Trinity Baptist Church

The Book of Mark

Religion and Its Victims

Mark 12:38-44

 

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One of the great dangers the New Testament writers warn us about is false teachers.  There have always been and always will be false teachers, lying prophets, religious deceivers and corrupt preachers who claim to represent God but actually represent Satan. 

 

The reason they are so dangerous is they claim to bring the way to heaven, but in truth what they share is the road to hell.  They claim to speak divine truth and actually speak satanic lies.  And over and over again, Scripture warns us about this danger. 

 

One of the most dangerous things in the world is religion because any religion that is separate and apart from salvation through faith in Jesus Christ is a false religion.  But convincing those who are religious that they are in danger of hell is extremely difficult.  That’s why one of the most deadly weapons in Satan’s arsenal is a false religion.

 

There is only one way to Heaven, only One approach to God and the true gospel declares that to be Jesus Christ Himself and every other way is a false way that leads to hell.

 

In the time of our Lord in Israel, those who were in charge of Judaism couldn’t have been farther away from what God intended for His people. 

The only appearance of anything even remotely related was in outward appearance. And remember, when Jesus visited with the scribe who came to test Him, He agreed with Jesus that the real thrust of right relationship with God is internal, loving God and loving your neighbor.

 

In fact, I had a revolutionary thought this week, and I don’t often make those public quickly, but Idid bounce this one off of Dr. Fannin this week and we took some time to discuss it and I think I’m right in what I’m about to say. 

 

My question to him was, “Is Judaism, in its purest form, what we call Christianity today?”  Isn’t it true that what God had in mind for the Jews is what we practice as Christians?  And if the Jews had embraced Jesus as Messiah as a whole and then lived in right relationship with Him, then that would be exactly what we have in the church. 

 

In fact, the earliest “Christians”, such as Peter and John and Paul, were Jews who did exactly that.  It was God’s design that the Jews love Him, love one another and be a blessing to the world.  And for those that do today, we call them “Messianic Jews”, but I’m not sure the adjective is needed. 

 

They are, in fact, Jews who believed God and embraced Christ and are obedient to Him.  They are the real Spiritual and scriptural Jews and every other Jew is a Jew in the flesh only. And we who are Gentile have the privilege of becoming “Jew” and therefore accepted as they are by and through the blood of Jesus Christ. 

 

 

So what was at work at the time of Christ was just a superficial shell of God’s original design as an apostate form of Judaism that was actually under the control of Satan and led by hypocrites. 

 

However, that was not the perception by the people.  They saw the Sadducees and Pharisees and scribes and priests and rabbis as the representatives of God.  They were viewed as devout and holy.  They were respected and responsible.   And yet, at their core, they were as rotten as they come, only pretending to serve and worship God.

 

And if there is any doubt about that, just keep in mind while they are claiming to honor God, they are bent on murdering the Son of God. And before very much more time passes, they will bribe Judas and Jesus will be crucified. 

 

And in these last few hours that Jesus has left, he will reveal them for who they are and lower the boom on their hypocrisy as he delivers His final public comments.  

 

Now I want to point out to you that what Mark records regarding them is relatively brief, only three verses.  But the full statement is given by Matthew in Matthew 23 and it goes on for 36 verses. And it is a hide-ripper!  And notice it is phrased in terms of

 

 

Jesus begins by saying, “Beware!”

 

Verse 38

 

Now while what we read here is a condemnation of those who reject Christ, it is also a warning to those who are under their teaching.  This is a warning from the Lord Himself about false teachers and false teaching.  And notice, there is a zero tolerance policy with Jesus for false teachers.

 

In particular, He mentions the scribes.  Scribes were, for the most part, Pharisees. They were very concerned that the Law of God be honored.  So they were the legal experts, the lawyers of Israel.  And as such, they had their nose stuck in everything from religious matters to civil matters to social matters.  

 

Their responsibility was not only interpretation of the Law, but application of the Law.  They handled all legal matters for the people, no matter what kind of things they were.

 

Now as such, they were to be the protectors of the people. They were to show them what God wanted. They were to hold them to the Law of God so that they could be conformed to the promises of God for blessing upon obedience. That was their role.

 

However, they did the opposite. Why else would the Lord warn about them?  When you’ve got to beware of your protectors, you’re in trouble.  And complicating matters was that the people trusted them.  And unfortunately, Jesus said in Matthew 23,

 “These men who are themselves sons of hell are making sons of hell out of you.”  And they were a volatile threat because of their hypocrisy. 

 

So here our Lord offers this caution regarding their leadership.  From the caution, we’ll go to

 

 

verse 38

 

Now notice that He characterizes their hypocrisy in ways that would be very familiar to the people.

The Lord pulls no punches and the main element is that they are spiritual frauds.

 

Everything they do is external.  It’s all on the outside.  In Matthew 23 He says that you clean the outside of the dish, but the inside is filthy. He says, “On the outside you’re a whitewashed tomb. On the inside you’re corrupt, rotting flesh.” So He talks about their fake outside. They like to walk around in long robes. They like to walk around in long robes.

 

These were special robes, scribal robes that went all the way to the ground.  They were fancy and unique and expensive and they had tassels or fringe around the bottom that distinguished them as holy and respected.  That was designed by God.  You can read about it in Numbers 15.  

 

But as time went on, they changed the designation of those tassels to symbols of their glory and power. And according to Matthew 23:5, they kept enlarging their tassels to draw attention to themselves. 

 

But they had no true holiness of heart.  They were just outward symbols.  They wanted to look the part of holy men, but paid no attention to the inside.    

 

Mark also indicates records for us they liked to be recognized and respected out in public. 

 

They loved to be greeted in the marketplace.  As they moved about in public life with their special, fancy, unique, one-of-a-kind, belonging only to their particular sect robe with its fancy tassels, everybody knew who they were and they expected to be addressed then with titles of dignity.

 

They wanted to be called rabbi, which means teacher or doctor.  Jewish literature tells us the titles used to refere to rabbis were, “O great one, O knowledgeable one, O excellent one, O exalted teacher.”

 

We still have a lot of that with us today. Dr. So-and-So, Dr. So-and-So. Father this and Father that.  We had a pastor over in Duncan who was proud of the Dr. before his name, so I always intentionally called everyone else “doctor” and referred to him as “brother”.  

 

Every so often someone asks me what I like to be called and I always tell them “brother”.  If you don’t like that, just use Terry. I figure Jesus was good enough for Jesus and Paul was good enough for Paul, so if I can get “terry” I’m doing alright. 

 

But false teachers are never humble. They always need to be elevated. That’s why they wear collars and special shirts and robes and hats and all kinds of goofy garb and you’ve got to call them the most high muckity-muck.  And remember, Jesus said beware of those who do such things.

 

And then it says they love the best seats in the synagogue.  In other words, they liked to be on stage.  They wanted to be recognized as elevated above the people.

They wanted to have the places of honor at banquets. They wanted to be near the host, to be the center of attention, the most honored, the most revered.

 

Let me tell you what I’ve noticed about religion and churches and denominations and such.  The more symbolism there is, the less spirituality there is also.  The more emphasis a church puts on symbols and icons and robes and paraphernalia, the less reality of the faith there is. 

 

When you have nothing on the inside and only what is on the outside, then symbols will expand and explode.

 

Want proof?  Notice what Jesus says in verse 40

 

That’s the hypocrisy of these guys.  Everyone thinks they’re the closest thing to God within 40 miles, but instead of being the protector of those who need protecting, they consume them. 

 

If anybody needed to be protected, it was the widows.  In fact, the Law of which they were experts demanded that widows be provided for and protected.  But what do these men do? They consumed them. That means to plunder them. It means literally to eat them up. How did they do that?

 

Remember, they are the lawyers of the day.  So they would do it through legal shenanigans.  They would cheat widows out of their estate while they were offering them legal protection.

 

They would mismanage the property of widows. They would abuse the hospitality of widows by moving in with them and eating their food and leech off of them. 

 

As the older women lost the ability to reason and think what was going on, they would steal them blind. Then they would take the house of a widow in pledge for the debt that they were owed for their legal services. So when the widow died, they would own the house. Nothing would be left if she had children.

 

They would convince the widows they needed to give so God could bless them or protect them or help them.  That’s why Jesus said they had turned His Father’s house in to a den of thieves.

 

I wonder how many false evangelists are doing the very same thing today by fleecing widows with promises of health and healing and prosperity and send me your money and God will pour out blessing to you, taking advantage of the weak, the desperate, the despairing, the lonely, the hopeless, the helpless.

 

And while they’re stealing from the widows, they would stand and pray these long, flowery prayers at church.  They don’t want to talk to God.  They don’t have anything to say to God. But it’s all a part of the show.  It’s all a pretense. It’s all fake. It’s all a sham. But that’s what they do, they’re hypocrites.

 

So our Lord cautions and characterizes. Then He offers

 

 

 

 

end of verse 40

 

Now there are a lot of people who think that if you’re religious you’ll receive less condemnation. Sometimes you hear people say, “Well, I’m sure that I’m going to go to heaven because I’m a very religious person.”

 

Oh really?! I think hell will be the hottest for religious people, especially false teachers and preachers who have brought others along with them.  Is that not what Jesus says here?   

 

He says they will receive a greater condemnation, not a lesser condemnation.  If you have the idea today that there’s good in all religions and God loves all religions and we need to find God in all religions and find the good that is there, then you really need to spend more time listening to what Jesus said. 

 

He’s talking about the religious leaders of Israel who believed in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the creator God of the Old Testament.  And because they had apostatized from the true religion and embraced a self-righteous works system, and because they had rejected Him and the gospel, they’re hell will be hotter than everybody else.

 

If you’re close to the truth, the potential for judgment is even greater. How much greater judgment will the one feel, Hebrews says, who has trodden underfoot the Son of God and counted the blood of the Covenant an unholy thing?

That’s the greatest of all judgment, to reject Christ. It would be better to have never known Christ than to have been close to Him and rejected Him. 

 

Now against that backdrop, Jesus sits down and watches the people bring their offerings to church and beginning in verse 41 we find Him teaching His disciples about what they see there. 

 

And I want to save that section for next week because there is too much there for us to cover tonight.  Most people think that is a passage about Christian giving, but it really has nothing to do with New Testament giving, but everything to do with what He’s just been teaching and we’ll take a look at that next time. 

 

Let’s pray.