Well, our scripture reading today continues to come from the book of Mark, and that is found on page 842 in Mark chapter 7, if you're using the black Bibles that are provided for you. If you don't have a Bible, the passage is printed on the insert, on the outline insert that you can use to take notes if you so desire or if your parents have so desired for you. As is our custom at Hope of Christ, just in honor of the Word of God, I invite you to stand with me for the reading of God's Word. Mark chapter 7, the first 23 verses. Now, when the Pharisees gathered to Him with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of His disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands, holding to the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches. And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?" And he said to them, "'Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, hypocrites. As it is written, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men. And he said to them, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition. For Moses said, honor your father and your mother, and whoever reviles father or mother must surely die. But you say, if a man tells his father or his mother, whatever you would have gained from me is korban, that is, given to God. then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down, and many such things you do. And he called the people to him again and said to them, hear me, all of you, and understand, there is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him, And when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. And he said to them, then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart, but his stomach and is expelled? Thus he declared all foods clean. And he said, what comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of the Lord remains forever. Please be seated. This may be one of the favorite Bible passages, or at least the beginning of it, of every young boy, isn't it? Finally, a passage that says, hey, even Jesus and his disciples didn't wash their hands before supper. And in fact, Jesus got really offended that you would even suggest that he ought to wash his hands before supper. And so, on my very filthy and smelly WWJD bracelet, I am simply following Christ's example, and I don't have to wash my hands every time I eat. I hope that is not the only thing you write down today. Is that really what Jesus is saying? Is he giving a new standard of hygiene? No. That is not the issue. It comes across Sort of strange to us though, doesn't it? The Pharisees and scribes' concern with this ceremonial washing, because it wasn't a hygiene washing, it was more of a ceremonial washing that they would do. They would wash their hands, just kind of sprinkle them with water. They would wash all sorts of things, even as it goes straight all the way down to couches that they would wash. And in our Western ears, it sounds like that's just kind of odd, but let me help you understand it a little bit more. We're all familiar with fasting and praying. Whether you yourself fast and pray, or you simply know of others who fast and pray, many religions include fasting in part of their worship. Even Christians are known to fast at times. Now, why do people fast? It's in order to give themselves a visual aid of a spiritual truth. People fast in order to help you to remember that I'm supposed to hunger for God. And so that's why people fast. It's not because eating or not eating is a more holy thing, but it gives a spiritual aid, a physical aid to a spiritual truth. Another aid is kneeling. In many religions, people kneel when they pray to their God. Even Christians at times will kneel when they pray. Why do we kneel? Why do we kneel when we pray? That's got to be one of the most uncomfortable positions to pray in for any length of time. Well, again, it is a physical reminder of a spiritual truth. It gives me a physical picture that I am supposed to approach God with spiritual humility, that in kneeling before God, I am expressing what my heart ought to be expressing, a humble approach to God when I pray. And so it's true in the Old Testament there were what were called the Ceremonial Laws. And the Ceremonial Laws were these physical pictures of a spiritual truth that you should understand. And among those ceremonial laws were laws about not touching certain animals or not even eating certain animals because it would make you unclean. There were laws about not touching dead people or not touching people with certain diseases. Even if they were a part of your household, you weren't to touch people who had certain diseases or else it would make you unclean. And if you were unclean, you were not able to go and worship God in the temple or in the tabernacle. In fact, there were even laws about mildew. If you were to touch mildew, even mildew in your own house, that would make you unclean. It was a physical picture of a spiritual truth that you were supposed to understand that coming before God is a serious matter. God is holy and I need to be clean in order to come before God. It was a physical picture of something spiritual that I was supposed to grasp. You need to be clean. You need to be pure to come before God. You know, if you're going to an interview, usually you shower before you go to that interview. Now, why is that? It's kind of hypocritical, isn't it? I mean, that's not your natural odor. None of us smell like lavenders naturally. It's kind of lying about what you smell like. When you go on a date, you brush your teeth. Why? That's not really representing the real you. You go on a date and you're masking the real you. Shouldn't you go just as you are? I mean, if that girl, if that guy can't love you in all of your odiferous wonderfulness, then they probably are not the person for you. Well, no. No, we clean up. We're willing to get cleaned up. We're willing to say, hey, this is an important person in my life. I'm going to wash. I'm going to brush my teeth. I'm even going to use deodorant. That's how much I like this person. It's not hypocrisy. It's love. It's, hey, I want to be clean when I come to you. I want to be pure. I want you to enjoy my presence. Now, if this is true for interviews or for dates or for meeting the fathers of potential dates, is it not true for worshiping God? Shouldn't we have a desire to be clean when we come to God? That's a good desire. It's not that the Pharisees' desire was bad. What was wrong with the Pharisees was they were wrong about what made them unclean, and they were wrong about the cure. They were wrong about how it was that they weren't clean, and they were wrong about how could they become clean. Jesus' problem with the Pharisees in verses 6 to 13 are interesting. So the Pharisees come and they ask what seems like a genuine question. They say, hey, why don't your disciples follow the rules? Why don't your disciples wash their hands before they eat? And Jesus responds very kindly. He says, well, did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites? I don't think Jesus was invited as the main speaker of any of the how to win friends and influence enemies seminars. I mean, he just kind of, I mean, he jumps right in with these guys. He quotes Isaiah, he says, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. Jesus calls them hypocrites. The word in the Greek comes from, is the word that they would use for play actors. People who pretended to be something that they were not. They would put on masks. He says, you pretend to love God. You are pretending to want to serve God by inventing all of these rules. In fact, you invent these rules so that you can ignore other rules. I mean, God had already said, hey, this is how you live to be holy. Here's the big 10, and then some things that you can apply from those 10. And here, God's people come along, or the teachers of God's people, and say, well, now that's hard. What we should do is make that easier. So let's make some new rules. And so these rules, can cancel out those rules, but then at least you're still keeping rules, and so you can get clean. Or they'd say, yeah, that's a good rule. And you know what they say, if one's good, two's better. So, I mean, God might think, this is good, why don't we add a couple steps to that, and then we'll really be clean. So let's make the rules either bigger or else different to cancel out the hard ones. And so this is what they did. And Jesus points to an example. He says, the Bible is pretty clear. It says, honor your father and mother. In fact, even Moses says, anyone who reviles their parents should be stoned. He says, and yet you have come up with an end run around this. You have told people that, hey, If you are willing to commit, if you're willing to give to the number you see on the screen, you can give all of that and not worry about your parents anymore because you've really, isn't it better to love God than to love your parents? I mean, God is eternal. I mean, where do you want to invest? Do you want to invest in eternal? Or do you want to invest in your parents who are, let's face it, not long for this world? And so folks liked that idea. So I can give to you and not feel guilty about not caring about my parents anymore. I could do that. And Jesus says, no, you can't. You've taken and invented a new rule because the old rule is a little too hard. But here, this way, you can at least still feel really good about yourself, and you can call it religious, and you can call it sacrificial giving, but really, you're living for yourself. Jesus comes back to the washing. After giving that example, he is so intent. He wants the people to get this. He calls them all to himself. He says, listen to me, all of you, in verse 14. You gotta understand this. There's nothing outside of a person that by going into him can defile him. It's the things that come out of a person that are what defile him. Jesus says, look, it's not what goes in. It's what comes out. It's not your surroundings. It's not those people out there that make you dirty. It's inside of you. It's not the food that you eat or you don't eat. It's not the drinks that you drink or don't drink that make you clean or unclean. It's what's inside of you. What you eat, what you drink has nothing to do with how holy you are. It's your heart. Now, this is so radical to the disciples, based on what the teachers have been teaching them, that his disciples assume this has got to be another parable. You notice that there's no parable here, but when he gets back to his house with the disciples, they say, hey, could you explain that parable to us? Jesus said nothing in parable. He says very clearly, what goes in doesn't defile you. It's what comes out of your heart that defiles you. And they say, hey, that was a cute allegory. Could you explain that to us? That's why Jesus says, are you, without understanding some of your Bible say, are you so slow? Are you so dim also? He says in verse 18, don't you see that whatever goes into a person from the outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach and is expelled. Yes, he is saying what you boys think he's saying. What you eat doesn't matter because you will leave it behind you, literally. It will go in, it will go out, and no one will be the wiser. Sometimes it goes out, and people are the wiser, and they figure out what you had, but it doesn't defile you. It defiles the house, but not you. All right, that wasn't in the notes, I admit. There were a lot of boys smiling, and it's just very few times that I can be sure that boys are listening. And so I got to take advantage of those moments. He says, no, that's not what makes you dirty. What makes you dirty? is in your heart. Jesus says, yes, you're unclean. Yes, you are defiled, but it is not because of what you've eaten. It is not because of what's going on around you. You are unclean because of what is inside of you. The problem is your heart. We often ask, you know, why is it that we do the things that we do? Why do you do the things that you do? Why do you act the way that you act? Why do you respond the way that you respond? Is it situational? You know, it sounds like it is. It sounds like our biggest problem is what's going on in our lives. If I'd have gotten a better night's sleep, I wouldn't have acted that way. If my kids would just, if my wife were just, if my husband was just, if my job, if the people at work were just, I would never have acted this way. Is it situational, or maybe it's biological? How many of us say, well, that's how I was brought up? Well, look, I'm from, and we fill in the blank, and wherever you're from explains why you act the way you act. Well, I'm Irish. What? It must be a biological issue. True story, the pastor that I worked for as an assistant pastor, he and I challenged one another regularly on who actually was more stubborn. And one time, in a very sinful way, needed the elders to get involved. We were so against one another at one moment. And one of the elders, after hearing the story, hearing what happened, hearing how we had allowed or caused the disagreement to elevate, to just horrible proportions, he shook his head and smiled and he said, well, you're both Irish, this is gonna happen. What? You're both, so it's a biological issue? He should have hired, what? I don't even know what he should have hired. Someone from outer Slobovia who had different, I don't know, is it biological? Is that our issue? Jesus says no. These things, your history, your situation, they may have influence on you, but they are not deterministic. They do not determine how you respond. It comes from your heart. The beauty of the fruit didn't cause Adam to sin. It was in his heart. Even his excuse to God, well, the woman you gave me. No, it was in his heart. If you are like me, you ask your children, for those of you who have children, they do something and you always ask the same question, or at least I do, and it's a foolish question to ask. It's always the same thing. Why did you do that? Why did you do that? Why did you hit your brother? Why did you lie about your homework? What possible answer are we looking for? And if we let them explain it to us, we let them tell us what the situation was, they explain why they lied to us, and then if we leave it at that, we have begun building the hypocrites Jesus is talking about. Well, this is why I lied to you. No. Why did I do this? Because it's in my heart. Because I want what I want when I want it. Because I would rather use, rather than using the gifts that I have and the things that I want to serve God and others, I would rather use God and people to get the things that I want and protect the stuff that I already have. It's in my heart. Listen to the list of how many of these things Jesus speaks of that are purely internal issues. He says, this is what defiles you, this is what makes you unclean, evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. A lot of those things don't even get out and they defile you. Evil thoughts, they defile you. Coveting, Wanting what others have, wishing that, coveting is basically saying, God, you got the wrong address. That was supposed to be given to me. Envy, we envy, we slander, pride, deceit. You know, you can, I like that Jesus doesn't say lying. He says deceit, that is a heart issue. You know, you can be deceptive with the truth. You can speak the truth technically and deceive. You know, the teenage boy comes home from school. Did you remember your homework? Yes. And then a couple hours later, mom goes down and he's playing video games. Why aren't you doing your homework? I left it at school. What? I asked you if you remembered your homework. You said, yes, I did. I did remember my homework, but I forgot it at school. Now when we let our children do that with the English language, you are letting them lie to you on so many levels. First of all, this boy did not for a moment think his mom was testing his cognitive recollection of the fact that there's a thing in school called homework and that occasionally teachers use that to gauge whether you're picking up what they're laying down. He wasn't, he didn't think that. He knew what she wanted to know. He used truth to deceive. Why? It's in his heart. It's in his heart. It's in your heart. Pride. Pride has got to be one of the ugliest, that's hyperbolic. I think pride is one of the ugliest sins that there can possibly be. It is so anti-gospel, it is ridiculous. The idea that something God, in His grace and providence, has poured into me and has not poured into someone else, now makes me better than them? I mean, if we had those FDA ingredients lists on our backs, do you know each of us, the first ingredient is dust. First ingredient, FDA list, you know, they have to list them in order, dust. I don't even know how much comes after that. It's just dust. You know, the allergen list would be, contains dust. And that would be the end of the list. So here we are, piles of dust that God in his mercy has breathed physical and for many of you, spiritual life into. And that makes you better than someone? And we all struggle with it, every one of us. We think that somehow my temperament makes me better than you, my abilities makes me better than you, my beliefs make me better than you, my academic abilities make me better than you. It's in our heart. It resides in your heart and then is expressed in your behavior. You know, a lot of times we say something and we say, Oh, I didn't mean that. Well, that's not true. You did mean it. Nothing comes out that wasn't there to begin with. What you should say is, I'm sorry I said what I meant. I'm sorry I said what I was thinking about you at the time. I can see you didn't take it very well. And even as I thought through that example, I realized, you know, sometimes we say, well, no, sometimes I really do say really cruel things that I didn't mean. I mean, I didn't mean what I said. Okay, let's analyze that then. Your heart told you that saying something that you didn't even believe that would be hurtful and painful to that other person is a good thing to do right now. It comes from the heart. It's in the heart. It's what we do. It's what defiles us. It's what makes you unclean. I had a pastor friend recall that he had a toddler come in from playing in the yard one day, coming up to lunch, and he walked in the kitchen, and he says, oh, what's that smell? What's that smell? And he sat down to lunch, and he's looking at his lunch, and he smells, and he goes, oh, what's that smell? What's that smell? And all through lunch, and then he goes off to bed, and he gets into his bedroom, and he's like, oh, what's that smell? What's that smell? And he said that when he went to put his son to bed for his nap, he bent down to tuck him in. He was like, whoa! The smell was him. We walk through life and we're like, oh, what's that smell? It's you. You're that smell. I'm that smell. It's in us. You stink because it's in you. It goes into the depths of your heart. Have you ever said to someone, well, if you were married to her, Well, if they were your children, you'd be angry too. Hey, if you had the day I had, if you had the job I have, wrong. Well, it might be right, but that's because I have a defiled heart too. Do you see, this is why the disciples hoped this was a parable. Is this another parable? Because if this isn't a parable, we are in trouble. If what makes me dirty isn't the stuff outside of me but coming from the depths of my heart, I don't know if I can come up with an alternative list of rules to fix that. I mean, you get a good night's rest, and you just wake up a well-rested jerk. Your kids grow up and move out, and now you're a jerk with an empty nest. You get a new job, and you're a better-paid jerk. You get a new house, and now you're a jerk with a bigger mortgage. You go to a different church, and still, what is that smell? The stench has followed everywhere you go. Nothing seems to fix it. You're surrounded by fools and idiots. So what is the hope? This doesn't sound very good. It doesn't even end with much hope. Well, it's tucked into the middle, and it's tricky to see, but it's beautiful when you see it. See, Mark rarely makes parenthetical points. He rarely strays from the action of what's going on to say, let me explain something here to you. That takes too long. He doesn't like that. He likes to be action-packed. And so when he does, if there are these parenthetical moments when he says, oh, by the way, then we should listen, we should pay attention. He says at the end of verse 19, this little parenthetical remark, he says, thus he declared all foods clean. This is why language is so important. Mark doesn't say, and so he said all foods were clean. If he had said that, if that's what Jesus was saying, then what he's saying is, oh, we got you, didn't we? That Old Testament, crazy stuff. I don't know what we were thinking. Man, that stuff's been clean all along. Oh, and you will love bacon. That's not what he says. It says, thus he declared all foods clean. This is like when I have the opportunity of dressing up, wearing a robe, and everyone around me is all dressed up, and this young fella and this young lady walk down toward me, and I talk, and there's a ceremony, and they exchange vows. And what is it that I say at the end of that? I say, by the power vested in me, and by the authority of the state of Virginia, I now pronounce you husband and wife, or man and wife. Now, when I say that, I'm not saying, hey, I just want all of you to recognize that these two have been husband and wife forever. It's just that they didn't know it when they were three. No, I am declaring something new. I am pronouncing something new. Something that wasn't true before is from this day forward true. Jesus, Mark is telling us by saying this, Jesus pronounced, Jesus declared all foods clean. In other words, that ceremonial law that was a physical gift to us, to show us something spiritual, was somehow fulfilled. Jesus had the power and authority to say, that which is unclean, I declare clean. I myself, by my authority, make it clean. Now, we were just talking in Sunday school that the whole Bible is God's Word. And so if God wrote His Bible, including those Old Testament passages that include ceremonial law, then only God can declare that it's fulfilled. And especially when we recall the track record of Jesus who says, I'm not here to abolish the law. He says, in fact, nothing until the law is fulfilled, not even a jot or tittle, not even a crossing of the T or a dotting of the I will be removed. And so for Jesus to say this, there's something significant going on here. Jesus is saying, I can make it clean. You are filthy. You are dirty. To come into God's presence, you need to be clean. You need to be washed. You need to be pure because your Father is pure. I can make you clean. I can declare you clean. That which was unclean, I can pronounce clean. That which was unholy, I can pronounce holy. Christ, in going to the cross, exchanges His holiness for our unholiness, exchanges His clean for our filth. so that as Paul said, God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God. We are filthy. We are dirty. We are covered with stench. And it's not some ceremonial stench. And it's not something that, hey, let's just add a few more rules or let's crank up the rules that we already have. It's in us. It's not something we can take care of from the outside. What we need is a God who announced in Ezekiel, I will remove your heart of stone and replace it with the heart of flesh. I will pour into you my spirit. and wash you and cleanse you. What can take away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Let's pray. Father God, help us, help us as a people Even as we seek to care for each other, even as we seek to love one another, help us to not simply add rules to one another's lives or make it seem as though, well, the problem you have is your situation, the problem you have is your biology. Help us to be instruments in your hands that would help one another to see my problem is my heart. And if I don't address my heart, none of the situation will ever matter. And the hope that we have is in Christ who has come to cleanse our hearts. Even as our assurance of pardon and grace reminds us, God, you are faithful and just. You forgive us our sins and you cleanse us from unrighteousness. We've sung it and we know it. Our hearts are prone to wander, Lord. Seal them to you. In Christ Jesus' name we pray, amen. Let's stand and sing together before the throne of God above. Now receive your benediction. Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead by the blood of his eternal covenant, that shepherd, that great shepherd of the sheep, our Lord Jesus, may that God restore in you everything good for doing his will, doing himself in us all that pleases him through the power and to the glory of his son, our Lord Jesus, both now and on into the ages. Amen.