Welcome and thank you for taking a bible break to test your knowledge of God's word. This week's question:

The Law of Moses, given by God through angels (Hebrews 2:2), was the schoolmaster to the New Testament Law (Galatians 3:24-25). The prophecies of the Old Testament were to be fulfilled by the coming Messiah, so that the Hebrews would recognize the time of His visitation and He for who He truly would be, the Son of God, the Christ.

That brings us to our question, "Who seats themselves in Moses' chair?". As Jesus walked this earth, He performed many miracles before the eyes of the multitudes as well as the religious leaders of the Jewish society. Interestingly enough, those Jewish leaders who studied the scriptures to find life everlasting, as well as teach the common people of Israel, such as Nicodemus, had trouble understanding many of the things that Jesus spoke (John 3:1-21). Those that saw miracles such the man who was blind from birth, receive his sight on a Sabbath day at the bidding of Jesus, and the Pharisees who were told of this miracle by Jesus said, "This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath." (John 9:16). The Pharisees told the blind man, "And they reviled him, and said, 'You are His disciple, but we are disciple of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses; but as for this man, we do not know where He is from.' The man answered and said to them, 'Well, here is an amazing thing, that you do not know where He is from and yet He opened my eyes. We know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is God-fearing, and does His will, He hears him. Since the beginning of time it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. If this man were not from God, He could do nothing.' They answered and said to him, 'You were born entirely in sins, and you are teaching us?' And they put him out." (John 9:28-34).

As we see, a beggar is teaching the truth to the Jewish leaders and they put him out of the Synagogue. Even the demons recognize Jesus of Nazareth and even speak openly of His as the "Holy One of God" and, "And demons also were coming out of many saying, ' You are the Son of God!' And rebuking them, He would not allow them to speak, because they knew He was the Christ." (Luke 4:34 & 41). The Jewish leaders charged that He cast out the demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons, none other than Satan himself (Mark 3:22). As Jesus often spoke in parables (Luke 18:9-14),used figures of speech (John 10:6), and referred to Himself as the Son of Man (John 12:34), Jesus was cornered and questioned by the Jewish leaders who asked Him, "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, Tell us plainly.' Jesus answered them 'I told you , and you do not believe; the work's that I do in My Father's name, these bear witness of Me. …I and the Father are one.'" (John 10:24-25 & 30).

When Jesus spoke these words, they picked up stones to stone Him because to them He spoke blasphemy by making Himself out to be God. Jesus even raised some from the dead, such as Lazarus, which caused no small stir among all the Jews, and while the multitudes were more convicted in Him as well as many of the Jewish leaders were believing in Him (John 12:45 & 12:42-43), the leaders comments were, "What are we doing? For this man is performing many signs. If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." "You see that we are doing no good; look, the world has gone after Him." (John 11:47-48 & 12:19). What a pitiful, self serving cry, and they planned all the more to kill Him as well as Lazarus who was raised from the dead to silence His act (John 11:53 & 12:9-11).

And so to answer our question, we turn to the book of Matthew, where we read, "Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying, 'The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses; Therefore all that they tell you to do, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things, and do not do them. And they tie up heavy loads, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger. But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries, and lengthen the tassels of their garments. And they love the place of honor at banquets, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and respectful greetings in the market places, and being called by men, Rabbi. But do not be called Rabbi; for One is your teacher, and you are all brothers. Do not call anyone on earth father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. And do not be called leaders; for One is your Leader, that is Christ. But the greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself shall be humbled; and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted. But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from men; for you do not enter yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in." (Matthew 23:1-13).

And so there we have the answer to our question, as the scribes and Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses as they do not do the writings of the Law and have elevated themselves above everyone including the Christ Himself, demanding signs above what were provided (Luke 11:16), challenged the authority of His words (Luke 20:1-2), charged Him because He healed on the Sabbath (Luke 14:1-6), charged that He did not keep their traditions (Matthew 15:1-2), counseled together to trap Him (Matthew 22:15-17), gave false testimony on which to accuse Jesus at His trial (Mark 14:56), and finally, delivered up the Christ to Pilate because of envy (Mark 15:10)! And only to their own destruction, both physically and spiritually (Matthew 23:27-39). Let us lay aside our preconceived notions and hold fast to the word for life!