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Christ Foretells a Great Uprooting
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use during his lifetime, and after his death it was to be appropriated
to the temple service. Thus he was at liberty to dishonor and defraud
his parents, under cover of a pretended devotion to God.
Jesus commended the poor woman who gave her all to the temple
treasury. But the apparent zeal for God on the part of the priests
and rabbis was a pretense to cover a desire for self-aggrandizement.
Even the disciples of Christ were not wholly free from they yoke of
inherited prejudice and rabbinical authority. By revealing the true
spirit of the rabbis, Jesus sought to free all who were really desirous
of serving God.
“Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This
people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoreth Me
with their lips; but their heart is far from Me. In vain they do
worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.”
Christ declared that by placing their requirements above the divine
precepts, the rabbis were setting themselves above God. Jesus
explained that defilement comes not from without, but from within.
Purity and impurity pertain to the soul.
The Rage of the Spies
The disciples noted the rage of the spies and heard the half-
muttered words of dissatisfaction and revenge. They told Christ,
hoping that He might conciliate the enraged officials: “Knowest
thou that the Pharisees were offended, after they heard this saying?”
He answered, “Every plant, which My heavenly Father hath not
planted, shall be rooted up.” The customs and traditions so highly
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valued by the rabbis could not endure the testing of God. Every
human invention that has been substituted for the commandments of
God will be found worthless in that day when “God shall bring every
work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or
whether it be evil.”
Ecclesiastes 12:14
.
Even among Christians are found institutions and usages that
have no better foundation than the traditions of the fathers. Men cling
to their traditions and hate those who show them their error. In this
day, when we are bidden to call attention to the commandments of
God and the faith of Jesus, we see the same enmity as was manifested
in the days of Christ. Of the remnant people of God it is written,