Superficial Christianity

Introduction

Opening Illustration: In college, there was a short season where I thought I wanted to make films for a living. I took too many film classes in college. As you take more film classes you begin to see behind the scenes at how fake everything really is. Very often the buildings on the set are not buildings at all, their just the fronts of buildings to look like a town. With the use of CGI now, many scenes are just filmed in front of a green screen, and the beautiful landscapes are added in later. Of course, the magic of cinema, is that it can look and feel so real. A good actor can make you believe that they’re they really feel the scene. And we, knowing its all fake, get caught up in it.

Personal: When it comes to the Christian faith, there unfortunately can a lot of acting that goes on. There is a lot of playing the part on the outside, without being motivated real faith on the inside. The biblical word for this is “hypocrisy” of which Thomas preached on last week. And I’ll begin by asking you, what areas of hypocrisy exist in your faith in God? What areas are just superficial, they may look one way on the outside, but if you get honest with God, your heart has no substance in it?

Context: In today’s text, Jesus is continuing in one lengthier section of teaching, and he critiques two groups of religious leaders in his day, the Pharisees and the Lawyers. We’ve been introduced to these groups previously in our study of Luke, but I’ll remind you who they are for context. The Pharisees were kind of like the pastors of the day. They were the religious leaders, who prioritized strict obedience to the law of God. They were famous for absolute compliance with God’s law, even adding hundreds of rules on top of God’s law that were not biblical. And the lawyers were the functional seminary professors, they were experts in the law.

Big Idea: Here’s the big idea for today. “Prioritize your heart before a Holy God, and the deeds will follow. But prioritize the deeds, and you may never get to the heart.”

Explanation of the Text

THE MAIN PRINCIPLE

First, let’s look at the setup of this encounter that a group of religious leaders has with Jesus.

Luke 11:37–41 “While Jesus was speaking, a Pharisee asked him to dine with him, so he went in and reclined at table. The Pharisee was astonished to see that he did not first wash before dinner. And the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You fools! Did not he who made the outside make the inside also? But give as alms those things that are within, and behold, everything is clean for you.”

Invite Jesus Over: A Pharisee invites Jesus over. And before the meal can even begin, Jesus does something that shocks them. He sits down at the table without washing his hands. You and I might think that is just unhygenic, but its much more than that for the Pharisees. Part of their of their traditions, not from the Bible, but handed down to them through oral tradition, was a scrupulous method for washing hands before a meal. Jesus knew this, and he intentionally didn’t do it.

Fools: Then he uses the tension in the room at that moment, to make a point. He says, “You focus so much attention on the washing dishes, and so little attention on making sure your heart is right with God.” The irony here of course is these Pharisees actually think that Jesus’ hands were unclean. In fact Jesus is the only one who ever hand truly unclean hands.

Psalm 24:3–5 “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart…

But what is the problem Jesus is diagnosing? These Pharisees have turned the beauty and majesty and mystery of relationship with God, life with God, into a set of life-draining rules. The rules look pious on the outside, but they’re just dead and rotting on the inside.

Give as Alms: Jesus says, “Give as alms those things that are within.” That language is quite deep actualy. He is speaking about the spiritual life of man. And what he means is that we were created for a relationship with God, not simply some religious rules to follow. God is after a heart that beats for him, a mind that desires him, a life that authentically reflects his goodness. Let your offering to God be a heart that is honestly his.

SIX WOES

So there is his principle, God is less concerned with the outside of the cup (with our appearance of being religious), and more concerned with the inside of the cup (our authentic heart before a holy God). Then Jesus turns the heat up. He pronounces six woes or rebukes over the Pharisees and Lawyers. The word “Woe” is the sharpest word Jesus had in his arsenal for condemning somebody. It essentially communicated, “Your soul is in danger if you stay on this path.”

Luke 11:42–54 ““But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces. Woe to you! For you are like unmarked graves, and people walk over them without knowing it.” One of the lawyers answered him, “Teacher, in saying these things you insult us also.” And he said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers. Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed. So you are witnesses and you consent to the deeds of your fathers, for they killed them, and you build their tombs. Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the w…”

Let’s walk briefly through all six woes, and then I want to linger on two of them to think about our own lives.

1, Verse 42: The first woe is in verse 42.

Luke 11:42 ““But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.”

One of the ways they washed the outside of the cup, but failed to tend to their heart was in their neglect of justice. They tithed 1/10th of everything down to the mint leaves they found on the ground. They were convinced that their scrupulous obedience to the tithing law made them good with God. And Jesus says, “That stuff’s easy. That’s kindergarten Christianity.” [Quick side note, I wonder what Jesus would say to those Christians in the room who are holding back from giving a full 10% to the Lord’s work through the Church - but today is not a sermon on giving]. That’s too easy to be done artificially. But showing justice and love for the oppressed and the vulnerable. That is not so easily done artificially.

Hosea 6:6 “For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

2, Verse 43: The second woe is verse 43.

Luke 11:43 “Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.”

These religious leaders loved the opinions of others. They were using their robes and positions of authority in God’s Church to build up their self-ego. They loved the honor that came to them when everyone saw them as religious leaders. They were using God to satisfy their own ego.

3, Verse 44: The third woe is verse 44.

Luke 11:44 “Woe to you! For you are like unmarked graves, and people walk over them without knowing it.””

Context will help us understand this. In those days, during festivals, folks would come from all over the country to Jerusalem to come worship. On the outskirts of Jerusalem are a number of cemetaries. There was a Jewish tradition that if you stepped on a grave, you would be ceremonially unclean for some time, and unable to participate in the festivities. And so, if you had a relative buried outside of Jerusalem, each year you would head out and paint the tombstone bright white, so that everyone would know this is a grave. Jesus accuses these religious leaders of deception. You yourselves are dead religiously, and your leading others to become unclean.

4, Verse 46: The fourth woe is verse 46.

Luke 11:46 “And he said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.”

People really looked up to these experts in the law. And these experts would load people up with all the things they could and couldn’t do if they were to maintain the strict faith. They made life nearly impossible to live for the average person who was just trying to pay the bills. But they didn’t care. Their heart was not for the people, which was the point of the law the whole time. The law was suppose to serve the people, not weigh them down.

5, Verse 47-51: This fifth woe takes up five verses. But we get the sense of it in verse 47.

Luke 11:47 “Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed.”

This one cuts deep. Outside of Jerusalem stood a few monuments to the ancients prophets like Isaiah and Ezekiel and Jeremiah. The religious leaders undertook building projects to honor those prophets who boldly spoke God’s Word. But Jesus said, “You wouldn’t have listened to them. You would have joined with the men who plugged up their ears, refused to listen, and killed the prophets.” After all, the greatest prophet that ever lived, He who always spoke the very word of God was speaking to them in that moment, and before conversations over, they’ll be looking for a way to kill him.

6, Verse 52: Sixth and finally in verse 52.

Luke 11:52 “Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.””

These lawyers were supposed to be a guide, a shepherd, a helper for people to draw near to God. But somewhere along the line, their version of godliness got off track, and not only were they far from God and on a path towards hell as a result, but they were taking others with them.

Application of the Text

Whenever we study the Bible, what we want to do is put ourselves under the microscope. It’s one thing to see the hypocrisy in the life of the Pharisees. Its another thing to search our own hearts and discover if there is any hypocrisy. This is hard work. What I want to do for the remainder of this sermon is pick just a few of the critiques Jesus has of the Pharisees. And I want to bring us to a place where we can honestly evaluate our own hearts, and our Church.

Illustration - Jesus Visits Us: A question I asked our elders at our most recent elders meeting as we were reflecting on this text. I said, “You know, if Jesus come in here as a secret shopper one day. He were to see what our Sunday gathering looked like. Then he were to follow us home, and see our devotion life and how we led our family and how we went about our week. What would he say? Would he come back the following week and say, “You did it guys. You got work to do, but this is what I was looking for?” Or would he say, “Woe to you.” We need to always be asking that question.

THE FIRST WOE: TITHING BUT NO JUSTICE OR LOVE OF GOD

Let’s take the very first woe. Jesus said,

Luke 11:42 ““But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.”

In this Woe, Jesus separates the easy things to do in the Christian faith from the more difficult. The example he uses is tithing. I don’t think Jesus is diminishing how big a sacrifice a tithe is. But in Jesus’ day, that was just baseline. What Jesus is saying here, is that we can easily deceive ourselves, like a hypocrite, by doing the fairly cleaner and easier things to do in Christianity, into believing our heart is right with God, when in fact, we’re neglecting the real meaty substance of what this is really all about.

Extended List: Today, we might extend the list from tithing, to all kinds of activities, that Christians keep themselves busy with, that are important to do, but not a substantive measure of their relationship with God.

Coming to Church on a Sunday. Good to do. Right to do. Easier to do.

Joining a Small Group. Good to do. Right to do. Easier to do.

Playing worship music in the car. Good to do. Right do. Easier to do.

Jesus says, “What I’m really after is to bring you back to the heart of God and your purpose. Love of God, and love of people.” You might recall elsewhere that Jesus was asked about the greatest commandment

Matthew 22:37–40 “And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.””

Why Settle for Phariseeism?: O Church, how easy it is to be like these Pharisees, doing and saying the things that you make it look like you are right with God, when in reality you’ve missed it. Why do we do this? Why do settle for Phariseeism. A few reasons…

Love of God is Costly: First, the love of God is costly. One cannot truly love of God until one has reconciled with the reality that we are far more sinful than we ever dared imagine. Our natural condition in this world is not to love of God, but is in fact to make ourselves our own Gods, to establish our own laws, to do life our own way. But in order to have a heart that truly loves of God, we must humble ourselves before him, confess just how foolish we were for pretending we could be our own little Gods nad lead our lead our little lives apart from him. Spiritual humility is a very costly thing.

Love of Other is Messy: But secondly, love of others, real love of others, is messy. It’s one thing to love peripherally. But to see brokenness around you, and to give your time, your heart, your blood, your sweat, your tears, it’s messy. Sometimes we’d rather give the check, than actually get our hands dirty with biblical justice.

The Gospel: Church, Jesus says

Matthew 7:13 ““Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.”

The narrow gate is Christ and his death on the cross. There can be no love of God, nor real love of others, until one goes through that narrow gate of surrendering of their life to Jesus, and receiving the free gift of forgiveness offered to us on the cross. We are all guilty of failing to love God as we ought, and failing to love others. Not one person excluded. Yet Christ, on that cross, offers us forgiveness for that sin. His death in place of ours. And by faith in Christ, he builds a heart that is able to truly love God and love others.

Highlight Justice Ministries at Church: I was asking some folks at our Church recently how we were doing on this as a whole. Are we a people that have been changed by God in such a way that we bleed for others who are hurting. I was encouraged by the answer. And as your Pastor, I just want to look you in the eye and say, “I see a lot of authentic faith in this place. I see a lot that says ‘there is health in here.’” I’ll highlight a few areas where you all have excelled.

Foster Care & Adoption: This Church leads the way in the city on adoption and foster care. We talk about caring for the vulnerable and the at risk, children are often among the top of the list. Years ago we developed the Adoption Fund to help willing parents financially afford an adoption. That adoption fund has been used many times over. Many of you have fostered children, have become safe families, have become certified baby sitters to come alongside foster parents. I suspect and hope that when Jesus sees that pouring out of this church he goes, “Yeah I was looking for that.”

Abortion Ministry: This Church has boldly stepped into the abortion conversation. We have a number of folks that regularly head out abortion clinics in Chicago with the love of God, to try to care for women with unplanned pregnancies, and save the life of the child in the womb. This is bold and sometimes dangerous work, that a number of you in this room do so faithfully. I suspect and hope that when Jesus sees that pouring out of this church he goes, “Yeah I was looking for that.”

Bread of Life Ministry: This Church completely revitalizd the Bread of Life Minstry that serves and cares for the homeless in Chicago, offering food, clothing, prayer, washing their feet, and connecting to other ministries. I suspect and hope that when Jesus sees that pouring out of this church he goes, “Yeah I was looking for that.”

Wrap Up - First Things First: There are countless other places and ways that many of you have been driven to love the vulnerable. But let me wrap this up by reminding us of the point. I’m grateful to be a part of a Church with folks who so love God and so love justice, that they’ll do the mess hard work. But I speak to every Christian in the room, is this true of you? What are your priorities? Have you majored on the majors, or has your version of Christianity majored on the minors.

PROPHETIC EDGE

I would like to hilight one more, the fifth woe. The fifth woe was that lengthier one where Jesus accused the lawyers of killing the prophets.

Luke 11:47 “Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed.”

The argument that Jesus is making is that these tombs that these Pharisees so ardently honor the prophets with are just bluster and show. It’s yet another religious outward act, but their heart is far from God. They dishonor the prophets because they don’t adhere to the very message the prophets were saying. Jesus goes so far as to say, that had those prophets been alive now, they would have joined in murdering them. Which, is exactly what they will soon do to Jesus.

No More Prophets: There are no more prophets today. The last of the prophets were the Apostles, and by God’s grace, their words have been recorded for us in Scripture. And so we too have access to the prophetic Word of God as originally spoken and written by real prophets. This Woe that Jesus speaks over the Pharisees and lawyers, he speaks over us as well, if and when we give lip service to the Word of God, or when we treat the Word of God as commonplace.

Giving Lip Service: So how do we engage with God through His Word, in a way that doesn’t just give lip service to it like the Lawyers? I know this is a common question I get from people. “My devotion life feels only so-so. What can I do?” Let me give you three very practical applications to help allow the prophetic Word of God to accomplish its purpose in you.

We Must Restore a Sense of the Majesty and Mystery of our Faith: First, we must retrain our minds to read the Scriptures supernaturally. We live in a rationalistic world filled with words and ideas. But the Word of God cannot be received by a Christian in the same way we receive any other book or publication. A Christian engaging in the Word of God is a supernatural event. We might say it is a mystical event. Our aim is to behold the glory of God in Christ Jesus. Our aim is to be “taste and see that the lord is good.” Satan is not going to put up a battle against your bible reading if your bible reading is simply to feed your knowledge or historical curiosity. But if you aim to see the supreme worth of Jesus Christ as made manifest through the mellennia and recorded in the Word of God, Satan will oppose you.

Do Not Leave Your Studies Until You Are Joy-Abounding in the Lord: The great George Muller who is often spoken about in Church settings, was a wonderful man of prayer, and lover of orphans in England. He said this when describing his own prayer life,

“I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord.”

Notice what he did not say. He did not say, “My first and primary business every day was to do my daily devotions and read my bible.” No, it was to have my soul happy in the Lord. We must approach the prophetic word of God with a sense that God Himself is speaking his very life-giving words into our souls. He has prepared that Word for that day to give us a joy in Christ, and a humility about ourselves.

We must read our Bibles not just to see the Words but to Savor the words;

not just to understand the chapter, but to delight in the chapter;

not just capture the essence of what was written, but to let what was written become our essence;

not to master the text, but to let the text master us.

We Must Reflect: Third and finally, we must reflect by the power of the Holy Spirit. Do not just read and then rush. I find I need a pen and paper to do this. As I read, I am looking for what God is speaking through the passage to me. Then if there is a particular sentence or two that sticks out I write it down and let the Spirit guide fresh thoughts on the text. This reflection time is so vital.

Lamentations 3:40 “Let us test and examine our ways, and return to the Lord!”

I do this with a pen and paper.

Conclusion

I began by saying that we must prioritize our heart before a Holy God, and the deeds will follow. But if we prioritize the deeds, we’ll never get to the heart. These Pharisees, in all their religion and devotion, missed the glory of Christ in their midst. Christian you are invited to something more. You are invited to life as it was meant to be lived. It’s a very different life from everyone else around you. This life of authentically loving God will