --> 00:27:38.759 What do I, what are the big things that take our attention as those in the Kingdom of Heaven? 00:27:38.759 --> 00:27:43.319 Then I've taken the five and six woes together versus 25 to 28. 00:27:43.319 --> 00:27:45.400 You know, again, very powerful pictures. 00:27:45.400 --> 00:27:52.240 The tombs, they clean the outside of the cup and the plate but inside it's full of germs. 00:27:52.240 --> 00:27:53.640 That's very relevant just now, isn't it? 00:27:53.640 --> 00:27:57.120 We're all cleaning a lot. 00:27:57.120 --> 00:28:02.039 Hopefully in November we'll be taking communion together for the four Sundays in the morning 00:28:02.039 --> 00:28:03.039 in November. 00:28:03.039 --> 00:28:07.319 He's going to make sure the cups are clean and the inside and the out. 00:28:07.319 --> 00:28:13.279 But they didn't clean the inside and then he goes on to give an even more ugly picture 00:28:13.279 --> 00:28:16.319 of tombstones that painted whitewashed on the outside. 00:28:16.319 --> 00:28:22.319 They're lovely and clean inside, full of deadness and he's saying, you know, you're putting all 00:28:22.319 --> 00:28:27.839 your effort into appearances, all your effort into looking good on the outside to other 00:28:27.839 --> 00:28:33.879 people but you don't care about what I think God says and I know the inside. 00:28:33.879 --> 00:28:37.919 You know, is that, that's a temptation in church, isn't it? 00:28:37.919 --> 00:28:43.319 It's a temptation for preachers to just be good on the outside, temptation for elders 00:28:43.319 --> 00:28:48.480 and leaders and deacons and others to look good on the outside but what about the motives 00:28:48.480 --> 00:28:50.679 of our hearts? 00:28:50.679 --> 00:28:55.639 You know, what about the pride, the selfishness, the bitterness, the greed, the lust, these 00:28:55.639 --> 00:28:59.759 things that nobody necessarily needs to know about although we'll sometimes come out in 00:28:59.759 --> 00:29:01.559 our actions. 00:29:01.559 --> 00:29:05.879 Jesus says, clean the inside, get the inside of our lives right. 00:29:05.879 --> 00:29:07.720 He's pointing to Himself. 00:29:07.720 --> 00:29:09.599 He's pointing to grace. 00:29:09.599 --> 00:29:14.399 He's pointing to mother hen, saying come to me for protection and for cleansing and for 00:29:14.399 --> 00:29:17.319 safety and for life. 00:29:17.319 --> 00:29:30.879 And the last one then is denying a sense of guilt which is just for all who reject Jesus 00:29:30.879 --> 00:29:37.679 and forgetting, particularly for those of us in the church who haven't come to faith, 00:29:37.680 --> 00:29:43.240 the advantages and the privileges that are ours, that we are spurning. 00:29:43.240 --> 00:29:48.759 You know, these Pharisees, these Jews, you know, they had great privileges. 00:29:48.759 --> 00:29:51.960 They were God's Old Testament people. 00:29:51.960 --> 00:29:55.400 Their fathers and forefathers had rejected the prophets. 00:29:55.400 --> 00:30:02.640 They had an opportunity to accept Jesus but they denied their advantages and their privileges 00:30:02.640 --> 00:30:08.800 and they denied the sense of guilt that was theirs for doing so. 00:30:08.800 --> 00:30:12.440 And so it's a huge responsibility for all of us. 00:30:12.440 --> 00:30:21.280 In summary, if we look at the number of words Jesus uses in some of these chapters, he says 00:30:21.280 --> 00:30:27.880 he uses the word blind five times and he uses the word hypocrites six times. 00:30:27.880 --> 00:30:30.080 That's really the summary of what he's saying. 00:30:30.080 --> 00:30:32.480 Don't be spiritually blind. 00:30:32.480 --> 00:30:34.880 Don't be hypocrites. 00:30:34.880 --> 00:30:36.519 Don't have an outward show. 00:30:36.519 --> 00:30:38.039 Let Jesus work into your heart. 00:30:38.039 --> 00:30:40.759 It's very strong stuff. 00:30:40.759 --> 00:30:46.480 One hour in church with God's people will not cut it for us. 00:30:46.480 --> 00:30:52.880 It's about dealing with God in our hearts day to day, moment by moment, second by second 00:30:52.880 --> 00:31:06.880 and recognizing His beautiful, glorious, courageous, strong, divine love in our place. 00:31:06.880 --> 00:31:11.360 So don't be blind and don't be a hypocrite. 00:31:11.360 --> 00:31:16.640 But do be like Jesus' picture of the mother hen. 00:31:16.640 --> 00:31:23.600 Love that grace and compassion for others that He had, even though they rejected Him. 00:31:23.600 --> 00:31:27.560 And many people among your friends reject Jesus, don't they? 00:31:27.560 --> 00:31:29.200 Let's not be self-righteous about them. 00:31:29.200 --> 00:31:31.520 Let's not damn them. 00:31:31.520 --> 00:31:37.680 Let's be like Jesus and pray to heaven that they will yet come in. 00:31:37.680 --> 00:31:42.360 That they will not keep rejecting the great and beautiful Son of God. 00:31:42.359 --> 00:31:49.839 You know, this is a vision of the kingdom of heaven, and it says everything is not right. 00:31:49.839 --> 00:31:56.439 It's a funeral lament, and we need to recognize we live in a day and in a time between the 00:31:56.439 --> 00:32:00.159 first and second coming of Jesus that there is much to lament. 00:32:00.159 --> 00:32:05.879 We're not yet in glory. 00:32:05.880 --> 00:32:15.200 And let's reflect His heart of generous grace and allow Him to partner with us, to transform 00:32:15.200 --> 00:32:21.000 us, to battle against the ugliness of sin in our hearts, the hypocrisy and the blindness. 00:32:21.000 --> 00:32:29.040 And let's run to Him afresh and new, old Christian or new, for protection and for grace and for 00:32:29.040 --> 00:32:30.320 a life of courage. 00:32:30.320 --> 00:32:33.240 Take our guilt, just give it to Him. 00:32:33.240 --> 00:32:42.680 He's paid the price and find in Him safety from the ongoing ravages of death and judgment. 00:32:42.680 --> 00:32:43.680 Let's pray. 00:32:43.680 --> 00:32:48.920 Father God, we ask and pray that You would help us to see more clearly. 00:32:48.920 --> 00:32:56.799 Sometimes the Bible seems so very far away from our experience as we fail to see humanity 00:32:56.799 --> 00:33:03.079 in it and fail to see our own humanity in it and fail to see God's divinity in Christ 00:33:03.079 --> 00:33:04.720 through the Spirit. 00:33:04.720 --> 00:33:12.839 So help us to see more clearly, deal with our blindness and also, Lord, forgive our hypocrisy. 00:33:12.839 --> 00:33:14.960 There are so many layers to our hypocrisy. 00:33:14.960 --> 00:33:20.159 It's hard to even, it's hard to sometimes even verbalize or know what it is. 00:33:20.159 --> 00:33:24.720 And yet we don't need to know, we simply need to recognize that we need Your grace and Your 00:33:24.720 --> 00:33:31.879 forgiveness and the honesty and the humility that comes from putting our trust in You. 00:33:31.880 --> 00:33:33.280 And may we do that. 00:33:33.279 --> 00:34:02.240 In Jesus' name, amen.