WE come to these verse for the last time to consider the emphasis particularly of verses 19 to 20. We have seen the sacred nature of the Bible and that it is all God’s word and all will be fulfilled. We have seen also how Christ came to bring the fulfilment to fruition and is continuing to do so. Jesus now seeks to press home the fact that it is a terrible thing to treat the word of God lightly and destructively.

Jesus presses home this message by saying that any one who breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practises and teaches these commands will be great in the kingdom of heaven. He then goes on to tell us that the religious teachers of his day were not living the commandments as they should, and were teaching others to do the same, and so would not enter the kingdom of heaven.

We have already learnt that the commandments refer to the whole teaching of the Old Testament, and so for us in the light of the New Testament the commandments mean the teaching of the New Testament as well as the Old. Jesus plainly teaches that the Old Testament is equally the truth of God with the New.

Jesus illustrates what it means to teach or fail to teach the commandments by speaking of the Pharisees and teachers of the law. These religious leaders and approved teachers of the Old Testament in Jesus day are spoken of by Jesus as failing in their teaching. He tells us that the righteousness that they taught and illustrated in their living was defective, and he goes on to say that they and all that followed their teaching would fail to enter the kingdom of God.

This is very serious stuff. Plainly Jesus was saying that they were breaking the commandments. Jesus was saying that they had not understood the message of the Bible and were not teaching it and the living they were setting forth was damaging to their eternal soul.

Where did they fail? There is no doubt that these leaders were not evil men. They lived outwardly at least exemplary lives. They were extremely religious. They did a great deal of good works. They prayed. They read the Old Testament. They spent their time seeking to interpret the Old Testament, and they codified and taught what they felt to be the meaning of it. Yet their righteousness did not reach the standard which won them a place in God’s kingdom.

When we read the Gospels to see the lives of these teachers we find that all the righteousness of these men was external. They followed the rules they made outwardly. They gave tithes to the poor and they fasted and so on, but it was all outside, and left their hearts still filled with the corruption of sin. Jesus exposes this condition in Luke 11 from verse 37 onward. Jesus says of them that they cleaned the outside of the cup and dish, and by this he meant that they observed meticulously all the rules of ceremonial purification which they taught in their understanding of the law, but Jesus says that inside they were full of greed and wickedness.. Jesus goes on by saying that these religious leaders tithed their money and all their goods, giving a tenth to God, but they neglected justice and the love of God. All their righteousness was outside. They left their hearts full of corruption.

In the sermon on the mount Jesus shows the defectiveness of the teaching and righteousness of these leaders. They were content if they did not murder anyone. Jesus tells them that they actually committed murder all the time as far as God saw things, because they committed murder when they despised people or hated people. Then again these religious teachers were content with the fact they did not actually commit adultery. But Jesus tells them that in the sight of God they committed adultery every time they looked on a woman with lustful thoughts.

In so many ways these leaders failed to see what true righteousness was and failed to see that God looked into the heart and sought righteousness there. They did not understand that righteousness commenced within, in the heart, and only when the heart was clean, could true righteous actions begin to be performed. They just did not understand or want to understand the holiness of the law of God, and they taught others to follow their example and so put their souls in danger too.

Then Jesus showed that these leaders treated the Old Testament with contempt. They interpreted it according to their own opinion and what suited them. They changed the law concerning divorce to suit them, and they did it so that they could feel they were righteous even though they got rid of their wives if they did not like them any more.

These ways continue all down history. People are always seeking to manipulate the Word of God to suit their own opinions and contemporary thought, and by this avoid the truth of God, and the way the truth convicts the sin within us. The church today is filled with this same spirit, and the Bible is cut up, twisted, interpreted to suit what we want to be and do.

There was a further important truth about the righteousness of the Pharisees. The Pharisees did not understand the solemn truth that we human beings in our sinfulness can in no way meet the righteousness which God demands, and which is set forth in the law and prophets. We can do everything in our power, and be as holy as we can, and yet we fall short of the righteousness of God. We need the Saviour Jesus Christ to fulfil the law for us.