Chapter 12:1-34

Beware the Leaven

Jesus issues a warning to beware of “leaven of the Pharisees,” and labels that leaven as hypocrisy. The problem that law at the base of the Pharisees’ teaching is differential between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. You will recall in the earlier treatment of the law that the Scribes and the Pharisees were accused of placing their value in the letter of the law, that is doing it exactly right. They offered their tithes at the temple while looking the past the real matters of justice and mercy. The lawyers where accused of placing legal prescriptions upon the people that were impossible for them to carry while offering no assistance in bearing the burdens. This is the basis of the hypocrisy. It is a secret that will be revealed in due time. Jesus warns that nothing that is covered will be left hidden. All secrets will be open for inspection and revelation. The implications for this revelation are eschatological – about the end time, the judgment day when everything will be opened for inspection. The end time judgment will open all closed doors and settle all issues.

Fear

This section on fear opens an interesting duality. On the one hand Jesus offers a teaching about fear directing the listener to the ultimate. Don’t fear the one who can merely kill the body; but fear the one who after killing the body can cast into hell. Once again the approach is eschatological; however, he then turns to the more current present life with a contrasting statement. Jesus offers the comforting phrase, “fear not,” because the one with that authority for death and damnation is the one who doesn’t let a sparrow fall to the ground without notice, who knows the number of hairs on your head. There is a delicate balance that is struck here between fear, and fear not that must be kept in present.

We live in a balance between the good and the bad within us. This is a balance that Jesus projects in his teaching. God has ultimate authority over life and death, over salvation and damnation. These matters reside utterly in God’s hands. This is a God of fearful power and incomprehensible authority. Nonetheless, the equal part of the balance is that this is a God that for the sake of the world shed the power and fearsome power to become a mortal. This is a God who literally shed immortality for the mortal life to be the God who could seek out the lost to retrieve them. This was a God who would die for the lost and condemned to fetch them back. This is a God who would enter with all mortality into death so as to bring eternal life to all who suffer death.

This balance between fear and fear not is balance that allows us to have access to the unfailing forgiveness of God, to participate in the mercy and forgiveness in the face of failure, but which also warns us against taking such grace for granted. Being the recipient of grace carries with it the responsibility of living the life of grace. Such a life is the life of repentance. Such is a life that receives the grace and is transformed by the love of God. Grace without transformation is cheap. If we face the forgiveness of our sins without the knowledge or the desire to change the way we live and operate in the world, we have taken the cross of Christ for nothing. God doesn’t not pass out “get out of hell free cards,” but calls for us to “sin no more.” As we all know, the task is daunting, even impossible as we cannot live without sin; yet, God is asking us to be mindful of the way we live and the way we operate and try our best looking to God for help and guidance where we fail. This is the constant battle between sin, forgiveness, repentance, and confession. It is the life of sinful humanity in the relationship to God.

This balance is necessary to keep us on track. Only when we fully understand the power and authority of God in both life and death, and redemption and damnation do we fully comprehend the “grace” shown to us in Jesus. It is Jesus who shows us that God chooses not exercise that ultimate power, but to accept us even in our sin. God chooses mercy over judgment.

Beware of Greed

Several individuals come to Jesus desiring the settlement of a dispute in their family will. Jesus penetrates to the depths of the real issue at stake, greed. Greed, the move of money lies at the base of an important human condition, that being the separation that lies between humanity and God. We are returned to the First Commandment, “You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, the mind, your whole body, and your whole strength.” This is a commandment about having God at the center of life. It is a matter of trusting God for all things.

Jesus teaches a parable of the rich man whose abundance is such that he has no worries in the world beyond where will I ever store up this wealth? In such abundance, the quality of life is easy to take for granted as is life itself. In Jesus’ parable it that life that is called for and the point of the parable is that no amount of wealth can ever secure life. The punch line of the parable appears at the end of verse 34, “where you treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Everything of ultimate concern gravitates to that place where treasure is stored. Is stored in barns, or bank accounts; or is it stored in the treasures of heaven where absolute value is placed upon God.

There is a second matter that arises against greed, and that is worry. Worry is the exact opposite of trust. “You worry about what clothing you will wear . . . and what food you will eat.” Worries about the necessities of life are core matters for human existence and matters that God address all through the biblical record of God’s interaction with humanity. Perhaps one of the most graphic is experience of the wilderness. The people of the wilderness had only God to depend upon. Only God could provide for their daily needs, and God did provide for their daily needs in the manna and the quail. Their needs were met on a daily basis; however, they were not allowed to store up treasures or supplies. Anything that they took beyond the needs of the day rotted. God taught the lesson all that we need will be provided.

Jesus teaches, look at the lilies of the field that are here today and gone tomorrow. Not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed like one of these. Look at the birds of the air. They don’t work for their food, but God provides it. Here is the punch line, “are you not of more value than these?”