The texts today continue the dark tales of a failed humanity. Malachi threatens those who will not listen, and in Matthew's Gospel, Jesus is issuing a set of "woe's" to the Pharisees and Sadducees. It paints a pretty bleak picture of who we are. The difficult part is that, on many levels, the texts are right.
13 "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven. For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them...16 "Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the sanctuary is bound by nothing, but whoever swears by the gold of the sanctuary is bound by the oath.' 17 You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the sanctuary that has made the gold sacred? 18 And you say, 'Whoever swears by the altar is bound by nothing, but whoever swears by the gift that is on the altar is bound by the oath.' 19 How blind you are! 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 sanctuary, swears by it and by the one who dwells in it; 22 and whoever swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by the one who is seated upon it. 23 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others... 28 So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
The Pharisees and religious leaders were missing the forest for the trees, it seems. On principle, they were right: they knew that when one swore an oath within the temple he or she was bound by that oath. What they missed was what about the temple and the sanctuary made it sacred. It is not our trappings, our dogma, our traditions, or any other thing that makes our life of worship holy. It is God who both inspires and is the object of our worship. It is the Spirit who gathers us into one community, uniting our voices as one as we confess our sin, confess our faith, and join in the feast of thanksgiving for what God has done. It's not the gold that is holy, it is what the gold adorns. It is not the gift on the altar that is significant, but that what the altar itself signifies. It is not the thing itself, but what is behind the thing that counts.
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