29 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. 30 And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your forefathers!”
33 “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? 34 Therefore I am sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. 35 And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. 36 I tell you the truth, all this will come upon this generation.”
In our verses for today the Lord Jesus issues His final “Woe” to the religious elite of His day with an emphasis on their gross hypocrisy. They spent time building tombs and decorating the graves of the righteous – the prophets slain by their forefathers - saying they would have never participated in their deaths while all the while scheming to shed the blood of the Prophet – the Christ - Who presently walked among them. The deceitfulness of a sinner’s hearts is obvious here. They fancied they would have gone against the tide of the sins of those of former days if they had been presented with like opportunities - delusional of remaining faithful yet all the while covered with shame in the present day - plotting to murder the Christ to which all the past prophets bore witness. They who condemn sin in others and yet do the same or worse themselves are of all others most inexcusable. Heads-up, we are prone to this type of hypocrisy as well:
“We are sometimes thinking, if we had lived when Christ was on earth, how constantly we would have followed Him; we would have not despised and rejected Him, as they then did; and yet Christ in His Spirit, in His Word, in His ministers, is still no better treated.” Matthew Henry
Paul tells us in Romans:
1 You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. Romans 2:1 (NIV)
By their acts they would demonstrate they walked just as the past generations. Following in their footsteps, they filled up the full measure of their forefather’s sin – heaping up their sins to the limit. Their words proclaim one thing, their actions another - sinners simply cannot hope to escape Christ’s judgment for lack of proof against them – particularly when their witness against their words. Second Chronicles clearly demonstrate Jesus’ Words – there is a point – unbeknownst to man - when God says “Enough”. God will bear long but the time will come when He will no longer forbear. He is jealous for the honor of His prophets and ministers:
15 The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to them through his messengers again and again, because he had pity on his people and on his dwelling place. 16 But they mocked God's messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the LORD was aroused against his people and there was no remedy. 2 Chron 36:15-16 (NIV)
“It is the prerogative of him who searches the heart, and knows what is in man, to pronounce who are hypocrites. The eye of man can perceive open profaneness, but it is only the eye of Christ that can discern hypocrisy. And as it is a sin which his eye discovers, so it is a sin which of all others his soul hates.” Matthew Henry
In the severest language, Jesus condemned these teachers of the law and Pharisees calling them snakes and vipers. Patience abused turns into the greatest wrath. His Words were not too dissimilar to our Lord’s forerunner John the Baptist’s when he confronted these characters who wore a mask of piety. Religious hypocrisy is nauseating to God:
7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.” Matt 3:7-8 (NIV)
“The popular image of Christ as ‘gentle Jesus meek and mild’ simply will not do. To be sure, He was full of love, compassion and tenderness. But He was also uninhibited in exposing error and denouncing hypocrisy. Christ was a controversialist. John Stott