Hypocrites (Luke 13)

Luke’s account of Jesus’ healing on the Sabbath is a riveting example of how hypocrisy and hatred often go together. Whether it is a cover for guilt or an arrogance that comes from long-term self-righteousness, hypocrites naturally hate those who expose the broken links between their pronouncements and their practice.

In the case of they hypocrites of Luke chapter 13, the hatred was pointed at the King of Glory Himself, He Whose sinless life and irrefutable holiness both revealed the inner rot of certain synagogue officials. Remember the situation in Luke 13. Jesus had healed a woman on the Sabbath who for 18 years has been bent and twisted by a demonic spirit. One of the synagogue officials became so indignant (the Greek word used here originally made reference to an emotion so strong it caused one pain) that it moved him to a public criticism of Jesus. His argument was that the Lord had broken God’s law. But Jesus, humiliated his opponents simply by showing how hypocritical they were being, they that treated their animals better than a critically needy daughter of Abraham. The word for hypocrite here is also revealing – it comes from the mask used by stage actors, those whose faces and words were not what they seemed. Exposed by the Lord Jesus, one has the choice of denial and hatred or humility and repentance. These fellows chose the first course. How about us?