Which turn with me to the 23rd
chapter of the book of Matthew. I've entitled this message, the
weightier matters of the law. The weightier matters of the
law. Verse 23. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint, and
anise, and cumin, and have omitted the wavier matters of the law,
judgment, mercy, and faith. These ought ye to have done and
not to leave the other undone. Ye blind guides which strain
at a gnat and swallow a camel. Now I request that you would
pray for me as I try to bring this message that I might preach
the gospel, preach the mind of the spirit from this passage
of scripture. And I would request that you pray for yourself that
the Lord would give you hearing ears. Pray that he give me a
word and that he give you ears to hear regarding this subject
of the weightier matters of the law. Now, this is a part of the
Lord's scathing denunciation. of the scribes and the Pharisees. And this was the sermon that
sealed his death. Now, I would like for us to read
this entire chapter. I'm not going to really comment
on it, but this verse of Scripture is a part of this message of
our Lord to the scribes and Pharisees. And this infuriated them to the
point that they said, we've had it with him no more. You know,
it amazes me the way the Lord talks in this. I mean, he says,
you snakes. You generation of vipers, you
hypocrites, you blind guides. That's strong language, isn't
it? And notice what our Lord says to these people. Let's read
this chapter together. Matthew chapter 23. Then spake
Jesus to the multitude and to his disciples, saying, The scribes
and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat. All therefore whatsoever
they bid you observe, that observe and do, but not ye after their
works. For they say and do not. For they bind heavy burdens and
grievous to be born and lay them on men's shoulders. But they
themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. But
all their works they do for to be seen of men. They make broad
their phylacteries and enlarge the borders of their garments,
and they love the uppermost rooms at the feasts, and the chief
seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the market, and
to be called with men, Rabbi, Rabbi, but be not ye called Rabbi,
for one is your master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren. And call no man your father upon
the earth, for one is your father which is in heaven. Neither be
ye called masters, for one is your master, even Christ. But
he that's greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever
shall exalt himself shall be abased, and he that shall humble
himself shall be exalted. But woe unto you scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites, for you shut up the kingdom of heaven
against men. For you neither go in yourselves, neither suffer
ye them that are entering to go in. Woe unto you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you devour widows' houses, and
for a pretense make long prayer. Therefore, you shall receive
the greater damnation. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites, for you compass sea and land to make one proselyte,
and when he's made, you make him twofold more the child of
hell than yourselves. Woe unto you, you blind guides,
which say, whosoever shall swear by the temple, it's nothing,
you're not bound to keep your promise, but whosoever shall
swear by the gold of the temple, the gift you give, he's a debtor.
You fools and blind, for whether it's greater, the gold or the
temple that sanctifyeth the gold. And whosoever shall swear by
the altar, it's nothing, but whosoever swears by the gift
that's upon it, he's guilty. You fools and blind, for whether
it's greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifyeth the gift.
Whoso therefore shall swear by the altar, sweareth by it, and
all things thereon. And whoso shall swear by the
temple, sweareth by it, and by him that dwelleth therein. And
he that shall swear by heaven, sweareth by the throne of God,
and by him that sitteth thereon. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint, and
anise, and cumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the
law. judgment, mercy, and faith. These ought ye to have done,
and not left the other undone. You blind guides would strain
a gnat and swallow a camel. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! For you may clean the outside
of the cup and of the platter, but within they're full of extortion
and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse
first that which is within the cup and the platter, that the
outside of them may be clean also. Woe unto you, scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites, for you're like whited sepulchers, graves,
which indeed appear beautiful outward, but within are full
of dead men's bones and of all uncleanness. Even so, you also
outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within you're full of
hypocrisy and iniquity. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites, because you build the tombs of the prophets and
garnish the sepulchers of the righteous and say, if we'd been
in the days of our fathers, we wouldn't have been partakers
with them in the blood of the prophets. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto
yourselves that you're the children of them which killed the prophets.
Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers, you serpents, you
generation of vipers. How can you escape the damnation
of hell? Wherefore, behold, I send unto
you prophets and wise men and scribes, and some of them you
shall kill and crucify, and some of them you shall scourge in
your synagogues and persecute them from city to city, that
upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from
the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, the son
of Berkeus, whom you slew between the temple and the altar. Verily
I say unto you, all these things shall come upon this generation.
Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and
stonest them which are sent unto thee. How often would I have
gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens
under wings, and you would not. Behold, your house is left unto
you desolate. For I say unto you, you shall
not see me henceforth, till you shall say, blessed is he that
cometh in the name of the Lord. Now, can you see where some folks
were greatly offended by this message? The things our Lord
said to these people? Now, let's look back at verse
23. This is our text. Woe unto you. And when the Lord says, woe.
That means woe. Woe unto you. Scribes and Pharisees, that's
the natural man's religion. You know, when he's speaking
to scribes and Pharisees, he's talking to what we all are by
nature. This is man's natural religion. This is Baptist, this
is Catholic, this is Presbyterian, this is Protestant, this is man's
natural religion. Phariseeism. Woe unto you scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, actors, Every believer is aware of hypocrisy
in their life. Are you aware of hypocrisy in
your life? Presenting an image. And you know, sometimes it's
a good thing to present an image. Hold your finger there and turn
back to Matthew chapter six. I want you to see this. Verse 16, "...Moreover, when you fast,
be not as the hypocrites of a sad countenance. For they disfigure
their faces that they may appear unto men to fast." It's obvious
looking at them, they haven't had anything to eat. It's obvious
looking at them that they're very upset and, oh, they're so
burdened. It's obvious. Verily I say unto
you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou fastest,
maybe you're in trouble and shame. And what does he say to do? Anoint
thy head and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto men to fast,
but unto thy father, which is in secret. And thy father, which
seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. Now there's a good
image to project, isn't it? Don't come all down and no, you
come with a washed face. Even if you are down, even if
you are, you come with this washed face that you don't appear to
men to fast. That's good in that sense. But what our Lord is talking
about, go back to Matthew chapter 23. Here's what the Lord is talking
about. Verse two. The scribes and the
Pharisees sit in Moses' seat. All there whatsoever they bid
you observe, that observe and do, but do not after their works,
for they say and they do not." They expect you to keep the law,
but they don't keep the law. They try to put rules on you
that they themselves don't keep because they're hypocrites. I
love what Paul said in Romans chapter 2 verse 1 when he says,
Thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest
another. For thou that judgest, doest
the same things." Anything you look down your nose at anybody
about is pure hypocrisy because you do the same things. Somebody says, I don't. Boy,
you're a good hypocrite. You've really fooled yourself.
You're acting so good that you think you're real. He says, Woe unto you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you pay tithe. of all these different
herbs, and he's not criticizing them for this. He goes on to
say, this ought you to have done. You should have paid these tithes.
He's not criticizing him for this, but he says, you shouldn't
have left the other undone. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites, for you pay tithes and so on, but you've omitted
the weightier matters of the law. Now, what this tells me
is that there are weightier matters of the law. weightier matters
of God's Word. Now, everything God revealed
is important. And I wouldn't dare want to be
somebody to sit in judgment and say, well, this is important
and that's not, because it's all important. If God revealed it,
it's all important, but it's also true that there are weightier
matters of the law. For instance, what is more important
for you to understand? How God saves sinners? Or the
difference between different views of eschatology? when Christ
will come back, like pre-millennial, and post-millennial, and all-millennial,
and all those different views people have. What's more important?
What's weightier? I want to know how God saves
sinners. That's the weightier matters of the law. Now, notice
he says to these Pharisees, you've omitted You've left out, you've
passed over the weightier matters of the law. Now, I think this
is interesting. Pharisees represent my natural
religion, your natural religion, this is the Baptist, this is
the Catholics, this is the Presbyterian, you name any kind of denomination,
put your name in there, there it is, Phariseeism. That's what
we all are by nature. Now, what the Pharisee does is
he leaves out what's critical. And a false prophet, I say this,
I hope somebody will understand and hear what I'm saying. A false
prophet generally is most clearly identified by what he leaves
out. Not by what he says, but by what he leaves out. You hear
a free willer and you know he's a false prophet, there's nothing...
Deceitful about, I mean, he's deceitful, but you know right
off the bat what he's saying. It's wrong. It's when somebody
comes in and just leaves stuff out. That's where they're dangerous.
They come closer to the truth. Now, these fellows omit. They
leave out the weightier matters of the law. And in this passage
of Scripture, he tells us what the weightier matters of the
law are. Judgment, mercy, and faith. And in that passage of
scripture, we open the service with, in Luke chapter 11, he
says, judgment and the love of God. So here are the four, this
is what the Savior says, are the four weightier matters of
the law. Judgment, mercy, faith, and the
love of God. Now, how in the world do you
go about omitting these things? What happens when someone omits
the weightier matters of the law? Now, the Lord goes on to
say, in this next verse, He says, you blind guides, which, strain
it and act. Something that's really not that
important, you make a big issue out of. But you swallow a camel,
something that is I said that wrong, didn't I? When you strain
it in that, you make it too much emphasis on something that's
not important, and then you swallow a camel, putting emphasis on
something that, not putting something, emphasis on something that is
important. Now, the first thing he mentions is judgment. This
is the first weightier matter of the law, judgment. Judgment. The word is crisis. Now is the crisis. of this world. The word means to decide, to
distinguish, to pass sentence. Let me show you the idea of the
word. Turn to Matthew chapter 25. This is the word that usually
refers to Judgment Day. Verse 31, When the Son of Man
shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with him,
then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory, and before him
shall be gathered all nations, and he shall separate them one
from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats." Now
here we have judgment going on. Him making decisions, separating,
passing sentence. Here's a sheep, here's a goat. Judgment. How many times do we
read in the scripture of judgment day? And this is something to
think about. You know, everybody, and I love thinking about this,
everybody is going to stand before God in judgment. Nobody's going
to get out of this. Everybody in this room, everybody
outside of this room, everybody to ever live, great people supposedly
and insignificant people, all people will stand before God
in judgment and they're going to be judged by Him and He's
utterly just, He's utterly impartial. He's no respecter of persons,
complete, impartial, justice and judgment. Justice and judgment
are the habitation of thy throne. Look in John chapter 3. I want
to look at several scriptures real quickly where this word
is used. Judgment. It's sometimes translated condemnation. Verse 19. And this is the condemnation.
That's the same word, judgment. This is the judgment. This is
the condemnation that light is coming to the world. Light as
to how God saves sinners by Christ. Light as to how a sinner can
be justified through the blood and the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Light is coming to the world. And watch this. And men
loved darkness rather than light. Because their deeds were evil. Look in John chapter 5 verse
24. Verily, verily, I say unto you,
He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me,
hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation. That's
the word, judgment. But it's passed from death unto
life. I'm not going to stand condemned.
I'm going to stand justified. Look in John chapter 7 verse
24. The Lord says, judge not according
to appearance, according to the way things look. Fact of the
matter is, don't believe anything you see. Judge not according
to appearance, but judge righteous judgment. There is such a thing. Look in John chapter 12, verse
31. is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this
world be cast out. He's talking about the cross
because he says, if I be lifted up from the earth will draw him
into me. This he said signifying what death he should die. Look
in John chapter 16, verse 8. And when He has come, He will
reprove, He will convince the world of sin, of righteousness,
and of judgment. Of sin, because they believed
on me. Of righteousness, because I go to my Father and you see
me no more. Of judgment, because of the Prince of this world is
judged. All judgment took place on the
cross. Now, we see how the Bible uses
this word. It's throughout the Scriptures,
judgment. Now, here's my question. How do you go about omitting
this weightier matter? How do you go about leaving out
this weightier matter? Now, there's two ways you can
do it. First, by just not saying anything about it. Just leaving
it alone. Not saying it. We won't go there
as to what that means. We'll go on to something else
that's easier to understand. First, by leaving it out. Or
secondly, by taking the same word and changing the meaning. and thus leaving it out and passing
it by. Now, a false balance, the scripture
says, is an abomination to the Lord. but a just weight is his
delight." Now, God is so completely just that if I leave out this
judgment, I've left out who God is. Now, here's how you use the
word judgment and change the meaning. I've got three ways
here. I want you to listen real carefully. This is very important. I want
everybody to hear what I'm saying. How is it that a preacher can
use the word judgment and yet change the meaning of it? Well,
here's the first way. Anytime a man preaches salvation
by works in any form, anytime a man makes salvation in some
way dependent upon what you do. You see, Bible forbids that. By grace are you saved. And if
you take some work that you're supposed to perform, here's what
the Bible says about my works and your works. What? Filthy
rags. That's God's testimony. And if
I say salvation is by works, I am saying that the Holy God
can accept my filthy rags and I can be saved by filthy rags. And therefore, I pervert judgment. You see that? Salvation by works
is a perversion of judgment. Now here's another way you can
pervert judgment. Remember, judgment is God's absolute
justice. is that God is just. No sin is
going to go unpunished. Here's another way you can pervert,
change judgment. By teaching what is known as
universal redemption. By saying that Jesus Christ died
for all people. By saying that He paid for the
sins of everybody. But salvation is up to what you
do with what He did. Now, if that's a perversion of
justice, you're going to tell me that Jesus Christ can pay
for my sins and I might wind up in hell anyway? You know what
I say by that? I say God is not just. If God
can punish me for something, my sins has already been punished
and sent me to hell anyway, I've perverted justice. There's no
justice there. I've perverted judgment. Just
the teaching of universal redemption is a perversion of justice and
judgment. Now, the first is teaching salvation
by works. The second is teaching universal
redemption, that Christ died for everybody. And the third
would be stated like this, looking at Christ's suffering as nothing
more than a legal transfer. Now that's the way most people,
most churches look, churches is a loose term, not religious
organizations, they look at the death of Christ as a legal transfer. My sins were legally charged
to Him and He was punished for them because they legally became
His, but it goes no further than that. Now I don't claim to understand
this, but this is very important for me to understand. If that's
the case, if Christ was just charged with my sins and punished
for my sins, and it goes no further than that, just a legal transfer,
God's not just. The only way God can be just
is if he punishes the person for what they did. Now, my sins
so truly became His that when God punished Him, He was giving
Him exactly what He deserved. And to loosen up on that, it's
a paste. If my sins were merely pasted
on Him, but He remains the same, His righteousness is merely pasted
on me and I remain the same. There's no justice in that. There's
no judgment in that. That's a perversion of justice.
That's a perversion of judgment. That's omitting the weightier
matters of all judgment. God is absolutely just. Justice and judgment are the
habitation of thy throne. Now, how this happened, I don't
claim to understand. I just believe. My sin so much
became His. that he became guilty of it.
Like that passage of scripture we looked at either last week
or week before, like he was wounded for our transgressions, that's
translated he was defiled. He was profaned. He was polluted. He was stained for our transgressions. Now, that breaks my heart to
think of that, but that's exactly what took place on the cross.
When God judged him, it's because he had it coming. And anything
short of that is a perversion of judgment. They've omitted
the weightier matters of the law of judgment. The next thing
he says is mercy. Now, everybody uses the term
mercy. I believe in the mercy of God. Well, how do you omit,
how do you pervert what the Bible teaches regarding mercy? Well,
what's the Bible mean by mercy? Here's the best definition of
mercy. But God. You were dead in trespasses and
sins. You walked according to the prince of the power of the
air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience,
among whom we all had our conversation in times past, in the lusts of
our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and in the mind,
and we were by nature the children of wrath, just like everybody
else. But God, not but you, not but you turned around, not but
you repented, not but you turned over a new leaf, but God, who
is rich in mercy, For His great love wherewith He loved us, even
when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. You see, in the Gospel, mercy's
not at the end. Mercy's at the beginning. You
don't do things in order to get mercy. God gives you mercy sovereignly. It's sovereign mercy. That's
the only kind of mercy there is. Now, how do I, how do I admit
this? Well, here's one way I admit
it. I admit it when I deny responsibility and I blame everything on God's
sovereignty. I can't help it that I'm a sinner. I was born
that way. It's God's fault ultimately. That's the way we think. And
so I become a victim rather than guilty. And I, you know, if you're
a victim, you don't need mercy, do you? Not, not really. Victims
don't need mercy. I omit the mercy of God when
I make it a payment, when I deny God's sovereignty. You know,
some people, they hear that God has mercy on whom He will have
mercy. They say, how could that be fair? How could it be fair for
Him to save one and pass by another? Well, what you're saying is God
owes you mercy when you think that way. But that's all we say.
And we omit mercy. We pass by mercy. We change the
meaning of the Word. And then He speaks of omitting
faith. The faith. What is faith? Faith
is believing God. God said it. I believe it. In Genesis chapter 15 verse 6,
It says, Abraham believed God. God said to Abraham, you're going
to have all these descendants. Just look up at the sky. Can
you count the stars? No. So shall your descendants
be. Abraham believed God. He had no evidence that what
God said was going to come to pass. I mean, Sarah had already
gone through menopause. He was an old man. He couldn't
produce life, but Abraham believed God. He staggered not at the
promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving
glory to God, being fully persuaded that what God had promised, he
was able also to perform. That's what faith is. It's believing
God. Faith is reliance. It's not merely giving a sin.
I've seen that Scripture teaches that. It's more than that. It's
reliance. 1 John 4, 16, we have known and
believed or relied upon the love that God has to us. Now, here's
what I'm relying on, that God's love is in Christ. That's what
I'm relying on, that God's love is in Christ and therefore it's
saving effectual love. I'm relying on all that He loves,
He saves. I'm relying on that. Now, when
I omit faith, I make faith out either to be less than what it
is or more than what it is. I make it less than what it is
when I leave out this reliance and just make it a scent, giving
agreement to some facts. You all see the Bible teaches
that. I agree with that. Well, that's not faith. Faith is a reliance. But I make it more than what
it is when I introduce the word and to it. We're saved by faith
and something else, fill in the blank. That's omitting this weightier
matter of the law. And then, in Luke chapter 11,
our Lord was speaking in a different time. He said, you've paid tithes
and so on, but you pass over judgment and the love of God. The love of God. I suppose that
there's nothing more perverted by this religious generation
than what they say regarding the love of God. This generation
of religious people have trivialized and passed over and made meaningless
the love of God by these blasphemous ideas they presented as. For
instance, God's love is unconditional. God's love is unconditional. He can love you just as you are. What kind of God could love you
just as you are? Boy, there ain't much to that
God. If he could love you just as you are, he's not very holy,
is he? He's not very just. God's love
is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. If God loves you, it's because
you're in the Lord Jesus Christ and you bring out His love because
you're united to Christ. Just as He loves Christ, He loves
you. You see, anything short of that
is a blasphemous, unconditional love. It's foolishness. Here's
another blasphemous idea regarding the love of God. God loves all
men the same. He loves Jacob and Esau equally. He loves Peter and Judas equally.
Now, wait a minute. The Bible says in Romans 9.13,
quoting from Malachi chapter 1, Jacob have I loved, but Esau
have I hated. God said that. Well, that means
he loved Esau less. Can God love less? What kind
of God can love less? You see, everybody God loves,
He saves. And don't get tripped up on this
thing, well, how could He hate Esau? I tell you what, I can
see why He'd hate me. Can you? Can you see why He'd
cast you off apart from the Lord Jesus Christ? Well, of course
you can if you're a believer. I don't have to convince you
of that. You know it's so. Thank God He loved Jacob. The love
of God which is in Christ. Nothing shall separate us from
the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now this generation
that we live in, they pass by, they omit, they
change the meaning of the weightier matters of the law. Judgment,
mercy, Faith and the love of God. And I tremble at the thought
of me or you doing that. May the Lord deliver us from
this horrible crime that our Lord laid to the charge of the
Pharisees' account. You pay tithes. These were Bible-believing
people. They believed the Bible was the
Word of God and they'd fight for it. They were very religious,
they were very moral, they had all kinds of things going for
them. But he said, you have omitted the weightier matters of the
law. Judgment, mercy, faith, and the
love of God. May the Lord enable us to sound
forth a clear message in this generation regarding judgment,
mercy, faith, and the love of God. Let's pray.