The Seven Woes, a Timely Warning

In Matthew 23, we find Jesus going on a long and vicious tirade against the legalists and powerful - the very religious, but evil ones, and Jesus spoke extremely harshly of the Pharisees and others in power who were hypocrites and abusers. Speaking of these religious leaders who pile law upon law upon law on the backs of people, Jesus said:

"They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them."

He then addressed these powerful abusers, delivering seven "woes..." The famous southern preacher, Clarence Jordan, translated "woe" as "It will be hell for you, Pharisees!" as in

“It will be hell for you, theologians and preachers— phonies, because you lock people out of God's Way. You not only won’t enter yourselves, but you slam the door on those who do.

It will be hell for you, theologians and preachers— phonies, because you send missionaries around the world to make one convert, and when you win him you make him double the devil’s son that you are."

And wrapping up with...

“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?"

Da-yum.

And at the end of that tough take down of the powerful religious abusers, Jesus said:

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing."

Fire and anger and bittersweet love.

I think many of us have a sense of this, today.