Are Your Phylacteries Wide?

(Today's reading - Exodus 34-36; Matthew 23:1-22)

In our Old Testament reading, God writes the ten commandments on the stone tablets. Of course they are important! They form the basis of what we, as Christians hold to today. Jesus tells us that the essence of the commands are found in two of them and that in the keeping of the two, the others are also kept. The two He singles out are commands that actually change who we are and not just what we do. “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ ³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22: 37-40)

Think about it... I can keep the commandments and not love my neighbor. I can "worship" God and not love Him. Jesus moved obedience from an outward action to inward motives. No more was it about what we did, now it is about why we did it. In Matthew 23, Jesus pulls no punches as He deals with those that are outwardly righteous, but inwardly are wicked people. He says, "they do not practice what they preach". Their words sounded good; they made great speeches and told everyone else what God expected, yet they lived unaffected by their own message.

“Everything they do is done for men to see: They make their phylacteries wide and the tassels on their garments long; they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats in the synagogues; they love to be greeted in the marketplaces and to have men call them Rabbi.’  (Matthew 23:5-7)

Everything they did was done to be seen by those around them. Their actions were premeditated for the praise they would receive. Their clothing was selected to get attention. They wanted to have the best seats in the house and wanted the praise of others. Jesus says this about them, "You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness." I don't know about you, but that gets my attention. He says we can look great to those around us, yet be "wicked" and "hypocrites".

The solution to the problem? Love God and love people. Move from self-centered to God-centered. Move from self-serving to serving others. Today's reading brings us face to face with our motives. Do we serve God in order to... rather than because of? God "so loved us", do we so love Him? God "so loved the world", do we so love our neighbor? He calls us to become like His Son and in the doing of that, what we do and how we live... changes. His priorities become our priorities. His love becomes our love.

May we never allow "religion" to become our God... the keeping of commands a substitute for love. Jesus came out swinging against that kind of "religion" and called on those that would follow Him to replace it with "relationship". God is now our "Father". We have been adopted into His "family". Families don't operate by a list of commands, they operate out of love for each other. As the song says, We're part of a family that's been born again; Part of a family whose love knows no end.

Let's be that family!