Pharisees & Corinthians

I don’t want to be a Pharisee.

Self-righteous. Legalistic. Prideful. Cold. Mistaking tradition for God’s truth.

The Pharisees were the perennial critics of Jesus during His ministry on earth. You say the word “Pharisee” and most people with a smidgen of Bible knowledge automatically think “legalistic, hard-nosed, narrow-minded religious dude.” Well maybe not the “dude” part.

But the Pharisees were not “bad guys,” at least not in the minds of many people in Jesus’ day. The Pharisees were a conservative religious group that tried to maintain Jewish identity in the midst of Roman occupation. They may not have been personally liked by the average Jew but they were generally respected and even admired for their religious devotion and conservative values.

I remember taking a trip to Israel in the late 90’s. Our Jewish tour guide, Nimrod (yep, that was his name), took us to one of the Decapolis cities near Galilee. He began to explain what was going on in Jesus’ day. The Romans were building cities around and within Israel designed to infiltrate and influence the Jewish people with Greco-Roman culture. Thus, not too far from the synagogue where the people could hear the Old Testament Scriptures read each Sabbath, there might be a Roman theatre or bathhouse that exposed the people to the more progressive, cultured, and sexually loose Roman lifestyle. The Romans were no fools. Instead of directly contradicting Jewish mores, they sought to entice the average Jew to a more Roman way of thinking and living…especially the young people.

The Pharisees were appalled at the luxurious, licentious lifestyle of the Romans and they did everything they could to shield themselves and their children from such an influx of immorality.

Putting myself in the Pharisees’ shoes, I was shocked to discover that they actually fit me quite well. As a parent in our current culture, I find myself thinking in many ways like a Pharisee.

But I don’t want to be a Pharisee.

I don’t want Christ’s love to be replaced by legalistic self-righteousness. I don’t want to preach morality over the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don’t want to lose the joy of the Spirit for the judgmentalism of a critical spirit.

But if I try too hard to avoid being a Pharisee, I might end up becoming a Corinthian.

Super-spiritual. “Enlightened.” Prideful. Smug. Mistaking tolerance for God’s love.

The Corinthians were an early group of believers in Jesus Christ. As the gospel spread out from Palestine, the Greeks began to hear it, consider it, embrace it. But coming to Christ did not immediately change their mindset. They still often thought and lived like Greeks. Intellectual, cultured, elite, morally “progressive,” sexually free. The apostle Paul had to write several letters to the Corinthian church to correct their thinking, to challenge their lifestyle, to confront their “tolerance.”

Flee from sexual immorality! All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? (1 Corinthians 6:18-19)

The Pharisees missed the gospel in the midst of their self-righteous legalism. The Corinthians misused the gospel in the midst of their self-gratifying liberty. The Pharisees externalized sin. The Corinthians ignored it. The Pharisees became critics of culture. The Corinthians became condoners of it.

That’s the challenge that I face in this present generation.

Engage in the cultural war and I find myself losing a part of my heart. I see people as enemies to be defeated rather than people who need Christ. I become like a Pharisee struggling to preserve old fashioned American identity in the midst of an invasion of Hollywood’s values. I become a foe of the world. And I forget the beauty of grace…that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners of which I am chief. 

But endorse the cultural flow and I find myself losing a part of God’s holiness. I see sin as a minor thing that needs to be redefined for more modern times. I become like a Corinthian downplaying sexual immorality and losing my identity as a follower of Christ. I become a friend of the world. And I forget the ugliness of sin…that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners of which I am chief.

There are dangers on both sides of the tightrope.

Hate Pharisees and I might be a Corinthian. Hate Corinthians and I might be a Pharisee.

Love God. Love my neighbor. Hate sin. Weep for the world. And I might just be in the Spirit.

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