Scripture Daily

Context No. 3555 of 4322 · Luke

Context · Reflection

Luke 11:45-54: in context

45One of the lawyers answered him, “Teacher, in saying this you insult us also.” 46He said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load men with burdens that are difficult to carry, and you yourselves won’t even lift one finger to help carry those burdens. 47Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. 48So you testify and consent to the works of your fathers. For they killed them, and you build their tombs. 49Therefore also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles; and some of them they will kill and persecute, 50that the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation, 51from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zachariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary.’ Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation. 52Woe to you lawyers! For you took away the key of knowledge. You didn’t enter in yourselves, and those who were entering in, you hindered.” 53As he said these things to them, the scribes and the Pharisees began to be terribly angry, and to draw many things out of him, 54lying in wait for him, and seeking to catch him in something he might say, that they might accuse him.

Jesus pronounces woes on the religious lawyers, the experts in the law, and the charges are searching. They loaded people down with heavy burdens, rules and requirements, but would not lift a finger to help carry them. They honored the dead prophets by building their tombs, while sharing the very spirit of the fathers who had killed them.

And one charge stands out among the rest: you have taken away the key of knowledge; you did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering. Entrusted with the Scriptures, the key that opens the door to God, they had so obscured and misused them that they kept people out, and stayed out themselves. It is a grave warning to anyone who handles God's truth: knowledge of Scripture is meant to open the door to God, not to become a barrier that keeps people from him. Those given the key are meant to use it to let others in, and to go in themselves, not to lock the door and guard it.

If I am entrusted with knowledge of God's truth, do I use it to open the door for others and enter myself, rather than letting it become a barrier that keeps people from God?

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