Jesus warns against looking good, but being dead and filthy.
Matthew 23:27-28 27 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth. 28 So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
These religious people were great at being religious. They studied and memorized scripture. They followed their religious rules without fail. They evangelized and did good deeds. They appeared to be beautiful monuments - like tombs cleaned up and whitewashed before the Passover Celebration, but inside they were dead and source of disease to others.
Even with all their rule following, Jesus calls them "lawless."
Do we ignore Jesus' warning not to put on a good appearance when inside we are dead and disease ridden?
If following Jesus is not about following all the trappings of religion - then what is it about? Jesus describes it here as having clean hearts. But how are our hearts transformed from death and filth to beauty? The Pharisees were "good" people - I can guarantee we probably aren't as "good". And all their trying added up to nothing but death and filth. I'd be getting ahead of the gospel, but Jesus has a plan for transforming our hearts...
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