Matt 23:1–39 — A Heartbreaking Farewell

Context

We have just finished Matthew chapter 22, where Jesus was engaged in theological debates with various sects of Judaism, the Jewish nationalists, the Sadducees, and the Pharisees, concluding with that last question where Jesus turned the tables on them and said, what do you think about the Christ?

Whose son is he? They said, well, he is the son of David, we know that. But Jesus said, well, that may be true, but how can he only be the son of David? How can he be a mere man when David himself called him my Lord? And he quotes from Psalm 110. The Lord said to my Lord, that is David speaking to the Messiah, to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet. If then David calls him Lord, Jesus asks, how is he his son? Jesus is not denying that he is the son of David, but he is saying he is much more than the son of David. He is not a mere man. He is the son of God.

And interestingly, the text tells us that at this point, no one was able to answer him a word. And from that day forward, no one dared to ask him any more questions. And so Jesus has bested his opponents. He has come off victorious in this seminary level theological discussion and debate. And he has concluded with this key issue of his identity, the most important question of all, who do you say that I am? And he affirmed his deity as the eternal son of God. Now we come to Matthew chapter 23.

Jesus has finished his conversations and dialogues and discussions with his opponents. And now he turns to the crowds and to his disciples and he issues these warnings against the scribes and the Pharisees and the Jewish leaders for their rejection of him as the Messiah. This chapter, Matthew chapter 23, which contains seven woes, woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, it says that seven times, beginning in verse 13 and continuing on down to the seventh one in verse 29. This chapter, which is full of woes of judgment against the scribes and the Pharisees, is a heartbreaking and very sad chapter to think about.

Here Jesus is. Think about the context of Jesus here. He is actually in the temple. We know that because, as I read at the very beginning of chapter 24, right after this speech of Jesus condemning the scribes and the Pharisees, it says Jesus then left the temple.

And so that tells us that this statement that Jesus made, these seven woes of judgment, are made in the very temple. And he is warning the people of God that the destruction of this very temple that he is standing in is coming. That is the situation of Jesus himself, as he gives these words of final warning, almost like a last call to the nation of Israel to repent and to accept him as the Messiah, and warning them that if they do not, that they are about to be destroyed. Of course, we know that that did happen in AD 70, when the Romans came and destroyed the temple, less than 40 years after these words were spoken. But it is interesting to note that that is the situation of Jesus himself right there speaking in the temple and making these warning judgments against the people of God.

But there is also another situation that we could contemplate here, and that is the situation of the author of this gospel, and that is Matthew himself. Now, Matthew is writing somewhat later? We do not know if it was before AD 70, before the temple was destroyed or after, but he is writing somewhat after all of these events. And the situation of Matthew, the writer of this gospel, is that he is recording the words of Jesus, but he is doing so aware that he is writing to another audience, and that is the audience of the church that is still in conflict with Judaism, the Christ-rejecting Judaism of their day.

One commentator put it this way. I thought this was a nice little way of summing up this second context. The first context is Jesus himself in the temple. The second context is later on, whether it is 30, 40 years later, Matthew writing to his audience, and the commentator said, quote, the synagogue was still across the street.

So imagine that Matthew’s writing this gospel to a church, to the church of Jesus Christ, probably a Jewish church that believes in Christ, but the synagogue was still across the street. And this conflict between Jesus and the Jewish leadership is still fresh in people’s minds and is being experienced now by the conflict between The Jewish believers in Christ and apostate Christ-rejecting Judaism. The synagogue of unbelieving Jews was still across the street. And so these words of woe and judgment are still ringing in the ears of God’s people.

That means then that there is a third possible situational context that we can think about as how we apply this passage to us today. There is a secondary application for us as well. And this is a very sensitive thing. We have to be very careful? Because it would be easy to simply take all of this negative language of judgment and warning and speaking against hypocrisy. It would be easy to take all of that out of the context of Jesus and out of the context of Matthew sitting across from the synagogue and to just apply it to the church today without any awareness of the differences between those contexts.

And then you could end up saying things like, you know, when you get to the end of the passage and Jesus says, truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. See, your house is left to you desolate? You are going to be judged and destroyed, and the temple’s going to be wiped out. Then are you, as a preacher, going to say that to the Church of Jesus Christ today and warn them of a future AD 70 for them? I think we need to be a little bit cautious about that and careful not to misapply the text and thunder from the pulpit against God’s people and say, be careful lest you too are consigned to hell.

But there is still this secondary application of our text, and I think we can see that from the fact that Jesus himself is addressing these words, not to the scribes and the Pharisees directly. The text says in verse one, Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples. So he is already left the scribes and the Pharisees to the side, and now he is addressing the crowds, the adoring crowds from Galilee that have accepted him as the Messiah, and to his disciples. And he is speaking about apostate Judaism, Christ-less, Christ-denying Judaism. to them, but he is doing so in a way that also has overtones of possible application for us as the people of God.

You can see that from the fact that at one point in the passage, so most of the passage is just thundering denunciations against Israel? But you can see that there are little moments in the text where Jesus somewhat begins to turn to the church? You see that in verses 8 through 12. Verses 8 through 12 is an interesting little section there where he says he is warning against the scribes and the Pharisees because they love to be called rabbi and they love the places of honor and so on. But then he somewhat makes a little application?

He says, But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one father who is in heaven. Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ.” He is talking to the church. He is talking to the people of God.

And then he has those two verses there, the greatest among you shall be your servant, which reminds us of that earlier passage in Matthew chapter 20, where Jesus is responding to the two disciples that wanted places of honor in Christ’s kingdom. And Jesus said, that is the way the Gentiles think, seeking authority and privilege and power, but it shall not be so among you. And then he makes that statement, the greatest among you shall be your servant.

So even Jesus himself, in this thunderous denunciation of apostate Israel, is also making a secondary application to the church and saying, be careful that you do not fall into some of these same mistakes and errors that we saw within national Israel, and especially within the leadership of national Israel.

And so we have to be very careful how we preach this text. I do not want to come to you today and put you under this thunderous denunciation that you guys are all hypocrites, you better watch out or you are going to hell. That is not quite the way it works.

But at the same time, we do need to think about, as we listen to Jesus’s denunciation of legalistic Christ-denying Judaism, how does that apply to us and what can we learn from this passage? I have three points. The hallmarks of legalism, the judgment on legalism, and the lament over legalism. That is what Jesus is fundamentally doing in this passage, is he is describing the hallmarks of what legalistic religion is like. It is tyrannical, it is hypocritical, it is superficial, and it is fanatical. And then he is giving his judgment upon that Christless, legalistic religion of the Jews.

And then he is also lamenting over the state of Israel. And that lament, interestingly, adds a note of hope? Because even though he is been thundering his judgment, he then says, but oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how I wish that you would have heard me and listened to me and received me as your Messiah. And so there was a note of hope.

The Hallmarks of Legalism

Even in his judgment upon legalism, there is also a lament over it. So first, the hallmarks of legalism. This is the bulk of the passage, beginning in verse 2 down to verse 35. The hallmarks of legalism. It has four hallmarks. First, legalism is tyrannical. Legalism is more concerned with controlling others than with controlling one’s self. We see that in the very beginning of our text in verses 2 through 4. The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’s seat.

So do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders. But they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. They sit on Moses’s seat, that is, they claim divine authority for all of their teaching. Some of their teaching is man-made traditions that are not at all found in scripture. And yet they claim divine authority, sitting on Moses’s seat and saying, you have to do this on the authority of God himself.

They preach, but they do not practice what they preach. They are very concerned about telling you what you must do and making sure you understand the fullness of what God requires of you, or claiming that they think God requires of you, but they themselves are not willing to do what they are preaching because they are more in love with controlling others than with controlling themselves and working on their own walk with the Lord and their own obedience to God.

Now there is one little problem here in the text that we have to address and that is in verse 3 where Jesus says, And that clearly is hyperbole? Because Jesus does not endorse everything that the scribes and the Pharisees taught. We know that from later on in the very passage. If you get down to verses 16 to 22, where Jesus talks about this discussion about oaths, where the Pharisees said there are some oaths that are not binding, And there are some oaths that are binding, and they are making these very fine distinctions between what makes the distinction between a binding and a non-binding oath.

Jesus does not agree with that. He does not agree with their attempt to find a loophole in the biblical teaching about oaths. So he is not endorsing every single interpretation of the Mosaic law that the Pharisees have. And we also saw that earlier in Matthew, in Matthew chapter 15, that dispute over the practice of ritual hand-washing before eating a meal, has nothing to do with getting rid of the germs, has to do with trying to be in a state of Levitical purity in order to maintain the purity of the priests and to place that purity requirement upon not just the priests, but all of God’s people. Jesus does not agree with that tradition either.

He says that is a man-made tradition. So in this verse here, when Jesus says, verse 3, do and observe whatever they tell you, we have to take that as hyperbole. He is not endorsing every single thing that they teach. Nevertheless, most of their teaching is based upon Scripture.

And so what Jesus is saying here is that they have an even bigger problem than simply their misunderstanding and misinterpretation of oaths or hand washing, they have a bigger problem, and that is that they love to lord it over God’s people, to tie up heavy burdens, and to tell God’s people what to do. They love to sit in Moses’s seat. and to have this position of moral authority where they are dogmatically and tyrannically commanding God’s people what to do, whereas they themselves are not at all concerned about their own obedience and their own practice of these things, and that just shows that their concern is their tyranny, that is their overriding burden.

So the first hallmark of legalism is that it is tyrannical. The second hallmark of legalism is that it is hypocritical. Legalism is more concerned with the honor of man than the honor of God, more concerned with appearances, more concerned with how people think of you than it is concerned with what God thinks of us. Legalism is hypocritical.

We see this in verses five through 15. It is in this section in verses five through 15 that Jesus says, they do all their deeds to be seen by men. Verse five. See, it is hypocritical. The word hypocrisy or hypocritical, it comes from a Greek word that means to play act, to be an actor on a stage, to put on a show. They are doing all their deeds to be seen by men. They are more concerned with the honor of men than with the honor of God.

In this context as well, Jesus mentions this whole issue of titles and positions of honor within the people of God. And we already touched on that briefly and saw how Jesus is applying that to the church as well. He says, they love places of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others. but you are not to be called rabbi for you have one teacher and you are all brothers. Now, Jesus here is not rejecting the concept of church office in and of itself. We know that from the fact that even within the Gospel of Matthew, there are references to the future offices that will be within the church after the resurrection of Jesus.

Remember the Great Commission, Jesus commissioned the apostles to go and to make disciples. And how were they to do that? By baptizing and by teaching all that God, all that Christ had commanded them. So that is referring to the office of the minister of the gospel who is the preacher and teacher and who administers the sacraments. So Jesus is not rejecting the concept of church office per se, but what he is rejecting is this attitude of grasping for positions and grasping for honors and loving those titles and relishing the outward display of receiving these honors.

He is criticizing them for their hypocrisy. They are more concerned with how they appear in the eyes of men than how they appear in the eyes of God. And then that ties in with verses 13 to 15 where he talks about how they are more concerned with gaining followers. than they are with actually saving the souls of their followers. They just want followers so they can have a list of accolades and say, I have this great list of followers, my party, who follow me, that look to this rabbi and that rabbi. But they do not really care about the souls of those whom they are converting. They are not concerned about their personal relationship with God. They are just looking at these things from the point of view of outward appearance. So, the hallmarks of legalism.

First, it is tyrannical, sitting on Moses’ seat, tying up heavy burdens upon God’s people. It is hypocritical, more concerned about honor in the eyes of men than in the eyes of God.

Third, it is superficial. This is where we come to that section about the various debates over binding versus non-binding oaths. This is verses 16 to 28. Or the discussion about tithing mint and dill and cumin, but neglecting the weightier matters of the law. Legalism is more concerned with superficial, external things than obedience from a heart transformed by grace. They strain out gnats, but swallow camels. What is that referring to? Straining out gnats. Well, it is referring to the fact that in the Old Testament, in the Mosaic Law, the Israelites were forbidden from eating insects. And so, to be careful, to make sure they did not eat any insect, even by accident, they would strain their wine to make sure that even any gnats that happened, little tiny insects that happened to get in the wine, were not accidentally swallowed.

So they are so concerned about being so precise about even these details, but yet they swallow camels. That is, they are completely overlooking major sins in their own hearts. They overlook the weightier matters of the law. justice and mercy and faithfulness. He says these you ought to have done without neglecting the others. You blind guide straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel. We are continuing on in verses 25 to 28. They clean the outside of the cup, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. So that is the third hallmark of legalism, is that it is superficial.

It is concerned with external things rather than obedience from a heart transformed by grace. This whole section here, verses 16 to 25, or 28, I should say, reminds us, does it not, of the Sermon on the Mount. Many of the same themes are repeated, especially that discussion about oaths and taking an oath, swearing by the altar, and so on. That whole section is directly picking up on themes that Jesus had already preached in the Sermon on the Mount. And Jesus there in the Sermon on the Mount is emphasizing this idea of the obedience that comes from the heart, the righteousness that exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees. And not simply being so focused upon the details that one overlooks the most important things. Majoring on minors instead of focusing upon the heart of what God desires from his people.

The fourth description of legalism, and this is not necessarily the case for all legalists, but very often, especially in the most malignant form, it has a fanaticism attached to it. The fourth characteristic of legalism is it is fanatical. It is tyrannical, it is hypocritical, it is superficial, but it can often become, and in the case of Israel, specifically the scribes and the Pharisees, it became fanatical, so intolerant that it persecutes the true messengers of the gospel, and that is the focus of verses 29 to 35. They are so obstinately and intolerantly devoted to their own righteousness, that they cannot tolerate the message of the gospel, whether proclaimed by Christ himself as he is going around Galilee and Israel healing the sick and eating and drinking with sinners and tax collectors, or whether it is proclaimed by the apostles and the messengers of the gospel that will come after the death and resurrection of Christ.

that is another detail in the passage, right, that tells us that there is a broader horizon here than just the immediate context of Jesus in the temple talking to the scribes and the Pharisees. Because in verse 34, Jesus is looking ahead to after his death and resurrection. I will send you prophets and wise men and scribes. some of whom you will kill and crucify and some of whom you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town. Just look over in the book of Acts and you see this continuation of this process where the apostles are going to Jerusalem and to the temple and preaching the gospel and the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin reject them just as they rejected the teaching and preaching of Christ.

Legalism is so fanatical, it can become so fanatical and intolerant that it persecutes the messengers of the gospel. This is the frightening result when legalism reaches its ultimate endpoint. When it has so rejected Christ and becomes so wedded to the idol of its own righteousness, it becomes frighteningly fanatical. almost feels like it is being driven by a supernatural force, does not it? There is some somewhat something demonic. Whenever you see the opposition to the gospel getting to that point where it is murderously persecuting God’s people, then you are seeing the demonic forces at work using the humans who are involved only as their tools.

The Judgment on Legalism

Reminds me, I think, of the way the Roman Catholic Church persecuted Protestants in the 16th century. They were so driven by their desire to maintain their power and their authority and their own righteousness and their own idea of merit before God that they hated the Protestants. They killed them. They had armies going after them to destroy them. That is the frightening end result of legalism when it reaches its climactic end point. So those are the hallmarks of legalism. Let us look very briefly then at the judgment upon it. The judgment on legalism is in verse 36 and verse 38.

Jesus says, truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. And then in verse 38, see your house is left to you desolate. The seven woes, woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites have now culminated in this final judgment. This is the heartbreaking farewell of Christ to national Israel. And it prepares the way for the two verses we read at the beginning of chapter 24, where Jesus left the temple and as he was going away, The disciples pointed out all the buildings of this wonderful edifice that Herod and the people of God had been building over the past generations. And he says, do you see all these? Truly I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.

And again, as I mentioned before, as we are looking at this text in its various situational contexts or horizons of application, this part of it here is directly related to the original context of Jesus rejecting national Israel and warning them of the coming judgment in AD 70. when the Romans would come and destroy the temple.

And so we have to be careful to then not simply apply that to the church today and say that all you hypocrites in the church, you are going to have your own AD 70 and you too are going to be wiped out. Nevertheless, even though we do not want to speak that way, obviously the church of Jesus Christ cannot be rejected the way national Israel was rejected. The Church of Jesus Christ is the Bride of Christ and will never become apostate, will never come under judgment. Nevertheless, there is still an element in which we can apply this even today? Because although it does not apply to God’s elect, All those for whom Christ has shed his blood are absolutely immune from the wrath of God. There is no judgment that will come upon you if you are in Christ.

But there is still a visible church of those that profess faith in Christ who could become subject to this warning. And the parallel text that comes to my mind is the most useful new covenant application of this warning of judgment upon national Israel, but applying it to the visible church, would be in Revelation chapter 2, where Jesus, the ascended Lord Jesus, walking among the seven lampstands of the churches in Asia Minor, warns the churches.

He comes to each church, the church of Ephesus and so on, and he warns them. Some of them have nothing, he has nothing negative to say. But many of them, like the Church of Ephesus, he has something critical to say. He says, you have left your first love. Repent and do the works you used to do before.

Otherwise, if you do not, I will come and I will remove your lampstand out of its place, implying that that particular expression of the body of Christ, that visible church in Ephesus, would cease to exist and no longer be a true church. We could say the same thing of the Roman Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Church itself has come to this point of expressing its total revulsion against the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so we could say that the Roman Catholic Church has its lampstand removed and is no longer a true church of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a corrupt church that has become apostate because they have rejected Christ and the gospel of Christ.

The Lament over Legalism

So there is the judgment on legalism. And then finally, the lament over legalism. And this is an amazing part of the text. You come to the very end, after hearing these stern warnings, woe to you, you hypocrites, woe to you. How can you escape hell? You are under the wrath of God. God’s going to wipe you out. And then at the very end, it turns into a lament and genuine sorrow. Jesus says in verse 37, Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it.

How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings? And you were not willing. You were not willing. See your house is left to you desolate, for I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Yes, there are stern warnings of judgment, but there is also genuine lament and sorrow.

I mean, it is an amazing thing to think about? I mean, when you look at how wicked Israel has become at this point, especially national Israel through its leaders, so wicked that they have, they are about to have Christ put to death in the next few chapters? So wicked they have rejected Christ. They are so clinging to their own righteousness and their own self-appointed positions of honor as rabbis and teachers of the law and Moses’ seat.

And yet, you know, you would expect Jesus to say, okay, God’s finished with you, you know, but there is still this little note of hope at the end of genuine desire that they would repent. Jesus desires that Israel would repent. His soul is grieved that Israel would not repent and accept him as the Messiah.

And this ties in with applying this again to our context today. We have to think about that. Let us not delight in God’s judgment upon those that oppose the gospel. Let us not simply say, well, God’s finished with you, I am finished with you, so I am not going to have any compassion for you at all.

Jesus himself taught the disciples to have that attitude of compassion even for their enemies. Remember back in the Sermon on the Mount, what did Jesus say? He said, love your enemies. Pray for them when they mistreat you and when they persecute you. What are you praying for when you pray for your enemies? You are praying that they would repent, that they would see the error of their ways, that they would come to Christ and be forgiven.

Even the psalms in the Old Testament, which contain some pretty harsh, what are called imprecatory psalms, that is, psalms where the people of God are calling down God’s judgment upon their enemies. But even those psalms have this implied prayer that the enemies would repent? that they would not stay in their place of hardened opposition to God. Even the imprecatory Psalms are Psalms that have a note of hope.

Another example of this is Jeremiah. Jeremiah is the one prophet in the Old Testament who is the most grieved over Israel’s sin. He lived right through that whole process of the exile. And he is grieved by Israel’s sin. And he wrote the Book of Lamentations, which he wept when he saw the city of Jerusalem destroyed by the Babylonians, which was, of course, a foretaste of what is going to come in AD 70. But he wept over Jerusalem. He wept over the destruction of the temple. Jeremiah is the weeping prophet. Even though he spoke God’s wrath and warning and judgment against God’s people, he also had a heart of love and compassion and desiring that they would repent and come to know the Lord.

So too we should have that same attitude towards unbelievers. Perhaps you know people in your own family who have hardened their hearts against Christ and the gospel and you have tried so often to share the gospel with them and they just seem so hardened in their sin and so angry and hateful towards Christ. we can still love them, still have a heart of compassion for them and pray for them. Even if you cannot do anything else, even if all the words have been said and there is nothing more you can do, you can still pray for them and the Lord will have mercy on his elect. So this whole chapter then, Matthew 23, it is a very difficult passage to preach. You do not want to preach it in the wrong way of just thundering God’s condemnation against the people of God.

But at the same time, there are beneficial applications that we can draw from this passage. One of the main things that comes to my mind as I look at this whole passage here is the way in which the legalism of the Jews had blinded them to Christ. Is not that really the fundamental problem?

Notice I did not really highlight it, but if you just go back and look at some of these verses here, Jesus uses the word blind several times. For example, in verse 16, woe to you blind guides. And then again in verse 17, you blind fools. I think it is five times in the passage he calls them blind.

And I think this really gets at this fundamental thing that the legalism of the Jews, their hypocrisy, their commitment to superficiality, their desire for honor among men and being teachers of the law and sitting on Moses’ seat and tying up heavy burdens upon God’s people, this whole legalistic ethos, this culture of legalism had so hardened their hearts and blinded their eyes that they could not see Jesus as the Messiah. Their hearts were cleaving to the idol of their own righteousness. And so they simply could not receive Christ. They could not see Him. They just could not.

He is standing right before them. The very Messiah, the Son of the living God, is standing right before them, and they just could not see Him. I remember, it somewhat reminds me of that last statement there in the very last verse at the end of chapter 22, after Jesus proved to them from Psalm 110 that He is not just a man, but He is the divine Son of God. It just says they were not able to answer him a word. They are just so stuck in their blindness and in their love of their own righteousness that they just could not see him even though he is standing right before them and he is also proven to them from scripture that he is the divine son of God. They simply could not see it. Their eyes were completely blinded. They are just completely silent when Jesus proves to them that he is the divine son of God. They had nothing to say because their hearts had already rejected Christ and they were clinging to their own righteousness.

So that is one of the main applications that comes from this text, is to understand the danger of legalism and how it hardens your heart and blinds you to see Christ. But then conversely, there is also the other side of the coin? And this is the second application, is that if legalism blinds you to Christ, and you cannot receive Christ because you are so wedded to your own righteousness, then the opposite is also true, that that is the solution? Of course, only the Spirit can open your eyes and give you faith, but the solution to legalism, the answer to legalism, is to receive Christ himself.

That is why Jesus concludes this whole series of woes and judgment, and he climaxes it with that last statement there in verse 39, where he says, I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. This, is the same cry of the crowd of the sinners from Galilee in Matthew 21 verse 9 at the triumphal entry. They were the ones who said, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

But they were not like the scribes and the Pharisees. They were not wedded to their righteousness. They were sinners. They were tax collectors. They were Galileans, which that in itself just proves that they are not really top-notch Jews? They are from way up north. They are hillbillies. They do not know how to keep the law. But this group, this ragtag group of sinners from Galilee, they welcomed Jesus. They loved him. They were the infants crying out in the temple. praising the Messiah and loving him.

And so if the problem of legalism is that it leads to hardening your heart and being unable to see Christ, then the opposite is also true that the solution to legalism, the answer to legalism is to receive Christ. And Jesus is saying it is very simple. This could all be over in an instant if you would just simply say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Yeah, come with all your baggage of all of your self-righteousness and all of your desire for the honor of men. But if you would simply say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. If you would simply receive me, then all would be well.

This statement here is a little bit confusing, a little bit hard to understand. I think the best way to explain it is this. It is a conditional or hypothetical statement. Jesus is saying this. This is how I paraphrase verse 39. He is saying, there is still one last chance.

If you welcome me in faith, like the crowd from Galilee did, if you welcome me in faith, then you will see me again for blessing. But then that implies the opposite? If you do not, if you do not welcome me in faith, you will not see me again for blessing, but rather for judgment. And of course, we know that national Israel will experience that in AD 70. But the elect within Israel, we will experience the positive side. There is still hope even after the death and resurrection of Christ. How do we know that?

Because in verse 34, Jesus says, I am going to send you prophets and wise men and scribes. And the Apostle Paul himself is a great example of that. He was a Pharisee who was blinded by his own righteousness and persecuting Christians, but he came to know the Lord.

And he himself says in Romans 11 verse five, so too at the present time, there is a remnant a remnant within Israel, chosen by grace. There is still an opportunity. And of course, even though the nation as a whole, we know, is going to continue in its rejection and become this rabbinic, Christless Judaism, yet we do know that all throughout the church age, There were and have been and will be Jewish believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, a remnant chosen by grace, who come to the Lord, who say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And this is the answer to legalism. Only this, that is receiving Christ by faith, only this will lead to the somewhat fruit and obedience that is truly pleasing to God. Not this fake, hypocritical, superficial, self-righteous, legalistic righteousness, but the good fruit of obedience that God desires from his people, that aims for the approval of God, that comes from a renewed heart, the fruit of saving faith in Jesus the Messiah.