Beware of the Leaven of the Pharisees
Renewing Your Mind
Ligonier Ministries
4.8 • 5.3K Ratings
🗓️ 21 April 2026
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Although the Pharisees devoted themselves to studying Scripture and making outward displays of piety, their understanding of righteousness was lacking. Today, R.C. Sproul challenges Christians to pursue true righteousness before God.
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Meet Today's Teacher:
R.C. Sproul (1939–2017) was founder of Ligonier Ministries, first minister of preaching and teaching at Saint Andrew's Chapel, first president of Reformation Bible College, and executive editor of Tabletalk magazine.
Renewing Your Mind is a donor-supported outreach of Ligonier Ministries. Explore all of our podcasts: https://www.ligonier.org/podcasts
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In our sanctification, it doesn't stay like that. |
| 0:03.8 | That the person who was declared to be just by faith, if that faith is in fact genuine, |
| 0:13.3 | and not just a claim to faith or a charade here, but that it's authentic faith, |
| 0:19.5 | then Christ will truly begin to be formed in that person's life, |
| 0:25.4 | and that person will begin to show forth the fruit of righteousness. |
| 0:36.4 | The Christian life is one of growth. Theologians call that sanctification. But are we as concerned |
| 0:43.7 | about pursuing righteousness as we ought to be? Do we take seriously Jesus' warning that |
| 0:49.0 | unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the |
| 0:53.8 | kingdom of heaven? Hello and welcome to this you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. |
| 0:55.0 | Hello and welcome to this edition of renewing your mind. I'm Lee Webb. |
| 0:59.0 | We need to take warnings like this from Jesus seriously, so how do we understand his warning |
| 1:05.0 | in light of the truth that we're justified not by our works, but by faith alone? |
| 1:10.0 | Here's Dr. Sproul now on the Christian's pursuit of righteousness. justified not by our works, but by faith alone. |
| 1:14.5 | Here's Dr. Sprold now on the Christian's pursuit of righteousness. |
| 1:25.5 | One of the questions that I hear frequently from people who are earnestly seeking to do the will of God is the question, what is the most important thing that God wants |
| 1:30.6 | for me in the Christian life? It's like the businessman who's always asking the question, |
| 1:36.2 | what's the bottom line? Let's cut through all of the details and the myriad possibilities |
| 1:41.7 | and the 1001 commandments. What is it that God really cares about in terms of the chief focus, |
| 1:49.0 | the chief goal, the chief end of the Christian life? |
| 1:53.0 | And what I'd like to do in this session is to focus on what I think |
| 1:57.0 | the Bible says is the answer to that question. |
| 2:09.1 | As I read the scriptures, it seems to me that the bottom line, the chief goal of the Christian life is righteousness. |
... |
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