God is not interested in your piousness. He is interested in your heart!
We can become so preoccupied with external rules and regulations in the church that we forget the principles behind them.
The Pharisees would meticulously strain out the smallest unclean insect—the gnat—with a cloth filter before drinking liquids, especially wine. However, Jesus said they would easily swallow a large unclean animal—a camel. Jesus was exaggerating a point to illustrate how much the Pharisees had neglected justice, mercy, and faith.
Matthew 23:23-24
23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. 24 Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!
42 “But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass by justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.
Luke 11:42
22 So Samuel said: “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, As in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, And to heed than the fat of rams.
1 Samuel 15:22
6 For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, And the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
Hosea 6:6
8 He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?
Micah 6:
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