Classic Christianity – Our Attitude Towards Legalism – Part 3 – 11-11-26
~ 2 Corinthians 5:21 — God made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God..
In “Classic Christianity — Our Attitude Towards Legalism, Part 3,” Bob George explains Jesus’ rebukes of the religious leaders in Matthew 23. Jesus condemned their focus on outward rules—such as carefully tithing herbs—while neglecting justice, mercy, and faithfulness. George uses the image of straining out a gnat while swallowing a camel to illustrate how religious legalism can elevate minor observances over what matters most.
The talk then focuses on hypocrisy: appearing righteous outwardly while harboring greed, self-indulgence, and other failures within. George says Jesus’ strong words were not a lack of love; they were meant to expose the leaders’ condition and their blindness to their own faults. He contrasts their judgment of others with the mercy people often seek for themselves.
Bob emphasizes that everyone has sinned and that God looks at the heart, not merely outward conduct or religious reputation. He argues that acknowledging sin as sin is necessary to recognize the need for forgiveness at the cross and freedom in Christ. The law reveals human sinfulness and inability to achieve righteousness—not a basis for self-righteousness.
Despite Jesus’ severe warnings, Bob highlights his compassion for Jerusalem, recalling Jesus’ longing to gather its people like a hen gathers her chicks. He presents Jesus’ death and resurrection as the answer to sin and death: Christ took upon himself the world’s sins and offers life to those who turn to him.
Finally, Bob contrasts living under the Mosaic law with living by the Spirit and the love of Christ. He says believers should not use the law as a measuring stick for their performance, but rely on Jesus’ life and sufficiency.
Here are the Scripture passages Bob quoted, referenced, or clearly alluded to.
- Matthew 23:23–24 — Tithing mint, dill, and cumin while neglecting justice, mercy, and faithfulness; straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel.
- Matthew 23:25–28 — Cleaning the outside of the cup while the inside is unclean; the image of whitewashed tombs.
- Matthew 23:29–36 — The leaders’ treatment of the prophets and the account of righteous blood, from Abel to Zechariah.
- Matthew 23:37–39 — Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem, his wish to gather its children like a hen gathers her chicks, and the words about seeing him again.
- John 9:1–16 — Jesus healing a blind man with mud and the ensuing dispute about healing on the Sabbath.
- Matthew 5:27–30 — Jesus’ teaching about lust and adultery, including the sayings about the eye and hand.
- Mark 10:17–18 (also Luke 18:18–19) — Jesus’ response to being called “good teacher.”
- Romans 3:10, 23 — “There is none righteous” and all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory.
- Romans 6:23 — The wages of sin is death.
- John 12:24 — The seed that falls into the ground and dies, then bears life.
- John 1:29 — Jesus as the one who takes away the sin of the world.
- Hebrews 7:12 — A change in priesthood requiring a change in the law.
- 2 Corinthians 3:6 — The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
- 2 Corinthians 5:20–21 — Believers as Christ’s ambassadors, and God making the sinless Christ “to be sin” for us so we might become God’s righteousness in him.
- John 10:10 — Jesus’ statement that he came so people might have life.
- Philippians 2:10–11 — Every knee bowing and every tongue confessing that Jesus Christ is Lord.
- Zechariah 12:10 and John 19:37 — The one who was pierced; the transcript connects this with Jesus’ return.
- Zechariah 14:4 — The Mount of Olives in the description of the Lord’s coming.
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Pray to God:
Do you really want to know the WHOLE Truth of what is going on today?
Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. James 1:5
Lord Jesus, teach me the truth of the world today and give me the wisdom to know the truth and identify the lies of the devil. Thank you God.”
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Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George Bob’s clear, timeless teachings on the complete forgiveness and unconditional love of Jesus Christ will transform your life as you learn about God’s amazing grace. Let’s join Bob as he teaches us from God’s Word.
Bob George 0:29
You give a 10th of your spices, mint, dill, and cumin, but you’ve neglected the more important matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former. You blind guides, you strain out a net, but you swallow a camel. You’re there straining at these gnats. Remember how we talked about over in Israel the Shabbat elevator on Saturday when the Sabbath starts, their Sabbath starts. You can’t work on the Sabbath, and if you’re in a hotel and your room’s on the 15th floor, the 10th floor, wherever it might be, why? How are you going to get to it? Because punching a button would be construed as work. And so they came up with an idea on that, because the teachers of the law and the Pharisees determined that that would be work. Now you’re going to have a little difficulty finding elevator pushing in the Bible, punching buttons of an elevator, but they determined that was work, and so someone came up with an idea. On the on Shabbat, on the Sabbath, we will have an elevator that when you get on it, the weight of it will cause it to go up to the top floor, and then when it gets the top floor, it’ll then come down and stop at every floor automatically, and then you can get off without pushing a button. And so on the Sabbath, that’s how the Orthodox, that’s how they ride the elevator. Now, how they get in the room, God only knows. I don’t know how they do that, but I do know that elevator they do not push the button on. Straining out a net, swallowing a camel, probably mean as a hornet on the way up to the room, but that didn’t make any difference. I didn’t push the button. We’ve talked about before one of the laws where work on the Sabbath couldn spit could spit on a rock, but not on the ground because if you spit on the ground, that makes mud, and that’s work, and so you can’t spit on the Sabbath, not on the ground. Remember Jesus when he healed the blind man. What did he do? Spit where on the ground? He didn’t even wait for the spit to make mud. He got down, made it himself, put it on the guy’s eyes. Do you think he needed to do that to heal him? Of course not. What was he doing? Driving the Pharisees crazy. Did they care that there was a man that was blind that could now see? No. You spit on the Sabbath. And what they want to do? Kill him. It’s okay to kill, just don’t spit. Straining on a gnat, swallowing a camel. Anything different today? Did you go to the prayer meeting Wednesday? You didn’t, huh? You are probably in some big trouble to have your quiet time. Can you imagine someone asking you if you had your quiet time if they hadn’t had theirs? Did you have your quiet time this morning? No, me neither. Feel like I’m going to these pastors’ conferences that we used to go to. How big’s your church? 10,000. How’s big yours? Five. 5000? No, five people. Can you imagine asking that question if you only had five people in your church? Asking someone how big theirs was? No, it’s only when you got one about 5000 yourself you ask how big yours. Oh, only 100, huh? And you keep trying, brother. You better believe it. I said that information’s passed on. What is that, folks? Spiritual one-upmanship, doing things to be seen by man. Any sincerity at any of that? There are no doubts of sincerity in any of it. It’s kicking field goals in the baptistry, and so he goes on to say another said, “You get down on this one.” Says you tithe. Well, that’s marvelous. But do you have any justice or mercy or faithfulness? Number five, woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they’re full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside will also be clean. What was he saying there? You guys got all this outward stuff that people see looking good on the inside. Man, you’re a mess. You’re an open grave.
On another occasion, he called them. Now, folks, these were the religious leaders of the day, these weren’t just some little group of people out there. These were the religious leaders of the day. They were the ones that the whole Israeli people followed, looked up to, and listened intently to everything they said, and tried to live in obedience to it. And Jesus went right in the midst of that group and said, “You’re a bunch of hypocrites.” See, folks, when we hear that Jesus loves you, we would look at that and say, “Boy, that doesn’t sound like much love, does it?” But is it? Is it love to let people function in their stupidity and in their hypocrisy and leading people down primrose paths. That’s not love. That’s not love. He didn’t say because you’re a hypocrite that I’m going to kill you, going to beat you up, said I’m just gonna let you know what you are inside. I’m just gonna tell you truth. That’s all. I’m being a truth teller to you. Is that unloving? I don’t think so. He called them blind guides. What does that mean? You can’t see, folks. Do you know how blind we are to our own to our own weaknesses? You know we were driving in today, and somebody I mean he went around us probably 80, 90 miles an hour, and I thought, sure hope he gets arrested. And Amy said, “I hope he gets ticketed.” Now the speed limit I think is 65. Now I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’ve gone 75, but a little breaking of the law is not bad. It’s just when you break it a bunch that you want to get them arrested. Aren’t we that way? When someone else does breaks the law, brother, I want vengeance. When I break it, mercy. Mercy is what I want. Aren’t we that way? We are blind to ourselves. We’re blind to our own weaknesses, aren’t we? We don’t see yourselves, and folks, that is where the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of God. What does it do? It gets down under the skin. It gets under the surface of things, and shows us the way we are. You see, it’s good to know this is the way we are. It’s the only way we’re going to look at that and say, “This is a sham. This is a sham” And Lord Jesus, what’s truth? What’s reality? And so, this is the most loving thing Jesus could do. It’s not pleasant to listen to, but it’s love. The sixth woe! Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You’re like washed 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’re full of hypocrisy and wickedness. Is that true? You see, folks, when we walk around acting like we are holier than thou, and we walk around acting like, “Oh, I’m so righteous, I’m so good,” we’re hypocrites. There ain’t anybody good. When they came to Jesus and said, “Good teacher,” he said, “Don’t call me good unless you want to call me God, because only God is good.” So when we walk around acting like we’re just about ready to make our ascension into heaven, we’re hypocrites. When we walk around with that attitude, oh, I don’t know how they could do such a thing. Just give it time. God will show you. It’s amazing how circumstances will change. It’s amazing how conditional we are when it comes to our own sins, I had a pastor that used to just pound the top of his Bible down through the top of the pulpit, practically just crumbling it on the evils of divorce, and he preached that violently until his daughter got divorced, never heard him preach it anymore. The evils of homosexuality. Till your son becomes a homosexual, and then you think, well, maybe, maybe he’s born that way. Maybe he’s got a chemical imbalance. You see how conditional we are, and folks, if we did not have this word of God that calls sin sin, He doesn’t call it emotional imbalance. He doesn’t call it the fact that you were born a certain way. He says no, it’s sin. But all have sinned.
You don’t have to feel bad; just face reality. All of us have sinned. All of us have fallen short of the glory of God. There’s none righteous, no, not one. So you don’t have to deny your sin. You’ve got company, like the entire world. But don’t call something an alternate lifestyle when God calls it sin. If you ever want to be free, if you want to live in bondage to your own stupidity for the rest of your life, you call it anything you want to. But if you ever want to go free and turn to him. You’ve got to call something what he calls it, and call it the same thing as he calls it in order to be freed by what he says frees you. And so he’s saying to to us here that you’ve got all this stuff clean on the outside, but underneath the skin is where your heart is, and that’s what God is looking at. Number seven, woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous, and you say, if we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets. So you testify against yourself that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets.
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Bob George 14:05
Fill up then the measure of the sin of your forefathers, you snakes, you brood of vipers. How will you escape being condemned to hell? Pretty harsh words, Aren’t they? Therefore, I’m sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. They want to do that with the Apostle Paul. And so upon you will come all of the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias son of Bekarah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. I tell you the truth, all of this will come upon this generation. He said, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who sent those sent to you. How often have I longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you are not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate, for I tell you that you will not see me again until you say, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” What do you think his ultimate heart attitude was at the end of all this? An attitude of weeping, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Here are your God’s people, the people to whom God gave His commands, the people to whom God sent the Messiah through your bloodline, the people that God set you apart from the rest of the world to be a representative of the one true God on this earth, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. You kill the prophets. You kill the people that God sent to you to tell you truth. He said, “I long to gather you as children, like a hen, gathering her chicks under their wings, but you wouldn’t let me. What was his heart? A heart of compassion, a heart of love, a heart of saying, “Why is your heart so hard that you will not listen to truth. Don’t you see your own hypocrisy? Now, folks, why was Jesus doing that? You see, the only reason that he would be doing what he was doing and saying what he was saying is in order to touch the heart of the self-righteous person, so that they would turn to him because he was headed to a cross, and he was headed to a cross in order to die, and to take away the sins of the entire world. And when a man refuses to recognize himself as a sinner, why in the world do I need forgiveness? He came to cure the wages of sin, which is death. You see, the teachers of the law. If you’re going to teach the law, then you got to teach the wages of violation. Death, death, death, and all of us, he said, are born into this world dead. And so I came to cure the wages of sin, which is death. And the only cure to death is what? Life. He said, that’s why I’m going to be resurrected. Because unless a seed falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone. But when a seed dies, it springs forth life. And so I will die for you. I will enter into this world, into this world of humanity. I will take upon myself the sins of the entire world. I will deal with sin once and for all, never to deal with it again. And I’m going to take it away. I’m going to deal with it. I’m going to judge it, and I’m going to pay the price for it. And that’s what he did at the cross. Now, how is a man going to appreciate that if he doesn’t think he’s a sinner? If I think I’m really, I’m wonderful. You’re not going to turn to him for forgiveness unless you think you got something to be forgiven. And those people were so self-righteous they didn’t see their own sinfulness. Blind guides, you do not see your own sinfulness. And the only thing you ever think of as sin is the filthy five and the nasty nine. nine. He said, “I got news for you. God looks on your heart. I don’t care if you didn’t, if you ended up in your life not doing any of those things. I see your heart, and that’s why he said what he said to them again, amplifying.
I am looking on your heart. What did he say, and what was his attitude toward the law, that which you heard of old, the law says, don’t commit adultery. But I say unto you, if you look at a woman with lust in your heart, you’ve already committed adultery. And then he said, if that’s the case, pluck out your eye. Teachers of the law, how come you got eyes if you really want to obey the law, and so he has to show us what his attitude toward the law is. His attitude toward the law is, “I gave it to show you your sinfulness.” And Paul amplifies that. What I’m quoting: What was the purpose? Of the law to show man his own sinfulness. Why did God give us the law to as a standard of righteousness? No, to show us our sinfulness, to show us we can’t, so that we would turn to the one who could, and that’s Jesus. We’re buried under the law, when you see that God looks on our hearts, we’re buried under that, are we not? Our own hearts convict us, don’t we? And we know ourselves that we can grin in church and be as mean as a hornet on the way home, don’t we? And I can be nice one moment and miserable the next, can’t I? Not talking about me. I’m talking about you. Can’t we? We’re a walking variable. There’s no consistency to you and me at all, and that’s why we need a savior. I want to tell you something, folks. I’m in the ministry, and I’ve been in the ministry since 1969. In essence, when I was saved, I wake up every day of my life saying, “Lord Jesus, thank you for your mercy, because if it were not for you, I’d be a goner.” And I just woke up. You don’t sit around saying, “Oh Lord, I bet you’re glad you got me.” You see, folks, we can sit there if we want to and wallow in our self righteousness, but in the final analysis, God looks down on these hearts of mine, and I see what I am capable of thinking in my heart, I have nothing to plead except the blood of Jesus. I have no one to thank except Jesus Christ. I have no righteousness to present to Him. None, none. All I have is to present to him is my relationship with his son. You don’t know what the attitude of Jesus is toward legalism. You just read it. What’s your attitude toward it? Do we tolerate it? Think, oh, it’s not so bad. Listen to teachers of the law and say they’re pretty good, folks. I don’t even want to hear a teacher of the law. They’re disgusting to me because they’re hypocrites. We do not proclaim the law; we proclaim the grace of God. Paul said, “The law kills, but the grace of God gives life.” We are not to be proclaimers of the law; we are proclaimers of Him. We are we’re told Christ’s ambassadors, and if and as if God were here making his appeal through us, I beg you and beseech you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God, for God made him who knew no sin to be sin for you, so that in him you and I can become the righteousness of God. That’s the promise. That’s what we should be proclaiming. And so, in the Lord Jesus Christ, when you see His attitude, you see that I came to do something that man can never do, and that is give life to the dead, to take away the sins of the world, and to free man from the law that kills, so that they can be led by the Spirit who gives life, folks. Do you know what we normally do? We use as a majoring as a measuring rod. In other words, when we we have to realize that the Scripture says that where there’s a change of the priesthood, there must also be a change of the law, are you still under the Levites? Who is your priest? Jesus. Well, if there’s a change of the priesthood, then there’s been a change of the law. What’s the change of the law? You’re no longer under the Mosaic law. You’re under a brand new one. It’s called the law of love.
And if you function under the law of love, that’s the law. Not, not that. Well, I function under the law of love, and the law of love helps me to keep the 10 Commandments. How many times have we heard that? Jesus came to help you keep the 10 Commandments. He didn’t come to help you do anything. He came to give you a new life, a new life where you’re indwelt by Him, led internally by Him, not led so that you match up against this measuring stick over here. Under the law, you’re always looking back and saying, “How am I doing compared to the law?” Is that how you live your life? No, you live your life led by the Spirit. And your measuring stick is not the law of Moses. Your measuring stick is the love of Jesus. And if I want to know how I’m doing, it’s how am I doing in comparison to the love of Jesus? Am I allowing the love of God to control my life, or am I being controlled by how am I doing according to the law? What was Jesus’ attitude toward the law? Forget it. You’re no longer under it. You’re under something far greater, and that’s Him. Anything wrong with the law? No. Paul said the law is holy and good. What’s the problem with the law? He said, “When it flows through me, it kills me. It’s an instrument of death, and the only reason that I need to see it’s an instrument of death is so that I will recognize that I was born into this world dead, so that I will turn to the one who said, ‘I came that you might have life, and that’s Jesus. Jesus said, “I tell you, you will not see me again until the time that you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.'” One of these days, our Lord Jesus Christ is going to return to this earth. He’s going to step right down on the Mount of Olives there in Israel, right in the midst of those people still trying to keep the law with their Shabbat elevators and all. And he said, “Look upon the one whom you pierced.” And at that moment, it says, “Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, and what a day that’s going to be! Well, let’s pray together. Father, thank you for the instruction that you give us in order to bring us to the reality of our own depravity, so that we will turn to you for your total sufficiency.
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