Lessons over dinner. Jesus confronts hypocrisy. Luke 14:1-24 Part 1
Notes
Transcript
Text - Luke 14:1-24
Subject - Humility
Theme - Humble invitation.
Thesis - Jesus teaches that the way to truly honor God is through humble invitation—by humbling ourselves before Him and extending grace to those who cannot repay, reflecting God's inclusive love and invitation to all.
Principle - Christian, be humble and generous in your relationships, seeking to serve others selflessly and inviting those in need, just as God has graciously invited you into His kingdom.
Intro
Intro
In our Christian lives and talking with people outside of the church, one of the common reasons I have heard, and perhaps you have to as to why people won’t go to church is that they say,
“I won’t go to church, that place is full of hypocrites.”
Why does it seem that the most fervent Christians are some of the most narrow minded, intolerant, judgmental people?
There are many Christians who are hypocrites.
Many abuses have unfortunately taken place in the name of Christianity.
And that is horrible.
When we read the Bible though we notice that it lays a basis for self critique.
Examining ourselves.
God sent the prophets to the people of Israel saying
you who believe in God, but your lifestyle, your habits, show you don’t take God seriously.
They pointed out the people’s hypocrisy.
Jesus frequently attacked religious hypocrisy.
Hypocrisy is pretending.
Pretending to be someone I’m really not.
Sadly, many Christians are hypocrites.
I’ve been a hypocrite many times in my life as well.
Maybe you have been hurt by someone else being a hypocrite.
What we must do is separate someone failing to live Jesus’ teachings with that Jesus actually taught.
We shouldn’t be surprised that Christians fall short.
Especially when we consider human nature and that we are all corrupted by sin.
If we are bothered by hypocrisy, hopefully especially our own.
Then we are on Jesus’ side.
No one has been more outspoken throughout history against hypocrisy than Jesus.
It was done in relationship though.
What I hope for us to see through our passage this week and next is that
as Christians, we must be humble and generous in our relationships,
seeking to serve others selflessly, inviting those in need, just as God has graciously invited us into His kingdom.
I want to encourage you this week to read the entirety of 14:1-24 on your own a few times.
For the sake of time I am only going to read the verses we are covering this morning.
1 One Sabbath, when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully. 2 And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy. 3 And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” 4 But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. 5 And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” 6 And they could not reply to these things.
In our passage today, we find Jesus, once again at a meal.
As a side not, it is interesting as we read the gospels, how much happens over meals.
Something we ought to consider more ourselves perhaps and how we as individuals do ministry.
Jesus is dining at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees.
He is placing himself in a precarious situation once again.
The Pharisees after all are out to get him so to speak.
Seek to trap him.
And that is just what it appears is happening here.
The first step to living with humility is addressing hypocrisy in our own lives.
Which is what Jesus is doing once again in the lives of these religious leaders.
Jesus calls out the Pharisees hypocrisy.
Jesus calls out the Pharisees hypocrisy.
1 One Sabbath, when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully. 2 And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy.
Dropsy is also know as edema.
It is a condition where your body retains fluids and can affect all parts of the body.
Feasts like these were open to the public and people could come wandering in
Outsiders could enter, stand, or sit, and watch what was going on.
The phrasing is interesting here though - And behold -
It is like oh there just happened to be this guy with a debilitating physical disease.
A little sarcasm perhaps on Luke’s part as he wrote.
Also the fact that at the end of verse one Luke wrote that the Pharisees were watching Jesus carefully.
The Jews had some interesting thoughts regarding this condition.
“Man is evenly balanced, half of him is water, and the other half is blood. When he is deserving, the water does not exceed the blood, nor does the blood exceed the water; but when he sins, it sometimes happens that the water gains over the blood and then he becomes a sufferer from dropsy; at other times the blood gains over the water and he then becomes leprous” Van Der Loos 1965: 505.
This man, was a man who would not have been allowed to drop in, especially to a leader of the Pharisees home.
Jesus, knowing the hearts of these men that he was sharing a meal with asks them a question.
3 And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?”
I wonder if these men’s attitudes might have been different had it been one of their close friends or family members that was standing before Jesus.
I have mentioned before how the Pharisees often made concessions in the rules for themselves.
They could essentially travel anywhere with a little preparation.
They often bent the rules for themselves.
Would they bend it here for themselves as well.
And likely the answer would be yes.
Ministering to a sick person was by no means a violation of any Old Testament regulation concerning the Sabbath (cf. Matt. 12:7).
Rabbinic attachments, however, prohibited anyone from treating a sick person on the Sabbath unless that person was in imminent danger of death if left untreated until the next day.
To do so, the rabbis taught, would constitute work and hence be a violation of the required Sabbath rest.
Even matters of life and death were subject to their cruel, inflexible, and ridiculous man-made restrictions.
Jesus question put them in a bind.
If they said that healing is permitted, they conceded His point and they raised problems about their traditions,
which had added to the Law of Moses.
If they said that healing is not permitted, they came across as uncaring.
Besides, if they had invited this man to be there, it cast questions on their motives for them to say, “No, healing is not permitted.” So they kept silent.
But the Sabbath was made for man,—for his benefit, not for his injury,—for his advantage, not for his hurt.
So Jesus heals the man.
He needles a little further with his follow up question after he heals the man.
5 And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?”
A quick translation note - if you have a NKJV or KJV your translation will read which of you having a donkey or an ox.
Current scholarship has determined that son is a better translation based upon older manuscripts.
If you look at the two words it can be easy to see how they might get mixed up.
Jesus directly involve his listeners in this phrase, which of you -
Of course, none of them would not immediately get to work to save the child or the animal.
Here was a man with dropsy who was in a sense "drowning" in his own fluids (edema), and they were unwilling to see him "rescued!"
Jesus is showing that they cared about their animals more than about this man suffering in a swollen, miserable state!
Jesus was exposing their lack of love and their religious hypocrisy.
6 And they could not reply to these things.
They had noting to say.
Sometimes matters of right and wrong can get very complicated, as they had here concerning "lawful" Sabbath activities.
Jesus cut through all the complications with a simple appeal to love.
Jesus assaulted the Pharisees hypocrisy with a call to love others, more than we love ourselves.
It was lawful to heal on the sabbath because that was an act of mercy and love towards the downtrodden.
The room became silent, not a whisper, not a grumble.
Jesus had their attention fully.
I pray Jesus has your attention right now as he had the attention of these men.
Because we all live in some state of hypocrisy.
Be it talking with someone, saying I’ll pray for you, and then never actually praying.
We are all judgmental is some fashion.
Have you ever condemned certain sins publicly while overlooking or minimizing others?
Ignoring pride, greed, or gossip.
How many Christians come to church on Sunday and act one way, but then neglect a personal relationship with God and fail to live out faith authentically in everyday life.
Who lost their temper with their kids, spouse, or co-worker this week?
Hypocrisy is a battle we all face.
Christian Hypocrites study the Word for ammunition against others, but they don’t apply it to themselves.
The Pharisees knew scripture, most probably had the first 5 books of the Bible at least memorized.
They were the guardians of the faith and they took their responsibility seriously.
But they were waiting to catch others in error.
Their goal was not confront others rather than confronting themselves.
Are we doing the same?
An example from marriage is a husband using scripture to demand submission from his wife.
The bible does not command a husband to be the head of his wife.
The command to husbands is to
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,
26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.
Wives are instructed
22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
Paul ends the section with
32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Husbands, how are you sacrificing your time and selfish interests to serve your wife and children?
Hypocrites target and try to bring down anyone who confronts their sin with the Word.
None of us likes to have our sin exposed.
That is what Jesus was doing to the Pharisees, exposing their sin.
A person that knows the Bible can use it out of context to explain away their sinful acts.
One major historical example of this is the crusades.
You watch movies about the crusades and often the battle cry was God wills it!
This was an actual battle cry during the crusades.
Hypocrites care more about their man made rules than about people being right before God in their hearts.
The Pharisees did not care about the people, their care was for the rules.
The man they brought to dinner was an example of that.
If Jesus had just observed their Sabbath rules, they would have been content to leave Him alone.
But Jesus always dealt with heart issues, like having a pure thought life, being free from anger, and being forgiving from the heart toward those who have wronged you.
Hypocrites bend the rules for their own purposes, but they apply them rigidly to others.
I think of the woman caught in adultery as well.
They bring this woman before Jesus, caring only about the rules.
How did Jesus respond to her and the Pharisees who brought her to him?
7 And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”
He was not going easy on sin but rather loving this woman, and telling her to go and sin no more.
He does the same with you and I.
Jesus wants our hearts.
His goal is to make us holy, as He is holy.
Hypocrites often ignore overwhelming evidence in order to persist in their sin.
Jesus powerfully and miraculously heals this man, but the Pharisees ignored that evidence.
And, this wasn’t the first time this sort of thing had happened!
Jesus had cast a demon out of a man in the synagogue on the Sabbath, and the report of that had spread widely (Lk 4:31-37).
He healed Simon’s mother-in-law on the Sabbath (Lk 4:38-39).
He healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath, but the Pharisees responded with rage (6:6-11).
On the Sabbath He healed the woman bent over for 18 years, but the synagogue official was indignant (Lk 13:10-17).
How much more evidence did they need to wake up and say, “Maybe we’re wrong and Jesus is right?”
This shows us how deeply entrenched this sin of religious hypocrisy is and how diligent we must be to root it out of ourselves when Jesus confronts it!
If you’re not careful, you can build a case to defend your point-of-view and ignore overwhelming biblical evidence that convicts you of your sin.
Our Daily bread has a wonderful illustration -
A young man was being interviewed for a position in a small business firm. The applicant had a neat appearance and made a good impression on the owner. He had also prepared an excellent resume in which he listed, as references, his pastor, his Sunday school teacher, and a church deacon. The owner of the business studied the resume for several minutes, then said, "I appreciate these recommendations from your church friends. But what I would really like is word from someone who knows you on weekdays." Sorry to say, in too many instances there is a striking contrast between the behavior of Christians in church and out in the world. The principles we hear preached on Sunday should be practiced all week. A good Sunday Christian will also be a good weekday Christian. —R. W. De Haan (Our Daily Bread, Copyright RBC Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved)
The question we must ask ourselves is are the principles we show here on Sunday morning present in the rest of our week?
Our goal is to answer that with a resounding yes.
But a more realistic answer is not always.
We can live in line with Jesus teaching.
Jesus is working to make each one of us holy.
Holiness is the goal.
The apostle Peter reminds us
13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
Peter’s words mean that all parts of our lives and character should be in the process of becoming conformed, both inwardly and outwardly, to God’s standards.
After people commit their lives to Christ, they sometimes still feel a pull back to their old ways.
Peter tells us to be like our heavenly Father—holy in everything we do.
Holiness means being totally devoted or dedicated to God, set aside for his special use and set apart from sin and its influence.
We’re to be set apart and different, not blending in with the crowd, yet not being different just for the sake of being different.
God’s qualities in our lives make us different.
Our focus and priorities must be his. All this is in direct contrast to our old ways (1:14).
We cannot become holy on our own, but God gives us his Holy Spirit to help us obey and to give us power to overcome sin.
Don’t use the excuse that you can’t help slipping into sin.
Rely on God’s power to free you from sin’s grip.
Life Application Bible Notes (Tyndale, 2007), 2128.
God is not impressed with a game we put on.
He is not impressed by a theater production we call religion.
God is concerned about your heart and my heart.
That’s why Jesus said Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.
We all fail at this but must remember - what was Jesus motive in addressing the Pharisees hypocrisy in the first place?
His love for them.
It is His love for us that rings true.
There is a story of a young girl, who as she was growing up noticed that her mother always word gloves.
One day she asked, mom please take off the gloves, I want to see your hands.
Her mother said, No, I will not do that.
But the girl persisted in asking and finally the mother gave in.
She took off her gloves revealing her scarred hands.
The little girl looked away in shock saying
Oh mom, those are the ugliest hands I have ever seen.
Her mother quickly put her gloves back on.
A little while later though the girl asked - Mom, how did your hands get so scarred?
The mother then told the girl the story that when she was a baby, a fire broke out in the house.
The little girl was in her crib and how she had to rush to the crib to get her out.
She ran through the flames reached out and grabbed the little girl.
She clutched her to her body and shielded her from the flames as she was running out.
She was horribly burned in the process.
The little girl began to cry saying Oh mother, your hands aren’t ugly, they the most beautiful hands in the world!
Jesus revealed to us that God’s heart is pure love for you and for me.
When you and I get in trouble.
When we are hypocrites.
When we are alienated from God.
Instead of washing His hands of us, He became man in Jesus Christ.
He bled and died on a cross to pay the penalty that we deserve for our sin.
And Jesus rose from the dead and is alive today.
God does not call us to live religious lives.
He calls us to deep commitment to Him.
Commitment that will produce purity in heart.
Cliff Knechtle
We must remember as John writes
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
None of this can happen if you haven’t asked Jesus to forgive you of your sin.
If you have not, you can receive that forgiveness today.
Put your faith and trust in Jesus, commit your life to Him.
For those of us that have, we must continue to root out hypocrisy in our own lives, running to God, confessing our sins that He would cleanse us form all unrighteousness.