This Weeks Sermon

Roland Hill, used to say that if a man were a Christian, he would have to show that his wife, children and even the dog and the cat should be the better for it. Being a Christian should make a difference in the way we care for others. There should be an integrity between what we say and what we are. Unfortunately for Jesus there were many people in his day that did not live like this themselves and wanted to show that Jesus did not either.

People were always trying to trip Jesus up. They were all too often trying to find a way to condemn him and destroy his ministry. They wanted to show that Jesus was a hypocrite and was breaking God’s law. Sad to say this was especially true of the Pharisees, one of the groups of religious leaders of his day.

They were the experts in the Jewish laws and all too often what Jesus said and did; brought him into conflict with them. The reason was simple, we find it in what Jesus said :- For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men.

To understand what was going on we need to think ourselves back into the situation that an ordinary Jewish man or woman would have found themselves in; at the time of Jesus. As a Jew, you were expected to keep the Law of God. This had several parts. Firstly there was the Law of Moses, the first five books of the Old Testament, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. These books both Jews and Christians accept as being the law of God, given to us through Moses. For Jewish people at the time of Jesus there was also another set of law to be kept. This was the Talmud, the rules and regulations devised by the Pharisees as an addition to the books of the Law. These were intended to be a defence around the Law, if you kept these man made laws, then you would be sure to keep the Law of God.

There was however a problem. What had started out as an aid to a Jewish man or woman walking in obedience to the Law of God; had become an end in itself and for the Pharisees these man made laws were more important than the Laws of Moses. William Hendriksen says of them that; “To be opposed to the word of the scribes is worthy of greater punishment than to be opposed to the words of the Bible.”

This problem was serious because it meant that these people, who so wanted to please God, actually ended up offending God in many ways. I want to take a few moments to show how these people who wanted to be clean before God actually ended up being dirty and offensive to God.

It has often been said that if you want to really hurt someone; you should not attack them but you should attack someone they love. This is true; because I can bear all sorts of insults aimed at myself, but I get very angry if anyone says anything bad about my children.

The Pharisees wanted to get at Jesus; so they attacked those who were near to Him, his disciples. They often did this, remember how they attacked them for eating corn on the Sabbath. This time the Pharisees came to Jesus complaining that His disciples were eating their meals with ceremonially unclean hands.

The laws of the Pharisees gave lots of rules and regulations as to how often hands had to be washed and even gave detailed instructions in how the hands should be washed a certain number of times; up to and over the wrists. In one sense there is nothing strange in this; think of the hygiene rules today, the signs that you see in public toilets telling you to wash your hands, the rules in kitchens about hand washing and hygiene. The Pharisees had many laws about washing because they wanted to keep God’s people clean from contamination from those who were not God’s people. At the market place you would brush against and meet many people, many of whom would be gentiles, that is, not Jews. By touching them, you would become unclean. So before you would eat - you would need to wash.

There are so many things that we can do with our hands and bodies that make us unclean before God. We can sin by using our hands and lifting the glass and drinking too much alcohol and becoming drunk. We can sin by using our hands to steal from others. We can sin by using our hands by holding someone and getting involved in a relationship that we should not be in, and commit adultery. We should try and keep ourselves clean before God.

These are all important but our Church is very clear that the most important source of authority in the Church is the Bible. We are only required to believe things that are in accordance with the Bible. Article six in our 39 Articles says that “Holy scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation; so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite necessary to salvation.”

While we should value the things that we can reason with our minds and the traditions that have been handed down to us from the past. It is the Bible that should have foremost importance in our life together as a Church and our lives as individuals.

Jesus confronted the Pharisees by doing something that they could not argue with. He quoted scripture, the same scriptures that they held to be so important. If he had used and argument they could have come up with some clever answer. If he had quoted some ancient tradition they could have quoted an older or more important tradition. What they could not argue with however was plain teaching of scripture.

This quotation from Isaiah spoke powerfully to these men. In it God pours scorn on the half hearted and double-minded worship of those who come before him. With their lips they worship God but in their hearts they are far from God. The problem is that they teach the teachings of men as though they were the doctrines of God. This was the very same mistake that these Pharisees were making 600 years after Isaiah lived.

Jesus used a very practical example to show what the Pharisees were doing in exalting the teachings of men to get around the plain teaching of God. The commandment says to honour your father and mother. However the Pharisees were getting around financially helping their aged parents by saying that their money was Corban, set aside for God. It was holy money and could not be used for a secular purpose. In doing so they were plainly disobeying the commandment of God. They were not honouring their fathers and mothers as God had commanded, and they were using God as their excuse.

For example :- We too can say that we want to keep the commandment and honour our father and mother, and then forget about them when they are in need. Forgetting to visit them. Not bothering to help them when they need work done at their home and so on.

Another example :- We may say that we want to honour the commandment, You shall not kill. And yet our hearts can be full of hatred and anger towards other people, even ones we love. I was talking with pastor Grant a week or two ago and we were saying that we have often seen in the Churches is which we have ministered; that there has been a fall out among a family over some issue, say for example an inheritance and this has led to a painful split in the family that has lasted for generations. Jesus reminded us that if we live with such anger in our hearts, we have broken the commandment.