Matthew 23:16-24 – The Fourth and Fifth Woe to the Pharisees

Matthew 23:16-24 – “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ 17 You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? 18 And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.’ 19 You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. 22 And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it. 23 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. 24 You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!”

I have been working at my current job as a lab assistant in a biological research lab for almost a year and a half.  At the start, I was quite hesitant to speak out and give my opinion on anything from lab safety to how a specific experiment should be run.  But as I spent more time there, developed my skills, and gained confidence in my abilities, I began to assert myself a little bit more and more, until finally, I acted almost like a pseudo-lab manager, handling the safety of the lab while taking a more involved role in planning and executing my experiments.  The only problem with that is that I had a tendency to “sweat the small stuff” or in other words, blow small things out of proportion.  This tendency to focus on the nuances rather than important issues gave me problems not only in my experiments but my relationships with my colleagues.  It messed up my experiments because it slowed down my work efficiency, for I was “too careful” with things that I often did not accomplish all that I set out to do, just because I was being “too careful” and in reality slow.  It also messed up my relationships with my colleagues because it turned me into an irritant who constantly gave them trouble over things that literally didn’t matter much but were “rules” for the lab.  I lost sight of the big picture of general lab safety and achieving the lab goals and got caught up in little insignificant details.

The fourth and fifth woe that Christ mentioned to the Pharisees in Matthew 23 focused on this exact issue – the Pharisees got caught up in the little details and forgot the overall goal of drawing people closer to God.  The fourth woe is found in vs. 16-22 and focused on the specific action of making oaths; people in that day did the same things we do now they swear by various things to indicate the seriousness of their oaths.  At that time, the Pharisees gave value to certain oaths and not to others; if the oath was by the gold in the temple or by a sacrifice given in the temple, then it was a serious oath, but if the person swore by the temple or by the altar by which the sacrifice would be given then it could be ignored.  They gave value to the gold and the sacrifice because it was holy but did not even consider that the things that made them holy were the altar and the temple.  Jesus rebuked them for this wrong placement of importance and corrected their viewpoint on oaths, reminding them that if they swore to anything in the temple then they were swearing by the One who dwells in it, and if they were swearing by heaven, they were doing the same as swearing by God, for heaven was His throne.  He was trying to help them realize that an oath is serious no matter what it was sworn by and should never be taken lightly.  Just look at how Christ’s words on oaths in Matthew 5:33-37, “33 ‘Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, “You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.” 34 But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. 36 And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. 37 Let what you say be simply “Yes” or “No”; anything more than this comes from evil.’”  Oaths if it could be avoided were not supposed to be taken.  The religious leaders lost sight of this and instead gave different weights to different oaths, a big mistake.  They got caught up in the details of oath keeping and lost sight that all oaths should never been taken lightly.  They looked to the sacrifices and money instead of to God and ended up placing glory and honor on the wrong things.  They missed the big picture.

The second woe the Lord directed at them dealt with the weight that they had given to tithes and offerings while ignoring the parts of the law that involved justice, mercy, and faithfulness (vs. 23).  Because they were so enamored with money and offerings and tithes, they forgot to focus on more important matters like showing God’s love and care for people and teaching God’s laws.  All they cared about was what they could use to line their pockets.  They forgot what Samuel said in 1 Samuel 15:22, “…To obey is better than sacrifice…”  Instead of teaching God’s laws to the people so that they could have a closer relationship with Him, they used it to gain power and money for themselves.  They basically turned the laws of God into burdens for the people instead of instructions and guidance for life.  Christ once again rebuked the religious leaders for missing the more important points; it was not that tithes and offerings were not important but that they had ignored the more important parts of the law about loving God and loving people.  They sweat the small stuff and lost sight of what was more important.  Christ summed both these woes up in vs. 24, “You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!”  He was basically letting them know that they were trying to fish out something so small while allowing big things to get away from them.  It is like trying to remove a fly from a pool when an elephant is sitting in it.  They were sweating something so small when they needed to concentrate on the big problem right in front of them, the attitude of their hearts.

We as Christians can easily get caught up in the little things and lose sight of the more important things, especially when we have been invested in the faith for a long time.  Just look at how so many of us are invested in our traditions instead of the Word of God; sometimes, we have even lost sight of why we do certain things and just do it because it is the way things have always been done.  We need to remember that the Christian walk is not about a bunch of Do’s and Don’t’s but having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  This is what we must emphasize when we disciple another person.  It is not to say that these things are not important but that they are less important than the weightier matters that the Lord places before us.  The Lord is not looking for more tithes and offerings from us.  He is not looking for us to sacrifice a bunch of our things.  He is not looking for the little additional rules we add to help prevent people from even coming close to sinning.  No!  God simply wants His disciples “to do justice, and to love kindness [mercy], and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8).  We should never lose sight of this lest we become consumed with things of little importance.  To avoid that fourth woe, remember who God is and place Him first, nothing else; nothing else should ever be raised to His level and glory.  To avoid that fifth woe, remember Micah 6:8.  Let’s stop sweating the small things and start focusing on God.