“Be Content to be Yourself ”

Matthew 22:24 – 23:12


We are reading through the Gospel According to Matthew and have come to the last week Jesus spent here on earth as a human. For three years he had been traveling around teaching anyone who would listen about the Kingdom of Heaven. He had invited twelve men to travel with Him as disciples. He had established quite a following and on this Passover Week Jesus entered Jerusalem as the Messiah, complete with a parade and all the fanfare from those following Him. They were in hopes that He would demonstrate His power by taking over the city and being the King the Jewish people had been praying for over the past seven hundred years. 


We are currently reading about the second day of Passover and Jesus and those following Him were in the temple. 

The religious leaders have been attempting to trap Jesus with various questions in hopes that Jesus will slip up so the people following Him will see that He is a fraud and turn on Him. 


Jesus is quite aware of their plans and doesn’t miss a beat by turning it right back on those who choose to challenge Him. Up to this point, Jesus has managed to silence the Sadducees. Today we have a lawyer among the Pharisees taking his turn at testing Jesus. He calls Jesus, “teacher” and asks Him to tell which is the greatest commandment in the law. Now mind you, the religious leaders have spent most of their time debating and distinguishing the hierarchy of the 613 laws in the Torah. By asking Jesus to choose one law, they hoped to make Jesus show neglect for the other 612. 


Rather than promoting one law over another, Jesus answers by defining the law down to its core principles:

  • Love the Lord with all that you have
  • Love your neighbor as yourself


Did you catch that? 


How many of us have asked God, 

“What do you want me to do?” or 

“What is my purpose in this world?” 


For God it is not so much the “what” but the “how.”


Regardless of what is on our calendar this week, God expects us to – 

Love the Lord with all we have, and

Love those around us



If God is really an integral part of our life – 

It will show by the presence of a love for God and caring for others. 


The lawyer and his colleagues had no response. However, before the Pharisee’s could leave, Jesus asked them a question. 


What did they think about the Christ? Whose Son is He?


Jesus has already asked a similar question to His disciples back in chapter 16 when He asked them, 

“Who do you say that I am?” 

It was a question that made the listener have to decide who Jesus was and connected Him to the Old Testament understanding of the Messiah.  


Their response was, “The Son of David.”


This is one of the great Old Testament titles given to the Messiah based on the covenant God made with King David in 2 Samuel 7. It’s not clear if the Pharisees knew or didn’t know that Jesus was of the line of King David, and was even born in Bethlehem, the city of David. However, when He entered the city, it was noted that He was from Nazareth. So for those who were aware, there was a direct connection.  


Jesus comes back with the Pharisees being partly correct. Their understanding of who the Messiah is, 

was not complete. 

Not only was Jesus “David’s Son” a reference to His humanity, 

He was also, “David’s Lord” a reference to His deity. 

Jesus’ argument came straight out of Psalm 110 which every Pharisee and Jew would have immediately recognized.  

No one chose to respond to Jesus’ statement. They were not about to admit that the Messiah was also the LORD God, even though Jesus had just shown this to be true. 


In fact, Matthew tells us from that point on, the questioning and interrogations stopped. Instead of being embarrassed by the religious leaders, Jesus had embarrassed them instead. 


Jesus may have been finished talking to the religious leaders but He wasn’t finished talking about them. Jesus then addresses the multitudes, of course the scribes and Pharisees were also listening. Jesus honored what the Pharisees taught and gave respect to them because the position they held had been given by God. However, His instruction for the people was to do what they say, not what they do. The religious leaders were bad examples of how to live out the very things they taught. 

They made life so legalistic that heavy burdens were a way of life and yet they wouldn’t lift a finger to give anyone assistance. The very opposite of the burden Jesus offered back in Matthew 11:30, 


“For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”


I hate to say this, but I grew up in a church that was a lot like the first accusation given to the religious leaders. Many of you may be able to relate to the idea that the essence of Christianity is a set of burdensome rules to follow. I have mulled over this concept for years and decided that for myself when I was a new Christian, it was helpful to have rules to keep me from sinning in my freedom. But once I had developed a deep relationship with Christ, I didn’t need the rules anymore. 



I had learned that following the Great Commandments, Love the Lord my God with all my heart and with all my soul, and with all my mind and with all my strength, and loving my neighbor as myself, was enough. 


The Jewish religious leaders debated this concept themselves. Biblical scholar William Barclay claims the Talmud, which is the compilation of debates by rabbis over the Torah, describes seven different types of Pharisees. These could be easily transferred over to legalistic Christians. See if you can recognize any of them.


  1. The Shoulder Pharisee, who wore all his good deeds and righteousness on his shoulder for everyone to see. 


  1. The Wait-a-Little Pharisee, who always intended to do good deeds, but could always find a reason for doing them later, not now.
  2. The Bruised or Bleeding Pharisee, who was so holy that he would turn his head away from any woman seen in public – and was therefore constantly bumping into things and tripping, thus injuring himself. 


  1. The Hump-Backed Pharisee, who was so humble that he walked bent over and barely lifted his feet – so everyone could see just how humble he was. 


  1. The Always-Counting Pharisee, who was always counting up his good deeds and believed that he put God in debt to him for all the good he had done. 


  1. The Fearful Pharisee, who did good because he was terrified that God would strike him with judgment if he did not. 


  1. The only positive Pharisee was The God-Fearing Pharisee, who really loved God and did good deeds to please the God he loved. 


Jesus’ warning against the religious leaders continues with the explanation that they did good works only to be seen and 

lived not for the praise of God, 

but for the praise of humans. 

The religious leaders demonstrated the very religious spirit Jesus spoke against in His Sermon on the Mount, back in Matthew 6. 


Here we are again, back to the Upside-Down Kingdom. The religious leaders were doing what most humans do, making sure their accolades were promoted in order to validate their place in society. 


For the religious leaders of Jesus’ day it meant wearing broad phylacteries, which were small leather boxes with tiny scrolls with scriptures on them, tied to the arm and head with leather straps, and enlarging the borders of their garments. 


Today it looks like large framed degrees on the wall and lots of letters after one’s signature. 


The human desire to be admired by others remains today as religious leaders still covet the seats of honor at banquets and being called Rabbi or today being called, “Doctor.” 


Jesus warns us against giving anyone inappropriate honor. The word inappropriate is key here. Jesus wasn’t 

against using titles, Jesus was called Rabbi, Paul was called father and teacher. 

What Jesus was warning against was the affection of such titles and hunting after them in order to gain notoriety or fame. 


Okay, try to put yourself in the temple as Jesus was speaking. You have the religious leaders listening and the disciples and followers of the Way listening and Jesus says this, I am reading from “The Message,”


“Do you want to stand out? 

Then step down. 

Be a servant. 

If you puff yourself up, you’ll get the wind knocked out of you. 

But if you’re content to simply be yourself, your life will count for plenty.

That last sentence was given as an exhortation to the graduates at St. Lawrence last Sunday. 

One of the speakers gave the exhortation that the best thing you can be is 

authentic, 

be yourself, 

no one else can do that. 

The challenge is to “be content to simply be yourself.”

Normally, people estimate greatness by how many people serve and honor them. Jesus turns that upside-down and says in God’s kingdom, it looks different. 

In God’s kingdom, greatness is estimated by how we serve and honor others. 

We can do that best when we are content to simply be ourselves. Remember, there is no one else like you. It’s not about what we do, but how we do it. 

This is our challenge for this week. 

Let’s pray.