The Seven Woes: Part One

SEVEN WOES….. 1. “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. Matthew 23:13 NIV

• Selfish ambitious/ Entitlement causing rejection. Often times we have taught laws & rules, acting out of zeal - falsely hindering the people from God. Example: over the years people have preached "holiness" to be about the way you dress, what you watch on television, if you wear lipstick or go to the movies - you could go to hell. Not realizing you are scaring people away from God instead of instead them to love him. Being a believer requires nothing but believing. As a leader, you are the representation of God, Christ, and/or the Holy Spirit therefore we must often times be mindful that our acting automatically influence the people. Position come with power but don't all that power to make you feel entitled. Entitlement will have you exalt yourself. A exalted leader is prideful, moves in zeal, abuses the power and place qualification of leadership that they were not required to meet. As a leader you prayer should be Matthew 6:10 "your kingdom come and your will be done in EARTH as it is in Heaven. • Romans 10 - For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth. Romans 10:2‭-‬4 KJV • Unjust & unbalanced law - cripples the systematic justice.

Basically, making your tassels long, and telling the people that if their tassels aren't as long they aren't fit. OR because you have a certain dilemma you are fit for the kingdom when that is not true. Many preachers will use the scripture "if a man put his hand to the plow and look back he is unfit for the Kingdom." Now that is true because the principle behind it. However, we have taught it wrong. Jesus and John taught repentance. Therefore, why or how can you teach - I am unfit for the kingdom for making a mistake. "Might i suggest it now about the practice but the principle." Many people have fallen away and came back, can we say that God did not receive them? NO. We can not. Therefore, why preach or teach this principle? As teachers, leader, preacher or just people of influence, we can not neglect GRACE, MERCY OR JUSTIFICATION.

One Sabbath day as Jesus was walking through some grainfields, his disciples began breaking off heads of grain to eat. But the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look, why are they breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath?” Jesus said to them, “Haven’t you ever read in the Scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He went into the house of God (during the days when Abiathar was high priest) and broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only the priests are allowed to eat. He also gave some to his companions.” Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath!” Mark 2:23‭-‬28 NLT When Jesus and his disciple were walking through a corn field picking food in the Sabbath - the leaders came to reprimand them. The Pharisees had the right to tell the disciples they were wrong because it was true, that by law no one could work on Sunday and picking corn was a form of work to them. However, now we must be consciously sound with wisdom and principle. It the tradition worth losing what you need. Tradition or law says not to eat, however the strength within my body is weak. So do I continue to get weak or eat.? Well that then come to your placement in God. What did God say. Notice, the disciple were justified not by themselves but by Jesus. As a disciple, you don't justify yourself. It's the job of the leader to valid the sinner's justification for righteousness. No, we can't just allow everyone to call themselves righteous but we also can't hold a standard to righteousness that only we can meet. There is an old saying "Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future."If that is true it is a result of justification. You're salvation justified you, allow others the same opportunity to gain justification through salvation.

#hypocrite #SevensWoes #Pharisees #Principles #Practices #TeachingSeries