When Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and reclined at the table. But the Pharisee was surprised when he noticed that Jesus did not first wash before the meal. Then the Lord said to him, “Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? But now as for what is inside you—be generous to the poor, and everything will be clean for you. Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone. Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces. Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which people walk over without knowing it.” One of the experts in the law answered him, “Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also.” Jesus replied, “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them. Woe to you, because you build tombs for the prophets, and it was your ancestors who killed them. So you testify that you approve of what your ancestors did; they killed the prophets, and you build their tombs.”

–Luke 11:37-48 (TNIV)

So much for Jesus, meek and mild. Nothing seems to have aroused our Lord’s anger more than hypocrisy and here we see a blistering example of it. Jesus is not railing at the Pharisees and teachers of the law because of what they did, but because of what they didn’t do. They didn’t practice what they preached.

You see, the Law was given to instruct people in how to be creatures and how to relate in a proper way to their Creator. In the case of the Pharisees and teachers of the Law, they had gotten their ends and means confused. They did things for the sake of doing them rather than remembering why they were instructed to do so. For example, God commanded tithing but not at the expense of looking out for the poor, the needy, and the most helpless in society.

When we look out for the neediest and most helpless in society, not only is this doing justice, it is also loving mercy as Micah reminds us (6:8). There is a huge difference in the verbs here and we would do well to pay attention to it. We are to do justice, but to love mercy (which will result in us doing justice as well–the justice of God as manifested in the cross of Jesus Christ). The Law was given to God’s people to remind them to do just that, which is necessary, in part, if we are to have a proper relationship with our Creator. The Pharisees and the teachers of the law had forgotten that and they got an earful from Christ.

The lesson for us is equally clear. Jesus calls us to examine our behaviors and practices to see if they meet our professed beliefs. If the Church would start practicing consistently what it preached instead of play-acting, what a difference we would make in doing our part so that God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

How’s your consistency these days?

There are two ways of seeing God: in this age and in the age to come. In this age, as has been written, “He who sees me sees my Father, too.” For they have a pure heart who not only do no evil and intend no evil but who also always do and intend everything good. For it is possible now and then to do good but not to intend it. Those who do so may do good, but not on account of God. And God does not reward such good, for the good rewarded by God isn’t the one that is merely done but the one that is well done. Moreover, a person who does good on account of God no doubt also intends the good. So whoever acts entirely justly and intends so with his mind sees God, for justice is the likeness of God. For God is just. So, to the extent that anybody has torn himself from evils and done good things, to that extent he also sees God, either dimly, or clearly or slightly or to a greater degree, or partly or completely, or now and then or always, or in accordance with human possibility.

–Anonymous, Incomplete Work on Matthew, Homily 9

An impressive example of the value of the discipline of starting the day with a period of listening for God’s guidance, and of asking instructions for the day, is that provided by the Iona Community of Scotland. This is the major discipline that holds all members of the Iona Fellowship together, wherever they may be. To a remarkable degree, their practice meets the test of social verification, since the way in which this small minority of disciplined men have penetrated the economic, educational, and religious life of their country is striking indeed. They are changing society because they have been changed.
Powerful and productive as individual silence may be, group silence may be even more productive. Many are able to report that a genuine entering into a group silence, when it is dynamic and not merely sleepy, can bring, in the briefest conceivable time, an entire flood of ideas not previously recognized. More than three hundred years ago, Robert Barclay, one of the acknowledged masters of the interior life, had such an experience that radically altered his succeeding career. “When I came into the silent assemblies of God’s people,” he reported, “I felt a secret power among them, which touched my heart, and as I gave way unto it, I found the evil weakening in me, and the good raised up, and so I became thus knit and united unto them, hungering more and more after the increase of this power and life, whereby I might feel myself perfectly redeemed.”

–Elton Trueblood, The New Man for Our Time

Teach Me, O Lord, Thy Holy Way

Teach me, O Lord, thy holy way,
And give me an obedient mind,
That in thy service I may find
My soul’s delight from day to day.
Help me, O Savior, here to trace
The sacred footsteps thou hast trod;
And, meekly walking with my God,
To grow in goodness, truth, and grace.
Guard me, O Lord, that I may ne’er
Forsake the right or do the wrong;
Against temptation make me strong
And ’round me spread thy shelt’ring care.
Bless me, in every task, O Lord,
Begun, continued, done for thee;
Fulfill thy perfect work in me,
And thine abounding grace afford.

–William Matson

Don’t be afraid of taking upon yourself the yoke of Christ. Christ’s burden is so light that it lightens. You won’t be pressed down by it; indeed, without it you cannot rise up. Think of the burden of Christ as being like the burden of wings for birds. As long as a bird is burdened by wings, it can fly. Without wings it is trapped on earth. The wings carrying us to Christ are the commandments to love God above all and our neighbor as ourself. To the extent you use these two wings, you will lift up your heart.

–Augustine, Sermon 68.12-13