While all the people were listening, Jesus said to his disciples, "Beware of the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows' houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely." (Luke 20:45-47)   There is a sense in which much of our evangelical world can fit under Jesus' is warning here in this passage.  So much of the things that have driven our practices and our passions these past years have been a desire to grow the church, to compete with the secular world, and to prove the greatness of God by the greatness of our churches and preaching and the spectacles that we can pull off.  But, it is exactly those sorts of things that Jesus warns his disciples to beware of here.  And, of course it's not just the evangelicals that that have this problem: many of us are tempted to the same.  But Jesus notes that some of what's underneath this show, flash, and pizazz—are things like the seven deadly sins that we've been talking about in our Sunday worship services. You can hear in this passage examples of things like pride.  "They like to have flowing robes and love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets," Jesus says.  There is also here the sin of greed: "they devour widows houses."  "Give more!" they say, "give more!" Perhaps even more than you're able to give, all so that I can build my empire.   Jesus warns us against these things and tells us that these men will be punished most severely.  Indeed these sins lead to all sorts of things that distract and that actually take away from what we show up in the church for.  We show up in the church to hear a word from God, a word of grace, a word of compassion, a word that meets us in our need and that is humble enough to meet us where we are.  Jesus does exactly that and his church should too. Ministers and leaders like myself have to hear this text and always weigh ourselves against it.  As James says in his letter, those of us who teach have to be careful for we will be judged more strictly.  But passages like this are a warning to all of us—not just against the temptations that some of these Pharisees and teachers of law had given themselves into of pride and greed, but we are also warned not to follow those who follow these sins of pride and greed and whatever else.   Jesus says: "I have a humble Kingdom and this is not necessarily what it looks like and so if you see these things—ministers and churches that like to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted with respect in the business world and have the most important seats in the places of honor—beware of such things."   Beware, and always remember that Jesus came to us humbly and that his work of humbly giving himself up at the cross is eventually what saves us, not greatness in our own eyes.  

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