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Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The Gospel readings are the text for this evening. Be seated.
Every one of you have the innate ability to sniff out false religion. And all false religion really is, is a disconnect between what we say and what we do and who we are. Amen. It was Joshua who said to the people of Israel, “Now therefore, fear the Lord and serve Him in sincerity and in faithfulness.” None of us desire to serve Him in sincerity and unfaithfulness. None of us desire to renew a false religion. And none of us desire to listen to the voice of falsehood. And yet…
Every one of us pray that first petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Hallowed be thy name.” May your name be holy among us. His name is holy without us. We pray that it would be holy among us. So it’s pretty obvious that every one of us are against false religion. We don’t have to even take a vote on it. But then what is true religion? Put simply, true religion is the sincere and faithful practice of the one truth of Jesus Christ. The sincere and faithful practice of the one truth of Jesus Christ. Religion is a practice. It is not something that we perfect. It is a continual practice. And it is a good thing, a good practice.
But what does it look like? How is it manifested? Because as I said, you and I would all be able to sniff out this hypocrisy of others. We do it quite frequently and are very quick to judge. So what does true religion look like? For the average run-of-the-mill Jew, true religion looked like the Pharisees and Sadducees of the Sanhedrin. They gave the inordinate amount of money to the poor. They faithfully prayed at all hours in the temple and in the synagogues. They met and discussed Scripture regularly. You and I call that kind of a person within our congregation a faithful man or a faithful woman, a godly man or a godly woman.
But in the case of these Pharisees and Sadducees, let’s take a look at their sincerity and faithfulness. Their chief concern in all of this was two things, as the text said. They didn’t want to lose their influence and place, and they didn’t want to lose the Jewish people’s allegiance that they would be the experts on what true religion is. And they feared that more than they feared God. They wished to preserve their concept more than God’s revelation in Jesus Christ.
Every single thing about what you heard me read to you was highly suspect and illegal by the Sanhedrin. Never would they gather at night. They would wait until the next day and gather. Never would they bring in false witnesses except when they want to skew the truth. Jesus was never truly indicted of any charge. Jesus was illegally arrested. Never. Jesus was convicted of capital punishment in a very rapid and rushed affair, rather than waiting a day or two, which was common for the Sanhedrin to do on such kind of cases. But everything the Sanhedrin did was demonic and devious and damnable.
There was only one thing about this trial that was right. And that was what God used Balaam’s ass, that is Caiaphas, to prophesy: that one man should die for the people. Though Caiaphas didn’t believe in it one bit, it was the prophecy fulfilled. And as John wrote in his gospel, he interpreted it to be to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad. Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin didn’t believe it.
Well, wait a second. There were two. Two men of the Sanhedrin who did, do you remember? Faithful Joseph of Arimathea, in whose tomb God would rest and rise, and his dear brother Nicodemus, the one who visited our Lord at night in John 3. How their hearts must have been torn.
But this would be a complete misuse of these two texts. All we did tonight was to say, oh, how bad those Sanhedrins were. We would never do such a thing. Amen. Go home. That’s not what this text is about. John said it another way in his first epistle, which you have said for decades: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”
Oh, we would never slap our Lord Jesus. We would never spit on His face, cover His head with a cloth and punch Him and cry out, “Who struck you, O Christ? Prophesy to us.” No. No, we wouldn’t. None of you would. But you are like me, and you wouldn’t love as you ought to love, which is spitting in the face of God. You may not forgive as you’re supposed to forgive, which is slapping Him. You may not serve as you have been called to serve, and that’s slugging Him in the face. That’s not true religion, is it?
Our Lord Jesus Christ practiced true religion, and that is what got Him that. When He practiced true religion, He was slapped for it, beat for it, spat upon for it, but not you. No. Showing and practicing true religion got Him the entire spurn of the Sanhedrin. The vast majority of his own brothers as Jews turned their back on him. The Roman Empire wanted nothing to do with Him either. And still to this day, the majority of the people who live in this town, this state, and this country, and this world, want nothing to do with Him either.
That’s what practicing true religion means. It says, that’s the one intent of true religion, so that one Lord Jesus Christ can be understood as the one truth, and His forgiveness is the only way that one can truly be cleansed, bound up, and healed. The Sanhedrin and the Pharisees were right for right’s sake, but they did not give mercy. Being right for right’s sake has no merit, and in fact is not true religion if we don’t practice that rightness with forgiveness and humility and service and love.
Caiaphas asked a very pointed question, which is what we are to meditate upon. At the end of his diatribe, he calls out to his fellow Jews of the Sanhedrin and he says, “What is your judgment?” They respond, “What is your judgment?” He deserves death. What is your response? What is your judgment of true religion?
All that you and I can say is, “Lord, I do believe. Help Thou my unbelief and save me.” And save everyone who believes in the forgiveness of sins that only You bring. Save them, O Lord. For You are the only one who has practiced true religion for me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
