The Seven Signs of Legalism
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Text: Matthew 23:1-39
Sermon bumper video: The Chosen, “I am just getting started” (S4:E3)
Turn with me in your Bibles to Matthew 23.
I chose to play this clip from The Chosen this morning not because it is word-for-word accurate to the biblical text—it’s not—but because I think it does a great job at showing the emotion that we often overlook when we read such texts in our Bibles, and I want you this morning as we read this passage to hear the righteous anger in Christ’s voice as he confronts these legalistic Pharisees.
Jesus has just finished a conversation with the Pharisees and Sadducees in Matthew 23 where they try to trip him up with tough theological questions, and then he stumps them with a theological question of his own which reveals their hard-heartedness.
In this passage, Jesus pronounces seven “woes” upon the Pharisees, foretelling of their coming judgement for their legalism. As he describes the sins of the Pharisees, we get a unique insight into what legalism is and how to recognize it.
Perhaps this morning it is difficult for you to reconcile the tender, loving Jesus that we all know and love with the wrathful, angry Jesus who denounces the Pharisees. I hope by the end of this message you will understand why this issue of legalism is such a big deal to Jesus, and I hope that we will all take a close look at our hearts this morning and examine them for this sin.
1 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, 3 so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice.
4 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger.
5 They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, 6 and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues 7 and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.
8 But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. 9 And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven.
10 Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. 11 The greatest among you shall be your servant. 12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
13 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.
15 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.
16 “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ 17 You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred?
18 And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.’ 19 You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred?
20 So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. 22 And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it.
23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. 24 You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!
25 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.
27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.
28 So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
29 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, 30 saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’
31 Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. 33 You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?
34 Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town,
35 so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. 36 Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
38 See, your house is left to you desolate. 39 For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’ ”
Prayer
Main Point/FCF:
Jesus’ main criticism of the Pharisees is their hypocrisy and legalism, so we need to take a close look at this and evaluate our own hearts, lest we be guilty of the same thing.
Legalism, at its core, is focusing on the rules but ignoring their purpose.
But, how do we recognize that in our lives? Jesus gives us seven signs in this passage to recognize legalism...
1. Legalists talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. (vv. 1-3)
1. Legalists talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. (vv. 1-3)
1 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, 3 so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice.
Perhaps one of the key phrases for Jesus’ condemnation of the Pharisees is found in the last part of verse 3: “They preach, but do not practice.”
Legalists are quick to point out when others stumble or sin, but rarely reflect on their own sins.
Jesus said that one of the best ways to spot false teachers is by examining their lives:
15 “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?
17 So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit.
19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.
Obviously, this is difficult if you’re listening to or watching preachers online. So, if you’re watching online, it’s best to stick with well-known names of people with good reputations from within your own circle or denomination. But even still, sift everything you hear against the word of God.
This is why the local church can never be replaced by online media. You don’t just need the sermon’s content, you need to rub shoulders with other believers and see their walk with Christ.
2. Legalists burden others while using the law as justification for themselves. (v. 4)
2. Legalists burden others while using the law as justification for themselves. (v. 4)
4 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger.
The Pharisees had become experts in making life difficult for normal people. They had developed strict rules about how far you could walk on a Sabbath day, hence the term “a Sabbath-day’s journey” which appears frequently in the NT.
Still, to this day in Orthodox Jewish communities, similar rules are followed. The Law of Moses prohibited lighting a fire on Sabbath (Ex. 35:3), presumably to give women and servants a day off from having to cook and prepare meals.
But, in modern Orthodox communities, this prohibition against kindling a fire has been extended to operating things that produce a spark or use electricity, which includes elevators. So, Shabbat elevators operate automatically on the Sabbath, constantly running all day long and opening automatically at each floor of the building, lest someone have to do the “work” of pushing the button on the elevator.
Obviously, the Pharisees in Jesus’ day didn’t have laws about elevators, but they developed all kinds of similarly burdensome laws that had nothing to do with the purpose of the original law. And yet, they were masters at finding loopholes for themselves.
The question for us today is, “Are we quick to judge others’ sins, but blind to our own? Do we twist Scripture to justify our own sins, while using it to condemn others?” That’s legalism.
3. Legalists are all about appearances. (vv. 5-12)
3. Legalists are all about appearances. (vv. 5-12)
5 They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long,
In the OT, God commanded the Israelites to commit Scripture to memory, to meditate on it and memorize it.
4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Of course, the context makes it clear that the intent of God’s instructions here is that people should be reading, and meditating on Scripture, applying it to every aspect of their lives. They should be so saturated in Scripture that it’s as if it’s their clothing and their house that they live in.
But, they took this quite literally, and actually took strips of parchment with Bible verses inscribed on them, put them in a little box and strapped that to their foreheads and their right arms, wrapping a long strap from it all the way down their arm.
Add pictures
Add pictures
And that might not have been so bad, except the Pharisees wore these all the time (normal people would just wear them when they prayed), and the Pharisees kept making the boxes bigger and bigger, so they’d be more noticeable.
While normal people might have a little box with a couple verses, the Pharisees are walking around with the ESV Study Bible strapped to their foreheads!
6 and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues 7 and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.
They loved getting called by their titles: Rabbi, Father, and so on.
And the point that Jesus is making is not that you can’t call your college professor “Doctor” or “Professor,” he’s not saying that you can’t show respect to people in a higher position. The point is that we should not be seeking out such attention for ourselves.
Beware of doing things to draw attention to yourself. We’re supposed to do our good deeds so that people will glorify God, not us.
Are you the type of person that needs to be thanked when you serve? Do you dress to draw attention to yourself? Are you the “know-it-all” in your group, who always has to have the last word?
The irony is that Jesus’ most common rebuke to these Pharisees, who walked around with Scripture boxes on their heads, is “Have you not read...?”
Scripture was just a prop to them. Is your Bible a prop? When is the last time you actually read it? Or do you just bring it to church to look good for others?
4. Legalists deceive themselves. (v. 13)
4. Legalists deceive themselves. (v. 13)
13 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves...
The Pharisees thought that if anyone was going to heaven, they were! But, Jesus makes it clear here, and in many other places, that many of the Pharisees were headed to Hell.
Jesus here calls the Pharisees “hypocrites.” Hypocrite is from the Greek word which just means “actor, pretender.” It was the word used for actors in Greek plays, but it also here refers to people who are pretending to be believers. It means that their outward actions of religion are merely external, they don’t actually believe in their hearts.
Legalism is deceptive because it is possible to convince yourself that you actually do believe. It seems like you’re doing something genuinely worthwhile. Following God’s rules gives the illusion that you’re righteous, but Scripture makes it clear that you cannot be made righteous by keeping rules.
Legalists think that they can do enough good things in their life to gain God’s approval and get into heaven. They think that if they keep enough of the rules, do enough good deeds, then God will be happy with them and let them in. They think that if their good deeds outweigh their bad deeds, then they’re good.
Legalists say things like, “I’ll go to church once I get my act cleaned up.” They think that they have to be good enough to go to church, because at the end of the day, they think their good deeds are what will save them.
But the problem is that you can’t clean up your life without Christ! Placing your faith in Christ and giving your life to him is the only way you’ll ever be clean in God’s sight.
And what’s worse...
5. Legalists deceive others. (vv. 13-15)
5. Legalists deceive others. (vv. 13-15)
13 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.
15 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.
They neither enter heaven nor let others go. They go around telling people that they just need to keep the rules better.
We saw this in PNG. I met a man out in Western province PNG who had been deceived by a cult out of Oklahoma. This cult leader had traveled all the way around the world to the capital to hold a rally and convince these Papua New Guineans that they ought to leave their churches and join his church in Oklahoma. And he even helped them figure out a way to pay their tithe via wire transfer to his church in Oklahoma. They convinced this poor guy that the KJV was the only translation that was God’s Word, and of course, English was not his first language, let alone Victorian English, so he couldn’t understand his Bible at all.
Remember what Jesus said,
6 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.
6. Legalists major on the minors. (vv. 16-28)
6. Legalists major on the minors. (vv. 16-28)
23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness.
These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. 24 You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!
Legalists make mountains out of molehills and molehills out of mountains.
Notice, Jesus doesn’t tell them that they shouldn’t be tithing, but rather rebukes them for obsessing over the tiniest detail of their tithe while completely ignoring much more important things.
One of the hallmark characteristics of legalists is treating minor doctrines as if they were the test of orthodoxy, and treating major doctrines as if they’re insignificant.
A legalist will debate you fiercely on tithing, arguing that a proper tithe is exactly 10% of your total gross, pre-tax income; and yet, will show no concern for the lost in their community and instead insist on using the money of the church to provide programs and creature comforts that help themselves.
I know of a legalist, a popular televangelist who calls himself “Dr. Dino,” who would go around vehemently debating unbelievers on the age of the earth and the existence of the Loch-Ness Monster but since he couldn’t figure out that his Bible told him to pay his taxes, he ended up in jail for tax fraud. He ended up twice divorced and the woman he’s living with now is not his wife, because he refused to submit to the government’s authority to issue a marriage license. Perhaps he should have focused a little more on the basics—like submitting to the governmental authorities and honoring God in his marriage—and a little less on side issues like the age of the earth and conspiracy theories.
Legalists will insist that men ought to wear ties and suits to church and women ought to wear dresses and treat guests as if they don’t belong because they’re not in the proper attire for church or because they sat in their seat.
Legalists will insist on their interpretation of the end-times chronology, but haven’t bothered in ages to tell anyone outside of their church that the Lord is returning.
Legalists will shut down a children’s program or youth program because “the unchurched kids are messing up our building, and this is the Lord’s house!” They care more about the building and the money than they do about the souls of the lost kids that are making holes in their walls and smoking in the bathroom. But if knocking holes in our walls is what it takes to bring kids to Jesus, I’ll go around with a sledgehammer and make this building look like Swiss cheese!
I once had a legalist stand up and challenge me in the middle of my sermon because I suggested that it was ok to clap during worship. He felt that clapping after a worship song gave glory to the person instead of to God. But that church had not baptized anyone in years because it had ceased to be a church that glorified God in any meaningful sense for many years.
Legalists flip their priorities upside down and major on the minors and minor on the majors. They look righteous on the outside, but on the inside they are full of greed and hypocrisy.
7. Legalists persecute the righteous. (vv. 29-36)
7. Legalists persecute the righteous. (vv. 29-36)
The one thing a legalist can’t stand is someone who is genuine.
29 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, 30 saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’
31 Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers.
33 You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?
34 Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town,
35 so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar.
36 Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
The Old Testament is filled with examples of people who could not bear to hear the message of the prophets, so they persecuted and murdered them.
He gives two examples: Abel and Zechariah. Abel is from all the way back in Genesis 4. Cain and his brother Abel both bring an offering to God, but Cain’s offering wasn’t done properly. Most likely, he did not give his offering with the right heart, whereas his brother Abel did. So, Cain killed his brother Abel—it was the first murder. And John gives us some insight as to why he did this:
12 We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you.
Legalists hate people who are truly righteous and following God because their life is like a light that shines on the darkness in the legalist’s life.
The other example he gives here is of Zechariah, whom it says was murdered between the sanctuary and the altar—in the middle of the Temple courtyard.
There are actually two possibilities for the identity of this Zechariah. One is Zechariah the prophet, who wrote the book in his name. In his book, he describes himself as “Zechariah, son of Barachiah.” His death is not recorded in Scripture, though, and there is no evidence that he was murdered.
The other possibility, which I think is more likely, is that this refers to a priest named Zechariah whose murder is described in II Chr. 24:20-22
20 Then the Spirit of God clothed Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest, and he stood above the people, and said to them,
“Thus says God, ‘Why do you break the commandments of the Lord, so that you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the Lord, he has forsaken you.’ ”
21 But they conspired against him, and by command of the king they stoned him with stones in the court of the house of the Lord.
22 Thus Joash the king did not remember the kindness that Jehoiada, Zechariah’s father, had shown him, but killed his son. And when he was dying, he said, “May the Lord see and avenge!”
The only issue here is that this Zechariah is described as the “son of Jehoiada,” whereas Matthew says he was Zechariah “son of Barachiah.” But, Barachiah could have been the name of either his father or grandfather, and people often went by more than one name. Or, Barachiah could have been the name of this Zechariah’s grandfather. There are other possibilities, and if you wanna chat with me sometime about this, I’m happy to do that, but I don’t want to distract from the main point of what Jesus is saying here, so I’m not going to deal any further with this issue.
The point is that from the very beginning, in Genesis, until the end of the Old Testament, people like the Pharisees have been persecuting and murdering the righteous non-stop.
And here, Jesus prophesies that they will continue to do so. His words in verse 34 foretell of the martyrdom of the apostles and the early Christians, and such persecution continues today around the world against believers.
To a lesser extent, even in local churches we see this played out as church members obsess about the color of the carpet and the type of music that is played in worship while they make life as difficult as possible for their pastor and anyone else who genuinely tries to follow God.
And in your life, if you follow God and genuinely try to serve him, you can rest assured that there will always be people who hate you for it.
18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.
19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.
21 But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me.
25 But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’
Finally, we need to see Jesus’ warning to legalists...
Warning: Legalism is offensive to God.
Warning: Legalism is offensive to God.
37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
38 See, your house is left to you desolate. 39 For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’ ”
Legalism is not a minor sin. Jesus consistently rebukes the Pharisees with more harshness and more denouncements of judgement than he does the tax collectors and prostitutes.
Why? I said earlier that legalism is focusing on the rules but ignoring their purpose. It is depending upon what you do for God rather than on what God has done for you.
A legalist thinks they can earn their way to heaven, that they can possibly be good enough to get there if they just try really hard. But, the problem is, that kind of attitude is not pleasing to God, because the very reason that God gave up his own Son on the cross is because you could never be good enough to earn salvation!
If you planted a tomato vine in your garden, and no tomatoes ever came from it, only thorns. But the tomato vine tried to justify itself by how pretty its leaves were; would you keep that tomato vine in your garden? Would you not rather dig it up and cast it out to make room for things that would actually bear fruit?
Imagine if a soldier committed treason by secretly spying for the enemy and selling military secrets that resulted in the death of many soldiers. Could they justify their actions by attempting to show how great a soldier they had been otherwise? Would their commendations and medals excuse their actions? Would that be an acceptable defense for their treason?
Imagine if your spouse cheated on you repeatedly over a period of time before finally being caught. But when you confronted them, they shrugged it off and said, “Yeah, but look at all the other things that I have done for you. I cook, clean, make money for our family, do the dishes...I’m a good spouse. I think the good I do outweighs the bad.”
Would you not be all the more enraged and offended at them? Would such a defense not only fail to appease you but inflame your wrath against them? Would it not seem to you but a slap in the face, an affront to your dignity, the deepest betrayal and most thoughtless and insulting of all things to say? Would you not look at them and say, “Who what!?!? The one thing that makes us married is our commitment to one another, our promise to save ourselves for one another. Is that commitment not the bedrock of our relationship, the defining characteristic of our marriage relationship? So what if you do the dishes? If you sleep around you have broken your vows and defiled the very thing that defines our marriage!”
So, when a legalist stand before God and attempts to justify himself through his good deeds saying, “But look at all the good things I did!”
22 ...‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’
Then Jesus will say to them...
23 ...‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
And they will say, “But I have been a good person!”
And God will say, “You do not even know what ‘good’ means. There is only one who is good.”
And they will say, “So what if I did not place my faith in Christ? I went to church, I said ‘Hail Mary’s,’ I gave money to the poor and to the church.”
And God will say to them, “Do you not think that had it been possible for you to be made right in my eyes through your good works that I would have spared my Son from the brutal death and agony of the cross? Does the brutality of his death not speak to you of the severity of your sins before me and my wrath against your sin? So what if you gave me one or two hours of your time every week, did you not live the other 168 hours every week for yourself? I am your Creator, the King of the universe. I created you for my glory and for my purposes. But you have lived for yourself, you have lived as if you are your own king. So what about your good deeds? You have ignored the defining characteristic of our relationship—I am God and you are not. I am Creator and you are my creation.
And even when I took upon myself the penalty that your sins rightfully deserved and made a way for you to be forgiven and reconciled to me, you did not submit yourself and humble yourself to my Son, but have attempted to justify yourself before me while rejecting my Son whom I gave up as a sacrifice for you. You have defiled the defining aspect of our relationship and your attempts to justify yourself before me are an affront to my holiness and make a mockery of my Son’s sacrifice.
Invitation: God can free you from the chains of legalism.
Invitation: God can free you from the chains of legalism.
37 ...How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings...
Here’s the good news...Christ died to make salvation of legalists possible.
We all have a bit of legalist in us. None of us likes to acknowledge our sins. We all attempt to justify ourselves and excuse our sins. We all start off thinking that we can be good enough, do enough good deeds, to make God happy with us.
But maybe you’ve finally reached the point where you realize that’s never going to happen. You never feel good enough in God’s eyes. You’re never going to be good enough. A baby chick can’t fend for itself—it needs the momma hen. And Jesus is waiting to gather you under his wing, to clothe you in his righteousness, and to make you a child of the King. All you have to do is stop trying to justify yourself and fall at the feet of the King.
Stop depending upon what you think you can do for God, and depend upon what he has done for you on the cross.
Just as an adulterer can’t “do” anything to make his/herself right, but has to simply throw themselves at their spouse’s feet and be sorrowful over their sin, you can do nothing to make yourself right before God. All you can do is throw yourself at his feet, acknowledge and repent of your sin, and place your faith in the promise that God has given in Christ.
He will redeem you. He will justify you. He will save you from your sins and he will make you righteous in God’s eyes, not through your good deeds, but through Christ’s.
Reflection Questions:
What does it mean to be a hypocrite? What is the difference between failing to live up to the Bible’s standard as a Christian and hypocrisy?
Can you think of a time when you might have been a 'legalist'? How can you change that behavior moving forward?
What are some examples of the 'heavy burdens' that legalists place on others today? How do these burdens affect people in the church?
What are the 'weightier matters of the law' that Jesus emphasizes in contrast to the smaller rules?
Why was Jesus so angry with the Pharisees? What about legalism is so offensive to God?
How can we avoid being legalistic in our marriages, parenting, work, and other relationships?
