608. Gospel of Luke - Chapter 11 (#8) - The Pharisees focused on the wrong things. July 31, 2024

[00:00:06] Welcome to Wisdom Today. My name is Bill Kelley and I'll be your host. In this podcast we will be exploring the book of Proverbs. The words of King Lamool, the utterance which his mother taught him, what my son and what son of

[00:00:54] my womb and what son of my vows. Do not give your strength to women nor your ways to that which destroys kings. It is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes intoxicating drink. Lest they drink and forget the law and

[00:01:19] convert the justice of all the afflicted. Give strong drink to him who is perishing and wine to those who are bitter of heart, let him drink and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more. Open your mouth for the

[00:01:39] speechless in the cause of all who were appointed to die. Open your mouth, judge, righteously and plead the cause of the poor and needy. Who can find a virtuous wife for her

[00:01:56] worth is far above rubies? The heart of her husband safely trusts her so he will have no lack of gain. She does him good and not evil all the days of her life. She seeks wool and

[00:02:13] flacks and willingly works with her hands. She is like the merchant ships. She brings her food from afar. She also rises while it is yet night and provides food for her household and a portion for her maid service. She considers

[00:02:34] a field and buys it. From her profits she plants evidured. She girts herself with strength and strengthens her arms. She perceives that her merchandise is good and her land does not go out by night. She stretches

[00:02:53] out her hands to the disk staff and her hand holds the spindle. She extends her hand to the poor. Yes, she reaches out her hands to the needy. She is not afraid of snow for her household.

[00:03:11] For all her household is clothed with scarlet. She makes tapestry for herself. Her clothing is fine linen and purple. Her husband is known in the gates when he sits among the elders of the land. She makes linen garments and sells them and supplies sashes for the merchants.

[00:03:36] Strength and honor are her clothing. She shall rejoice in time to come. She opens her mouth with wisdom and on her tongue is the law of kindness. She watches over

[00:03:51] the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed. Her husband also and he praises her. Many daughters have done well but you excel them all.

[00:04:11] Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing but a woman who fears the Lord. She shall be praised. Give her of the fruit of her hands and let her own words praise her in the gates.

[00:04:30] Friends today I'd like to take a closer look at verse 10 and proper 31 verse 10 says this who can find a virtuous wife for her worth is far above rubies. Friends we will revisit that

[00:04:50] verse prior to closing today but what I'd like to do is continue our study in the gospel according to Luke. And on Monday's podcast we finished a passage of scripture called the lamp of the body

[00:05:08] and we talked about Jesus being the light of the world and we also talked about that we are supposed to be like Jesus himself so logically we should conclude that now we are to be the light

[00:05:25] of our present day society. Today we are going to be finishing chapter 11 and there's a lot of material to cover today and I'm gonna tell you in advance that this passage of scripture

[00:05:40] used to get me fits. I really didn't understand a lot of what was going on and now I have drawn a lot closer to God and as you draw closer to God scripture begins to reveal itself to you

[00:05:58] in other words it starts to become clearer and clearer so I'm gonna kind of let you know in advance that I will be going over quite a bit of commentary today because I really want you to grasp

[00:06:15] what is really happening in this passage so we're going to begin in Luke chapter 11 beginning in verse 37 and as he spoke a certain Pharisee asked him to die with him so he went in and sat down

[00:06:35] to eat when the Pharisee saw it he marveled that he had not first washed before dinner now friends before I even say another word I just want you to focus on how keen the Pharisees were

[00:06:53] in watching every single thing that Jesus did so he happens to sit down at the dinner table and he hadn't washed his hands and the Pharisee was beside himself he didn't understand how

[00:07:12] Jesus could possibly do this let's go to verse 39 then the Lord said to him now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean that your inward part is full of greed and wickedness

[00:07:33] so friends the first point that I would like to bring up today is the Pharisees focused on the wrong things now I am reading out of the Nelson study Bible and I'd like to read the commentary for this

[00:07:50] verse it says these condemnations by Jesus are similar to those found in Matthew's Gospel chapter 23 the Pharisees washed the outside of cups making sure that the cups had not become unclean through contact with a dead insect Jesus pointed out that the Pharisees concerned themselves

[00:08:22] without word appearances and ritual cleanness while what was inside what really counts was full of selfishness and evil let's go to verse 40 foolish ones did not he who made the outside

[00:08:45] make the inside also but rather give alms of such things as you have then indeed all things are clean to you but low to you Pharisees for you Ty, Mint and Rue and all manner of herbs

[00:09:07] and pass by justice and the love of God these you ought to have done without leaving the others undone so here Jesus is scrutinizing the Pharisees and basically telling you what my first

[00:09:27] point was is that the Pharisees were all focused on the wrong things let's look at the commentary for verse 42 the Pharisees worried about tithing 10% even down to the smallest herbs which were

[00:09:46] tied according to the dictates of tradition not the law of Moses the law spoke of tithing all produce but what constituted food was debated some Pharisees took the strictest interpretation and counted almost anything including spices however they neglected two basic things that the

[00:10:14] prophets also had warned about love and justice now friends I don't know if you listen to Friday's podcast or not but I talked about the great love chapter and I talked about it doesn't

[00:10:31] matter what you do in life if you don't have love nothing that you do in life matters having love is more important than doing anything else in the world let's look at verse 43

[00:10:51] whoa to you Pharisees for you love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the market places whoa to you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites for you are like graves which are not seen

[00:11:10] and the men who walk over them are not aware of them listen to the commentary per verse 44 the Pharisees were like hidden graves to have contact with a grave or with the dead

[00:11:28] was to become ceremonially unclean anyone or anything in the same room as the dead was considered in Jewish tradition to be impure this is Jesus's stronger condemnation the Pharisees the Paragon's a purity were in fact the height of uncleaness now friends I am going to go back to

[00:11:58] the Old Testament a book in which I seldom refer to but I wanted to show you the extent of which the Pharisees took the matter of the law let's go to the book of numbers chapter 19 and I am going

[00:12:17] to read a passage of scripture between verses 11 and 19 I wanted to pay particular attention to how stringent the law truly was he who touches the dead body of anyone shall be unclean

[00:12:37] seven days he shall purify himself with a water on the third day and on the seventh day then he will be clean but if he does not purify himself on the third day and on the seventh day

[00:12:55] he will not be clean whoever touches the body of anyone who is died and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord that person shall be cut off from his real so friends they are

[00:13:14] actually saying that you won't be able to go to church anymore if you do these things listen to how nitpicky they are he shall be unclean because the water of purification was not sprinkled

[00:13:31] on him his unclean is still on him this is the law when a man dies in a tent all who come into the tent and all who are in the tent shall be unclean seven days and every open vessel which has

[00:13:51] no cover fastened on it is unclean whoever in the open field touches one who is slain by a sword or who has died or a bone of a man or a grave shall be unclean seven days and for an

[00:14:12] unclean person they shall take some of the ashes of the heifer burnt for purification from sin and running water shall be put on them in a vessel a clean person shall take hissep

[00:14:27] and dip it in the water sprinkle it on the tent on all the vessels on the persons who were there or on the one who touched a bone the slain the dead or a grave the clean person shall sprinkle

[00:14:48] the unclean on the third day and on the seventh day and on the seventh day he shall purify himself wash his clothes and bath in water and at evening he shall be clean so friends I'm going

[00:15:06] to do a little bit of humor here would you rather be stripped listening to the scribes who told you about the law or do you think you would like try to hang out with Jesus and listening

[00:15:24] to what he had to say personally I like the idea of following Jesus I think if I live at that time on earth that's what I would have done let's go to verse 45 then one of the lawyers answered and

[00:15:41] said to him teacher by saying these things you reproach us also in other words these people understood that Jesus was referring to them and basically calling them hypocrites he was basically telling

[00:16:00] them why don't you practice what you preach let's go on to verse 46 and he said whoa to you also lawyers for you load men with burdens hard to bear and you yourselves do not touch the burdens

[00:16:19] with one of your fingers so friends my second point today is Jesus accuses the lawyers of burdening men with burdens hard to bear let's look at the commentary for verse 46 Jesus applied his woes to lawyers as well as to the Pharisees in everyday Greek the term translated burdens

[00:16:48] refers to a ship's cargo the idea is that a heavy strain was being imposed on the people and yet in the end this burden did not bring them closer to God here Jesus reviewed the tradition that had

[00:17:06] grown up around the law of Moses you yourselves do not touch the burdens the meaning of this phrase is debated was Jesus accusing the scribes of hypocrisy and not practicing what they taught and in making distinctions that freed them from obligations as they did with oaths

[00:17:32] or was Jesus simply accusing the scribes of not offering aid and compassion to those who tried to follow their rules the second interpretation is more likely since the Pharisees were known

[00:17:46] for adhering to the law let's go to verse 47 whoa to you for you build the tombs of the provis and your fathers killed them in fact you bear witness that you approve the deeds of your

[00:18:05] fathers for they indeed killed them meaning the provis and you build their tombs let's look at the commentary for these two verses Jesus made a biting ironic comparison between the current generation of Israel and the generations of the past Jesus was saying that the current generation

[00:18:31] finished the job of slaying the provis that the previous generation had started the building and care of tombs was supposed to be an act of honoring the provis the Jesus pointed out

[00:18:47] that something else was really going on let's look at verse 49 therefore the wisdom of God also said I will send them prophets and apostles and some of them they will kill and persecute that the

[00:19:05] blood of all the prophets which was shed from the foundation of the world may be required of this generation from the blood of able to the blood of Zechariah who perished between the altar and the temple

[00:19:24] yes I say to you it shall be required of this generation so friends we are going to stop right there and we will pick up tomorrow but before we close today I'd like to go to our verse of the day

[00:19:41] provoked 31 verse 10 who can find a virtuous wife for her worth is far above her abyss now friends my wife and I just celebrated 28 and one half year of marriage and some of you may say

[00:20:04] wow that's being a little bit specific isn't it well today is the 22nd two days ago was the 20th and that was half of a year and friends I know this may sound a little bit silly but we don't know

[00:20:22] the day or the hour when God will call us home and I really kind of want for you guys to think about that you know I often think about this there's a lot of times where a husband or a wife will leave

[00:20:38] and go to work or something and for some reason they may have had an argument or something and you know they don't say goodbye they don't end with the kids and something happens to that spouse they get an

[00:20:54] accident and the most awful thing happens that spouse dies and that person sometimes may feel guilty for the rest of their lives they were in that accident because I made them upset friends life is too short

[00:21:15] we need to always be thinking about love, about loving our spouse, about loving our parents, our kids, our grandparents, our grandkids those who we hang out with our friends

[00:21:33] friends my call to action is this today how close are you to your spouse and your kids I know that's a silly question but do you always say goodbye do you always kiss them as you walk out the door I want you to give us some thought

[00:21:56] every single time you leave their presence and have to go somewhere you should say hey always remember I love you give them a kiss let them know about how much you love them friends I will never end the podcast

[00:22:15] without giving anyone an opportunity to receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior if you have never made that decision this is what I'd like for you to do repeat a simple prayer after me

[00:22:28] and all you have to do is say this Jesus I recognize on a sinner and I have need of the Savior I want you to be the Lord of my life I want to follow you the rest of my life in Jesus name

[00:22:43] amen and friends that is all you have to do if you said that prayer you were now in the family of God congratulations welcome to the family now may the Lord bless you and keep you the Lord make

[00:22:57] it's they shine upon you and be gracious to you the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace friends please join me again tomorrow as we further explore wisdom today