Stress Test Devotional May 11
May 11, 2024
MATTHEW 23:1-7 | 1 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; 3 therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach. 4 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them. 5 They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long. 6 They love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, 7 and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have people call them rabbi.
What a hard chapter to read, if you are a Christian leader! Matthew 23 has a series of criticisms, by Jesus, of the spiritual leadership of the Pharisees. Eager to please God, they have turned the
commands of God into a complicated set of detailed instructions, impossible for ordinary people to follow. But adding more detail to, for instance, the Sabbath command, they have created an
atmosphere of fear about breaking it. A command given to free us for creativity and connection and spiritual joy becomes a burden. Further, they have created a spiritual elite of rule followers—and elites quickly fall pray to elitism, to arrogance and superiority. Dividing the world into the righteous and unrighteous, they’ve lost perspective for the purposes of God’s law and in trying to fulfill it actually abrogate it.
Do you know anyone more driven by rules than relationships?
