Matthew 15:1 - 20

I spend a fair amount of time these days talking to “religious folks” about all sorts of things. One common theme is that they don’t want to hurt or offend others.

Which in general is a noble sentiment. My question however is whether it is the highest principle we need to align our lives to? If, as a matter of principle, we are never ever to offend anyone, then we are in for trouble. 

I am not saying we should go out of our way to offend people. I am asking, “Is there a principle higher than the principle of not offending another?” For Jesus there is. His principle is to align his life with the Word of God. Even if he offends others, as verse 12 tells us he did!

For Jesus God’s Word is supreme. He notes in verse 6 that the religious of his day have nullified it.

You have made the commandment of God void because of your tradition.

We do this today. I speak to religious, especially pastors, who don’t want to offend people. They don’t want to appear like the young boy with a baseball bat in his hand. They don’t want to come across as judgmental. They are well aware of their own sin. But if we all must be sinless before we are allowed to point out some other part of the world that is wrong, well, we are in for a rough ride down the moral ladder.

In Jesus’ day the issue was they were actually using a religious tradition to keep from taking care of their parents. They would “dedicate money to the Temple, but then they could actually use it.” Some of them were doing it to avoid taking care of their parents. The Bible says that not honoring your mother and father is punishable by death. If you are interested in this specific situation, I suggest The Message of Matthew by Michael Green, pp.171-172.

In the limited space, I want to ask, “Where today have we created religious traditions/laws that in essence violate God’s Law? And further, for those situations, are we speaking up, or are we afraid to offend?”

Many churches today teach “norms of behavior” as “religious law”. Sin is blessed. Religious law is modified and backfit to match the prevailing attitudes of society.

When we do this, when we twist and contort our religious laws to the point where they nullify God’s Law, we are hypocrites—mere actors pretending to worship the Living God.

What is equally worse is many of us are silent—we don’t want to offend. 

And when religious leaders do not speak up, we put those under our charge in spiritual peril—all because we don’t want to offend. 

May God give us the grace and strength to speak and call others home to Jesus.