Editor’s Note: This is a transcript of an audio talk, lightly edited by Claude AI. Misspellings have been corrected, sentences and paragraphs have been formed for readability, and scripture quotations have been highlighted. Banter, interjections, and informal asides are marked with [Banter/Aside] where they occur. The content and theology are entirely those of the speaker.

Luke 7:29–35 — Bible Study Talk

The People and Publicans Who Justified God (vv. 29–30)

So, we are in Luke 7 again, and Jesus had finished talking about John the Baptist. I think we are going from verse 29 or so — is that right? [Banter/Aside]

“And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptised with the baptism of John.” — Luke 7:29

And the publicans — so “all the people” means everyone, especially and including, up to and including, the publicans. And of course, the publicans were a hated group. A despised group.

The crowds that had gone out to see John had also come to see Jesus. This was part of John’s ministry: to prepare the way. And he did — he stirred up the remembrance of the Old Testament prophecies. He said, “Look, there is somebody coming after me whose shoe laces I am unworthy to untie,” and sure enough, the people were on the lookout for Him. Some of these people came by faith. Others came for more cynical and self-serving reasons.

And incidentally, the Pharisees sent a delegation to John, asking, “Are you the one? Are you the Messiah?” It is interesting why that should be, and why they never sent a delegation to Jesus. It was because John was related to an important priest, and what these Pharisees recognised, amongst other things, was priestly official standing — what you might call denominational or ecclesiastical rank. They thought, “Oh, this is impressive. We have to deal with this.” Whereas Jesus had none of that. He only had all His works, His lineage, and the prophecies. But the Pharisees thought very little of these things. They were only concerned with the ecclesiastical realm and rank therein.

They did not acknowledge Jesus as king. That is the crux of what they would not acknowledge.

“We will not have this man to rule over us.”

That they would not have. And in modern times, there are those who only see Jesus in His role as priest — only that — and will cry heresy and cry that something is not right, that “this is not the gospel,” if you present Him in the guise of a prophet. What does a prophet do? He speaks in terms of the covenant. He speaks in terms of covenant sanctions. He speaks in terms of law. There is no prophet that does not refer to those things. And this the Pharisee does not like.

Why? Because the Pharisee has laws of his own — laws that he and his ecclesiastical circle have made up, and which tie the people to them. And of course, they do not like Him as king either, because a king rules according to law, and again that takes things outside the control — bear that word in mind — the control of the ecclesiastical establishment.

”Justified God” — What Does That Mean?

“And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptised with the baptism of John.” — Luke 7:29

What does it mean to “justify God”? Are they saying God was unjust, and now by some action they make Him just? Well, of course not. They are saying, rather, that God is just. God is right. How so? He is right in His prophecy through John the Baptist — right in what John reiterates, right in relation to Jesus. “Yes, this is God.” All the words He speaks in terms of baptism and repentance are right, and we say amen to God. So they justified God — they said a great “Yes” to God, a yes that included agreeing with God’s assessment of their own sin.

Because what was John the Baptist’s message? Thank you, Tiff. [Banter/Aside] In a negative sense: flee from the coming wrath. It was a message of repentance — make straight the paths for the Lord, your paths are crooked, make them straight. Repent. And it was a specific word given to the Roman soldiers, that they should not extort people, and to tax collectors, that they should take no more. But what was there for the Pharisees from the mouth of John?

“O you brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?” — Luke 3:7

Quite different.

The Trinity and the Spirit in Christ

So the same spirit that was in John that enabled him to be a prophet was, of course, in the Lord Jesus Christ — because the Lord Jesus Christ was anointed with the Spirit. The Spirit is with the Son and the Father; with the Father is the Spirit and the Son; with the Son is the Spirit and the Father. The way I have heard it expressed is that the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the Father — each of them fully contains the other members. And:

“…the fullness of the Godhead bodily dwelleth…” — Colossians 2:9

So the fullness of the Godhead is in the Spirit, the fullness of the Godhead is in the Son, and the fullness of the Godhead is in the Father. This is the mystery of the Trinity. This is the answer to so many questions.

But — The Pharisees and Lawyers (v. 30)

But as opposed to these people who received humbly the message of their own sin and their need of repentance, comes a “but.”

“But the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, being not baptised of him.” — Luke 7:30

This group is apart. It will not receive. It will not say yes to God. And we are to beware of that spirit.

“Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees…” — Luke 12:1

Do the Pharisees represent only people in the state? Well, there are Pharisees in the state, of course. But the Pharisee spirit is, above else, a self-righteous spirit. And of course, are they going to receive a word that says that they are in sin and need a Saviour? No.

And then there are the lawyers — experts in the law — who, like the Pharisees, had set aside the law of God by their traditions and rejected the counsel of God. So God says through His prophets: “I say this, this, and this. You are to flee from the coming wrath.” And the Pharisee says: “We will decide who flees from the coming wrath. Thank you very much.”

Now, I know what it is like to reject a specific counsel of God to myself, and I will be a Pharisee in those moments. [Aside] That Pharisee spirit — the one that wants to justify myself by criticising others, saying “Well, look at me” while making myself the standard — that is an example of the Pharisee spirit at work in someone who is genuinely a Christian. Beware. It will lead you to damnation, if at all possible.

But the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the counsel of God. Can you imagine the arrogance of rejecting the counsel of God? But if you are knowingly in sin, that is exactly what you are doing. Being not baptised of him — they said, “Look, we are clean already. What need have we of washing?” And this is what the Pharisee spirit says: “I am clean.” It refuses to hear the counsel of God that says, “Wash yourselves. Be clean.” Instead, it says, “Well, look at the other man down the road — he is dirty. I am clean.”

Children in the Marketplace (vv. 31–32)

And the Lord said:

“Whereunto then shall I liken the men of this generation? And to what are they like?” — Luke 7:31

He is speaking here of verse 30 — the Pharisees and lawyers — rather than of the publicans, who were themselves humble and had no great respect amongst the people.

What are they like? Are they awesome? Tremendously impressive? People really seeking after God? Is that what He says? Well, in some senses Jesus does say:

“…except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.” — Matthew 5:20

But it is a rather different tone here. They are not like King Solomon in all his wisdom, nor like King David going out to war. No.

“They are like unto children sitting in the marketplace, and calling one to another, and saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned to you, and ye have not wept.” — Luke 7:32

These serious people — these unsmiling people. Remember where we have seen them before: at the peripheries, looking in. They are too serious to be engaged in feasting; they are looking in, criticising. Jesus healing, healing, healing — they are very suspicious of life. Life is too serious a business for them. They are interested in principles and in religious practice. All this healing and life-giving business is, to them, trivial.

They are like children. And that is something to consider — that the pharisaic spirit, the Pharisees of our own generation, are big babies. They think of themselves as tremendous intellects, tremendously pious people, people to be taken seriously, weighty people. But how does Jesus handle them? He says they are like children sitting in the marketplace.

They are in the marketplace — at the centre, where people are. Jesus said:

“…when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret…” — Matthew 6:6

But the Pharisees are in the marketplace where they can be seen. They are children in the marketplace, not actually participating in the real business of the marketplace — just imagining they are playing at business. [Aside] I suppose in our day that would be like little children being wheeled around the supermarket, reaching for the biscuits, saying “I want a biscuit” or “I want a cheese pizza.” [Banter/Aside] Not a very flattering picture. Not at all. This is Jesus’s divine assessment of these grieved, self-righteous people.

Calling to One Another — The Pharisee Echo Chamber

“…calling one to another…” — Luke 7:32

Who are they speaking to? They are speaking to themselves. Oh, they have journals. They have podcasts. [Aside] Pharisees echoing unto Pharisees. We have podcasts, don’t you know. We have got journals, don’t you know. The Pharisee Weekly. Pharisee Monthly. Scottish Rite Pharisee — I do not know what it is. [Banter/Aside]

And they are complaining — talking to one another, complaining about the people: “The people do not get it. They just do not understand.”

“We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned to you, and ye have not wept.” — Luke 7:32

“We are the ones who call the tune. We are the piper. When we say dance, you better dance.” What is dancing? It is joy, it is celebration. “When we say you should be joyful, you had better be joyful.” Very interesting.

You would imagine with the Pharisees it would be about teaching — “You haven’t understood our teaching” — but no, it is about control of emotions. And isn’t this often the way with this pietistic church movement? They want to control your emotions. The burden is that church life is properly expressed in regulated emotions.

I have thought about this before, and it is worth considering. [Aside] Are not the worship songs set up to tug on the heartstrings this way and that — be happy, be sad? And is not the sermon often designed to take you on an emotional roller coaster? I had never thought about this before. But the Pharisees are not just intellectual figures — they are figures who want to control your emotions. And if we have allowed our emotions to be controlled by the wrong group, perhaps this is what we should be wary of. This is the leaven of the Pharisees. This is how it gets into the system — through the emotions. This is relevant stuff.

And they are using music:

“We have piped unto you…” — Luke 7:32

That is interesting. The organ, which was an instrument used in Jewish synagogues, was rejected after the temple’s destruction because it was deemed too joyful — “the temple is gone, there is nothing to be joyful for, we are in mourning.” Emotional manipulators.

We must guard our hearts against mourning for the wrong things and being joyful for the wrong things. We should mourn for the right things — sin, death in the world, injustice as defined by God’s law. And we should rejoice for the right things. And in a biblical way, we are not to cut off our emotions — we are to sanctify them. Joy, weeping, mourning — these must be brought under the discipline of the Word.

So they want to control people in the affective domain — the domain of emotions, as exemplified by rejoicing on the one hand and mourning on the other.

John the Baptist: He Hath a Devil (v. 33)

“For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath a devil.” — Luke 7:33

Here is John, not rejoicing outwardly, living on the more austere level. He is in the mourning phase, you could say. He is denying himself. And what is the assessment of the Pharisees? “He hath a devil.”

How does one assess whether someone has a devil? Well, they shriek, they may have superhuman strength, they seek to destroy the person who hosts them. There was plenty of this in their own time, since Jesus discovered and healed many who were demon possessed, even within the synagogues. So the Pharisees would have known well, in their demon-soaked age, what a devil-possessed man looked like.

Why then did they arrive at this ridiculous, non-sequitur conclusion — that John, because he did not live a lavish lifestyle but lived austerely in the desert with locusts and honey, had a devil? Locusts were clean insects — they had hinged feet with which they jumped. Wild honey is good. What is morally unjustifiable about any of that? Are they sticklers for the law of God? No — the law of God is irrelevant to them; they have set it aside by their traditions.

So then: is John the Baptist under their control? Far from it.

“O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” — Matthew 3:7

Is that somebody under their control? No. And he is not obeying the Pharisees in the affective domain either. When they say “be austere, be sad,” it is water off a duck’s back to John. When they say “dance,” he is not under their authority — he is under the authority of God and God’s law.

So what do the Pharisees and lawyers do? They attribute the worst possible interpretation. Having defined good and evil in terms of their own system — whether people respond to their calls for obedience in the emotional domain — if someone disobeys them there, they are evil. And John the Baptist’s pushback, and from a man with a tremendous following at that, threatens them deeply. They want that following. They are in the marketplace where people can hear them. And anybody who threatens that following — “That man is of the devil. He is causing people not to come to our church.” [Aside] Ouch.

The Son of Man Eating and Drinking (v. 34)

“The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners!” — Luke 7:34

Perhaps, if they did not like this austere man John the Baptist, they will like the opposite? Well, eating and drinking are pleasurable activities. Who does not like to eat and drink? He is not drinking lemonade — He is drinking wine and feasting.

And yet we often conceive of Jesus’s life as one of pure austerity. But here it is presented quite differently. Yes, He did bear our sins, and He came and experienced heartache and heartbreak at every moment, being away from the Father in His body, experiencing all the sin around Him. But at the same time, He was there, enjoying Himself in people’s company.

Is this not a rebuke to those of us who have a somewhat grim religious spirit, who frown upon spending time with people? Should we not imitate Jesus — the Son of Man who came eating and drinking? [Aside] For instance, when I was in Switzerland — in the Suisse romande, the French-speaking part — the food was great, the table wine, the aperitif, the digestif, maybe a champagne if you were lucky. Very convivial indeed. [Banter/Aside]

But of course Jesus is there for other reasons. He is not frowning in the corner. Who is frowning in the corner? The Pharisees. They are observing it all and tutting. Are we the observers and tutters? Not so the Son of Man. He is in the middle of it.

And who is He eating with? He is eating with the publicans, with the tax collectors. In Northern Ireland terms — are we willing to eat and drink with the other side of the house? Hmm. [Aside]

Behold — Gluttonous Man, Wine-Bibber

“Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber…” — Luke 7:34

Well, Buddha was fat — because he was a man who was wined and dined in various courts. Is this the picture of Jesus? No. He was either a stonemason or a carpenter — very tough, walked everywhere, and He carried the cross even after taking a tremendous beating. This was a man. A real man. Is He a gluttonous man? A wine-bibber, someone who takes too much wine? No. He was never drunk in His life. No way.

“A friend of publicans and sinners” — oh! Well, where in the Bible does it say this is wrong? Again, they have their own definition of right and wrong, and according to their definition, you should be happy and dancing on the one hand and mourning on the other. So we have a very different picture: the Pharisees on one hand, and the Spirit-filled man on the other.

The Spirit-Filled Ministry

If you are a Spirit-filled man exercising your ministry, you are going to be building an audience, and you are going to be giving joy to people, and you are also going to cause people to mourn. Because if you are saying “flee the wrath to come,” people are going to get on their knees and beat their breast — like the publican did — and say, “I am not worthy, I do not deserve it.” They are going to mourn.

And this is what the gospel commands us to do. But does it stop with mourning? Is it just a mourning gospel? No — it is a rejoicing gospel:

“Rejoice, and be exceeding glad…” — Matthew 5:12

“Blessed are ye…” — Luke 6:22

We have already heard that in the Sermon on the Mount.

This got the back of the Pharisees up because they say: when you should be happy, when you should rejoice — as opposed to when, according to the gospel, you should mourn and why you should mourn. They have a following they want to maintain and expand. But when you come in your Christian ministry, full of the Holy Spirit and directed by the Holy Spirit, if you have this outward-facing ministry, you are going to have people under you as disciples. And that is going to raise the ire of these Pharisees. They are not going to like it, and they are going to come after you with all sorts of accusations — ridiculous accusations, totally illogical, except within their own system. And they are not just going to go after the mind; they are going to go after something much more powerful: your emotions. They are going to hit you at the emotional level.

These are people predominantly within the church, as we are presented them here — very powerful religious figures who have some sway in the civil realm as well.

Wisdom Justified of Her Children (v. 35)

“But wisdom is justified of all her children.” — Luke 7:35

So if you are wise yourself — that is, if you fear God — you will come down on the right side. You will judge correctly. They justified God. So ultimately, what is the test? If you are on the side of the Pharisees, you say “jump” on command. But if you are on the side of the gospel, the law of God speaks — “who says jump, be happy, be sad, mourn and weep, rejoice” — and because you say amen to God, you say amen to God’s Word. It paints a very ugly picture of you. You say amen. It paints a picture of joy. You say amen. “I receive it by faith.”

So here is a very, very rich scripture that gives us a tremendous picture of who God is, of who the Pharisees are, of who God’s people are, of who the Holy Spirit is, of the necessity of having the Holy Spirit in us to direct us — even for conflict, and the conflicts of a whispering, accusatory kind.

May the Lord bless this examination, study, and meditation of the Word to our hearts. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Scriptures Referenced

ReferenceText / Context
Luke 7:29All the people and publicans justified God, being baptised with the baptism of John
Luke 7:30Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves
Luke 7:31–32Whereunto shall I liken the men of this generation… like children calling in the marketplace
Luke 7:33John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; ye say, He hath a devil
Luke 7:34The Son of man is come eating and drinking; ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners
Luke 7:35Wisdom is justified of all her children
Luke 3:7”O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” (John’s rebuke to the Pharisees)
Luke 12:1Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees
Matthew 3:7John’s rebuke: “O generation of vipers…”
Matthew 5:20”…except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees…”
Matthew 5:12”Rejoice, and be exceeding glad…”
Matthew 6:6”…when thou prayest, enter into thy closet…”
Luke 6:22”Blessed are ye…” (Beatitudes)
Colossians 2:9”…the fullness of the Godhead bodily dwelleth…”