Weightier Matters
As I was reading through Matthew again recently, a verse caught my attention. I’ve probably read this verse hundreds of times, but I usually breeze over it without a second thought. This time, I read it slowly a few times, and I can’t get it out of my mind:
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. (Matthew 23:23 ESV)
Weightier matters… justice and mercy and faithfulness. Yes, Jesus was speaking against the religious people of his day. But, I wonder if he would say the same thing to most Christians today. Perhaps he would even say that same thing against me.
Many times I found myself at the top of a theological hill shouting across to only lose the people in the valley. No Charity rarely produces lovers of Christ. Another area of maturity. I think some of this will flow from my understanding of “church”.
There have been many times in the past when I considered where one went to church on Sundays, how much money one gave to said church, and how many related church activities one attended as the “weightier matters.” I, like Lionel, was losing the people in the valley. Jesus is teaching me a better way.