Let's be turning to Luke chapter
11. Luke 11. Our Lord now begins to address
the hypocrisy of man's heart. And we do well to take heed to
these words ourselves. It's easy for us to look and
say, all right, now he's turning his attention against the people
that need to hear this, those Pharisees, those lawmongers,
those workers, will workers, and those that attack others.
when we're humbled, when we're made honest, we see how that
we ourselves are guilty of a self-righteous heart. And we need to hear these
words, just as we saw with Judah this morning. So he addresses
this sin of hypocrisy, and it's not because that man lacks religion. That's not the problem. Man loves
religion. Man embraces religion. And that's
where we see all manner of hypocrisy, because man can put on a good
show. Man's a good performer. And he
can put on a good show, but he cannot bring forth the love of
God in his heart to love a people, to be kind, to be gentle, to
help, to care for others, the way that the Lord cares for his
people and provides for his people. That we can't produce. That we
can't produce. We need his grace. We can't produce
a new creature in ourselves. Only God can produce a new creature. And that's what he's bringing
his people to see. He's breaking us of our self-righteousness. He's breaking us of a confidence
in the flesh that we might find our all in him. Because if he
leaves us to ourselves, we just drift right on into complacency,
self-righteousness, hypocrisy. It's very easy for us to do.
And so our Lord uses this occasion which is given here, brought
forth here by the Pharisees, the scribes, and the lawyers
to expose the wickedness of our hearts. to show us that God is
not pleased with an outward form of dead-letter religion, but
that he seeks those to worship him in spirit and in truth. That's
what he's bringing his people to see. He deals with us in this
manner. In fact, it says a certain Pharisee, as we'll see, and that
makes me think that Perhaps this man was delivered one day from
his hypocrisy. Perhaps. He's done it for us
all. We that do believe, he's done it for us. He delivered
us. He delivered me from self-righteousness,
the death of it. I still see it in my members.
I still see it in my members. But my hope is not in me. It's
in Christ, whose grace is sufficient, whose blood covers me of my sins,
covers my sins. and brings me before his throne
faultless." One commentator, as I was studying this passage,
one commentator said, I'd rather be guilty of any other crime,
standing before the throne, the judgment seat of God, than to
be found guilty of the sin of self-righteousness. And I take
that to mean, think about that. Think about that. Because it's
a sin that pride and self-righteousness blinds us to. We don't see it
in ourselves. And but the Lord here is talking
to the most religious sect of people. He's talking to the Pharisees,
people who among us are the stars of religion. I mean, these are
the brightest bulbs in religion, so to speak. And yet he had the
harshest words to say to them. He was very generous, very gracious
to the harlots and the publicans, to the sinful. He was very kind
to them, very generous, When they cried out and begged him
for grace and mercy, he gave it freely, abundantly to them. But the Pharisees, they wouldn't
have it, because they were so confident in themselves. And
so he had the harshest words to say to them. And I think it's
recorded here for us, for his people to read it, and to see
what salvation we need. We need to be made new creatures. So we're going to look at these
reproofs, these rebukes that Luke highlights here that we
may take heed to desire to seek that single eye which is full
of light because the single eye is set upon Christ. and looks
to Christ for all my righteousness as opposed to the evil eye which
is burdened by many things and and and cumbered about with many
things so that we can't see Christ and we're full of darkness so our text begins Luke 11 37 Verse 37, as he spake, he was
just talking about that single eye full of light. That's what
he was talking about. And as he spake, a certain Pharisee. We're not told who this Pharisee
was, but it's a certain Pharisee, and he needed to hear this. A
certain Pharisee besought him to dine with him, and he went
in and sat down to meet. There's that truth. Ask and it
shall be given you. Seek and ye shall find. Only this man wasn't coming to
Christ as his Lord and Savior, asking Him, Lord, dine with me.
Sup with me. Lord, eat with me. Fellowship
with me. He wasn't doing that. No, he
was seeking honor, the honor and praise of men. That's what
he was looking for. And it wasn't long before this
man saw all he needed to see to be disgusted with Christ.
It says verse 38, when the Pharisees saw it, he marveled that he had
not, that Christ had not first washed before dinner. He saw
that. What did he see? He saw what
all the other Pharisees were saying. This man, if he was of
God, Surely, he would see our righteousness, and he would commend
us for our works. He would follow our traditions
and customs because they're right on point. We've done it. We've arrived. We're followers
of God, and there's no sin in us. But he doesn't do what we
do. Clearly, he's not of God. And
so they despise him. They stumbled over the stumbling
stone, put in their way, and they wouldn't hear it, they wouldn't
hear God, and they cast him aside. So, let me say this. There is
a feast for the people of God. There is a coming marriage feast,
and all who sit down with the saints of God and the kingdom
of light for that feast, they shall be washed. only it's not
a washing that we do for ourselves, it's a washing of the blood of
Christ to purge us of our sins, to cleanse us of our stain, and
He brings us in perfect righteousness, His righteousness, given to us,
that we may come washed and sit down, be made partakers of that
marriage feast between the Lamb and His bride. So there is a
washing. Blessed are they whose iniquities
are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute sin. An imputation is what you
are. So if you're sinned, the Lord
imputes sin to you because that's what you are. It's just. It's
just. But if there's no sin, it's because
it's been purged, washed by the blood of Christ. And he imputes
righteousness to us because that's what we are in Christ, righteous,
righteous. Now this context here, where
our Lord exposes the hypocrisy and self-righteousness of man, here, we see it in verse 39,
the Lord said unto him, the Lord said unto him, that caught my
eye because Luke, when he writes, typically writes, and Jesus answering
said, Jesus answering said but this he says and the Lord said
this is this is this is the Lord speaking as the Lord this is
Christ speaking as the Lord condemning the works that are in the heart
of man condemning these works that that man is guilty of the
Lord said unto him now do ye Pharisees make clean the outside
of the cup and the platter but your inward part is full of ravening
and wickedness. Ye fools, did not he that made
that which is without make that which is within also? And that
word fools there is you ignorant, stupid people. Have you no sense? Do you not understand? You're
out of your mind, you're senseless. What you think you're doing,
you're not doing at all. It's different than the word
used in Matthew 5, 22, when the Lord said, if a man says someone
is a fool, that they're guilty of hellfire, that word there
means you're godless. There's no hope for you. There's
no hope for you. Well, if there's no hope for
that man, there's no hope for me either, because I'm just as
guilty. I'm just as guilty. I'm just
as ignorant. I'm just as full of darkness. I'm just as ignorant
of the truth of God, just as stupid, just as senseless, just
as out of my mind as any other man. Lord save me. Lord, save
me. And so he's pointing out, you're
in darkness. You guys are in darkness. You're
very religious. You look great on the outside, but didn't God
also make the inside? And didn't he who promised to
save his people in the garden by the promised seed, isn't he
able to save that which is within also? Not just to make you look
good on the outside. Doesn't he deal with the heart?
Doesn't he deal with the heart? Yes, the Lord deals with our
hearts. That's why Christ said he seeks
those who worship him in spirit and in truth. Not just a facade,
not a fakery, not hypocrisy. He changes the heart. It's a
heart religion. It's a heart religion. The kingdom
of God is within you. Not games, not playing games,
and just outward perfection. And just in what we've read so
far, there's three lessons I just want to bring out before we go
on. Three things here that the self-righteous, they're focused
on the traditions of man. They don't understand the word
of God, so they make things up. They make traditions and customs,
and that becomes their focus. And we see it. Maybe we don't
see it, but people without see it. They know when you go to
a certain sect, a denomination, a church, there's customs there.
There's bylaws. There's ways that things are
done. And if you do it this way, all is well with you. You'll
be accepted. If you don't do it this way, you're not one of
us. Some denominations it's more
easy to see, but it's all there. It's all there. We see it. If
you do what they say, you'll be brought in to the fold and
accepted of them. And that's what we look for,
right? We like to be included, and we like to be part of something. And so we aspire to that, right?
And we gravitate toward that. Secondly, all the emphasis for
the self-righteous is on the outward, the outward form. That's
what we're looking for. Christ said, you may clean the
outside of the cup and the platter, but your inward part is full
of ravening and wickedness. And it just shows that we get
caught up in worrying about what other men think than what the
word of God says. and knowing the God of this word. And our confidence is put on
what we can see and how we can measure against one another.
That's where we put our emphasis, is self-righteousness. And our
Lord warned in Matthew 15, 19 and 20, he said, out of the heart,
out of your hearts proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries,
fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies, these are the things
which defile a man, but to eat with unwashing hands, that doesn't
defile a man. We're so focused on, well, let
me wash my hands and do these little ceremonial things here
and it'll make me look good and it'll help me to enter into spiritual
things or whatever we think of there, but we have a heart problem
and that's what the Lord's showing us. Your hearts are dark. Your hearts are wickedness. You're
full of these wicked works of the flesh. Again, like we saw
with Judah and Tamar. Judah's scheming. Tamar's scheming. It's all out of the heart. the
heart. Man thinks that if I can just
conform to an outward form, that'll be good enough, and God won't
look any deeper than the skin here. He's going to see that
I'm trying my best, and I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing,
and that'll be good enough. He's not going to look at the
heart. Paul said we have a form of godliness. Man has a form
of godliness, but denies the power thereof. from such turn
away. In other words, if you're the
Lord's, He's going to give you His identity. He's going to give
you His Holy Spirit. He's going to make you new creatures.
New creatures. Born again. A heart that loves
God. That confesses our sin. Right? I'm a sinner. I cannot
save myself. Lord, save me. We're going to
come to Him as the Christ. As the Savior. Not just a token
figure. Not just a picture on a wall.
All right, not just an emblem like a cross on the wall or something.
No, we're coming to the Savior. Save me, Lord. We're going to
cry like blind Bartimaeus. Lord, Son of David, have mercy
on me. I'm the sinner. Save me. Otherwise, I perish. So believers do love the gospel.
We love the assembly of the saints. We want to partake with one another
in this fellowship and partake of the ordinances. And we're
drawn to Christ. We're drawn here. But it's a
matter of faith. It's an inward faith. We don't
see what's going on in the heart of people. We don't know. We
think we do. We think we're pretty sharp.
We think we're good at profiling. But we can be dead wrong, absolutely
dead wrong, because we don't know how the Lord is dealing
with his child. Even if they're putting on a
happy face, the Lord may be dealing severely with them. And they
need it. And so don't judge. Don't judge. Pray. Pray for grace. Pray for
grace and seek to be gracious because you just don't know what
the Lord is doing. And then third, the self-righteous
is ignorant of spiritual things. He called them fools. He's saying
whatever light you think you have, It's darkness. It's darkness. And he warns us,
take heed, lest the light you have, lest the understanding
you do have of the scriptures, and the understanding you do
have from the ordinances and what the Lord has shown you,
that it only amount to a bunch of darkness. Take heed that what
you see and do understand that it's leading you to Christ. And
so as he shows us that, Lord, save me. Forget what's behind.
Don't have any confidence or trust in what you did back then.
Just keep pressing to Christ. Keep pressing to Christ. Keep
going to Christ. Don't stop seeking him. Lord, save me. Help me. Have mercy on me, Lord. Don't
let me die here like this. Save me, Lord. That's what he's
bringing us to see. Even Paul said, Oh, wretched
man that I am, who shall save me from the body of this death.
I thank God for my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I thank God for
Christ, because what I see in the flesh is not enough. It's
not enough. I need your grace, your salvation,
your mercy. As he said in the Philippians
letter, in Philippians 3, 3, he said, we are the circumcision,
which worship God in the spirit and have no confidence in the
flesh. Because this flesh is a hypocrite.
It's a theater for us. We're just playing a game if
left to ourselves. And so anything less than Christ
and only Christ is filthy rag righteousness, which are coming
to God with bloody rags. with the equivalent of poop in
your hands and saying, look, Lord, doesn't this smell pretty?
No, it doesn't. It doesn't. Only Christ, his
savor, is sweet and acceptable to the Father. Verse 41. Let me just say this. This is
not a commendation. He's pointing out their hypocrisy.
He's saying, you'd rather give alms of such things as you have,
that which you have abundance of, And behold, all things are
clean to you. I need a little dust up here. I need a little cleanup. Maybe
I missed a few things. So let me give alms out of the
abundance that I have. And then everything's fine. Everything's
all good. And you think about that. If
that's how they're given, that they just wanted to clean up
some things, Maybe his invitation to Christ and all his disciples,
because he had 12 apostles and others that followed along, that
man was putting out a pretty good sum of money for that meal,
right? Perhaps he was just doing it
to give alms, to take care of this poor pitiful man, this Jesus
of Nazareth. He's close, he's got some things
that are pretty intriguing, but He's not one of us, so I'm gonna
show him some almsgiving. And this is where we come now
to Christ pronouncing these woes against them all. So verse 42,
woe unto you Pharisees, for ye tithe mint and rue and all manner
of herbs and pass over judgment and the love of God. These ought
ye to have done, according to the law, you should do those
things, and not to leave the other undone. And so when our
hearts are set upon self-righteousness, when our heart is full of self-righteousness,
we major on the small details. We're so fixated on the small
things, the little easy things that we can do, what's comfortable
for us. We focus on those things. But
the greater things, like loving your brethren, bearing long with
your brethren, loving the Lord, seeking to know him, confessing
your sin to the Lord, and crying out to him for mercy, those things
are forgotten. We pass by those things very
easily. We're just so focused on the little things. woe unto
you Pharisees, for ye love the uppermost seats in the synagogues
and greetings in the markets. When our hearts are set on self-righteousness,
Our focus is on advancing ourselves, promoting ourselves, looking
good in front of others. We want to be recognized for
some skills, some superiority, some ability that we have by
our others in the fellowship. When our hearts are focused on
self-righteousness, we're looking out for number one, ourselves. And by that, I don't mean we
are number one. I'm just saying that's how we think of ourselves,
that we're number one. And so we're doing things for
our own benefit, not the benefit of our brethren. Verse 44, woe
unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye are as graves
which appear not, and the men that walk over them are not aware
of them. We can have people fooled. You
can fool me. I can fool you. We can put on
a good show, but we're not fooling God, who sees all. He sees the
heart. He knows what's in our thoughts.
He knows what we are by nature, and He's not fooled. We're not fooling the true and
living God. He knows. He sees whether there's
light and life of His Son in that person. He knows. We need
the light and life of Christ. We need the Savior of Christ.
That's what pleases God. Not our sacrifices, not our good
works, not what we do. Christ is the one who makes us
acceptable unto the true and living God. We need His work
of grace in us. As Paul wrote to the Galatians,
For in Christ neither circumcision nor uncircumcision availeth anything. It doesn't matter whether you're
in this group or that group, or how you promote yourself here
or there. That doesn't make the difference. The thing that makes
the difference is a new creature. A new creature in Christ. And
I can't make myself a new creature. Only He makes new creatures. Only He is the quickening spirit.
Only He gives life. We must go to Him. Go to Christ. Seek Christ. Fly to Him, sinner. He is the Savior of the sinner. He was sent of the Father to
save His people from their sins. That's how we come as begging
sinners, needy sinners. Lord, save me. Lord, give me
the bread of heaven. Lord, feed me. Wash me, Lord. That's how we come to the Savior. That's how we come to our God.
We must be made new creatures because man looketh on the outward
appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart. He knows the heart. In another place, Christ told
the Pharisees, you're they which justify yourselves before men,
but God knoweth your hearts. He knows you're trusting in your
outward form. He knows you're trusting these
things, and that within, you're full of darkness, full of wickedness,
full of ravening, horrible, sinful crimes. And that's true of all
of us. You may not be disposed to this
thing, but you love that thing. And that's true of every one
of us. We have something that we love and that we want to partake
of. We need to be saved, washed from
that. And Lord, save me from the dominion
of that sin and bring me under the dominion of Christ and keep
me there. Keep me there. And he's able
to keep his people humble. and to see our need constantly,
and he'll use that as a thorn in the flesh to keep you humble,
ever looking to him. You may not always fall in it,
but sometimes you get close enough to know, there I go again, there
I go again, Lord, save me, have mercy upon me, have mercy, save
me. And he does that, because he
knows the heart. For that which is highly esteemed among men
is abomination in the sight of God. So just because you're staying
away from it, have no confidence in what you're doing, Have every
confidence in Christ, that it's his grace, and it's his provision
keeping you. When our hearts are set on self-righteousness,
this is when we take offense to the gospel of Christ, because
the word, his gospel, shines a light And by nature, we're
full of darkness. We have dark crevices and corners
in this heart that we keep dark and don't want to bring out to
the light. But his word shines it. And eventually, that light
hits it. And when our hearts are set on self-righteousness,
we take offense. Why is he talking about me? Why
is he bringing this out about me? He knows he's talking about
me. I don't know nothing. I don't
know nothing. I'm just trying to preach the
word here. How many times was Peter rebuked? So if you and
I are rebuked by the grace of God that we would have that spirit,
yeah, it hurts. Lord, don't say that. Don't say
that I'm going to do that. And yet, it's true. Lord, save
me. Bring me back. When thou art
converted, Peter, strengthen your brethren. And that's when
we do. That's when we're much more gracious,
much more kind, much more giving to our brethren when we've been
humbled and the light's shown our own sinfulness. That's when
we hear it. But when our heart's set on self-righteousness,
we won't hear him. And so, verse 45 shows this.
I believe this man thought he was a sincere worshiper. I'm
trying, Lord. I really am trying. I'm trying to do my best. I'm
trying to help the people by pointing out to them, this is
how you come to God. You have to do this, and you've
got to stop that, and you've got to do this this way, and
you've got to do that that way. He was sincere in that. And he's
like, Lord, you're reproaching me, too. You're calling me out
in this. You're shining a light on me.
And yet Christ rebuked him. Verse 46, he said, Woe unto you
also, ye lawyers, for ye laid men with burdens. You put heavy
burdens on men grievous to be born, and ye yourselves touch
not the burdens with one of your fingers. And the lawyer was seeking
to justify himself. And that's what a lawyer does.
He's seeking to justify that one he's representing. And this
man's representing himself. And he's seeking to justify himself
by condemning that light, that bright light shining from the
gospel. Don't shine that thing on me. I'm good. I'm doing the best I can. Don't
shine that light on me. Well, if you're the Lord's, that
light shines on every one of us and exposes the creatures
and the evil things in our heart. It makes us to see that, yeah,
he is talking about me, and I need his grace. I've been thinking
that I was something for too long, and I need his grace. But
it's a mercy. It's a mercy that he does that
for us. When we're focused on helping
everybody else, all we're doing is just loading them up with
burdens, right? Criticizing, well, you almost
got it, but you didn't get it. Fix that now. Get that right.
And it just keeps on heaping and heaping. And that sinner,
that poor sinner, never finds any peace with God. Because you're
never satisfied with him. And all you're doing is just
putting a burden on him. Now let's read verse 47. Woe unto you, for ye build the
sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Truly
ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers. You're
making yourself a partaker of them, for they indeed killed
them, and ye build their sepulchres. Therefore also said the wisdom
of God, and here again Luke uses another title. of Christ because
Matthew tells us Christ said this and Luke says it's the wisdom
of God speaking here. This is the wisdom of God talking. I will send them prophets and
apostles and some of them they shall slay and persecute that
the blood of all the prophets which was shed from the foundation
of the world may be required of this generation. The Lord
brings that truth by us from time to time, even those who
have no part in him, to show that this is man. This is what
man is. He's a filthy, wretched, vile
creature who cannot save himself. And he will not hear it. He will
not hear it. He'll take offense to it, and
he won't believe. From the blood of Abel unto the
blood of Zacharias from A to Z, which perish between the altar
and the temple, verily I say unto you, it shall be required
of this generation. And so when the heart is set
on self-righteousness, persecution follows. That's where that self-righteousness
comes from. And again, we saw it this morning.
We saw examples of a self-righteous attitude, and we think, That's
it. I'm pulling out the big guns
here. And all the big guns are are
just the works of the flesh. And the wrath of man doesn't
work the righteousness of God. Our works don't save us. They don't help the situation
at all. And so self-righteousness attacks
and persecutes those whose hope and faith rests in the blood
of Christ. That's where the Lord's bringing
his people, to find their all in Christ, to make him the hope
of his people, to give us a new heart, not set on and content
with the outward form and the hypocrisy, but to make us so
that we're not content with anything in the flesh but Christ. so that
we have no hope at all but Christ. That's a good hope. That is the
hope of the saints. That's the hope that the apostles
had, is Christ. And that's where he's bringing
us. So he's chipping away and stripping away and pulling back
all the things that we're trusting in. And it hurts in the flesh. It does hurt. But it's for our
good. He means it for our good. And
when you're there in heaven before the throne of God and he says,
well done, come on in, thou righteous servant, come into the kingdom
prepared for you. Are we going to complain then?
Not at all. Not at all. Let us hear now that
we might be saved and find our inheritance in him, in him having
that hope there. He's the Savior. He's the one
who saves his people. But man who trusts his works,
he despises that Christ, and he despises those that are little
in his sight, you that trust in Christ. Yet stay upon him. That is the hope. Stay upon Christ. Believe him. When our hearts
are set on self-righteousness, therefore, The self-righteous
removes Christ. He goes back, he plucks Christ
out and says, nope, nope, that isn't talking about Christ. Let
me show you the carnal things. Let me show you the fleshly things,
which you gotta do better now. And he just goes back over and
shows the carnal things, so hindering them that would come to God by
faith in Christ. Verse 52, woe unto you lawyers,
for ye have taken away the key of knowledge. ye entered not
in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered."
The key of eternal life is Jesus Christ. He is the Word of God. He's the one by whom we enter. He's the Good Shepherd. He's
the one that enters in and takes His people out of that death
and out of that nothingness, and He leads us in paths of righteousness
for His name's sake, revealing salvation in His people. He said to the Jews, search the
Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life, and there
they would testify of Me. Of Me. And as we see By the grace
of God, this word is speaking of Christ. It's revealing the
salvation of Christ, because that's the one thing needful,
is Christ. But Christ said to them, and
ye will not come to me. If we're left to our own will,
our own free will, ye will not come unto me that ye might have
life. But we need him to break our will, to give us a new will.
to give us a new heart to come to Christ. So don't take away
the key of knowledge. Preach Christ. Show one another
Christ. When our hearts are set on self-righteousness,
it goes to war against the truth. It goes to war against Christ,
relying on the works of the flesh. And we see that in verse 53 and
54. And as he said these things unto them, the scribes and the
Pharisees began to urge him vehemently, and to provoke him to speak of
many things, laying weight for him, and seeking to catch something
out of his mouth that they might accuse him. These Pharisees,
these scribes and lawyers, they were watchers, just waiting for
Christ to slip up, waiting for his disciples to slip up, to
find something, that there's something in there, and I'm going
to find it, and I'm going to expose it, and then see, aha,
you're a sinner. This thing about Christ, that
can't save you. You've got to fix it yourself. You've got to
add your own works to this thing. And that's what they were looking
for, to destroy Christ, to take away the key of knowledge and
stop them who are coming in by faith. So self-righteousness
is in all of us by nature. We can't stand here and just
say, look at them, look at them, look at them, because we're missing
what the Lord's saying to us. It's here in these scriptures.
We're the ones reading them, usually. It's for us. It's for
us to see. And our Lord gives us this word
to turn us from being satisfied with vain, dead religion and
hypocrisy, which is so You know, peculiar to us, it's right here
in this flesh, because salvation is found in a new creature, a
new creation, not by our works, but by His work, by His hand. And He gives us His Spirit, and
the Spirit testifies to us that we are the children of God. The
Spirit beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children
of God. And it comes in that one who confesses the Lord Jesus
Christ. That's his work. It's not us
bringing him forth. It's his work. Confessing Christ,
confessing I'm a sinner. Lord, save me. I know that he's
the Savior. I know that he died for the sins
of his people and that you raised him from the dead to justify
all those who believe him. Lord, give me that hope. Show
me Christ. save me by Christ, your salvation. And if children, then we're heirs,
heirs of God, and join heirs with Christ. If so be that we
suffer with him, that we may also be glorified together with
him." And that's his work. It's his testimony that he reveals
in his people. We look imperfect on the outside,
and We don't want it to be that way, but admittedly, we are weak. And by nature, we are fools.
But by his grace and mercy, his love, his care, his provision,
he gives all that we need. His grace covers a multitude
of sins, and he provides for us. But he uses what he will
to teach us and to show us Christ and to rest us in him. I pray
he rests you in the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.