Two Kinds Of Religion

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

The Gospel of Philippians and the Call to Rejoice

We find ourselves in the Gospel of Mark, but before we dive into that text for today, I actually want to start us in the book of Philippians. You don't necessarily have to turn there, but I'm going to reference it briefly.

It was probably during Paul's second Roman imprisonment in AD 61 that he wrote the letter, the epistle that is the book of Philippians. It's a magnificent letter to a young church in Philippi that Paul planted.

One of my favorite stories in the book of Acts happens in Philippi with the Philippian jailer as he cries out, what must I do to be saved? And Paul said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.

And in many respects, this book of Philippians is also one of my favorite epistles in the scriptures. And the reason for that is because it is overflowing with encouragement for the ordinary Christian, an ordinary Christian like me.

Unlike some of Paul's other occasional letters like the book of Galatians or the book of 1 Corinthians, Paul has very little to say by way of criticism of this church. It's almost all encouragement coming their way.

He sets forth Christ as an example of humility to be followed. He speaks about the righteousness that is found by faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. He exhorts the Philippians to cast off all confidence in the flesh.

And he reassures and counsels the anxious Christians in chapter 4. And one of the principal applications of this book, if you remember it, if you know it well, is this. Paul says repeatedly, rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord.

Again, I say rejoice. That's such an encouragement for me to be told to be commanded to rejoice in Christ my Savior. And Paul repeats that word rejoice nine times in the four short chapters of Philippians.

And if there was one Pauline epistle that is all clear blue skies, it's the book of Philippians. But what we find in the book of Philippians in chapter 3 is just one sentence, one verse that is like a gray cloud in the blue sky that is Philippians.

And it's found in Philippians chapter 3 in verse 18. I'll read it from verse 17 for context. But just one single verse nestled in chapter 3. It says, brothers, join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example that you have in us.

For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. And here we see that there exists a true biblical Christianity that is a great cause for rejoicing in the presence of God.

But just as there is a true biblical Christianity, what we see here as well is that there is a counterfeit Christianity. There is a counterfeit faith that exists in acidic contrast to that which is good and true and excellent.

And it could be said in Paul's day and perhaps even more in our day today that there are two kinds of Christianity. Now some might disagree with me and I welcome your discussion afterwards, but there are two kinds of Christianity.

There is a kind of Christianity that is true. And there is a so-called Christianity that is a false Christianity and is in fact anti-Christ in its Christianity. And my question to each of you is this, which group do you belong to?

Or to go a little bit further, the people in your closest circles, which group do they belong to? This is a vitally important question and today our text holds the key to the answer of this question. This afternoon what we're going to be doing, it's really a special time in the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ because this is his last exchange in his public ministry.

Everything after chapter 12 and verse 44 is Christ alone with his disciples, teaching them, walking with them. He doesn't go underground, but he's outside of the public life, he's outside of the temple core, he's not teaching anymore.

And so we have to pay attention, what is Christ going to say last to these crowds that have been with him from his ministry in Galilee all the way now to his ministry in Judea? And what we're going to see, at least in today's encounters, we're going to find him making observations about what I'm calling two different kinds of religion.

The faith of a proud scribe and the faith of a humble widow. Here we see two pictures, one of false religion, which is both repugnant to God and hazardous to others. We'll see how that is. And one of true religion, which is precious and pleasing in the sight of God.

And what we'll do as our small group today, as we approach this brief text, what stands before us today is the opportunity to do one of two things. The opportunity to rejoice in Christ, that our Christianity, by God's grace, is true, and then to improve upon it, or we have the opportunity to recognize, perhaps even to put it bluntly, that our Christianity has been a sham.

And while we have, the Christianity that we have has been a sham, but nevertheless, we have the opportunity, even at this very moment, to repent, to cast ourselves upon Christ as a merciful Savior, and to hold fast to that which is true.

So here we have the opportunity, as I was looking at this, for those of us in this room who are true believers, to increase in our assurance in Christ, in our assurance of our salvation. I think all of us would thoroughly love that, to be more assured of our profession of faith.

But if there is not a cause for assurance, then here we have the opportunity to repent, and to draw near to Christ on his terms. And so let's begin in chapter 12, in verse 35. I'm going to read verses 35 to 37, and then we're going to spend a little bit of time there in 35 and 37, I'll say at the onset, and then we're going to look at these two different kinds of religion.

So 35 reads like this,. And Jesus taught in the temple, and he said,. And the great throng heard him gladly. I love that picture of Christ in the temple court, teaching the word of God, and the great throng hearing him gladly.

So last week, what we found in verse 34 was this, that at the end of 34, no one dared to ask Christ any further questions. And it was really a wise decision, because what we found, as Christ interacted with the Pharisees, and the Sadducees, and the Herodians, and the scribes, is that they were no match for his wisdom, and for his understanding.

And so, to use modern vernacular, he mopped the floor with them. And now here in verse 35, after a day of full questioning, Christ flips the script on his inquisitors. I like what one commentator said, he said, After a day of questions comes the question of the day.

Christ is going to pose a question to these religious leaders, that is going to leave them on their heels. And so what we find in verse 36, is that the Lord initially, right at this very moment, look at this with me.

Verse 36, it says, David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared. We have a small enough group, I'll ask the question. What doctrine is that teaching, do you think? David himself, through the Holy Spirit, declared.

Any thoughts?

Here we have the doctrine of inspiration. The inspiration of the scriptures. Taught just unassumingly, in chapter 12 and verse 36. It's just a passing reference. But here Christ affirms that David was carried along by the Holy Spirit as he penned the Psalms.

The Old Testament is not man's book. The Old Testament is God's book. And that ought to inform the entire way that we view the whole canon of scripture, and even how we read the Psalms, and read the whole of the Old Testament.

And he quotes here, from Psalm 110 and verse 1, what our brother read earlier, and I appreciate that. In case we don't know, Psalm 110 is the most frequently quoted Old Testament text in all of the New Testament.

If you were to search through all of the New Testament, what you'd find is 33 either complete quotes or allusions to Psalm 110. And that's for good reason, and we're going to get to that in a moment. But the reason that Christ here quotes this text is because he has a test of his own.

And so what we see is this, that in Psalm 110, it was originally used in the Jewish context, after it was written by David, inspired by the Holy Spirit, that it was used at the inauguration of the kings of Judah.

And so as the kings of Judah were brought into the office of king in that nation, they were seen as being vice-regents of God. Mere vice-regents of God. God himself was the true king, and they were kings underneath him.

And so they would read Psalm 110. And besides being an inauguration text, it was also widely recognized as a messianic psalm. A psalm that foretold and that looked forward to the coming of the long-awaited Messiah of Israel.

And if we were to look at Psalm 110 in verse 1, in the original Hebrew language, what we would find is that it would read something like this. The Lord said to my Lord, it would read, Yahweh said to Adonai, sit at my right hand.

Using there the two personal or two of the personal names of God. It literally reads, if we were to translate it from the Hebrew, maybe roughly back into the English, God said to my God, sit at my right hand.

And when the Jews read Psalm 110 in verse 1, they didn't know what to do with this text. They never really had a sufficient explanation. In their understanding, any descendant of David would by necessity be inferior to David.

We see Christ alluding to that in verse 37. That's just the way Jewish heritage, ancestry, and lineage worked. The son was inferior to the father. But in this case, David's descendant was to be far superior to him, even bearing one of the personal names of God.

So Christ puts this question to these leaders who have been trying to trap him now for who knows how many hours in the day. And in Matthew chapter 22, you have to appreciate the gall of these leaders to test Christ over and over and over again like a woodpecker picking at him.

And then in Matthew chapter 22, it says that Christ, his critics, when they were not able to answer him, they didn't answer even with a word. It was a test question that was beyond the abilities, even of their own law experts.

But what was Christ getting at? What Christ is getting at here, just in this opening section, is this, that Jesus Christ was David's son as it concerned his human nature. He was the true descendant of David.

We know that. It's a fulfillment of prophecy. But also, not only was he David's son, the long-awaited Davidic king and messiah, but as it concerned his divine nature, he is exactly what Mark has been trying to get at for the whole of the gospel of Mark.

Right from chapter 1 and verse 1, that Jesus Christ is the son of David and the son of God and God himself incarnate. And anyone who is to truly understand the whole counsel of God and who Christ is must understand this.

I like what one commentator says. He says, here, the whole mystery of the incarnation is wrapped up in this one quotation in Psalm 110. And that's why we see it so frequently in our New Testaments. The whole of Christ's incarnation, God himself coming to the world as Emmanuel, God in the flesh, is captured in Psalm 110.

So the scribes are not opposing. They're not testing, not questioning some rabbi from Galilee. They are opposing, they're questioning, they're challenging God. So here we have Christ with his critics silenced.

And we find that Christ now contrasts the scribes with one of the many faithful widows who would have been in the temple court on that particular day. And in this story, we could almost make an untold number of observations.

As a matter of fact, and Sam, I believe you've heard this before, brother, that first-year seminary students, what they will often do, if you're in a hermeneutics 100 level class, is they will give you one verse in the Bible and they will say, make 50 observations.

Make 20, make 30, make 50 observations from a single verse. And Stephen Lawson tells the story, when he was assigned that same assignment, he made 50 observations from one chapter of the Bible. And they said, no, not one chapter, one verse.

What we could probably make is that many observations from these short few verses. But what I want to do for our time is to highlight six observations. I'm not going to subject you to a 50-point sermon.

I like the Puritans, but not that much. But what we'll do is we'll look at six observations from verse 38 to the end of verse 44. And what we're going to do, Christ, it's not at all a coincidence that he's contrasting one who is involved in false religion and one who is involved in true religion.

And so what we're going to do is we're going to do the same contrast. Christ here reveals who he is, and then he contrasts two people in relation to himself. And so the first observation I want to make is this.

False Faith Majors on Appearance, While True Faith Majors on the Heart

False faith majors on appearance, while true faith majors on the heart. False faith, appearance, true faith, heart. So the scribes, we're going to bounce back and forth a bit here in verse 38. It says this, of the scribes, Christ says, and in his teaching, he said, beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces.

I'll finish verse 39 for context. And have the best seats in the synagogue and the places of honor at feasts. So that's the scribes. Of the widow, Mark tells us in verse 41 that Christ sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box.

Many rich people put in large sums. And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. And he called his disciples and said to them, and we'll continue on in a moment. So here we're introduced immediately to a contrast between a typical scribe and a widow that you'd find in the temple court.

And the first thing that Christ describes, at least in relation to the scribes, is the appearance of the scribe. That they walked around in long robes. Christ tells us that they were immediately, they would have been immediately recognizable by their appearance.

They wore long robes that drew attention to themselves. These long robes are sometimes referred to as prayer shawls. They're clothing for the pious. They're clothing for the people who pray. The righteous, the godly, the chosen few.

And they were adorned with tassels on each corner. And rather than the colorful fabrics, even in that day many of the Jews would have worn clothing made with colorful fabrics. Instead they wore these prayer shawls that were made usually of wool or of a white linen.

And so a white colored material. These could only be worn by the rabbis and the scholars of the day. And to wear these robes was to convey an air of wealth. And a prestige of power and of righteousness.

And so if you were to see someone walking through the marketplace in the prayer shawl, you knew with certainty they were either a rabbi, a significant religious leader, or someone who was very important like a scholar.

Going to the temple or from the temple. And what's interesting is, and maybe I'm making an argument from silence you'd say, but we're told nothing about the widow's appearance. We have a great focus on appearance in the scribes, but almost no focus at all at the widow's appearance.

Except that she comes at the end of the line with a little bit to offer. And this immediately paints a picture I think of one of the principal characteristics that distinguishes true faith from false faith.

False faith is perfectly content. Perfectly content to appear godly and righteous. But to possess none of it. While true faith settles for nothing less than the righteousness of Christ. Firmly established in the heart.

False faith, the kind of faith that the scribes have in this story, and we're going to see how Christ is quite critical of them, is a counterfeit faith. And the person who possesses it is satisfied with people thinking that they are righteous.

It is what I might call Sunday Christianity. And a good example, someone might ask, how do I know if I have this false faith, this counterfeit faith, at least as it pertains to appearance? It has nothing to do with your physical dress or your stature, so much as the way that you conduct yourselves from day to day.

A Sunday Christian is the kind of person who speaks one way with their unbelieving colleagues at work. Who speaks one way with their family and with their children. And when it comes time to be around the people of God, they dress themselves up.

They put on their proverbial prayer shawls to look righteous and to keep up appearances before people. A false faith that majors on appearances is what George MacDonald would call a person who is a devil at home and a saint abroad.

Where you're rude to the people around you, you're rude to your wife, you're rude to your husband, you're rude to your children, but when it comes time for church, you're very careful with your words.

Someone who has a false faith is like a facade on a movie set. You appear healthy and attractive from afar or from the right angle, but you lack zero substance. And you know that when you begin to have conversations with people around you, and you realize that you're as shallow as a mud puddle.

Meanwhile, true faith is sincere and abhors all hypocrisy. And the person who possesses it is not primarily concerned with what men see, but with what God sees. It is a faith where God is big and where man is small and where life is lived for an audience of one.

Where life is lived for God. Dear friends, are you more concerned about what people think of you than of what God thinks of you? Are you more concerned with obedience to the Word of God when you're around the people of God than when you're alone or with your wife or your spouse or whoever it is?

The Bible has a lot to say about appearance. And I've been told, and I know it's true, that I always emphasize my first point to the detriment of my other points. So I'm going to keep it subdued. I have six points.

But the Bible has a lot to say about appearance. Almost without fail, whenever you read, for instance, about the kings or the leaders of the nation of Israel, if it has something to say positively about their appearance, they're a bad king and they're a bad leader.

And I'll show you an example of that. 1 Samuel 9, verse 2. We read of Saul, the very first king of Israel. Kids, can you hear this? Do you think that Saul, Noah and Elise, do you think that Saul was a short guy like me?

Maybe with a marred appearance? Or do you think that he was a tall and handsome man?

What do you think?

Maybe scarred. Doesn't have a very good complexion. What do you think? You think he was short?

Okay.

We'll see what it says. So 1 Samuel 9, verse 2 says this. And he had a son whose name was Saul. Speaking of Saul's father. A handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he.

From his shoulders upward, he was taller than all of the people. So another way that we can say that is he was head and shoulders above the rest. He looked down at everybody. He had an athlete's physique and a supermodel's face.

Amongst all the people of Israel, there was not one more handsome than he. Now, was Saul a good king or a bad king? What we find is when we look at Saul's life, he's like a piece of fresh produce at a superstore or wherever you get your groceries.

Where you look at it and it's pleasant to the eye and it looks delicious. And then you get it home and you cut it open and it's rotten on the inside. That was Saul, the first king of Israel. Meanwhile, King David.

We're told of King David. A man who's described as a man after God's own heart. When Samuel went to the house of Jesse, where he was told by the Lord to go to the house of Jesse and to anoint one of Jesse's sons as the king of Israel, what happened was Jesse arranged all of his sons in order.

And this is what we read in 1 Samuel 16, verses 6 and 7. When Samuel came, he looked on Eliab, David's brother, and thought, surely the Lord's anointed is before me. But the Lord said to Samuel, do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him.

For the Lord sees not as man sees. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. So as Samuel continued to go through the brothers, what he found is that the anointed one amongst Jesse's sons was not there.

And he inquired, is there another one? And they said, well we have, there's another brother, but he's a bit of a runty one. 1 Samuel 16 says, are all your sons here? And they said, there remains yet the youngest.

But behold, he is keeping the sheep. And Samuel said to Jesse, send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes here. Now David was overlooked, the passage says, because he was the youngest. But that Hebrew word katan is most frequently used as well to describe the smallest.

If you look at it, the dictionary definition, or the lexicon definition, while David was, we're told, ruddy in appearance, meaning that he had good circulation in his face, and he had nice looking eyes, rosy cheeks, at the same time, he was the smallest, he was the youngest, he was the least important, he was the least impressive.

God does not look at our appearance on Sundays. He does not look at our appearance on Wednesdays or Thursdays at prayer meeting. He doesn't look at our appearance when everyone is watching. God looks at the heart.

And dear friends, what does your heart look like if God were to examine your heart today? Would he find that you are consistent, consistently faithful, consistently godly, day by day, hour by hour? If someone finds you in the middle of the night or Sunday at 3 o 'clock, they find the same person.

Or would they find a hypocrite? Would they find someone who is double-tongued and two-faced, and is not who they claim to be on Sundays? Christ himself did not have any kind of appearance that would attract us to him.

Isaiah 53 verses 2 and 3 says,. For he grew up before him like a young plant, like a root out of dry ground. He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.

He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. And as one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised, and we esteemed him not. There was nothing about Christ that should attract us to him.

But look at Christ's character. Look at Christ's perfect life. Look at Christ's perfect example. Dear brothers and sisters, dear friends, we don't need to look righteous on Sunday, or to look righteous in front of other Christians.

We need to be righteous. And we need to have a heart after God. And we don't get that heart after God by reforming our heart, by trying to make up our heart like a heart makeover. We need a new heart.

Christ said in John chapter 3 and verse 3,. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. God promised that new heart beforehand. In Ezekiel chapter 36 and verse 26 it says,.

And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit. And a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. Brothers and sisters, we cannot be content with having a godly appearance before men, and an ugly and marred appearance before God.

Some of us are perfectly content to have an attractive exterior, but a corrupt and a wicked heart. For those people who do not know Christ, Christ says of you, just as he said of the scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people's bones.

If that is your heart, if that is your life, if that is your appearance, then the command today is to repent and believe on Christ, and to ask for a new heart. And if you do, in fact, have that new heart, and dear friends, you can say before the Lord, I am consistent.

You can find me anywhere. I am the same, because I live for God, and not for the praise of man. And dear friends, press on for a better heart still. Paul wrote to Timothy in 1 Timothy 1 .5, the aim of our charge is love, that issues from a pure heart, and a good conscience, and a sincere heart.

Cultivate your heart even further. The next contrast that I'd like to show us is this. False faith is characterized by prideful self-righteousness, while true faith, humble trust. False faith, prideful self-righteousness.

True faith, humble trust. Christ not only tells us that the scribes were more concerned with their appearances, but that they were characterized, their lives, by sinful self-righteousness. Not only did their attire convey that they saw themselves as righteous, and worthy of honor and glory, but even their seating arrangement in the synagogue.

Christ talks about having the seats of honor, the best seats. Even that conveyed their exalted view of themselves. Christ tells us the scribe was always careful to choose the very best seat in the synagogue.

And so if we were to get, I love using this language to get into our time machine, and to travel back to Christ's day, and to set foot in Jerusalem, and to go to one of the local synagogues in Jerusalem or a surrounding area, what we would find is this, that you would come in, much like this room, I'm not sure if it would be as big as this room, but you would find all of the chairs facing forward.

And then on the outskirts, you would find chairs facing inward. And then you would find chairs at the front, facing toward all of the worshippers that would come into the synagogue. And where the scribes would sit, whenever possible, was in the front seats that would look at the congregation.

They would look at all the Jews as they prayed, and as they worshipped, and as they repented, and as they confessed their sin, and as they sought forgiveness from God. And it exposed a real thought in their hearts, that all of the people in the room needed forgiveness.

And all of the people in the room needed God's grace and mercy. But they themselves were righteous and beyond that need. And so they sat in the front, facing, rather than facing forward, and sitting with all of the members of the assembly.

They did not sit with the people, but separate from the people. In their minds, they were different. They were righteous. They didn't need God. They didn't need God's grace, at least. And we see this.

Christ talks about this in Luke chapter 18, in verse 9. He says this, and think about this for a moment. Just listen carefully, because I want to ask you a question. He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others with contempt.

Two men went up into the temple to pray. One a Pharisee, and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed, Thus, God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.

I fasted. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted. This was the heart of the scribes.

God, I thank you that I am not like the sinner. I am not unjust. I am not the adulterer. And meanwhile, the tax collector in the same temple beats his chest and cries out for mercy. So this was the heart and the mind of the Pharisee, the scribe.

Meanwhile, we see the widow's actions in this particular passage. That she not only comes to the temple to contribute her own offerings for the ministry of the temple, but that she gives all that she had to live on.

This is leading up to the Passover. And so she comes to participate in and to look forward to that substitutionary work that was the Passover lamb dying in the stead of the Israelites before the Exodus.

And she not only comes humbly, you'll hear me repeat this a few times, comes again at the back of the line, but she gives everything, trusting that God will provide. Abraham looked forward to the day when God would bless him with descendants and that faith was credited to him as righteousness.

And in the same way, here is a woman who comes trusting that God will meet all of her needs, even though she gives all that she had to live on. What we see here, I would suggest, is exactly in reference, I didn't just bring up Philippians as a good sermon illustration, but what we see in the heart of Paul in Philippians chapter 3, where he says, I count all things as loss for the sake of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.

He says in chapter 3 in verse 2, look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh, for we are the circumcision who worship God, the Spirit of God, and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.

And he talks about all the reason that he would have to put confidence in the flesh, that he was of the chosen tribe, he was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, a Hebrew of the Hebrews. As to zeal, he says, a persecutor of the church under the law, blameless.

But in verse 7 he says, but whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. I love how he repeats this. Indeed, he says, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.

For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.

The righteousness of God that depends on faith. For the scribes, for those who rely on self-righteousness, you get what self-righteousness provides. Kids, what do you think trusting in our own righteousness gives us?

Isaiah says, even our righteous deeds are like filthy rags. When we trust on what our righteousness can give us, we get what righteousness affords, which is an eternal hell, separated from God. We are never enough.

The scribes were not enough. The widow was not enough. That's why she was coming humbly with her offerings, trusting in God, and we are not enough. But, when we rely on Christ's righteousness, we get what Christ's righteousness affords.

The Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, living a righteous life, dying that atoning death on the cross, defeating death and being raised from the dead as the firstborn from the dead. What does his atoning work afford?

What does his atoning work purchase? Is God going to reject Christ's atoning work? Absolutely not. And so, when we rely on the righteousness of Christ, by faith in Him, we get the righteousness of Christ.

The very righteousness of God. Justification, and adoption, and reconciliation, and peace with God. And that's why Paul can say that for all those who are in Christ Jesus, there is no condemnation. There are two kinds of religion.

There is a religion of human achievement, of the scribes, coming with their own self-righteousness. Or there is a religion of divine accomplishment, that what I could never do, Christ has already done for me, and so I hope in Him.

Human achievement is a false faith. It is a false Christianity. It will lead you to hell. But a religion of divine accomplishment, that is true faith, and true justification, and eternal life, forever with God.

Faith That Is Despised by the World

The third observation that I've made here is, false faith is celebrated while true faith is despised and rejected. It's a sad and inevitable fact in this fallen world that the most popular and prominent forms of so-called Christianity have little or nothing to do with Christ, or God, or the God of the Bible.

And this is what we see. That Christ says about the scribes, that when they would walk, not only would they get the best seats, and not only would they wear long robes, but that they would get greetings in the marketplaces.

And what it looked like was this. It wasn't only complimentary greetings, like, Hello, Rabbi. Hello, Mr. Scribe. But when someone saw a scribe walking through the marketplace, picture this for a moment, wearing their prayer shawl, walking solemnly to the temple, unless you were a laborer involved in active work at that very moment, maybe a construction worker fixing a gutter on the edge of the sidewalk, everyone was to rise to their feet and to pay honor to the scribe, to pay honor to that rabbi, to pay honor to that great and righteous leader.

And so they received tremendous praise. They were, in some respects, the celebrities of Jerusalem, celebrated by the people. Meanwhile, true faith is despised and rejected. Here we have a nameless widow, for the third time, at the back of the line.