Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/online/mhcc00/v00750

Text File | 1994-03-01 | 7KB | 115 lines

00751
 #23-33 The doctrines of Christ displeased the infidel Sadducees,
 as well as the Pharisees and Herodians. He carried the great
 truths of the resurrection and a future state, further than they
 had yet been revealed. There is no arguing from the state of
 things in this world, as to what will take place hereafter. Let
 truth be set in a clear light, and it appears in full strength.
 Having thus silenced them, our Lord proceeded to show the truth
 of the doctrine of the resurrection from the books of Moses. God
 declared to Moses that he was the God of the patriarchs, who had
 died long before; this shows that they were then in a state of
 being, capable of enjoying his favour, and proves that the
 doctrine of the resurrection is clearly taught in the Old
 Testament as well as in the New. But this doctrine was kept for
 a more full revelation, after the resurrection of Christ, who
 was the first-fruits of them that slept. All errors arise from
 not knowing the Scriptures and the power of God. In this world
 death takes away one after another, and so ends all earthly
 hopes, joys, sorrows, and connections. How wretched are those who
 look for nothing better beyond the grave!

00762
 #34-40 An interpreter of the law asked our Lord a question, to
 try, not so much his knowledge, as his judgment. The love of God
 is the first and great commandment, and the sum of all the
 commands of the first table. Our love of God must be sincere,
 not in word and tongue only. All our love is too little to
 bestow upon him, therefore all the powers of the soul must be
 engaged for him, and carried out toward him. To love our
 neighbour as ourselves, is the second great commandment. There
 is a self-love which is corrupt, and the root of the greatest
 sins, and it must be put off and mortified; but there is a
 self-love which is the rule of the greatest duty: we must have a
 due concern for the welfare of our own souls and bodies. And we
 must love our neighbour as truly and sincerely as we love
 ourselves; in many cases we must deny ourselves for the good of
 others. By these two commandments let our hearts be formed as by
 a mould.

00769
 #41-46 When Christ baffled his enemies, he asked what thoughts
 they had of the promised Messiah? How he could be the Son of
 David and yet his Lord? He quotes #Ps 110:1|. If the Christ was
 to be a mere man, who would not exist till many ages after
 David's death, how could his forefather call him Lord? The
 Pharisees could not answer it. Nor can any solve the difficulty
 except he allows the Messiah to be the Son of God, and David's
 Lord equally with the Father. He took upon him human nature, and
 so became God manifested in the flesh; in this sense he is the
 Son of man and the Son of David. It behooves us above all things
 seriously to inquire, "What think we of Christ?" Is he
 altogether glorious in our eyes, and precious to our hearts? May
 Christ be our joy, our confidence, our all. May we daily be made
 more like to him, and more devoted to his service.
00775
 * Jesus reproves the scribes and Pharisees. (1-12) Crimes of the
 Pharisees. (13-33) The guilt of Jerusalem. (34-39)

 #1-12 The scribes and Pharisees explained the law of Moses, and
 enforced obedience to it. They are charged with hypocrisy in
 religion. We can only judge according to outward appearance; but
 God searches the heart. They made phylacteries. These were
 scrolls of paper or parchment, wherein were written four
 paragraphs of the law, to be worn on their foreheads and left
 arms, #Ex 13:2-10; 13:11-16; De 6:4-9; 11:13-21|. They made
 these phylacteries broad, that they might be thought more
 zealous for the law than others. God appointed the Jews to make
 fringes upon their garments, #Nu 15:38|, to remind them of their
 being a peculiar people; but the Pharisees made them larger than
 common, as if they were thereby more religious than others.
 Pride was the darling, reigning sin of the Pharisees, the sin
 that most easily beset them, and which our Lord Jesus takes all
 occasions to speak against. For him that is taught in the word
 to give respect to him that teaches, is commendable; but for him
 that teaches, to demand it, to be puffed up with it, is sinful.
 How much is all this against the spirit of Christianity! The
 consistent disciple of Christ is pained by being put into chief
 places. But who that looks around on the visible church, would
 think this was the spirit required? It is plain that some
 measure of this antichristian spirit prevails in every religious
 society, and in every one of our hearts.

00787
 #13-33 The scribes and Pharisees were enemies to the gospel of
 Christ, and therefore to the salvation of the souls of men. It
 is bad to keep away from Christ ourselves, but worse also to
 keep others from him. Yet it is no new thing for the show and
 form of godliness to be made a cloak to the greatest enormities.
 But dissembled piety will be reckoned double iniquity. They were
 very busy to turn souls to be of their party. Not for the glory
 of God and the good of souls, but that they might have the
 credit and advantage of making converts. Gain being their
 godliness, by a thousand devices they made religion give way to
 their worldly interests. They were very strict and precise in
 smaller matters of the law, but careless and loose in weightier
 matters. It is not the scrupling a little sin that Christ here
 reproves; if it be a sin, though but a gnat, it must be strained
 out; but the doing that, and then swallowing a camel, or,
 committing a greater sin. While they would seem to be godly,
 they were neither sober nor righteous. We are really, what we
 are inwardly. Outward motives may keep the outside clean, while
 the inside is filthy; but if the heart and spirit be made new,
 there will be newness of life; here we must begin with
 ourselves. The righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees was
 like the ornaments of a grave, or dressing up a dead body, only
 for show. The deceitfulness of sinners' hearts appears in that
 they go down the streams of the sins of their own day, while
 they fancy that they should have opposed the sins of former
 days. We sometimes think, if we had lived when Christ was upon
 earth, that we should not have despised and rejected him, as men
 then did; yet Christ in his Spirit, in his word, in his
 ministers, is still no better treated. And it is just with God
 to give those up to their hearts' lusts, who obstinately persist
 in gratifying them. Christ gives men their true characters.