This is a good time to be a false teacher and defend a deadly doctrine. It seems that today’s most brazen heretic will receive an audience and, in all likelihood, a contract to publish a book. The novelty is seductive, orthodoxy is considered boring. They are the ones who alert and challenge those who run the risk of being described as “hateful. “There is more patience for those who subreptitiously defend the truth than for those who defend it valiantly. Conviction is a sign of pride, while humility is expressed in Love, it seems, forces us to endure every mistake patiently. And this kind of love, we are told, is illustrated by Jesus: he did not judge, he accepted all opinions, he would have accepted different kinds of teachings, as long as these teachings contained love and traces of truth.
However, a quick examination of the Gospels shows that this view is far removed from the Jesus of the Bible, demonstrating that society has reinterpreted Jesus through the relativism of our time. When Jesus interacted with investigators, lost and deceived, He was invariably compassionate. . He answered patiently and kindly. But when Jesus interacted with religious hypocrites and false teachers, He responded with anger and firm conviction.
- Today.
- Those who love truth must learn to demonstrate a firm conviction like Jesus’ through the old discipline of controversy: the practice of participating in public debates and disputes.
- The purpose of the controversy is not to “add points”.
- The theological muscle.
- But rebukes merchants of mistakes and expresses your concern for those who are captured by their lies.
- Like the ancient heretics of Crete.
- Should today’s false teachers shut up?(Titus 1.
- 11).
- In doing this right.
- We imitate Jesus Christ.
- Who was a skilled polemist.
We see an example of Jesus’ controversy in Matthew 23, where Jesus speaks to the multitude of scribes and Pharisees, what happens on this occasion is not a private defense, but a public censorship, Jesus publicly addresses the mortal doctrine of these religious leaders. for the benefit of their victims and potential victims. Jesus doesn’t hide anything. You don’t have time to congratulate them on the things they do well. He doesn’t prepare his speech to give them the benefit of the doubt. On the contrary, it specifies its doctrinal errors and actions of injustice; He calls them strong but appropriate language; warns of the consequences of his mistake; and urges his listeners to reject false teachers and their earthly doctrine.
These religious authorities masked the mistake as if it were the truth. Jesus confronts his mistake by telling the multitude, “They carry heavy burdens that are difficult to carry and put them on the shoulders of men; However, don’t they even want to?Move them with your fingers? (Mt 23. 4). In God’s name, these leaders defend a system of work-based justice that ignores and denies God’s free grace. Jesus gives them an example of his false teaching: “Even with you blind guides, who say: Whoever swears by the sanctuary is nothing; but if someone swears on the sanctuary gold, is he bound by what he swore?(Mt 23:16). They reinvented the faith so that they could maintain a religious appearance even when they violated the oaths; they adapted their beliefs so that they could remain true to the letter of the law, even if they violated their spirit; Jesus identifies it as a false doctrine and confronts it.
When we respond to the error by giving him the benefit of the doubt, we come close to making the same mistake as the false masters: hiding the error as if it were the truth. Like Jesus, we must love the truth and love people enough to call error what it is.
Religious authorities teach error as if it were the truth and therefore act in a hypocritical manner. When Jesus warns the multitude of the doctrinal error of these leaders, He also speaks of their wrongdoings. May you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you decim the mint, the dill and the cumin, and neglect the most important precepts of the law: justice, mercy, and faith; However, should you be doing these things and not omitting them?(Mt 23:23). And again: O yourselves, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you clean the outside of the glass and the dish, but these, inside, are full of prey and intemperance!Blind Pharisee, clean the inside of the glass first, so that the outside will also be clean!?(Mt 23, 25-26). Jesus emphasizes the unjust actions of false teachers.
Some may find it difficult to reconcile Jesus’ love with bold rebuke on this occasion, but he reveals a dangerous tendency to separate God’s love from his relentless demand for truth. Dishonor God when we call good injustice (Is 5:20). Do it when, like Jesus, we call evil injustice.
Having highlighted his injustice, Jesus appropriately describes and qualifies false teachers. Is it only in Matthew 23 that Jesus calls hypocritical scribes and Pharisees six times?In addition, he calls them “blind guides,” “fools and blinds,” “blind,” “bleached tombs,” “children of those who killed the prophets,” “snakes,” and “viper race. “Jesus does not hesitate to call false teachers exactly what they are. Does Jesus sweet and humble, express without sin divine anger towards those who must tell the truth, not error, and who have taught the doctrines of demons under the banner of heaven.
It is true that you should always avoid defaming someone by calling them what is not. But it is also true that when God is slandered by false teachers who claim to teach on his behalf, we must call them for who they are.
Jesus ensures that His listeners know the full gravity of this mortal doctrine. He knows that adhering to such false teachings will have the most terrible consequences, so he repeats the phrase “Ae” six times. It is a word of divine judgment, of abject misery that foreshadows a miserable ending. How will you escape the condemnation of hell?(Mt 23. 32). They will not escape, nor will those who submit to such a hateful mistake.
As we have explored throughout this series, false doctrine is a mortal doctrine that leads teachers and listeners to destruction; Is it good and loving to warn you of this destruction, so that you may return to wisdom, freeing yourself from the bonds of the devil, having been captured by him to fulfill his will?(2 Tim 2. 26).
Jesus exposes the earthly doctrine and unjust actions of these false teachers, appropriately describes those who accept this doctrine, and describes the consequences of this error; however, controversy is not only about confronting error, but also about teaching truth and orthodoxy. It is not only knowing the truth, but also submitting to it; for these reasons, Jesus asks his listeners to turn away from the absurdity and inconsistency of error in relation to God’s truth, unlike the scribes and Pharisees who do all their works to be Jesus, seen by others, said to the multitude, “But the greatest of you will be your servant. Anyone who is exalted will be humiliated, and anyone who humbles himself will be resurrected” (Mt 23:11-12).
If Jesus’ listeners apply only reason and logic, they will see that this teaching cannot be true and that these actions do not promote justice; they will reject the false and willingly accept the true; they will put aside false doctrine and religious hypocrisy and embrace sound doctrine and godly living.
This is a good time to be a false teacher and defend a mortal doctrine; and it will continue to be so, unless God’s people accept their responsibility to defend the faith and protect the vulnerable. Jesus left us order and example. Jesus shows that if the controversy generates few friends (after all, it is those who have rebuked him who have killed him and those who have warned him that have abandoned him), he honors God and prevents listeners from falling into the trap of mortal doctrine.
I thank Conrad Mbewe for his outline of this passage.