Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday November 5, 2023
Scripture: Matthew 23:1-12
Reading this part of Jesus’s story, it’s tempting to paint it as a battle
between good and evil. We’re in the last
week of Jesus’s life, and Jesus is in the temple debating with the Pharisees.
Tensions are running high as they engage in this battle of the wits. Jesus has been telling pointed parables
trying to reform the religious systems of his time and place, and then the Pharisees,
Sadducees, and Herodians ask Jesus a series of trick questions trying to trap
him with heresy but Jesus manages to answer back to all of them. And then we come to what we heard today –
Jesus calling out the Pharisees for hypocrisy – for not practicing what they
preach, for accepting the honour that their position brings them, for making
showy displays of faith without any substance or actions to back it up. It is very tempting to paint Jesus as the
triumphant hero over the evil Pharisees.
And yet instead of a battle between opposing forces, this story might be better understood as an inter-religious dialogue. Jesus and the Pharisees have a different way of living out their faith, but they hold that faith in common. An analogy might be to gather a Roman Catholic with a rosary, a United Church person with a cross pendant, an Anglican with a communion chalice, and an Evangelical with a bible – all of them sharing why these symbols help them to live out their faith. We all have different practices, even as we share our faith.
Jesus isn’t calling out the Pharisees for their practices. There is nothing wrong with their practices. The phylacteries are a little box containing a tiny scroll of scripture that is bound to their forehead, reminding them that God is always present. The fringes on their shawls remind them to pray. These are both good things.
What Jesus is calling them out for is when the symbols or the actions are empty – that they aren’t backed up by inner change. Jesus wants our whole hearts to be transformed for God… the practices that we use to get there are less important.
And there are lots of different practices that we can use to get there. For some people, it is prayer. For other people, it is studying the bible. For some people, it is quiet meditation or contemplation. For some people it is through music. There are probably as many different paths to be in relationship with God as there are people seeking that relationship!
I do think that we need both practices to work on our relationship with God as well as an inner re-orientation of our hearts. External practices without that changed heart… well, that’s what Jesus is calling out in today’s reading, with the group of religious leaders who seem pious on the outside but who lack a heart for God and for their neighbours. And yet expecting a changed heart to happen out of the blue without seeking it… that may not happen.
We need to seek for a balance – seeking an internal transformation through our external practices.
I’m reminded here of one of my favourite bits from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Philippians when he writes: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” It may seem like a contradiction – are we the ones working on our transformation, or is it God? But I see it as a both/and situation. We seek relationship with God, and it is God, by the Holy Spirit, working in us. And then as we are transformed, we long more deeply for God, and God deepens our transformation. And so it goes on and on.
So is Jesus telling the Pharisees to ditch their phylacteries and prayer shawls? No! We need practices to help us connect with God, and sometimes those practices involve physical objects. But I think that Jesus is telling them that they need to open themselves up to God’s transforming power, rather than using these objects to appear more holy than their neighbour. That’s the hypocrisy that he's calling out.
And so I invite you to ponder… what practices do you have in your life that help bring you closer to God? What practices do you have in your life that empower you to love your neighbours more deeply? And do you have practices in your life that are “empty” practices – things that don’t nurture your spiritual life at this time that you can prune from your life?
And may the Holy Spirit be at work in
all of us, every day, empowering us to love God with all our being, and to love
our neighbours as ourselves. Amen!
What practices nurture your relationship with God?
Image Credit: bartb_pt on Flickr
Used with Permission.
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