Woe to you scribes and Pharisees
They clean the outside of the cup but inside is full of extortion and self-indulgence
They are like beautiful whitewashed tombs that are outwardly beautiful
But inside is full of dead man's bones and uncleanness.
They outwardly appear righteous but inside are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
They are blind.
They need to cleanse the inside so the outside of them may be clean too.
Even here Jesus is trying warn them, trying to help them see the truth. And the truth is that if they would just turn and cleanse their hearts once more. They could be set free from the heart struggles.
It's easy to make our focus on what needs to be fixed on the outside. It's something we can have control of, or at least think we have control of. But fixing ourselves on the inside, that is something we can't do on our own. We need Jesus for that. We need to have His healing Spirit come into the depths of our souls and cleanse us deep.
We need Him. That is what the Pharisees and scribes were blind to. They believed they didn't need Him and in fact wanted to get rid of anything that would remind them of their need for Him. All they could see is how much better their life would be if they got rid of the conviction His words brought deep into their souls. They didn't want to see the truth because that would mean turning their lives inside out for Him. So their solution to the problem: what can we do to get rid of Him?
These poor blind Pharisees and scribes. If only they had wanted to see the truth...
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