1. Lesson One of the Book of Daniel, Introduction to the Book of Daniel

The Book of Luke, Looking on the Outward Appearance - Lesson 149

Luke 11:37‑44,  ³⁷And as he spake, a certain Pharisee besought him to dine with him: and he went in, and sat down to meat. ³⁸And when the Pharisee saw it, he marvelled that he had not first washed before dinner. ³⁹And 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. ⁴⁰Ye fools, did not he that made that which is without make that which is within also? ⁴¹But rather give alms of such things as ye have; and, behold, all things are clean unto you. ⁴²But 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, and not to leave the other undone. ⁴³Woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye love the uppermost seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the markets. ⁴⁴Woe 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 see in this passage another example among many of a confrontation between the Lord Jesus Christ and the Pharisees.

For the Pharisees were promoters of a system of belief based upon an unwritten code of law called the oral law. 

As we said last week this oral law was their commentary of what they thought God meant in the law as given to Moses.

The Oral Law was a “do it your self” book on how to be holy. 

This book is alive and well in the world of Judaism and indeed in Christianity and there are many that live by this book.

Minute rules and regulations were in place after many years of refinement but according to Jesus Christ these rules and regulations were nothing but bindings which in essence placed heavy burdens upon men’s shoulders.

Think about King David’s love for the law compared to what the Pharisees promoted.

David in Psalm 119:97-104, wrote:

O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day. Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies: for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.  I have refrained my feet from every evil way, that I might keep thy word.  I have not departed from thy judgments: for thou hast taught me.  How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!  Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way.

From this beautiful endorsement of God’s word by David to the time of the Pharisees the law by oral tradition had been corrupted into a way that bound heavy burdens upon men’s shoulders.   

You can be sure that if the word of God is preached in truth it will result in a testimony like David’s.  “O how love I thy law.” 

Instead of this testimony the people of Jesus’ day were bound by heavy burdens grievous to be borne and without any help from those who placed the burdens by the oral law.

but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers as Jesus said in Matthew 23:4.

No doubt this is why the Lord Jesus Christ said in:

Matthew 11:28,  Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. ³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Jesus Christ takes the yoke of religion off men’s backs and places his yoke upon them and teaches them of himself.

This will bring a man to this wonderful testimony that David wrote of when he said, “O how love I thy law.”

God’s law was given to help man but the Pharisees had so added to it that it became a grievous burden. 

We need to understand that Jesus Christ was setting himself up for crucifixion by these very confrontations with the Pharisees for the oral law of the Pharisees took higher precedence than the Word of God. 

I remember as a young boy witnessing the foot washing sacrament of my Mother’s church.   

This ceremony was their response to the command of Christ to his disciples to wash one another’s feet as he had washed their feet.   

They had taken this command in a literal way and turned it into a sacrament which is an outward and visible sign of inward and spiritual grace.   

In other words if I wash your feet in a ceremonial way then I am complying with Christ’s command to wash one another’s feet and therefore I can now say: 

Done! Finished, that is now out of the way, I have met Christ’s command to wash one another’s feet.   

So this command of Christ had turned into a ceremonial washing of feet for no one taking part in that ceremony would show up with dirty feet.    

There was no need for the washing of feet, there was only a desire for ceremony in order to fulfill this command. 

You can be sure that all feet had had an early morning cleaning before coming to church that Sabbath.   

The foot washing ceremony was announced well in advance and no one was caught with dirty feet. 

This is one of those memories that little children have because it was so unusual.   

I was probably 4 or 5 at the time and my mother brought me with her, down to the church basement where all the ladies were assembled to wash one another’s feet.   

I suppose the men were in another location doing the same. 

But the washing of feet that I witnessed simply was the pouring of water on the feet from a water pitcher and a ceremonial dutiful wiping of them with a clean white towel.   

There was no scrubbing allowed and none needed for there were no dirty feet.   

But the ceremony had replaced the intent of Christ’s command which was to have a humble spirit of service to each other and to attend to the needs of others with that humble spirit.  

I cannot demonstrate that humble spirit today by the washing of feet for you do not need me to wash your feet.   

Christ meant for us to be prepared to serve one another in meeting one another’s needs.   

Not to satisfy his command by some religious ritual. 

That is what ritual does.   

Perhaps it begins based upon a good motive but eventually it turns into a religious practice for others to see in order to judge you worthy. 

Remember the incident with Jesus Christ and a Pharisee named Simon.   

This is the occasion when Jesus’ feet were washed by the woman of ill reputation, who accomplished her task with her tears and her hair. 

What is interesting to us is that Jesus pointed out to Simon that he had not greeted Him with a kiss, washed His feet, nor did he anoint his head.  

This Pharisee, who would not have thought of eating without a ceremonial washing, did not provide Him with the one washing He really needed.   

His feet were dirty and needed washing for in those days unshod feet were prominent around the place of dining and they always were dirty after traveling on the dusty roads and trails. 

This Pharisee was particular in the matter of an unnecessary washing, but careless in a beneficial and practical washing. 

But this is man’s religion.   

I do what religion prescribes but I neglect the weightier matters and pass over judgment and the love of God: these I ought to have done, and not to leave the other undone. 

God’s religion is pure as James tells us in: 

James 1:26,  Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world. 

Pure religion is not ceremony and pomp and ritual but pure religion is beneficially doing for others! 

One thing I think we can know for sure is that Jesus Christ did not forget to wash before this Pharisee’s dinner, but he purposely and deliberately did not ceremonially wash. 

Being in a Pharisee’s house for dinner certainly demanded of all those invited that they ceremonially wash. 

And this Pharisee would have provided the necessary means for the washing.  

There was no mention of others who did not wash so I suppose all others at the table must have excused themselves and gone to wash.  

But Jesus did not wash and they soon realized that he was not going to wash as he began eating.  

Think about what you would think of others in this class who sat at table and did not bow their head and give thanks before eating.  

How shocked we would be!  The Pharisee’s reaction would have been the same reaction.   

But Christ is doing what he is doing for a reason. 

It was now time to take a firm stand against the oral traditions of the Pharisees, for they had become of more importance to them than the written Word of God.

Jesus has deliberately not washed here to make a point, to show the difference between Him, His teachings, and His practice, and that of the Pharisees.  

This is a deliberate move on the part of the Lord Jesus Christ, a move which He knew would make the differences clear between Himself and the Pharisees.   

It would further set him apart from them which would cause their hatred to be greater.  

So he uses this event to show these differences as he confronts the evils of the Pharisaic system of which his host is a part.  

We know this for he responds by saying “ye Pharisees,” in verse 39. 

The overall intention of his response is the contrast between the outside, which is secondary, and the inside, which is primary.  

Jesus begins by talking about the washing of the outside of a cup or a dish, but then moves to the inside of a man.  

The overall force of Jesus’ words is clear.  

Jesus differs from His host and the other Pharisees by seeing the inside as more important than the outside, the heart as being more important than appearances, man’s attitudes and motives as more important than one’s actions.  

The Pharisees believed that a man is made holy by working from the outside, in.  

Jesus believed that holiness (and defilement) came from the inside, out. 

Look at he cup example.   

If you could only have one side clean which would it be, the outside or the inside? 

When you are at the table and you examine the plate which side do you examine?   

Wouldn’t you put up with a plate whose bottom was dirty but have no tolerance of a plate whose top was littered with dried food? 

Who can disagree with the fact that cleanliness on the inside is more important than cleanliness on the outside?  

The Law dealt with external things, but its purpose was to teach Israel with reference to the heart.  

Jesus could therefore summarize the whole Law in terms of love: love for God and love for one’s neighbor.  

The Sermon on the Mount makes this point forcefully.  

Jesus taught that seeing the Law’s application only to outward acts was inadequate and inconsistent with God’s intent in giving the Law.  

He taught that obedience to the Law must be a matter of spirit, and not just of letter.   

Obedience to the law was for man’s benefit, it was not to be a curse. 

This was the original meaning of the Law but the Pharisees did not see it this way. 

Apparently the Pharisees explained their emphasis on the outward, the “outside of the cup” by insisting that it was important because God made it.  

We certainly must keep the outside of things clean, including ourselves, because God made them.  

But Jesus simply points out that God also made the inside, and thus they, by the same logic, should be kept clean as well. 

When viewed by outward measurements, the Pharisees looked good, but Jesus exposed the vileness of their hearts when He told them that they were “full of ravening and wickedness” (v. 39).  

When we look at the gospels as a whole we see that the greed and wickedness of the Pharisees was worked out in ways that seemed admirable, in ways that looked pious, in ways that may have even brought them praise, but which were evil (cf. Matthew 23:5‑7). 

And that is why Christ could call them whited sepulchers. 

Matthew 23:27,  Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness. ²⁸Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. 

Jesus then told the Pharisee that the way to “clean up” was to empty the contents of the dish — what was inside — and thus all things would be clean.  

It is really a very simple image.   

Instead of worrying about the outside empty that which is inside for the benefit of others.  

give alms of such things as ye have; and, behold, all things are clean unto you. 

One of the evils of the Pharisees was greed (v. 39; cf. also Luke 16:14), and thus Jesus proposed generosity as its antidote.