Preparing Your Heart
Easter 2025 • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 6 viewsWe celebrate Easter every year making it easier and easier to see it as yet-another-annual-tradition. The problem with this is Christ's desire to see a true since of sincerity in our hearts. We can see this throughout the Old Testament but also in Christ's anger which burns against those cheapening the celebration of Passover. In this scene, we see Christ's anger against the actions of those profaning His temple, but also anger at the priests and scribes who allow it.
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Sincerity in Religion
Sincerity in Religion
What is the purpose of church when it comes to preparing for major holidays?
Something the “old” churches do right: Biblical calendar
Advent (preparation for Christmas)
Christmas
Epiphany (following Christmas)
Lent (preparation for Easter)
Easter (resurrection through the ascension)
Pentecost
PURPOSE: Ensure your heart is in the right place to celebrate the events coming
In our culture, we suffer from too many holidays… not because recreation is bad but because it conditions us to ignore the purpose of the season.
How many people stop and think about the Presidents on President’s Day?
Halllmark sometimes decides to CREATE a holidays… secretary’s day and grandparents day are lovely gestures but you MADE THOSE UP.
BIBLICAL BASIS: God’s desire for us is sincerity, not just going through the motions.
Common message cited by Christ to the Pharisees
6 For I desire faithful love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
Christ’s Message: Your religious displays do not honor me; your heart does.
Christ cares about the HEART; God isn’t satisfied with people “dancing the dance”.
God’s warning to the priests who “do the sacrifices”
3 “Look, I am going to rebuke your descendants, and I will spread animal waste over your faces, the waste from your festival sacrifices, and you will be taken away with it. 4 Then you will know that I sent you this decree, so that my covenant with Levi may continue,” says the Lord of Armies. 5 “My covenant with him was one of life and peace, and I gave these to him; it called for reverence, and he revered me and stood in awe of my name. 6 True instruction was in his mouth, and nothing wrong was found on his lips. He walked with me in peace and integrity and turned many from iniquity. 7 For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should desire instruction from his mouth, because he is the messenger of the Lord of Armies.
God paints an image of “profaning” the religious decorum of the day (sacrifices)
Contrasts his intent… that the priests would guard knowledge and instruction and that He would ensure life and peace in return.
8 “You, on the other hand, have turned from the way. You have caused many to stumble by your instruction. You have violated the covenant of Levi,” says the Lord of Armies. 9 “So I in turn have made you despised and humiliated before all the people because you are not keeping my ways but are showing partiality in your instruction.”
Two observations...
1) NOT RELATED TO SERMON: Preachers today need to read this and ask themselves some hard questions.
2) RELATED: God is referring to religious leaders doing the festivals and sacrifices as they were told…
But that wasn’t “good enough” God wanted more…
God wanted their hearts!
Read Malachi 2:1-7 and note that the religious leader ARE doing the religious acts (sacrifices), but God prioritizes their hearts.
1) How many holidays, celebrations, and special events do you see churches celebrate? If you were to give a of rating 1-10, how would you rate the ‘sincerity’ of each event (focus on God vs focus on production, tradition, etc)?
2) Is there any value to “monkey-see, money-do” style religion? Should churches be focusing more on giving people the holiday experience, or helping people have hearts ready for the holiday’s importance? Why is this so important when it comes to discipleship?
Church Is To Facilitate Hearts Being In the Right Place
Church Is To Facilitate Hearts Being In the Right Place
God cares about the heart, not the simple religious act.
Evident with his interactions with religious leaders in Israel.
Also evident in the most classic instance of Jesus’ righteous anger.
15 They came to Jerusalem, and he went into the temple and began to throw out those buying and selling. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves, 16 and would not permit anyone to carry goods through the temple. 17 He was teaching them: “Is it not written, My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations? But you have made it a den of thieves!” 18 The chief priests and the scribes heard it and started looking for a way to kill him. For they were afraid of him, because the whole crowd was astonished by his teaching. 19 Whenever evening came, they would go out of the city.
Why was Jesus so angry?
Bad Read: Commerce in the church
Not exactly… makes this about an act rather than a heart
Good example of dangers in “reading it with your perspective in mind”
Good Read: The sellers and money-changers were corrupting the heart of the Passover
Exchanging non-Kosher money for Kosher money at high rates
Selling impure sacrifices
NOTE: The priests and scribes were AFRAID after this.
Fear wouldn’t be a reasonable response to Christ simply “getting rid of crooks”
This indicates the priests and scribes were COMPLICIT… NOT properly guarding the hearts of those seeking to worship God
Christ’s anger burned when He saw people making a mockery of the Passover.
How much more do you think He disdains those who cheapen the meaning of the ultimate Passover… making a display or spectacle of worship for THE Passover Lamb, Jesus Christ?
God’s desire for us is true worship and true discipleship, not merely the appearance of it.
Read Mark 11:15-19 and note Christ’s anger at seeing individuals cheapening the sincerity of the Passover.
1) What can be the danger in regularly overlooking, dismissing, or trivializing the meaning of Holidays like Christmas and Easter?
2) How does cheapening our holidays potentially lead to individuals missing the stories of BLESSING that come from these religious celebrations?
God’s Desire for Celebration: Blessing
God’s Desire for Celebration: Blessing
God gave us instructions for festivals and feasts so we can remember His blessing and covenant.
When the joy of the celebration is of OUR MAKING rather than GOD’S MAKING, it’s “less than”… we are robbing ourselves.
This Easter, and any time we gather, as a church we want to keep our focus on fostering hearts of devotion and thanksgiving… as individuals, we want to observe the purpose for these events so we can receive the FULL BLESSING God intended.
