The Heart of the Matter is the Matter of the Heart

Many years ago, I met an elderly lady in our neighborhood. People said she was a good Christian and knew the Bible thoroughly. I was impressed. She held a Bible study group in her house, and people came to listen to her teaching.

However, my perception was shaken when I heard about her strained relationship with her in-laws. Given her role as a Bible teacher, I had assumed she was in the right. Yet, when I met her in-laws, I discovered they were devout Christians. I didn’t know who was wrong and who was right, but it disturbed me to see Christians don’t get along with Christians.

One day, someone brought her to our church. Since her church is much farther away in another town, it was much more convenient for her to attend our church. After a communion service, she said we shouldn’t use the normal bread because bread has yeast, which symbolizes sin in the Bible. As Jesus said,

“Watch out—beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.” (Mk 8:15b).

Respecting her age and biblical scholarship, we tried to accommodate her by changing the bread to matzo since it’s even simpler to prepare. However, a few months later, she left the church despite our hospitality. Later, I learned she didn’t just couldn’t get along with her in-laws but almost everyone around her.

I was naïve thinking someone who knows the Bible would be the most gracious person. In fact, in the Bible, we see Pharisees who treated the Bible seriously and taught the Bible to others. They were quite difficult to get along. Their heads were filled with biblical knowledge, but their hearts were rotten. They eventually crucified Christ.

Have you ever wondered how a person can be so religious and so vicious? It serves as a warning to all of us. With all the warnings Jesus gave us, why do some Christians still become like Pharisees? It’s a reminder that we, too, can fall into the trap of righteousness without grace. Jesus said,

“For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 5:20).

It was a tall order because the Pharisees were strict practitioners of righteousness. The Hebrew term “righteousness” is quite complex because it means fulfilling God’s commandments. But Jesus made it simple with the Great Commandment, covering the Old Testament: Love God and love people—nothing more and nothing less.

In other words, if we don’t have love, nothing matters. Even if we can recite the Bible from cover to cover, we miss the kingdom of heaven. As Paul put it impactfully,

“If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.” (1 Co 13:1–3).

Paul was a recovering Pharisee, and he knew what the Pharisees had missed. Their heads were full of biblical laws, but their hearts were short of divine love. As Jesus said, we cannot enter heaven without love.

Do you know the distance between heaven and hell? It’s just about 18” apart—the distance between your head and your heart. It’s upside down, of course. Heaven is where your heart is, and hell is where your head is. Interestingly, all four of these words start with “h.”

This doesn’t mean biblical knowledge is unimportant. It is vital for our lives but must go beyond our heads and flow to our hearts. When the Bible goes to our heads, it becomes knowledge. When it enters our hearts, it becomes wisdom.

Today’s scripture lesson taught us about Jesus’ encounter with the Pharisees, who criticized Jesus’ disciples for breaking the rabbinic law. But Jesus revealed that the heart of the matter is the matter of the heart. This story allows us to self-search and evaluate our hearts to see whether our hearts are in the right place according to God’s law. Let’s begin!