Good Theology Ain’t Enough

Matthew 23:23 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel! (ESV)

Different people understand the Good News of Jesus in different ways. Me, I’m a simple guy. I open the Bible, read it and believe what God says, even when it conflicts – which it does often – with contemporary secular thought.

Calling myself a theologian feels a tad pretentious to me. I’m not that smart. But I do have a passion for God’s Word. I want to go deeper, draw closer to Jesus, know Him better, become who He made me to be. All good … but there’s a danger.

And that danger is this: That we become so passionate about our theology that we trumpet it to the exclusion of the most important thing of all. Love. Because the deeper we go into God’s Word, the more evident the evil of all those people out there appears to become.

Jesus had people like that in His life. A whole religious sect, in fact; the guys who ultimately orchestrated His assassination. This , in part, is what He had to say to them:

Matthew 23:23 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel! (ESV)

These guys made up rule upon ridiculous rule in an effort to follow the Law of Moses. But they neglected the most important thing. Love, by way of justice, mercy and faithfulness.

Don’t fall into that trap. As someone once said, good theology doesn’t compensate for a hateful heart.

That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.