After Jesus had feed the 4,000 he gets in a boat with the Apostles to go to the other side. As He enters the boat he gives them this warning:

Mr 8:15 And Jesus <repeatedly and expressly> charged and admonished them, saying, Look out; keep on your guard and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod and the Herodians.

He was warning them of two systems of belief that were likened to leaven. Leaven as you know is the yeast that is put into our bread that makes it light and fluffy. After being add to the flour and sugar the yeast begins to digest the sugar and starts to multiply. This multiplication causes the dough to rise until every part of it is thoroughly incorporated into the mixture. After the yeast is added there is no way to separate it out of the dough. Leaven in the Bible is likened to sin by Paul:

1Co 5:6 Your glorying [is] not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?

Jesus warned them about the leaven of the Pharisees, because He did not want it to get into the minds and lives of His disciples. To find out what Jesus was talking about I read every exchange of communication between Jesus and the Pharisees. I also read the infamous rebuke that Jesus proclaimed against them which I refer to as “The Woes”.

After reading all those scriptures I came to this definition of what I believe the leaven of the Pharisees are:

It is the clinging to outward religious forms and not dealing with the inner hidden sin.  No matter how pious or orthodox it might seem it is the worship of religion = self and not of the Living God.

We are constantly in a struggle with trying to live a godly life in the midst of this ever declining moral climate.  No matter where we live there is a constant pressure from what I believe are evil spiritual forces that try to get us to listen to the lust of our baser selves or our old man.  When the Scriptures tell us to put off this old man with its deceitful lust we can easily become overwhelmed by this seemly impossible task. Sometimes it is just easier to put on an outward display of holiness and righteousness then deal with those deeply engrained behaviors that need to change (the Leaven of the Pharisees).

The problem with that is sin is like leaven and it will begin to multiply unless it is killed. Our old nature doesn’t want to be ignored even though it was defeated when we were baptized into Christ. The hardest thing for us to understand is how to kill or put to death our old man. Remember that the old man was in bondage to sin and Paul likens sin to leaven. The sure way to kill leaven is with heat. Heat will kill it and cause it not to grow anymore. When the Jews offered up sacrifices they burned them with fire on an altar. Paul gives us this admonition:

Ro 12:1 ¶ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, [which is] your reasonable service.

We present our bodies to God as a living sacrifice. So how does it get burned up? Is that our responsibility in offering ourselves to God? NO, and NO!! We offer our lives to God and He is the one that will apply the fire to consume the offering. Our responsibility is to keep our lives in that constant state of being an offering. Remember the Leaven of the Pharisees was the worship of religion and self, not of God.  The focus was on their accomplishments in regard to holiness. It is sometimes so tempting to compare our accomplishments to others, so we can feel good about our self. But Paul warned us; 2Co 10:12 ¶ Not that we <have the audacity to> venture to class or <even to> compare ourselves with some who exalt and furnish testimonials for themselves! However, when they measure themselves with themselves and compare themselves with one another, they are without understanding and behave unwisely.  This behavior is borne out of not understanding the true working of God’s mercy and grace, which are the outward manifestation of His unsearchable, incomprehensible love.

As the offering cannot of itself burn on the altar, unless the priest sets the wood under it on fire, so we cannot of ourselves accomplish anything without the helping hand of His Grace. Here are the first verses of an old song that clearly states the importance of His Grace;

Only by grace can we enter

Only by grace can we stand

Not by our human endeavour

But by the blood of the Lamb

The heat that God applies to our living sacrifice is the fire of His passion for us. That fire lights a fire in us that causes us to grow in our understanding of His love.

Have a great day!!