The Camel in the Ointment (Matthew 23:16-24)

Class Outline:

Wednesday October 29, 2025

 

MAT 23:16-24 (Woes 3 and 4)

 

Introduction: 

 

We’ve all felt the ache of knowing that we do not measure up to the greatness of some ideal.

 

You can become a champion at something worthless and as a legend in your own mind, feel pretty great. Until it all comes crashing down. 

 

Mankind has found that it is always easier to take a minor thing that is fairly easy to do and proclaim it as the most important thing and thus claim greatness. This is what the Pharisees and scribes did, but they did it with God’s law and used those minor things to lead the people to judgment. Jesus the Christ would not allow it, for He came to save the lost, not lead them to eternal ruin. 

 

 

The Pharisees took minor things out of their context in God and then held them up as the ways to God.

 

Vows were allowed but not commanded. If an Israelite under the law took a vow, he was required by God to fulfill it.

 

The reason for vows is pretty straight forward. Promises would have to be made and the option was given to swear on something greater than yourself, which in Israel was always to be God.  

 

Vows have their place in the sphere of faithfulness and justice.

 

Take the vows out of that sphere and what do they become?

 

Jesus told us not to take them (MAT 5:33-37).

 

In Mat 23 He points all vows to God who indwelt the temple.

 

Lord Jesus says yes to the Father; HEB 10:7. His vow is to God.

 

Tithing was mandated for the support of the Levitical priesthood.

 

Tithing had its place in the sphere of faithfulness, justice, and mercy.  

 

Take it out of that sphere and what does it become?

 

When these are taken out of their sphere (giving, praying, and fasting; Mat 6) they become common and they do not lead to a deeper understanding of God.

 

Blind guides and fools who swallow a camel. 

 

Swallow a camel: sins that result from neglecting justice, mercy, faithfulness. 

 

No justice: no protection of the poor, widows, oppressed, common people. 

 

No mercy: no help to sinners, foreigners, weak, ignorant. 

 

Parable of Pharisee and tax-collector; parable of Good Samaritan; quote of HOS 6:6 in Mat 9; 12. 

 

No faith (faithfulness - this is to God): no sacrifice, selfishness, no proper worship of God (think the minors, isolated, are true worship), no real understanding of God’s Word. 

 

Strain out a gnat: blind fools who conclude that the rituals and traditions alone are deliverance from God’s judgment; MIC 6:6-8.

 

God judges the vital acts that should come from a heart of love.

 

Caution: Don’t swing the pendulum the other way and neglect the small things.

 

Jesus states that they should have tithed their herbs while not neglecting the vital virtues. 

 

This means that good character does not major in the minor and still takes care of the minor. 

 

The minor acts, rituals, small things are manifestations of the major virtues. God certainly wants us to prioritize things.

 

Jesus came as Messiah-King and part of His mission was to pay for the sins of the people. Made righteous by imputation, we fulfill the Law through Him, and we can pursue the major virtues and the major and minor expressions of them without fear of failure and condemnation.

 

True worship develops inner character in all people. 

 

Leaders who worship God become humble servants of the people they lead. 

 

Jesus is the ultimate example of this:

PHI 2:5-8

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

 

This is a repetition of His teaching on the greatest in the kingdom of heave in Matthew 18-20. His last words in Matthew just before He entered Jerusalem to proclaim Himself were just this. Servants and slaves of one another was our only way, the Way of the kingdom of heaven.

 

The Lord Jesus is always our model of faithfulness, justice, and mercy.

 

Jesus’ justice: dining with tax-collectors and prostitutes (Mat 9); touching lepers; Gentiles, women, forgiving sins. 

 

Jesus’ mercy: forgiveness; compassion on the masses; feeding 5K and 4K. 

 

Jesus’ faithfulness: sinless in the will of the Father, worship, comprehension of the Word (devil’s temptations). 

 

Combining all three on the cross. 

 

Conclusion: 

 

These two woes together reveal a leadership who does not honor God because they lack faith in His Messiah and His Word. 

 

A hypocrite is someone who says one thing and does another.

 

The woes are a warning to us who know Jesus Christ as the King of the kingdom of heaven. 

 

Do not major in the minor things, i.e. examine your heart for religiosity and legalism. Keep your eyes open to God’s Word and see Jesus Christ in the Scriptures. Clearly seeing Christ and the gospel is the surest cure for hypocrisy.

 

Worship God, the Trinity, in your daily lives through majoring in the with your worshipful eye on your God whom Jesus brought you to by grace.