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Jesus and the Pharisees: A Match Made In Hell (Mark 3:6)

by Wayne Davies  
10/18/2014 / Bible Studies

In Mark 2:1-3:6 we read five consecutive stories of Jesus' conflict with the Pharisees. Along with the throngs of people eager to benefit from his healing ministry, the religious leaders are following Jesus around Galilee. The crowds are there for the miracles: Jesus provides free medical care for the sick by the hundreds. The Pharisees are there to gather evidence: "Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely" (Mark 3:2).

And by the time we get to Mark 3:6, the Pharisees have accomplished their mission. They now have an impressive list of "sins" committed by Jesus and his disciples:

--Jesus forgives sins. This claim to deity is blasphemy (Mark 2:7).
--Jesus' socializing with tax collectors and sinners is a disgusting display of guilt by association (Mark 2:16).
--Jesus doesn't fast; what devout Jew doesn't fast twice a week? (Mark 2:18).
--Jesus violates rabbinic traditions by picking grain (Mark 2:23-24) and healing people (Mark 3:5) on Saturday, both forms of "work" which are violations of their interpretation of the Old Testament Sabbath law.

The Pharisees are furious with Jesus. How furious? After the fifth incident, in which Jesus heals a man with a shriveled hand on the Sabbath, "Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus" (Mark 3:6).

For the first two chapters of Mark's gospel, we have an amazing account of the Galilean ministry of Jesus. He heals people of any and every physical ailment, from a simple fever (Mark 1:30-31) to leprosy (Mark 1:40-42) to paralysis (Mark 2:1-12) to deformity (Mark 3:1-5). Not only that, but he has been casting out demons and liberating people from a life of Satanic oppression (Mark 1:25-27).

Day after day, Jesus also spends countless hours teaching and preaching to the people. Truly he has not come to be served, but to serve (Mark 10:45).

And yet the Pharisees are now ready to kill Jesus. How can this be? Why the bitter resentment and murderous hatred? What had Jesus done to evoke such a response?

Certainly it is not the miracles. Who can find fault with a man for helping people the way Jesus did? And even if he doesn't obey all the rabbinic traditions, who kills a man because he doesn't fast and picks grain on the Sabbath?

I think this question is best answered by taking a close look that what Jesus said rather than what he did. The Pharisees were ready to kill Jesus because of his words rather than his deeds.

What did he say that so infuriated the Pharisees? He said many things that got under their skin and penetrated their stubborn hearts.

Jesus confronted the Pharisees about their sin.
He does this subtly at first, but the message is loud and clear. "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners" (Mark 2:17). The Pharisees were filled with religious pride; they thought they were righteous, but Jesus later condemns them because "on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness" (Matthew 23:28).

The God-Man hated hypocrisy, and the Pharisees were full of it. In Matthew 23, just days before Jesus is crucified, he pronounces judgment on the Pharisees by calling them "hypocrites" not once but six times! He also labels them as blind guides, blind fools, whitewashed tombs and children of hell who are full of greed and self-indulgence.

Obviously, these indictments only added fuel to the fire that was burning in their hearts against Jesus. Rather than seeing themselves as sinners in need of repentance, they became even more determined to get rid of him.

Jesus claimed to be God.
The Son of God proclaims his deity repeatedly in the gospels. "The Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins" (Mark 2:10). "The Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath" (Mark 2:28). These statements are clear proclamations of the divine nature of Jesus Christ.

The Pharisees saw the miracles and refused to accept them as unmistakable evidence of Jesus' deity. Instead, they came to the incredibly illogical conclusion that Jesus got his power from the devil. "He has an evil spirit . . . By the prince of demons he is driving out demons" (Mark 3:30 and Mark 3:22).

The conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees demonstrates the deadly virus of pride and self-righteousness. Failure to see ourselves as terminally ill sinners in desperate need of spiritual healing will blind our hearts to the truth. And failure to see Jesus as God is the tragic result of that blindness.

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