Matthew 23:27-39
“‘Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous, and you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’” (Matthew 23:29-30)
It’s hard for me to read this passage and not reflect on America’s history of racial oppression – everything from the injustices done against this land’s original inhabitants to the slave trade to Jim Crow-era lynchings to the Japanese internment camps to the time my friend Nick Hernandez was called a “sand n*****” two days after 9/11 because he has brown skin that someone mistook for Middle Eastern and not Hispanic origins. It’s hard because I know for a fact that white people (myself included) have said and still say things like, “If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have participated in those lynchings.” And of course we say that because to say otherwise – to say that we would’ve participated in a lynching – is to admit that we are currently capable of participating in a lynching and we don’t like to think of ourselves in those terms.
But what does Jesus say to these (likely) self-deceptions? “You testify against yourselves that you are descendants of those who murdered” (Matthew 23:31). That’s right. Whatever we think of ourselves now, we are still descendants of some pretty terrible people.
I suspect that the point isn’t to shame us for our origins (though this also doesn’t mean we are free to just ignore this history). The point is to find our goodness, our righteousness, our holiness in Jesus.
The hypocrites look backward and say, “I would’ve been pure.” The Christian looks forward and says, “God, make me pure.” That’s a HUGE difference! The hypocrite wants to trust in themselves. The Christian knows they must trust in God (or perish trying).
Even with this holy wisdom, the church is still often a place where we look backward in order to seek our goodness rather than looking forward. We’re still often more married to Genesis than betrothed to Revelation. As a result, we don’t accept the cure for the curse that Jesus offers us. For to accept the cure means to accept that we would – and did – kill the prophets (or the indigenous people or the black people or the Japanese citizens or the Middle Eastern resident). It is to accept our historical and current complicity in the world’s injustice and then to seek Jesus’ help in righting the wrongs. Amen.
