Jesus was invited to dinner at the home of a leader of the Pharisees. Jesus accepted the invitation just as many churches and organisations accommodate evangelism. The invitation highlights theological and missiological traps against evangelism. The Pharisees’ invitation suggests a domesticated mindset and practice of sharing love as a flawed theological and missiological trapdoor to date. The Pharisees’ open invitation was not without guided toleration and access to their prideful knowledge of the law and financial resources to organise a free meal. Pharisees do not give free meals; instead, they use people in the name of loving people.

Theology and missiology inform and affect how we live, relate, lead, how we seek to win others for Jesus, and how we think about God, mankind, the Church, and the Great Commission. If theology informs our hearts and minds rightly, it directs our mission as active witnesses for Jesus Christ. The Pharisees’ theological and missiological thinking is not just tragic and counter to the Great Commission; it is a trap, that is, an error in thinking and opposition to Jesus and His ways of healing on the Sabbath. These traps erode the passion, confidence, and motivation for consistent evangelism as a lifestyle among church workers and members. The reflection is, why are the Pharisees insecure to take on difficult people like Jesus and His followers, but could maintain a bent woman for 18 years and the man suffering from dropsy?

Sadly, Jesus was hardly a polite dinner guest, just as His Gospel and evangelism are not a politically correct message, either on the Sabbath or not. In evangelism, it is not about the free meal or seating in the highest place, but engaging with people with heart dis-ease just as Jesus did. No sooner had He walked in the door than He saw, right in front of Him, a man suffering from dropsy. Dropsy, also called edema, is a swelling of the joints or the whole body, often due to a faulty heart or to diseased kidneys or liver.’ Jesus’ acceptance of the invitation from the ruler of the Pharisees shows the urgency and the need for a rapid response to evangelism today.

Spiritually and physically, there are many bent members in our churches today, like the man suffering from dropsy in Luke 14 and the bent woman in Luke 13, hence the urgency of evangelism. Opposition to Jesus and evangelism will always come from the leaders of the temple and institution who are happy to keep members with their heart issues and spiritually crippled members warming the pew for many years, even as leaders, choirs, and committee members with motions without movement. The Pharisees had no solution to the man’s and woman’s problems because they were just ceremonial leaders and held the office for personal security reasons. They were ignorant of the truth about Jesus. Ignorance of the truth leads to the failure of a home, church, or nation. Truth is no respecter of person or nation. Truth delivers. Truth brings salvation and healing. The same truth that brought healing to the man suffering from dropsy and the bent woman in the temple is what the temple leaders lacked.

Truth confers powers and increases our faith. No truth, no power or faith. God is no respecter of persons, Pharisees, or nations, but in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him.’ Faith shaped by truth confers divinity on humanity. Every man’s or woman’s mountain is ignorance (Hosea 4:6). People, churches, and nations are in captivity because they have no knowledge and encounter with Jesus (Is 5:13). Faith comes not just by hearing God’s word but by hearing directly from God. Access to God’s Word is the stronghold of faith. No one hears from God and doubts Him. His voice is mightier as exemplified by the healing of the man with dropsy and the bent woman. There is a difference between hearing from God and merely hearing God’s word. Moses, Paul, Wesley, and others dared to challenge the institution because they heard from God directly in truth and Spirit.

The Pharisees had a motive of inviting Jesus, just as many church institutions today have a motive of making evangelism a department and not a duty for every church leader and member. Evangelism is not just for socialising. Jesus did not just go and socialise or warm the pew. He went with a sense and passion of mission, always doing His Father’s business, prepared to speak out boldly for God. If you do not have the same missional sense as Jesus amidst the Pharisees or church institutions, you will end up compromising your faith and eternal future.

The Pharisees are always driven by pride and self-serving motives, unfriendly to Jesus and the works of evangelism; they are looking for something to accuse Jesus of or evangelism, specifically for violating the church laws. The Pharisees are very strategic in their opposition to evangelism. They place a man suffering from heart dis-ease at the meal, thereby creating a situation where Jesus would be forced to choose between breaking the Sabbath or ignoring a suffering person. What is important to the man is not the free meal but holistic healing from Jesus.

Jesus did not fail to disappoint and confront the Pharisees in their sea of theological and missiological errors, as well as religious hypocrisy; they were watching Him closely, out to get Him (Lk 14:1-6). The Pharisees, as the guardians of the faith, but lacked the truth, waited to catch Jesus in an error, but did not watch themselves closely. The major challenge facing evangelism today is when you have guardians of faith who lack the truth and oppose it. Jesus called them hypocrites.

Hypocrisy and pride are related sins. Hypocrites target and try to bring down anyone who confronts their sin with the Word of God through evangelism. The Pharisees, just as the institutions, care more about their manmade rules than about people’s salvation or being right before God in their hearts. Evangelism, as a heart issue, prioritises inward righteousness over the Pharisees’ external conformity. The Pharisees can bend the rules for their own purposes, just as institutions have ways to circumvent the rules when they need to rescue their own son or ox from a pit on the Sabbath, but no healing is allowed on the Sabbath. 

The Pharisees ignored overwhelming evidence to maintain their institution, thereby persisting in their sin, pride, and opposition. As usual, they ignored the evidence of Jesus’ miraculous healing of the bent woman and the man suffering from a heart problem (Lk 4 31-39; 6:6-11). The Pharisees’ motive for inviting and accommodating Jesus was not to learn from Him. In evangelism, there comes a time as a challenge head-on, just as Jesus asked the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?’ Evangelism puts the church institution on the defensive just as Jesus put the Pharisees in a bind. They could not concede to Jesus’ healing ministry, as this would raise problems about their theology, leadership, positions, and traditions. Evangelism challenges institutional and leadership hypocrisies just as Jesus asked the Pharisees ‘a rhetorical question to underscore His point: “Which one of you shall have a son or an ox fall into a well, and will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?” Jesus is saying, “If your son, or for that matter, even your ox, falls into a well on the Sabbath, you wouldn’t hesitate to pull him (or it) out. Yet you want to let this man go on in his suffering!” In other words, they cared about their animals more than about this man. Jesus was exposing their lack of love and their religious hypocrisy.’

We live in a day and age where the temple leaders like the Pharisees and Christian psychologists assume the doctrine of self-esteem is a basic “Christian” belief. The Bible clearly teaches self-denial, not self-esteem. The Word of God, evangelism, and Jesus confront us continually with our sin to receive eternal life (2 Tim 3:16).