| There is here a striking metaphor of the
Lord that greatly effects our view of Christianity and religion in general.
It is the idea of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. The
word has to do with a piece of dough that has leavening in it. It
is roughly parallel to our word "yeast." But just remember
that it was not a powder added to the bread dough but a piece of dough
from formerly leavened flour.
I. HOW REMARKABLY PESSIMISTIC THE LORD'S WARNING WAS AND IS.
1. The Pharisees and Sadducees were the main religious parties
in Judaism. Though there were little groups such as the Herodians
and the Essenes -- hermits down in the Jordan valley where John Baptist
presumably grew up. But the Pharisees and Sadducees really made up
THE religious establishment.
The Sadducees were the liberal party in Judaism. There is a reference
in the N.T. of their rejection of the existence of angels and the idea
of resurrection and perhaps of the existence of a separate entity which
we call the soul (Acts 23: 8). If they weren't very sure of the unseen
world they surely were of the seen one. They were very politically
involved. They controlled the high priesthood which was as much a
political office as a religious one. Typically they were very rich.
But then, the Pharisees were not exactly paupers, either.
The Pharisees were the theological conservatives and, in addition, held
to a huge maze of complicated, extra-Biblical and contra-Biblical laws
and interpretations. They were the teachers of Israel and the protectors
and copiers of the text of the Scriptures and guardians of the manuscripts
of the O.T. They were also the vigilant custodians of how it was
to be interpreted.
Leaven or yeast, as the NIV has it, is almost always used in a negative
sense. Only one time is it used positively, when it speaks of the
Kingdom of God leavening whatever it touches. Here it is clearly
negative, speaking of the basic religious principles of the religious establishment.
It would be like, in our day, casting aspersions upon the combined clergy,
the seminary faculties and the lay leaders of all the churches and parachurch
organizations in the nation. It would have been a shocking generalization.
Of course we remember the gracious truth that there were large numbers
of those, especially of the Pharisees, who like Niccodemus the Pharisee
and Joseph of Arimathea rejected the erroneous aspects of these religious
parties and found the Lord. And to the credit of that great grace
also, Acts 6: 7 records that a great company of priests came to the Lord.
These would likely have been Sadducees.
Soon after the N.T. period and even during the time of the N.T. the
"leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees" confounded the church and has been
doing so ever since. Enough here to notice that what Jesus said was
a challenge to the whole religious system of the day.
Be on the lookout for the "leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees."
You can expect to see it in society in general, in the religious segments
of that society and even in the present political election where everybody
is suddenly getting religious. Watch out for the "leaven of the Pharisees
and the Sadducees."
II. NOW, WHAT IS THIS LEAVEN, THIS YEAST?
1. We look at the things that were common to these very disparate
parties to find out the probable meaning of our Lord. First in the
passage itself we see in regard to the Pharisees a cynicism and utter lack
of sincerity. It was born of their competition with the Sadducees
that was like a vicious game that governed all their relations.
These Pharisees were always asking Jesus questions that were intended
to "get something on him," to trip him up. And now they were trying
to get him to prove himself by making a miracle as if he were a street
magic performer. The blasphemy of it was unspeakable. Here
they were in the presence of the incarnate Second Person of the Godhead
and they were trying to get him to compete with them. On the other
hand the Sadducees would have simply been disdainfully patronizing toward
him.
The appropriate response in the presence of Jesus is to cry out to him
for mercy and salvation and fall at his feet as the Lord of all Christians
and of all creation itself.
Of course, this was all wasted on the Pharisees as it would have been
on the Sadducees. The Pharisees were into their own extensive, complicated
extra-Biblical religious ideas while the incarnate Son of God stood before
them as the embodiment of the central event in human history. And
they missed him! Their legalistic ideas in the one case and worldly
ideas in the other, caused them -- the religious elite of Israel -- to
ignore the incarnate Son of God.
Don't ever lose the delight and wonder of Jesus, the God-man, his atonement
for the sins of everyone who will call on him and who will fall as his
feet, and the wonder of his justification by the imputation of his righteousness
to the believing sinner and his promise to bring you under his protection
and lordship for time and eternity; don't ever lose it in the externals
of religion as it is practiced in America today.
2. A second aspect of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees
was their pride. This is related to the former. They could
not think of themselves as being in the need of a Savior, much less of
a Lord. For the Pharisees, the text of Scripture itself, rather than
being the instrument of finding the Savior and Lord, with all of its added
interpretations was their Savior. And the Sadducees weren't any better
off. They would have scoffed at the idea that they needed to be saved.
God ought to be pleased that he had them on his team.
The first instruction in the list of things to do to go to heaven, of
course, is that you can never buy your way in. Indeed, there is a
mighty high entrance requirement but it is not a purchase price that is
paid. The purchase price is what Jesus has done on the basis of his
divine perfection and infinite value. But neither the Pharisees nor
the Sadducees would have been able to see this.
The religion of the Pharisees and Sadducees was leavened. It said,
as bogus religions always say, that the individual brings the price --
or a part of the price of salvation to God. It says something in
its hand it would bring to placate a holy God. That is the "leaven
of the Pharisees and Sadducees." But the religion of the Bible says
"Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling."
Christianity says "Nothing!" "Nothing!" "Nothing!" The "leaven
of the Pharisees and Sadducees" says "Something." The "something"
varies from cult to cult and religion to religion but it is always "Something."
"Something in my hand I bring." That is the "leaven of the Pharisees
and Sadducees," even when it is found in groups and quarters that are not
supposed be heretical.
This leaven is everywhere. It is the basis of popular religion and
of watered down Christianity. Talk to the person the streets; talk
to the cult people who come to your door; talk to the theists who are theists
but theological liberals. It is the "leaven of the Pharisees and
of the Sadducees." Let us purge it out of our theology and mindset.
3. The third aspect of the "leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees"
is pretentiousness in piety.
The word for it that the Lord made famous is the word upocritos, the
basis of our word "hypocrite." The word actually means "stage actor."
Their religious observance was just a series of things they did to put
on an act before others. On one occasion the Lord describes them
as praying on street corners to be seen of men. The idea is that
if they prayed on street corners they could be seen in all four directions.
It probably was his hyperbole and intended to be humorous but knowing the
Pharisees, it may have been a literal fact of their practice.
How often in history has this leaven appeared. It ranges from
the practice of raising money by an auction -- (have you ever seen one?)
-- asking for everyone who will give a thousand dollars to stand or raise
their hand and then 500 and then 300 and so forth. I have seen assemblies
where they had the people shouting out as people do in an auction when
somebody makes a bid. And it ranges to such things as open offering
plates that have become common in America Christianity instead of the cloth
bags they formerly to used in Victorian times so that you couldn't see
how much the other person gave. And I must say, that in a church
that takes offerings in this way, it certainly does increase the offerings.
But at what cost? One strongly suspects that it is taking advantage
of the "leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees." And it is even seen
in some churches making a publicly posted record of the amount of people's
gifts.
Never, never parade your piety. Never do anything out of the motive
of showing off your godliness. But that doesn't mean you have to
hide it. But ask God to give you grace that you will not do anything in
order to be seen or heard as being pious. But please don't let that keep
you from participating in the service with leading in prayers of petition
and worship. Ask God to give you a good motive as you lead the Lord's
people in the worship of God and make public prayers to him in our behalf.
4. And in the fourth place this leaven of the Pharisees and
Sadducees concerned their use of ecclesiastical institutions and offices
and positions for personal advancement along the lines of career, reputation
or financial matters.
Both the Pharisees and the Sadducees did this with great skill.
The Sadducees did it through their control for many years of the office
of the High Priest who, by right of his connections with the Romans had
many lucrative offices and positions to hand out to his fellow partisans.
For he was in control of the whole religious operation in Judaea.
The Pharisees did it through their control of the rabbinate where they
controlled the teaching and even the precious scrolls of the synagogues
and of the temple itself; not to say also their virtual control of the
interpretation of those scrolls by their involvement in the education process
of the rabbis.
This is horribly present right now in typical downtown churches where,
if all the people who were members really showed up there would be the
virtual establishment of a city like Athens all gathered within a 3-block
radius.
This happened to the church a few hundred years after the apostles.
Constantine helped it along in the early 300's when he legalized Christianity
and virtually made it the official religion of his empire to replace paganism.
He did it probably more for political reasons than for his personal faith
but he did it. It was a sad day for the church, for the enemies of
the gospel left off persecuting the church from the outside to begin corrupting
the church from inside.
How sad when this happens! But even sadder still when the church
structure encourages it. It is the subtle influence of the "leaven
of the Pharisees and Sadducees."
Let us pray to God that in our church we will be free of it in our worship,
in our ministry and in our offices. May God grant that we will increasingly
see these things as means of glorifying the God of all grace who has called
us to himself and that the offices of the church -- even the menial offices
of the church -- may be wonderful privileges to the holders of those offices
as they sacrificially serve the Christ who saved them.
"Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees."
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