Episode 80 Matthew 23 Woe

Dan: (00:00)
Hi, everyone. And welcome to training for life redeemed. I’m your host, Dan, as always, I am here chatting with my father David Jackson, who is the one who does all the work right in the background. I just sit here asking questions and summarizing Bible passages. today we are looking at Matthew chapter 23, continuing our way through the book of Matthew Dad. In our last episode, we had Jesus refute the Sadducees’ and the Pharisees’ and scribes’ questions about all the laws or the rules, trying to trap him. And then he returns fire with his question and they can’t handle it. We then shift into him basically having to go them being pompous, arrogant, people who walk around in robes and they’re longer curls and that person next to them. And, they like to be seen as the leaders and the ones who are doing all the nice things. Yeah. Which I’ve gotta say hasn’t completely left the church, unfortunately. why is he having to go about it? Like he tells people don’t don’t call anyone. Father don’t call anyone on earth leader. You like, why? Why, why can’t you’re my dad

Dan: (01:13)
I can’t call you father though.

David: (01:14)
yeah, this is, this is about power. This is about pride. This is about social, you know, climbing the social ladder into the higher ranks. And Jesus is just pulling the whole plug on the whole rank system that you’ve got and we keep falling into it. I’m, you know, we can look at churches, like, for example, the Roman Catholic church, Jesus says, don’t call anybody father and they turn around and they call all their priests father. and how do you not see that as you know, disobedience? Well, then I go to a Baptist church and they refer to pastor Bob and you go, what’s the difference? I understand, you know, I’ve got a friend who’s an army chaplain and he’s an evangelical and he’s tried to persuade the troops, not to call him Padre. And he’s just given up , it’s hopeless.

David: (02:17)
Padre is Spanish for father. So, but if you look at Jesus, none of Jesus’ disciples ever address him as rabbi. The only people who talk to Jesus in that sort of language teacher, rabbi, you know, great leader are the people outside his circle of disciples and he never rebukes them for doing it. He just sort of overlooks that whole culture. I mean, that’s your culture and I’m trying to bring in the kingdom of God and replace it. So we’ll just, that’s not gonna be the issue we’re gonna fight over. We’re gonna try and explain to you how the kingdom of God works, bring you, grace, give you the concept of, you know, God who became flesh came among us to serve, not to be served and just upend your whole system. but now if you become a Christian, then we need to stop and sit down in the dust and ashes, you know, looking at the cross and going, how do I get up from this place where I’ve been forgiven and Ponce around and expect everybody to call me, you know, father, or great leader or rabbi or whatever.

David: (03:28)
it’s a real issue. I mean, if you look at Christian literature, there’s lots of guys out there, with PhDs and academic things and all the rest of it. and you sort of pick up some vibes if they’ve gotta put doctor on their author, there there’s this culture that wants to blow yourself up to sell your stuff rather than go by the substance of whether, you know, Christ or not. and that Jesus is upending. That whole thing, don’t be impressed by titles. Don’t be impressed by, you know, what these guys are wearing, be impressed by the content of their faith and the teaching that they’re delivering, if it’s faithful. and that’s the challenge. So this is all later on. He’s gonna say, you know, you’re all hypocrites, which is a Greek word for an actor.

Dan: (04:23)
Yeah.

David: (04:24)
Okay. So here’s the mentality. Jesus says, well, God says, I want you to remember my commandments now. How do you remember stuff? Remember your HSC?

Dan: (04:37)
I do remember my HSC. Don’t ask me about any of the content, unless it’s PDH when you teach at the moment.

David: (04:42)
Yeah, yeah. But do you remember memorizing quotes? Equations? Yeah. And what did you do to memorize all that

Dan: (04:50)
Flashcards?

David: (04:50)
Flashcards

Dan: (04:51)
Down, went over it all the time. Put up posters all over the house,

David: (04:54)
Posters all over the house. I remember sticky notes all over the bathroom. Yeah.

Dan: (04:58)
Yeah. I still encourage students to do it too. Yeah.

David: (05:01)
And it works. It does,

Dan: (05:02)
It does work. So we’ll get you through the exam. You’ll forget it all afterwards, but that’s

David: (05:05)
Well, that’s not true. I’m I’m gonna challenge that. my, your mother taught me how to study. I never thought of memorizing anything, but I can still do the things I memorized for those exams. I can still do.

Dan: (05:18)
Have you used it those since then? Yes. Yeah. That’s why,

David: (05:21)
Although it was useful to learn it, wasn’t

Dan: (05:23)
It? Yeah. Yeah.

David: (05:23)
It’s called the Bible.

Dan: (05:24)
I learned, I learned a whole bunch of physics and chemistry, you know?

David: (05:27)
Yeah. You’ve gotta

Dan: (05:28)
Use, I haven’t used that since. So

David: (05:29)
I’ve got no, but here we’re studying the word of God and God is saying, remember my commandments. And to make sure you remember them, you gotta make your sticky notes and your reminders and everything. I, so, you know, put it on your forehead, stick it on your hand. put it on your doorpost. But remember it, what do these guys do? They go out and they take the words of Deuteronomy six, Deuteronomy four, where God commands them to do this. They write those words in microscopic print. Like you wouldn’t believe on a bit of paper this wide and they roll it up and they put it inside a little leather pouch. The photos are in the notes. , you know, and there’s six of these little things tied up with a bit of cotton inside a box and the boxes like this big, and they stick it on their forehead with big straps. So everybody knows that Raban God

David: (06:21)
, nobody can read a thing in that box. You know, they’ll, they’ll recite the Shema. the Shema is hero Israel. Yahweh is our God. Ya is one. They’ll get that far. but then we gotta have a box on our wrist and we’re gonna make the straps longer and longer and longer. Did you notice I’m obeying God, everybody, you know, you know, he says, don’t trim the corners of your beard. I’m gonna grow them down to my knees so that everybody knows. Look, you know, I’m obeying God, it’s just such an act and God is sitting there going, what about the commands? That just, what about loving me and wanting to be like me and following my instructions instead of poncing around trying to impress everybody, but me. Yeah. And that’s what the heart of this issue is. Jesus is threatening their popularity. and he’s gonna threaten ours cuz we’re gonna be unpopular if we follow Jesus.

Dan: (07:23)
Yeah. So Jesus moves on to our woes, right? Woe scribes and Pharisees, wo scribes and Pharisees. I have a feeling that there’s no woe to the Sadducees. I feel like they’re kind of left out like job where they leave out the young guy who shouldn’t have talked in the first place. yeah.

David: (07:39)
That’s the one

Dan: (07:40)
It’s just like, yeah. You’re not actually even worthy. You’re talking about. So I’m just gonna pretty, just describes and Pharisees. and he does all these WOeS all it’s like, it’s pretty much the rest of the chapter. yeah, pretty much the rest of woe, woe, woe. Right. and leading into then, you know, lamenting over the fact that Jeru was gonna be destroyed because of these leaders and how that’s right. Judaea has been run and how they constantly kill all the messengers and they’re responsible for, they are gonna kill the ones that get sent in the future. And that’s just,

David: (08:10)
He’s, he’s really just, this is his, the last, this is the end of his public ministry. This is the last thing Jesus is gonna say. That’s recorded of Jesus saying publicly in his whole life.

David: (08:24)
And the last thing he says to the people in Jerusalem, in the temple on Tuesday, you know, late Tuesday afternoon is you’ve been bunging on an act all this time. You are fake in everything that you’re doing in this temple. Your worship is fake. You’re doing everything to be noticed and praised by men and you are disobeying God, and you’re not loving him in the process. Meanwhile, you’re up there in that upper room plotting how you’re gonna kill me. Well, what do you think is gonna be the outcome of that? Woe, this is street theatre. if you go back in the old Testament, you find Isaiah Jeremiah, there’s a couple of other prophets who will deliver woe, woe speeches. And they do it just before the Assyrians and Babylonians come in and wipe out the place. So this is your moment when the prophet stands there and says, time’s up. Yeah, you’re gone. And that’s what he’s doing. He’s doing the woe. The last prophet declaration that I’m finished with you, you’re done judgment is coming. See you later boys. But he doesn’t do it with this triumphal. You know, you are gonna get what you deserve. Mm.

David: (09:49)
You look at how this chapter ends and you’ve got this weeping Jesus standing there looking at Jerusalem, going by the, because of what you’ve done, this whole place is gonna get wiped off the map. And he’s broken hearted about that Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Why? You know? Yeah. and there’s the bleeding heart of God, looking at these people. And he predicts over the next 40 years between now. And when Jerusalem goes down, you’re gonna kill the people. I’m gonna send you even at the last minute to call you back to get saved and sure enough, within the year they’ve stoned Stephen. Yeah.

Dan: (10:38)
And Paul’s On the hunt

David: (10:39)
and Paul’s on the hunt. And the next thing you know, you know, James, the apostle is dead. eventually they’re gonna kill Jesus’ brother, James toss, him out on the street. It’s they’re gonna get what they deserve. But there is the God who is judging them, who is dying in the place of his people, weeping over the judgment. He’s about to deliver.

Dan: (11:04)
Well, that brings us to the end of this episode, the end of Matthew chapter 23, if you would like to grab the study notes to go along with this episode, please head over to trainingforliferedeemed.com/80. If you enjoyed the episode, if you’re enjoying the series, please subscribe, leave us a review. That would be great as well. We’d love to see reviews coming up on apple podcasts. And I think Spotify now even allow you to do reviews. We would love for some more of that. It helps people to find the podcast. It helps it to be noted by other people as well. and yeah, we look forward to chatting to you again next week, where they continue to go through Matthew. We had finish that off

David: (11:39)
And, and we’re in 24. Next time.

Dan: (11:41)
we’ll see you then.