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Christ Lamenting Over Jerusalem oil on canvas, 1846 Sir Charles Lock Eastlake, England Tate Gallery, London, Gift of Robert Vernon, 1846

A Regretful Pharisee

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At that very hour
some Pharisees came and said to him,
‘Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.’
He said to them, ‘Go and tell that fox for me,
“Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow,
and on the third day I finish my work.
Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way,
because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed away from Jerusalem.”

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets
and stones those who are sent to it!
How often have I desired to gather your children together
as a hen gathers her brood under her wings,
 and you were not willing!
See, your house is left to you.
And I tell you, you will not see me
until the time comes when you say,
“Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.”

Scripture | Story | Prayer

A Regretful Pharisee

There was a time when Pharisees were respected, when we were treated with dignity and reverence. We were the keepers of the law, the experts on living on a godly life, a righteous life. Like many of you, we are highly educated, deeply devoted, good people. We were convinced that we knew what was right and what was wrong. It was all there in the Torah. Looking back on everything that happened, it is both ironic and embarrassing that those of us who had devoted our lives to God’s law were so opposed to Jesus, who, I now believe, was sent to embody God’s law, to redefine morality in remarkable ways.

I’ll give you an example: Pharisees spent a lot of time protecting the Sabbath. After all, it is clearly written: “You shall observe the Sabbath and keep it holy.” That is plain enough. Well, Jesus came along and challenged us with the idea that the Sabbath was created for us, not the other way around. In other words, it is intended to be a gift, not a burden. If then, for instance, someone needs medical attention on the Sabbath, the commandment to keep the Sabbath should not stand in the way of anyone receiving it. That is what Jesus preached and lived.

Another important example. We, meaning the Pharisees, were completely wrapped up in the idea of purity. We strove to be pure in body and soul. In our defense, the scroll of Leviticus is an unequivocal if not cumbersome directive to live purely before God. The problem is that we thought the call to purity was more important than anything else and furthermore, that, in order to retain religious purity, we were required to stay away from people we thought of as sinners.

There are no words adequate to describe how appalled we were by the fact that Jesus regularly spent time with, even shared meals with certain unclean people, people we thought of as sick. Jesus, in turn, treated us as if we were the sick ones. It was enormously confusing. He called us blind fools, hypocrites, vipers. It hit me hardest when he referred to us as white-washed tombs, implying that we were painted clean on the outside but were rotten on the inside. I didn’t know quite what to do with such perplexing accusations.

Now, I can’t speak for all Pharisees but some of us wanted to understand Jesus. It is true that some wanted only to expose him as a fraud. But others of us spent considerable time watching him and listening to him, struggling to figure him out. Contrary to public opinion in your day, not every Pharisee is stubbornly set in his ways.

Jesus knew that. Personally, I was eager to study him, to comprehend his radically new approach to Godly living.

Interestingly, I began to learn from Jesus only after I gave up trying to make sense of him with my head alone. As a teacher of the law I am often wrapped, some would say trapped in the intellect. Jesus preached a law that is not written primarily in the mind but rather, on the heart. He loved people. He embraced them, taught them, healed them, encouraged them. The love of God lived in him. That fact was unavoidable, even to us blind fools and whitewashed tombs. And that love was never more obvious than when we found him weeping over Jerusalem, the beloved city.

The name ‘Jerusalem’ means ‘house of peace’ and yet, it has never been a house of peace. It is supposed to be the happy home of God’s people but it has always been conflicted and, sadly, tragically, remains so today. It is supposed to be the seat of the prophets and yet, prophets have regularly met untimely deaths in Jerusalem and Jesus, who defined himself as a prophet, was no exception.

Jesus cried out to Jerusalem with compassion and woe. I have to be honest with you. I never heard first-hand the heart-wrenching words that Luke places in Jesus’ mouth:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”

But I witnessed Jesus’ tender tears for the troubled city of Jerusalem. He wept for what Jerusalem might have been, might yet be. He wept because Jerusalem was supposed to be a place where God’s glory could shine brightly. And, of course, he wept because he knew a number of powerful people in Jerusalem were out to get him.

Chief among his enemies stood Herod who had already brutally eliminated John called the Baptist. Jesus’ tears were as a prayer. That is, in part, why I went to see him that day. Some of us wanted to warn him Herod was out for blood. He was surprisingly unafraid, unwilling to compromise himself, loath to run away even if it meant death. He could have saved himself, you know. Most of us, even the most hypocritical among us, did not want him to die. If only he had heeded our warning. If only he had been a little more conciliatory. If only he had listened.

The bottom line is that most people were not ready for him. Most people were not prepared to meet the demands of such painfully comprehensive love. Most people were not willing to give up the old ways of doing things, the old ways of determining right from wrong, pure from impure, the old way of thinking about what God expects from us, hopes from us.

The question I leave with you is this: Are you ready? Are you ready to abandon everything else you’ve ever learned and lean on the wisdom, grace, and instruction Jesus continues to offer freely. Are you willing to meet him face to face and, instead of encouraging him to get lost, which is what I did, are you willing to meet him face to face and lose yourself in him?

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You are welcome to use these narratives for worship or study but please give the author, Sarah M. Foulger, credit for the writing - and consider making a contribution to Seasons of Change, a non-profit mental health agency in Edgecomb, Maine. Send contributions of any amount to Seasons of Change/ P.O. Box 277/Edgecomb, Maine 04556.

Sarah M. Foulger may be contacted at: sarahfoulger@gmail.com