We are continuing our series through the seven woes to the scribes and the Pharisees. Our Lord Jesus has a confrontation to the spiritual leaders of his day and to us as well, indirectly. Very powerful, very helpful. Today we have the seventh woe, and these are found in Matthew 23, verses 29 to 36. I commence the reading at verse 29. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets. Thus you witness against yourselves that you are the sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? Therefore, I send to you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Arachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the Lord our God abides forever. Do you know who you really are? Well, I think maybe I do. Yes, you have a self-conscious mind. You evaluate your thinking all the time. You say, well, if I think this or I do this, I'm doing good. So I feel good about that. Or if I think this or do this, I evaluate my thoughts and my actions, and I can feel guilty for my sin. Thoughts excuse or accuse you for doing good or bad. But we're complicated creatures. Do we really know and understand deeply our own motives? Romans 1 teaches us that because of our idolatry, our foolish hearts have become darkened. Even though we know it is right, we often choose to do the wrong thing. And truly, we don't know really why we did the thing we did anyway. Knowledge and education does not, cannot stop us from sinning. So I ask again, do you know who you really are. Do you know what really drives you, what really motivates you? Can you say with absolute certainty that everything you're going to do today will be proper and right? I mean, you're at a Bible university, by the way, right? Why or why not? How is it that we hesitate to answer that question? Why is it so difficult to answer that question? The human mind is full of all sorts of things we don't fully understand. And if we can agree on that truth, why are we oh so blind to our sinful behavior and our sinful potential? The scribes and the Pharisees have been confronted by our Lord Jesus in the previous six woes, blind to what they really are. In the continuing passage here of the confrontation, our Lord Jesus previously has accused the scribes and the Pharisees of greed, self-indulgence, and lawlessness. They are rotten to the core, and the core is rotten too. In fact, they're so rotten that they've totally lost track of how bad the whole scenario has become. But they're absolute geniuses at looking good. looking and appearing righteous. Our Lord Jesus will now, in this seventh woe, point to their absolute worst crime, their worst false advertising and inner perverse twisting of righteousness, that of being murderers of the true messengers of God. Christ is pointing out the worst form of self-deceit possible. I'll read again verse 29. Woe to you, strives and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, if we had lived back in those days, we would not have shed the blood of the prophets. One of the best marketing programs that they had of their own self-righteousness was building these large tombs, which is a bit odd for the Jews to do. That's a Greek and a Roman thing to do. Building huge buildings out of marble just so you can have a nice burial for someone. Something we called a mausoleum. But they thought, they borrowed from the Greek and Romans and say, how wonderful it would be to show proper respect for our ancestors by giving them a proper burial place. Even if they died hundreds of years ago, you could build a large and expensive tomb for everyone to see. We know from Acts chapter 2, verse 29, that the tomb of David was still standing. Maybe they had done a nice job for tomb of King David. Some scholars think that at this time period, Zechariah was having a tomb built. We don't really know. But everyone loves a good building program, right? We're building a new church. We're building a new school. We're building a new classroom. Everybody loves it. It helps the public to be convinced that you are developing the country. And of course, no one is going to argue with you if you say, well, we're going to build a really beautiful building to honor the ancestors. But Jesus is furious with them. Absolutely angry. Why? because he's not blind to the true condition of their hearts. He truly understands their own motives for building such a special tombs. And what's their motive? To convince themselves and the public that they are so much more righteous than their forefathers. They're basically telling themselves in this building program, certainly we would never commit the murder of the prophets the way our grandfathers did. No, no, no, we would never do that. But think about the hypocrisy of this. At the very same time, they're building these beautiful tombs. They're planning on killing and murdering the greatest prophet ever, Jesus Christ himself. Matthew has been recording all along in his gospel. The murders that these guys have been planning all along. Matthew chapter 12, verse 14. But the Pharisees went out and conspired against him. How to destroy him. Matthew 16, 21. From that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and on the third day be raised. Matthew 17, 22 and 23, the very next chapter. As they were gathering in Galilee, Jesus said to them, the son of man is about to be delivered into the hands of men and they will kill him and he will be raised on the third day. And they were greatly distressed. Previous chapter, Matthew 22, verse 15. Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. Jesus has the right to be angry because these fellows have convinced themselves that they cannot possibly make a mistake even in who they choose how to kill. It's like they have the perfect mafuta, the perfect anointing. They know a true prophet from a false prophet. They believe they can define their own righteousness and make sure they would never make the mistake again, like their grandfathers did, of killing a true and genuine prophet. But they're no different. That's what Jesus is pointing out. You think you know and understand yourself. You're no different than your grandfathers. Verse 31, Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. You see, the Pharisees may have a plan to try to trick Jesus to entangle himself and trick himself. They think they're so clever with words, but Jesus, in his great and infinite wisdom, has turned the whole tables and the words upside down. Jesus is basically telling them, you fools, you admit by your own words that you are the sons of murderers. Every young man would like to think that he has more wisdom, more moral authority, more integrity than his ancestors. But this problem of pride, especially as youth, blindness to who we really are, we try to convince ourselves that within ourselves we can solve the problems that we have had with our forefather, the generational issues that we may have. We tend to do it academically. We tend to do it psychologically. when in fact it's a profoundly deep spiritual problem. Let me use myself as an example. My grandfather was a German Nazi spy in World War II. He was forced to work with the SS, what they called the Schutzstaffeln. Now the SS, they were the true believers of Hitler. They were the real no-joke Nazis. And my grandfather had to work with them as an intelligence officer. And at first he thought, I'm serving my country, I'm doing my job. But in time, he came to hate them. And he got into a lot of trouble. And he was sent to a place, a battle called the Eastern Front, where you were supposed to die. So we heard all these stories growing up. We think, well, praise God, we wound up in America and we don't have that problem. I was raised as an evangelical Christian. Certainly, I'm immune and I'm not going to be like my grandfather, who I'm named after, by the way. But when I went to university, my roommates, my friends had to confront me of my pride and arrogance and my love of huge authoritative political power. I was attracted to that. I was attracted to that and projecting power. I like to drive big cars. And my friends really confronted me about it. I couldn't imagine having the attitude and the arrogance that a Nazi could have. And they told me, Schipke, you're like your granddad. You would fall for that nonsense if it weren't for the gospel. And I'm so grateful for that. I needed to be humbled and I'm very grateful that that happened. But the blind scribes and Pharisees, even though they are being confronted by the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, refuse to be humbled. Instead, they fail miserably at understanding who they really are and their true motives. It's as if they are the ones who have the ability to know who is a true prophet from the false one. As a result, not only do they commit the sin of their fathers, they make it much worse. And in their dealings with Jesus, they have become much more hard of heart and become overwhelmed with hatred. Jesus knows that this is the case. And that's why he tells them in forceful language in verse 32, fill up then the measure of your fathers. What is Jesus saying? He's saying, I know who you are. I know the depth of your hatred. I know the depth of your perverseness. I release you to go and do ahead what you want to do. That's a terrible statement to receive from the Lord Jesus Christ. Romans chapter one repeats a phrase again and again to describe the depths of our depravity, where he says, and God gave them over. God gave them over. God gave them over. God gave them over to do those things which were not natural. God gave them over to do those things which were self-destructive, that would harm themselves. Things that naturally we should know are terrible. One of the worst things that can happen to you and to me is for God to just ignore our sin and to let us do whatever we want. That's what the scribes and Pharisees are saying, hey, we're the authority, we're the power, leave us alone, let us do our jobs, we're the experts, we're from the government, and we're here to help. Sorry, not true. The Lord Jesus is saying, since you have hardened yourselves against all warnings, The responsibility is now entirely yours. Because of the cruelty and the baseness of your hearts, the crime you have planned no longer can be averted. Carry it out, therefore, and suffer the punishment. Remember what Jesus tells Judas the very next week at the Last Supper? He tells Judas, whatever you do, do so quickly. In other words, get on with it. If you're planning evil and wickedness, do it. The language speaks to a completely hardened heart, and that's the ugly reality. And therefore, Jesus, right then and there, he pronounces judgment. Verse 33, you serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? You see, our arrogance, you and me, our arrogance convinces us that we are not vulnerable. That's what spiritual blindness produces. We don't know who we are. This is dangerous. This should be terrifying to you and me. But yet we tend to float on in life that we're in control and everything's just great. At the moment, the judge of all the earth is speaking, and they are being condemned. And they don't know it. They don't see it. The punishment for sin is more sin, to be left in your sin. The consequence itself is the sin. And their hardened stubbornness, Jesus describes in more detail how they are going to keep sinning. Verse 34, Jesus, of course, is prophesying of the future persecution to happen in the early church and probably for the church for all time after his resurrection and exaltation. If they were willing, to kill and murder the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and our perfect prophet, surely his followers were going to suffer. These snakes thought that they were never going to sin like their grandfathers, but now not only will they kill Jesus, their Messiah, they will keep killing and they will keep planning to kill. Think, for example, of the example of the Apostle Paul. He's chased and hunted down from city to city to city, all over the Roman Empire. There wasn't a city in the Roman Empire where a Pharisee wouldn't chase down and try to discredit the ministry of the Apostle Paul. The Pharisees made sure that Paul was never safe, never at rest, and always in drama, and getting into trouble with the Roman government. And eventually, that's why the Roman government killed him, because he was labeled as a disturber of the peace. But Paul and all of these faithful men who preach the gospel are sent by Jesus. Notice what Jesus says here, I will send to you more prophets and you're going to kill them too. These precious special people sent by the Lord Jesus, who as it says in the letter to the Hebrews, the world was not worthy. slaughtered like sheep, as Paul says. That's why Jesus says that the weight of the condemnation that these snakes bear is enormous. Verse 35, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah. whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come on this generation. He mentions Abel in Genesis. Abel, the faithful son of Adam and Eve, who offered the sacrifice of worship that was acceptable before God. You know the story, Cain reacts. He's enraged, he's furious. God warns him. God tells Cain, there's an option here. You can repent. If you do the right thing, will not your face be lifted up? Cain, if you do the right thing, won't you be encouraged? What does Cain do? Just like the Pharisees, he kills anyway. Then you go all the way from Genesis all the way to Chronicles, the end of recorded Jewish history that would have been available to them at the time, Zechariah. Zechariah faithfully spoke the word of God to Joash the king after his apostasy. Joash was faithful through most of his leadership. And then when the high priest dies, other princes of the kingdom speak to him and convince him to commit idolatry. In 2 Chronicles 24 verse 20 we're told, Isn't that the same message that Jesus has for the scribes and Pharisees? For his faithfulness, Zechariah was stoned to death. Where was he stoned to death? Right in the sanctuary. Within a stone's throw, as we say, of the altar itself. Talk about sacrilege. Talk about committing the worst crime in the holiest of places. And yet the scribes and Pharisees are about to commit something even worse. Why else does Jesus mention Abel to Zechariah encompassing all of old Jewish history? Jesus saying then is that the blood of all the righteous men whose stories of murder from the first to last from A to Z, Abel to Zechariah, are recorded in scripture, is charged to this generation. He's pointing the finger at them saying, you have this murderous spirit. You have the same attitude as your grandfathers, and you've even made it worse. These so-called spiritual leaders should have been easily able to understand Jesus, but they refused. The future fire and wrath that Jesus is pronouncing on them pronouncing all of the Jewish people, because in murdering the Messiah and persecuting his ambassadors, they showed that they were of the same mind with their grandfathers who murdered the prophets. Moreover, the terrible crimes had been committed in spite of repeated warnings and earnest invitations to repent. And the consequences for the stubborn blindness were complete. And we saw that He said, within this generation, 30 years later, 30 some odd years later, you have the total destruction of Jerusalem. And it continues to this day, really, the hardness of heart. So how are you and I supposed to respond to this? You say, well, that's a nice story. I'm not a scribe. I'm not a Pharisee. Are you sure? Do you really know who you are? You might be telling yourself that, no, I can't do this. But seriously, as people of God who plan to be and trusting that the Lord will guide you into spiritual leadership someday, do you know who you are? Are you blind to your own sins and sinful patterns? Can you be sure that you won't repeat the sins of your fathers and grandfathers? What then is the solution to this danger? What then is the solution? The Holy Spirit has to reveal to us who we really are, where we need to repent, what's really going on deep within our minds, within our souls. And at root to all of this, key and critical of this, is to acknowledge the absolute sovereignty of God in all things. we should be carefully listening to the warning found in Psalm 2. Allow me to read it. I think it's appropriate that we do, even though I don't have the time to preach on it. Let's read it. Why did the nations rage in the people's plot in vain? Scribes and Pharisees, right? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, that is Christ, saying, let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord holds them in derision. Then he will speak to them in his wrath, terrify them in his fury, saying, as for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. I will tell of the decree. The Lord said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me. and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. And you will break them as a rod of iron and dash them to pieces like a potter's vessel. Now therefore, O kings, be wise. Be warned, O rulers of the earth. Here's the lesson for you and me. Serve the Lord with fear. and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are those all who take refuge in him. So what are we supposed to do? Take refuge in the same Christ who can judge us. Take refuge in the sovereignty of Christ to plant you and I into churches, into ministries, into various ways to develop his kingdom. It is a merciful and faithful Savior that confronts you and I to take a serious look at our own conscious thoughts and bring them into obedience to Him. Every thought must be captive. Every motive must be laid bare before whom to Him we are to make an account. Only of the power of the Holy Spirit sent by Jesus will cause us to be aware of who we truly are and where we as Christian leaders can fall into sin and perhaps lead others astray. May the Lord grant us the grace of repentance and faith. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for our Lord Jesus Christ, the great shepherd of the sheep, our King, our Redeemer, our greatest prophet, Lord Jesus, as you bring us into service into your church, we humbly ask that you would reveal to us where we could sin, where we could lead your people astray, where it could possibly be that we could fail you. And so bring discredit to your name and to the church. Lord Jesus, we humbly ask that you would keep our eyes wide open to our true nature. to where we need to repent, to where we need to grow and walk with you. Thank you for this gift. Thank you for the Holy Spirit who allows us to walk with you, understand where we need to grow. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.