Beware of the Scribes...

So as we jump into our text this morning, you have to pay attention to the characters. Who's in there right now and what are they doing? And so it says at the beginning that some of the scribes answered him and they say, Teacher, you've spoken well. Well, that's a loaded response. There's a lot going on in that response. The reason that the scribes spoke up and said this is because Jesus, just before that, had been responding to the Sadducees' question about the resurrection. If you were here last week, I reminded you the Sadducees didn't believe in the resurrection. And they were at odds, even to the point of causing riots with the Pharisees over this doctrine, over whether it was true or not. And so the Sadducees posed this question to Jesus about the resurrection. Jesus answers them, and in answering them, he affirmed the resurrection. And so what I want you to see is the scribes are stepping in right on the tails of it and saying, yeah, that's right, you spoke well.

Those guys are wrong. They were glad for Jesus. The scribes were glad for Jesus, even though they wanted to kill him. They were glad for him in the process of all of this going on. They were glad for him to display the Sadducees' ignorance, their foolishness. And this is why they tell him that he had answered well. So that's the specific reason that they say, teacher, you've spoken well. But their response can also be applied generally. They've all questioned him. The scribes and Pharisees have questioned him. The Sadducees have questioned him. And every question they asked him, they thought, there's no good answer to this question. We've got him. And every time they asked him a question, and they say, is it A or is it B? He says to them, no, it's C, and you're an idiot for not knowing it. Jesus has proven all of their questions are foolish, not just the ones from the Sadducees. And this is why none of them had the courage to question him any longer. They're done arguing with him.

They can't win the argument. Have you been in situations like this where you realize, you know what? I've been outdone. This is where my argument falls to the ground, right? I wish you hadn't made that particular point because there's nothing more to say. He's made them look foolish in public and they're done being made to look foolish in public so they don't have any courage to question him any longer. They're done. They couldn't trick him. They couldn't get him to say anything incriminating. Now, What's going on between Jesus and the scribes and Pharisees is a very good example of Proverbs 26.5, which says, These men were to be the leaders of the people. They were responsible for them. And Jesus answers them because of the danger that they're putting their hearers into with their folly, with their arguing, with their debating about about marriage and in the resurrection and about money and whether they should pay taxes. If Jesus had kept silent, they would have been justified in their questions. It would have seemed as though there was no answer to their questions, that they were right and he was wrong. And so he answers them as their folly deserves so that they wouldn't be wise in their own eyes. And it's also worth noting that they weren't going to be wise in anyone else's eyes, that everyone who was listening would have seen their foolishness. Have you ever observed arguments or debates or stuff

you know, a conflict going on and you think, man, he got, that was good. No, there's no answer for that. And then the guy answers him and you go, oh, I'd never thought of, oh, that's a really good answer to that. I'd never knew the answer to that. I never knew how to think through that, how to process that. And so you have to remember that all of this is going on in public. There are people observing and learning. And so they've decided they're not going to ask him any more questions because he's made them look like fools publicly. But that's not the end of it.

Jesus asks them a question, and it's a question just like the questions they've asked him, a conflict. And he puts the question to them. So he goes from being on the defensive, if you will, or the receiving end of questions. Once they've been silenced by his answers, he then says, now, by the way, I have a question for you. Now that it's all been said and done, he asks them, how is it that they say that Christ is David's son? Seems to come out of nowhere. David says in the book of Psalms, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. Therefore, David calls him Lord. And how is it that he, how is he his son? Now, do any of you think you can answer the question? This is how we ought to think when we read scripture. When we find questions that are being posed to people, we go, okay, do I know the answer to the question? How is it? So David called his Lord his son. Or how did he call his son his Lord? I don't know how that worked.

There's a bit of context that you need to have from Luke that's left out. And so we're going to get it from Matthew. The question is, who is the Lord in this passage? And so Jesus asks this question of his disciples. He says, who do people say that I am? And his disciples asked him, answered him, and they said, some say John the Baptist and others Elijah, but still others Jeremiah. or one of the prophets. And so what Jesus is asking them is, who do the people believe I am? And they're saying, well, they think you're a prophet. And then Jesus follows up with him and he says, but who do you say that I am? Who do you say that I am? And this is where Simon Peter answers him and he says, you are the Christ. You are the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus said to him, blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my father who is in heaven. And so you have to realize who,

When Jesus asks this question, it's not just some theoretical question. He's putting the question to the Pharisees and to the Sadducees about himself. His disciples know who he is. They know he's the Christ. This is what Peter has said. The people expect that he is someone of note, at least a prophet, more than a prophet. The scribes, on the other hand, don't care if he's the Christ. They just want him dead. And so when Jesus says to them, how is it that they say that Christ is David's son? You could replace him and put him in it. How is it that they say that I'm David's son? This is how the disciples would have heard the question. Who are they? How is it that they say that the Christ is David's son? Who are they? Who says this? Fair question. Who says that the Christ is David's son? In Matthew 22, which is a parallel account to our text here in Luke, We read, Now this part is left out of Luke, but Matthew records it. Before he says what we have in our text, he asks them a question. And they said to him, And in Mark,

12.35, this is another parallel account, Jesus began to say as he taught in the temple, how is it that the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David? And so the people who believe that the Christ is the son of David are the people who've been accusing him. They say, we believe that the Christ is the son of David. And he says, okay, you believe, you believe that the Christ is the son of David. And the disciples are understanding, so they believe that he's the son of David because we know he's the Christ. How is it? that he's his son. And so what the conflict is, how can a king's son be his Lord? It's sort of an impossibility. In what circumstance would one of David's sons be called his Lord? How could his son rule over him? His son would rule after him, but not over him. So how does this all work? Who is David's son? Is he his son or is he his Lord? And before we come to the answer of this question, how is it that David's son is

his Lord and his son. I want to note to you that none of these men offered an answer. Matthew says that no one was able to answer him a word and that this was the reason that they had no courage to ask him any more questions. They didn't want to be made to look a fool anymore, so they kept quiet to his question. We don't know. Everything's been laid bare at this point. How do you say that the Lord is the son of David? How's that work? And they keep silent. Now I want you to think for a minute about conflict. And what happens when people can't answer a question anymore? When you're arguing with somebody, as all of us are wont to do, what happens when there's not an answer to a good question? You have a couple of choices, don't you? What's one of the choices? What can you do if someone pins you to the wall and you don't have an answer? You can ignore it. Yeah, you can just act like they didn't ask the question. You can just discredit, no, they didn't ask me a question. Yep.

You can ignore it. What else might you do? Get angry, right? Attack them. This is where they start mocking one another. We completely change the subject. Stop talking about the question at hand and I start talking about your past or I start talking about your problems or your sins or what you've done. I change the subject. I tell you what a terrible person you are and how you shouldn't even be able to ask. You don't even have a right to be asking me these questions. Now, it is possible in a conflict when you get caught, And you don't have an answer because it's a good question to say, you're right. It's not common that that's what we do. But it is possible. You remember weeks ago I told you about Canaan and the carrots. When he didn't know the answer to the question. When he said, give me some of that. And I said, what is that? I don't know. Give me some of that. Well, what is it called? He wouldn't tell me. And I said, son, what is it? He said, you can teach me. I don't know what it is. I don't know what they're called.

This is a possible answer to this question. They could have said to Jesus, even at this point, we don't know. Help us. Help us. Resolve it for us. Teach us. But they keep silent. I do want you to note that Jesus never does answer the question that he asks, which is a bit disappointing to me in the text, that he never says, well, actually, here's how it works, guys. So as I went looking and studying and figuring out, okay, so, Are the Pharisees wrong for saying that David's son would be his Lord? Or that David's son would be the Christ? And no, they're not wrong. And yet David says, my Lord said to my Lord, how's it all work? Well, each one is true in its own sphere. Is one of David's sons to be the Christ? Were the scribes and Pharisees right to believe that one of David's sons would be the Christ? Yeah, they were right. They absolutely were right. If you go into the book, at the beginning of the book of Matthew,

The whole first chapter is dedicated to proving that Jesus' lineage came from the line of David. That he actually was the fulfillment of that prophecy. So they were right. And yet how then is he his Lord? How is an inferior said to be a superior? Well, when you understand who his son is and what he's like, namely Jesus, not Solomon, you understand that he's his Lord not because he's his son, but because he's God. He rules over him. David was a type. He was a figure of who was to come to be a king. That's what David's whole purpose was to demonstrate, that there was going to be a coming king who was going to rule over the people, over the land. And so when David calls him his Lord, he's acknowledging not his familial connection to David himself, but his deity, his godhood.

He's going to be my Lord. God is going to come and save his people. And he's not just going to be one of my sons. He's going to also be the son of God. This is what David is declaring by faith through a veil in the Psalms. Now, Jesus doesn't answer this for the people. He doesn't tell them that this is what's going on. This is why they said that. This is why you believe it. And here's the answer to it all wrapped up in an ice boat. He doesn't do any of that. He simply then turns to the people and he warns them. It says, while the people were all listening, he said to the disciples, beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes with respectful greetings, and we're going to go through all the things he delineates as them. And to us, a lot of the things he says about them, it's just like, oh, okay, well, they wore long robes. I guess that's just what they wore. But each one of the things that he says to them was meant to call up an image or a reference in the people's minds.

He's speaking to them directly now, and he says, beware of the scribes who look like this and who act like this. Now, is it too far of a stretch to think that the men who were questioning him were dressed just like he described? Beware of the scribes who like to wear long robes. Can you feel the tension of what Jesus is saying? I want you to see from the very beginning that when Jesus warns the people, he is very specific. He uses names. Now, he doesn't use names, but They're standing right there. And scripture in other places testifies when there are warnings that they're very specific. Avoid these sort of men, men who act like this, men who do this. And one of the things that's very difficult for us today is being specific like this in our warnings, in saying that people, certain people are bad people, wicked people, ought not to listen to them. Imagine on one hand, you've got Jesus saying, you all,

Beware of the scribes and the Pharisees who like to wear long robes, who like the places of honor at your banquets, who offer up these long prayers for the sake of appearance. And you're looking right at the men he's talking about. Could you imagine us doing something like that today? Could you imagine it? You know what it would sound like? Here's what it would sound like. I find where I wrote it. This is how we would say it. You ought to be careful around him. Now, I don't know his heart. And I might be wrong, but I think he might be dangerous. And you should consider if you should continue to listen to him. You should pray about it. Now, is that nearly as helpful as what Jesus says? I don't find it to be nearly as helpful. It's much less offensive. It doesn't offend me to be told, be careful maybe if you think it's dangerous. You figure it out. That doesn't offend me. And I want you to consider for a minute.

In your own life, have you ever met people that you know are bad news and they're getting involved with people that you love? And you know they're bad news. Can you say that? Well, you know, we're sitting here kind of like, yeah, I could say that, but it would be really difficult if I said it. If I said they're bad news, stay away from them. You have. How'd that go, Luis? Okay, not well. You care that your loved ones are involved with people who are bad news. Why is that important to you? The reason it's important to you is because you love them. The people that you care about are being put in harm's way. And what you want to do is protect them. And so you want to say, that's a bad dude. Stay away from him. She's a harlot. Don't have anything to do with her. You have it in you to want to protect people.

But as soon as you realize that, you realize if I say that, all hell's going to break loose. If I tell them that they're being wicked and you should have nothing to do with them, just like Jesus does of the scribes, you realize what kind of trouble is going to come. I want to take a little bit of time and go through what Jesus says about these men. The specific things he mentions. The first thing he says is that they wear long robes. Well, as opposed to what? Well, as opposed to robes that were girded up. A long robe is really hard to work in. And so it was common dress for men to wear long robes. What would they do when they had to work? They would gather it up, tie them up so that they could actually work. The scribes, they're not interested in working. They're not interested in helping. They're not interested in doing anything. So they wear their long robes out in public. Now, let me ask you a question. Does what we wear communicate something about us? Okay.

Does what other people wear communicate something about them? You willing to say anything about it? In case you're not tracking, let's take skinny jeans as an example, okay? What do you guys think about skinny jeans? Are they appropriate attire for men? Oh, no, well, okay, so if I made all you men stand up, I'd find at least one of us would be like, I think those are tapered leg jeans, a little tight, a little bit of spandex in your denim, and we'd all laugh. Now, if we said to that man, you ought not to wear pants like that because they're not manly. They make you look like a woman. Who's going to laugh then? Who thinks that's funny? Who thinks it's true? Well, my point is not to say that it's funny. My point to say is that we laugh because that's how we get out of the tension. People laugh when they're uncomfortable. They're like, oh. Because they don't know what else to do.

So do our clothes communicate? What if it wasn't a man? What if we were talking about women? Do women dress immodestly? Yes. Should Christian women dress immodestly? No. Do they? Sometimes. Yes. Can we ever say it? Can we ever go to a woman? I remember when I first started going to church. And I was in a small group with a bunch of young people my age, early 20s. And one of the girls was in our small group. She sang on the worship team. and I didn't notice this. I heard the story because there was a problem. When she was singing, she raised her hands, and when she raised her hands, her midriff showed. Well, some older woman in the church went up to her afterwards and said, you shouldn't wear a shirt like that because it's distracting, not only to the men, but to everyone. It's a distracting thing, and if you're going to be up front, you ought not to dress like that. Sweet older woman in the church, and this young girl had a fit because this woman said this to her.

No place to say anything like that to her. So was the older woman right or wrong about the clothing first, and then second about saying something about it? Was she right or was she wrong? She was right, but should she have said it? You sure? Because the few times I've brought stuff like this up, or generally speaking, I don't tend to talk to women about their clothing. I talked to Vanessa, or we talk about it, and she talks to them. But it doesn't go well. You're all sitting here like, oh, yeah, no, that's fine. Yeah, no, we're happy. Okay, until it's you. We'll just see. They wore long clothes. I want you to realize that Jesus spoke about their attire negatively because it indicated something about them. In their context, it indicated that they were not willing to work. They were proud men. They were lazy men. They were entitled men.

What else? He says that they love respectful greetings in public. Now, who doesn't? Who wouldn't like that? If you're walking down, well, hello, how are you, sir? How was your day? Are you doing well? Can I get you something? We'd all love to be treated that way. I watched an old interview, Johnny Carson interview of Richard Pryor, an old comedian. And one of the things that came up in the interview was what it's like when celebrities go to other countries where they're not known. Because in America, if Richard Pryor walked down the street, do you guys know who Richard Pryor is? Okay. Yeah. He's an old black comedian. And he was a drunk and a druggie and he got cleaned up and he's very funny.

And he was very well known back in the 70s into the 80s in some very funny movies. And so one of the things that came up was, well, he had gone to Zimbabwe. Well, back in the 70s, you think anybody knew who Richard Pryor was in Zimbabwe? Uh-uh. Now, so what he and Johnny Carson were talking about was what's that like and how do celebrities, American entertainers, handle not being known in public? Because they think, I don't want to be known. I just want to go out to dinner with my family and not have people, you know, flash mob, people snapping pictures and everything. But you know what the actual truth is? They don't like being places where they're not recognized. They don't like places like Zimbabwe. Because nobody, because they walk down the street and nobody knows who they are. And you know what? They get treated like a normal person. And they're used to being treated with preference. And so they don't like it. They want to be known. That's these men.

They love respectful greetings in public. They demand and expect public honor. Do we want to be treated a certain way? What do you do with leaders who want to be treated a certain way, expect to be greeted in a certain way? Maybe as simple as the address. You know, some of you guys call me Dave. Some of you guys call me Pastor Dave. Some of you guys call me Pastor Abusara. And then who knows what of those things or something else you teach your kids to call me. Hey, you, tag up my pants. How do you teach them to, to speak, using myself as an example. How should I respond? What should I expect? Don't you want to know what I want to be called? Don't you want to know what I want you to tell your kids to call me? What if I demanded that you called me Pastor Abu Sara? All of you, all the time. And if you called me Dave, I communicated to you very clearly that you had crossed the line that you shouldn't have crossed. What would you think of me then? Yeah, but what would you think of me?

You're full of yourself. That's right. That's what would be true of me if I did that. These men love respectful greetings in public. And you just imagine that if they didn't get them, how they behaved. They also loved seats of honor in the synagogues and at banquets. You remember when Jesus taught about where to seat yourself at these sorts of places? Where are they supposed to seat themselves? You're supposed to seat yourself in a place of dishonor or less honor than you deserve. And then the host is supposed to come in. and move you up. No, you come up here. You sit up here. And what that does is communicates levels of honor. Who's more important? Now, we all just had Thanksgiving, okay? We all sat around a table, presumably, with other people from our family. How many of you had seating charts or name tags? We did. They did. Okay, what's the point of seating chart? Not just practically like, okay, we're going to have the kids over here, and we're going to do this so that people can get by and get to the sink.

Yeah, and what you're doing, you know, in my house, there's some adults and there's a bunch of kids. And what do we want to be able to happen at our Thanksgiving meal? You want the adults to be able to talk, right? So when we set the food out, if we don't assign seating, what's going to happen? All the kids are going to get right in the middle where all the food's at. Because that's where they want to be. And what's that going to mean about where the adults end up? One here, two over there, another one in this other place. And are the adults going to be able to have conversation? No, they're not. And that's a problem, isn't it? After all, at the Thanksgiving meal, the parents, the adults, ought to be able to carry on a conversation, and the kids ought to be quiet, and there ought to probably be some preference given to the adults. So what happens when one of the kids decides they're going to sit up near the food and they're not going to pay attention to the seating chart? Well, it tells you they think more highly of themselves. They love.

The seats of honor. Because you know what? At my house, we did put the good food near the adults. And we did serve the kids, and they ate the same food. But the food was up near us. And there was bickering bunks of kids about where to sit. I don't want to sit there. I don't want to sit there. I can't be. Love seats of honor. And so when we are creating a seating chart at our Thanksgiving table, just as an example, what we're creating is a ranking of honor and importance. You don't belong up here. You belong down at the other end. Not at a Thanksgiving meal, I've gone into other people's houses and been told where to sit. No seating chart, just, you know, I'm going to go sit down wherever there's a seat. And I actually have had the host make everyone on one side of the table get up, move down a seat, because they wanted me to sit up near them. Very awkward. Very awkward. But what's being communicated to everybody? Who's important? Now, these men loved it.

They thought they deserved to sit up at the front end. They thought they deserved preferential treatment. And it was wicked of them. You contrast that with Jesus washing his disciples' feet, taking on an apron and doing a slave's work. Seats of honor versus washing your disciples' feet. And then Jesus goes on and he says, Up to this point, it's almost just like manners and etiquette. And it's like, well, I don't know about, you know, are you telling me we should have a seating chart at Thanksgiving? And I think, well, you should consider it. I think you'd learn something if you actually had to think about it for five minutes. And then if you don't want to do it, that's fine. But I think you'd be like, oh, who are the important people here? Who do we need to consider? But you might get by without saying, well, clothing is clothing and there's fashion and style and whatever. And it is nice to be greeted in public and, you know.

Jesus is just saying these sorts of things. But then he goes on, and what's he say about them? He says that they devour widows' houses. Now, is there any way to say that that's okay? Is that just to be dismissed like, well, it's just fashion? No, they're devouring widows' houses. What's that mean? Well, it means that they're making buddy-buddy with the widows and taking all of their money. They're stealing from them. These rich men want to become richer, and so they go find the most weak and defenseless people in their congregation, and they fleece them of all their money. That's what they're doing. That's what it means to devour the widow's house. And they offer long prayers for the sake of appearance. You ever been somewhere where you thought, they should stop talking? Never at church, I'm sure. But you ever been somewhere where you're just like, that's enough. You've said enough. We got your point. You're saying it the third time. You ought to be quiet now. So what is it when someone

has to hold the floor when they have to be the one talking. They have to go on and on. They have to be heard. It's simple pride. It's just simple pride. You see this with children. How often do you just tell your kids, be quiet. You do not need to be the one that's being heard at the dinner table or in the car or wherever it is you're at. You be quiet. You are overwhelming the space with nothing of substance. Be quiet. And why do the kids get frustrated when you say that? Well, because you're telling them that they don't get to control everything. And so when these men pray these long prayers, everyone around them has to submit to it and listen to it and bear it. I've known men to pray this way. They pray and pray and pray. And the funny thing is, you know what we do with prayer? We end up saying the things in prayer that we're unwilling to say in conversation.

I pray that they will do this. Funny thing, you didn't say that before you prayed. Prayer is often used by us as a way to say what we think needs to be said, but to say it to God, not to the person that we're praying for. And it's just awful. It's just awful. If you think someone's doing something foolish in sin, making some sort of awful decision with their life,