Luke 20
Can you remember the refrigerators of your childhood? I know that seems like a strange question in the context of Jesus in Roman occupied Jerusalem. I can remember two. The first one was avocado green with chrome trim. A beauty from an era when appliances were built with endurance in mind. She lasted until I was 11. Then my parents bought a classic mid-80’s Kenmore refrigerator straight from the Sears Catalog. She was beige. I think every appliance was beige in 1987, a cultural counter swing to the gaudiness of the age of disco and psychedelic sectionals. To spruce up the new fridge, my dad stuck some spiffy signs on the front with industrial grade magnets. One simply said, “Engage brain before putting mouth in gear.” Wise words. He would often patiently point to it whenever words shot out of my teenage pie hole. I think Jesus would like that sign. He might have even pointed to it as He dialoged with the Pharisees, scribes and Sadducees. But the issue with His enemies sprouted from their hearts, the very problem Jesus came to solve.
At this point in Luke, the drama is rising to a boiling point. Jesus has already proclaimed that He will go to Jerusalem and be handed over to the Gentiles to be killed and rise again on the third day. As He teaches in the Temple by day, the Jewish leaders come out to debate. The chief priests and scribes confront Him first, asking by what authority Jesus does things like heal blind men and raise people from the dead. Incredible, right? You would think that the miracles would, oh, I don’t know, connect them to the wonder of who Jesus is. That’s not what happens. Jesus answers their question, as He often does, with a question. “I will also ask you a question! You tell Me, was John’s baptism from heaven or from men?”
The next verse says, “they reasoned among themselves.” I love that. It seems so innocuous. Like Jesus asks them a really good question and they just need to process it in community. But they are afraid. Very afraid. If they say it was from heaven, Jesus will confront them by pointing out the hypocrisy of their unbelief. If they say it was just a human baptism, the mob will grab stones and smash them into their heads until they die because they believe John was a prophet. Which of course he was. They are stuck between their immovable pride and the reality screaming in their faces and they have no answer and just say, “We don’t know.”
Jesus then speaks another parable into their madness. This one about a vineyard owner who had leased his land to some people and then who sends folks to collect some of the produce during harvest. Pretty normal setting. Except the renters beat up the first three guys. So he sends his beloved son. But the renters, and Luke is brilliant here, the renters turned violent abusers of people, “reasoned among themselves”. Same phrase. What do they reason? That if they kill the son, they can steal his inheritance. Kill the son, get the riches. That’s their plan. Jesus reminds them that He is there to crush everyone who rejects Him. They have a choice: Reject Jesus and be crushed, accept Jesus and be saved. They go on the attack.
Luke says that “spies pretending to be righteous in order that they might catch Him” come to trick Jesus. The very thing the Jews most sought was righteousness. They craved it with every pore in their body. But they wanted the be the source of their own righteousness. They wanted the glory so badly that they were quite literally happy to pretend to me righteous to destroy the Righteous One. Incomprehensible blindness. So they lay a tax trap: Should we pay tithes to God or taxes to Ceasar? The self-righteous see things in black and white. Jesus wants to open our eyes to see everything in technicolor brilliance. Jesus simply says do both. And they became silent.
Next up: The Sadducees. Experts in the Law. Materialists. Only believe what they can see and prove. Reject the supernatural, including life after death. No resurrection. So they lay a clever trap, “If a lady is widowed 7 times, who is she married to in the resurrection?” Ha! Gotcha, Jesus! We’re so smart. Jesus simply tells them they are bonkers. God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – all at the same time. Because even though they are dead to you, they are alive to God, because He is the God of the living. You are gravely mistaken. Luke says bluntly, “They did not have courage to question Him any longer about anything.”
Jesus loves it when we ask Him questions. The Jewish leaders showed all their cards the moment they opened their mouths. They thought they were engaging their minds before putting their mouths in gear but what they were really doing was revealing their heart. What kinds of questions do I ask Jesus? I ask Him why. I ask Him why things are so hard all the time. Why don’t I know what to do? And I reveal that I don’t like it when things are uncomfortable. I don’t like it when I have to ask Jesus for help. I reveal that I want to sit on the throne of my heart. I want to be the master of my fate. But I have only one Master. Jesus does not share His Throne. And when questions shoot out of my pie hole, Jesus patiently points to my heart and reminds me to engage it before I put my mouth in gear. And when I do that, I can listen to Him. I can hear His voice when He asks me, “Will you trust me?” It is then that I stop arguing with Jesus and start enjoying Him. It is after I shut up and give Jesus my heart that I start asking better questions.
“Why do You love me?
What are You teaching me?
How are You so wonderful?”
Then I sit and listen at the feet of my Savior, my God and my King.
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