Introspection: A Heavy Load to Bear

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

A Heavy Load to Bear

The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses' seat; therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach.  They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them.  They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long.  They love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have people call them rabbi.  But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students.  And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father - the one in heaven.  Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah.  The greatest among you will be your servant.  All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.

Matthew 23:2-12 (NRSV)

I focused on the score

But I could never win

Trying to ignore

A life of hiding my sin

 

To label me

A hypocrite would be

Only scratching the surface

Of who I've been known to be

From "Undo" by Rush of Fools

Don't you hate it when you read a passage or a story from the Bible and realize that you have more in common with the supposed "bad guys" than you do with the "good guys"?

Time and time again, Jesus butted heads with the religious elite of His day, especially the Pharisees, a group of Jewish people who dedicated their lives to following their religious Law and to teaching the Law to other people.  Not long after Jesus rode into Jerusalem as if in a royal procession and made a scene at the temple,¹ the Pharisees and other religious groups began hammering Him with loaded questions, trying to collect enough ammunition to bring Him down.²  Fed up, Jesus issued forth a series of scathing critiques directed toward the Pharisees and the religious scholars.³

Though Jesus had a lot of criticisms for the Pharisees and the scholars, it is worth noting that His criticisms generally didn't involve their teachings.  He probably agreed with them on most issues.  In fact, Jesus even said that the people should follow their instructions because they "sit on Moses' seat."  Moses is the one who originally received the Law from God and taught it to the people, so, by saying that the Pharisees "sit on Moses' seat," Jesus is basically affirming them as teachers of the Law.

Jesus' conflict with the Pharisees and the religious scholars stemmed not from their teachings but rather from the fact that they did not follow their own teachings.  Jesus remarked, "They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them."  The Pharisees knew that the Jewish Law was extremely difficult to follow, but, instead of being honest about their own struggles, they faked it.  Over and over again, Jesus called them "hypocrites."  The word hypocrite is derived from the ancient Greek word hupokrites which means "actor."⁴

I believe that Jesus might have some similar critiques for modern-day Christians.  Like the Pharisees, Christians have a nasty tendency to place more importance on orthodoxy - right belief - than on orthopraxy - right behavior.  For example, one preacher can be judged and condemned as a "heretic" regardless of the kind of life he or she lives, while another supposedly more "orthodox" preacher can be lifted up as a man or woman of God despite being a generally contemptible person.⁵  Churchgoers who find themselves in disagreement with what their pastor teaches will leave their church and seek another one, and entire denominations have even split over matters of doctrine.

Can we Christians honestly say that we place such an importance on what the church actually does?

So often, Christians, myself included, are a lot more concerned about being right than doing right.  Simply being right doesn't make a person any better than anyone else.  It doesn't matter what we know if we don't put what we know into practice.

As someone who tries to pass along insights into the Christian life though Sunday school lessons, blog posts, and occasional sermons, I feel as though I, like the ancient Pharisees, place heavy loads on people's shoulders.  To use a pole-vaulting analogy I sometimes set the bar so high in my writings that I cannot clear it myself.  For example, not long ago, I delivered a sermon about how we would do well not to say, "Why bother?" yet, a few days ago, I found myself thinking these very words.  I like to remind people that all religious instructions boil down to two "simple" rules - love God, and love each other.  These two rules are easy to remember, but at times they can be damn near impossible to follow.  It's easy to preach, and it's easy to teach, but putting into practice what one preaches and teaches is an altogether different story.

When the Pharisees did practice what they preached, they did so for the sole purpose of impressing people.  For example, Jesus made the observation that they "make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long."  Phylacteries were little boxes attached to straps that Jewish people would wear on their arms or on their foreheads while praying.  Inside the box was a tiny scroll on which a Scripture passage was written.⁶  The fringes of which Jesus speaks were the tassels on the corners of a prayer shawl.  Both of these things were meant to remind the wearers of their duty to follow the Law.⁷  If Jesus wanted to make a similar observation about showy Christians in our day, He might say, "They wear T-shirts with Bible verses, and WWJD bracelets, and large shiny crosses on their necklaces."

Jesus remarked that the Pharisees, "love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have people call them 'rabbi.'"  As someone who also finds himself preoccupied with his own self image, I must confess that I can relate to the Pharisees in this respect.  Last year, a friend of mine introduced me to several members of his church, saying that I was "a preacher."  Being called a "preacher" made me feel pretty good about myself, proud even.  I felt as if I had accomplished something I had set out to do.

If you have been reading this blog for a while, then you know that, a few years ago, while I was working at my previous job, I began to flirt with the possibility of going into the ministry.  Though I desired to do something more with my life than to write software for gambling machinery, looking back, I am beginning to think that some of my motives might not have been so pure.  I think that maybe I considered going into the ministry because, in the circles in which I was traveling at the time, that was what all the "cool kids" were doing.  I think that maybe I wanted to be someone special - to be part of the club, so to speak.  I'm only a little bit ashamed of this fact.  I have no regrets because I know that God was at work, for it was through the journey I started back then that I discovered my spiritual gifts.

To be perfectly honest, I have discovered that doing the things I started doing since that time - teaching Sunday school, delivering sermons, and publishing blog posts - can be an ego trip.  Hearing that I gave somebody "something to think about" always gives my pride a shot in the arm.  It does my ego good to stand at the pastor's podium, delivering a message to an entire congregation, and to stand in the church foyer afterward, shaking people's hands and hearing people tell me that I did a great job.

Though the Pharisees and the religious scholars liked to be called "rabbi," Jesus said that we should not call anyone "rabbi" or "instructor" because ultimately we have only one teacher, Christ Himself.  He then reminded the people that, in the Kingdom of God, the first will be last and the last will be first, as He had already said more than once.  This is not to say that nobody serves as a teacher in the Kingdom, but that to be a teacher is not to have a title of honor to flaunt but to have a responsibility to other people.

In the Kingdom of God, all of us are equal before God.  The fact that some of us have the audacity to try to teach spiritual truths to others doesn't make us experts in such matters.  Pastors, preachers, and Sunday school teachers put their pants on one leg at a time just like everybody else: they have the same struggles as everyone else.  The fact that the Pharisees put a heavy load on other people's shoulders was not the problem, for spiritual truths can be very difficult to bear.  The problem was that they made themselves appear to be more spiritual than they were, when they should have admitted their own struggles and tried to help others to bear the load.

I think that we all have a basic understanding of what is right and wrong, but, deep down, we all know that it can be difficult to do what is right.  I think that, like the Pharisees, we all have trouble practicing what we preach.  As Christians, we are all called to follow in the footsteps of Christ, and we call other people to do the same.  Following Christ is indeed a heavy load to bear.  We are not called to simply dump this load on each other's shoulders but to help each other carry the load.  We must be honest about our own struggles, willing to help others carry their loads, and humble enough to let others help carry ours.


Notes:

1. See Matthew 21:1-17.
2. See Matthew 21:23-27 and Matthew 22:15-40.
3. See Matthew 23:1-36.
4. Wiktionary: Hypocrite
5. Benjamin L. Corey makes such an observation about a number of high-profile preachers on the fourth episode of the podcast That God Show.
6. Wikipedia: Tefillin
7. See Deuteronomy 11:18 and Numbers 15:38-39.

Christian Reading in His Book was painted by William Blake.