“you make him [a convert] twice as much a son of hell as yourselves,” Jesus to the scribes and Pharisees, Matthew 23:15
“The problem with current interpretations of Jesus’ character is that they all try to force him into their own mold. They deny the miracles, the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection, of course, and make Jesus out to be a gentle teacher of platitudes… perfectly reasonable and urbane.” (Reverend Dr. Peter Mullen, www.dailyreckoning.co.uk, Feb 27, 2008)
“A truly humble man is sensible of his natural distance from God; of his dependency on Him, of the insufficiency of his own power and wisdom.” (Jonathan Edwards, Puritan Pastor, 1703-1758)
Aaah, the days of innocence! The days of Vacation Bible School and Sunday School in the American church. Jesus is shown wearing a white robe, of Northern European race, holding a lamb, moving about on a flannel board at the whims of a loving middle-aged mom teaching the lesson. This picture is very holy and mostly true. But not Biblically complete.
Scripture adds another side of Jesus. Jesus of righteous anger. Jesus of wrath. Jesus not politically correct. True, there is no greater love than that of Jesus (John 15:13); yet His love is passionate- passionate for God’s glory.
Jesus continues to expose the scribes and Pharisees for who they really are: hypocrites. From a distance, they are “good ole church goin’ folk.” But upclose their actions reveal their dark hearts. They shut off the kingdom of heaven from men. They do not enter themselves or allow others who are entering to go in (v. 13). (Wow, is that politically correct to say?)
Jesus came “to seek and save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). Yet the scribes and Pharisees accused Jesus of being “Beelzebul, the ruler of demons” (Matthew 9:34; 12:24), a glutton and a drunkard (Matthew 11:19). They were “indignant” when He received praise (Matthew 21:15), and they were trying to “seize” (Mark 12:12), “trap” (Mark 12:13), and “destroy” (Luke 19:47) Him. They tried to make the narrow way even narrower (Matthew 7:13-14).
Verse 14 is put in brackets in the New American Standard Bible translation (NASB) and is not included in other popular translations. This is because the oldest and most reliable copies of Matthew do not include this verse. However, we can still be confident that this is a genuine saying of Jesus because these very words are found in Mark 12:40 and Luke 20:47. Matthew had a tendency to write his gospel topically (for example, the parables of chapter 13). Once he began with Jesus’ words about the Pharisees, he gathered more of those sayings (i.e., Luke 11) into this one location.
The scribes and Pharisees would devour widows’ houses by convincing widows to give large parts of their estate to them. The Pharisees probably told the widows that their husbands’ salvation would be guaranteed if they did this (just as the Christian church did in the Middle Ages with the selling of indulgences). And long prayers would be given as a pretense to justify and sanctify this practice of ripping off widows, in spite of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6:7.
In the second (or third) woe listed, Jesus accuses the hypocrites of traveling on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, he is twice as much a son of hell as they are (v.15). New converts often show a zealousness that leads to greater religious activity, and in this case, resulting in more evil. Verse 15 should give pause to those engaged in missions. Don’t we travel over land and sea in pursuit of converts? Are we too condemned? It depends on our hearts.
In our missionary zeal, are we motivated by our own glory and thus guilty of making sons of hell? Or are we motivated by the love, grace and glory of God? The Pharisee Saul was confronted with this question on the road to Damascus as he traveled on land in pursuit of his religious enemies (Acts 9:1-2). On that road Saul was so overwhelmed by the glory of God that it changed his life (Acts 9:3-5). Saul became Paul and Paul changed the world (Romans 15:19). And history.
What is our passion? If our over-riding passion is to make ourselves look good, then we will not survive the grave. If our passion is to make God look good, then we will live and reign with Him forever in His city for His glory (Revelation 22:5).
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