Matthew 23:27-28 NRSVue

²⁷“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful but inside are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of uncleanness. ²⁸So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

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Some thoughts on this scripture

Reflection
Looking good is no trivial matter; it worries a lot of us. Most women say they feel worse about their own looks after reading women's magazines. In the western world women use up to 20 cosmetic products a day. British consumers spend £5billion a year on cosmetics. From the age of nine, boys and girls are spending money to smell and look different.

Reflection
Thank you, Lord, for reminding me that looks -- including the looks of respectability and righteousness -- do not matter. What am I like inside?

Reflection
Jesus often criticises hypocrisy in the gospel. Hypocrisy is found in people who don't practice what they preach, who ‘act' the gospel rather than live it out, and who stress externals to the loss of the interior fullness of religion. Jesus regularly critiques a religion that focuses on externals only, on people who practice faith for show. Hypocrisy can kill the spirit within us.