Following Jesus (8)
Scott Bayles, pastor
Scripture: Mark 7:1-23
Blooming Grove Christian Church: 2/19/2017
If you’ve been with us all this year, you know we’ve been talking about all about Jesus—seeing him more clearly and following him more nearly. As we’ve followed him through the Gospel of Mark, we’ve seen some remarkable things.
The heavens opened at his baptism and the Holy Spirit descended upon him. A few persistent people dug a hole in someone’s roof just to gain access to Jesus. He’s healed men and women all over Galilee and the surrounding countryside. He cast a legion of demons into a herd of pigs. He stilled the storm on the Sea of Galilee. And most recently, in Mark 6, Jesus provided and impromptu picnic for five thousand families. After that miraculous meal, Jesus sent his disciples across the lake and told them he would meet them on the other side.
He wanted some alone time to pray and connect with His Father. But then, late in the night and in the midst of another storm, Jesus returns to his disciples, walking on the water. This is one of the most memorable moments in the gospels, but you might be surprise that Mark leaves out one of the best parts of that story. Matthew tells us that, at Jesus command, Peter got out of the boat and walked on water as well. That is, until he became frightened by the wind and waves. Suddenly Peter began sinking and cried out for help. Jesus, of course, caught him but also criticized him, saying, “You have so little faith. Why did you doubt me?”
The question is—why would Mark leave that bit out? Well, remember that Mark’s gospel is essentially Peter’s gospel. Mark traveled with Peter and wrote down everything that Peter told him about Jesus. So it’s no wonder that Peter, probably a little embarrassed, decided to leave that little detail out.
You and I probably have some mistakes and missteps that we wouldn’t want recorded for everyone to read too. But it just goes to show you that—except for Jesus—pobody’s nefect. As we strive to follow in Jesus’s footstep, we’re bound to fail and fall from time to time. But, like Peter, we don’t give up. We get back up, lean on Jesus, and keep moving forward.
From this point forward in Mark’s Gospel we see the popularity of Jesus begin to decline. Moving toward the final year of His life, Jesus pours more time into the disciples while the religious leaders ramp up their hostility. As Jesus exposes their superficial spirituality, they become more agitated and attack Him relentlessly to discredit Him and eventually send Him to death.
Mark 7 opens with one such skirmish. If you have a Bible, open it to Mark 7:1-23. This is a longer section of Scripture, so we’ll read it in segments as we move through the story. Jesus’s conflict with the Pharisees unfolds in three parts—centering around three problems. The first is a hand problem.
• A HAND PROBLEM
One day a pack of Scribes and Pharisees traveled from Jerusalem to spy on Jesus. After a while, Mark says:
They noticed that some of his disciples failed to follow the Jewish ritual of hand washing before eating… So the Pharisees and teachers of religious law asked him, “Why don’t your disciples follow our age-old tradition? They eat without first performing the hand-washing ceremony.” (Mark 7:1-5 NLT)
Now, Mark includes a parenthetical explanation in verses 3 and 4, clarifying that this ritual had nothing to do with proper hygiene practices; rather, this was a spiritual ritual. This ceremonial washing cleansed a person not from germs or grime, but from any “defilement” that he or she may have contracted without knowing it.
This ceremonial washing originated in the Tabernacle, where priests washed their hands and feet prior to performing their sacred duties (Exodus 30:17-21). That was part of God’s Law. It was a symbolic purification prior to handling an animal sacrifice. The Pharisees, however, continually added their own traditions on top of God’s Word. They extended this law to all “descent” Jews to be performed before formal prayers and meals. Thus, before each meal, devout Jews performed a short ceremony, washing their hands and arms in a specific way. Perhaps this is where the idea “cleanliness is next to godliness,” comes from.
But this was just a tradition, not a requirement of God’s law. The Pharisees knew this. They even referred to it as “our age-old tradition.”
Traditions can be tricky.
Humans are by nature creatures of habit. Every church—every denomination or fellowship—has its own traditions. Everything from the order of worship to the type of music to “wearing your Sunday best” is a tradition. I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard the phrase “that’s the way we’ve always done it.” Some traditions are helpful, but others are harmful.
While attending college in TN, I preached for a small country congregation that told of a time in their past when a certain tradition became trouble. The old church build didn’t have air-conditioning, so during the summer, they left the windows open. But sometimes flies would come in and get into the communion bread, which sat on the altar at the front of the sanctuary. In order to keep the flies out, they covered the table with a small white sheet. Well, they did that for so long that even after they had air conditioning installed they kept using the cloth. One day, the person preparing communion spilled some of the grape juice on the cloth. He knew they didn’t really need it, so he bundled up the sheet and put it in his car so he could take it home and wash it. When the time came that morning to take communion, half of the congregation got up and walked out because that old white sheet wasn’t covering the bread. The people of that congregation allowed their tradition to become more important than harmony and communion itself.
In the Pharisees minds, their traditions were just as important as God’s Word. And they wanted to impose that tradition on Jesus and His disciples. We need to be careful about our traditions and not make the same mistake. We ought to recognize our traditions as traditions. We shouldn’t impose them on others. And we must always be willing to sacrifice our time-honored traditions on the altar of biblical truth!
So as the story unfolds, Jesus responds to the Pharisees complaint with some scathing criticism of His own. Jesus points out a hypocrisy problem.
• A HYPOCRISY PROBLEM
Rather than answering their question, Jesus railed against their underlying tone by quoting the Scripture they claimed to know so well. In the following verses, Jesus says:
You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.” For you ignore God’s law and substitute your own tradition. (Mark 7:6-8 NLT)
Jesus then goes on to give an example of how the Pharisees skillfully sidestep God’s laws in favor of their own traditions. Instead of taking care of their aging parents as God commanded them to do (Exodus 20:12, Deuteronomy 5:16), they could simply take a vow of “Corban,” claiming that all of their money was dedicated to God. They could still use their money any way they wanted, but this vow became an excuse not to help needy parents. And, Jesus says, “this is only one example among many others” (Mark 7:13 NLT). They used their own man-made traditions to get around or create loopholes in God’s commandments.
These religious leaders claimed to be holy, but in reality, they were hypocrites. And there’s nothing Jesus hated more than hypocrisy. The word hypocrite actually comes from the Greek theatre. Hypocrite was the Greek word for actors who wore masks and performed on stage. Today, churches are still full of people who do the very same thing. They’re guilty of false piety, a holier-than-thou attitude, or saying one thing while doing another. These people hide behind the mask of religion, but they lack a genuine relationship with Jesus. As Jesus said, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.”
I’m reminded of a little boy who attended the baby dedication of his little brother. The older boy proceeded to cry all the way home. His father asked, “What’s wrong son?” The boy said, “The minister made you promise that you would have us raised in a Christian home.” “What’s wrong with that?” asked the Father. The boy cried, “I want to stay with you and mom.”
Bottom line: we need to get real with God. Don’t make a stage production of your spiritual life. Take off your mask. Be honest with yourself, with others, and especially with God because, the truth is—these Pharisees weren’t fooling anybody and neither are you.
Finally, after dealing with the hand problem and hypocrisy problem, Jesus gets to the real problem—a heart problem.
• A HEART PROBLEM
Jesus knew that anything He said to the Pharisees would simply fall on deaf ears, so he turns to the crowd and calls out to them: “All of you listen,” he said, “and try to understand. It’s not what goes into your body that defiles you; you are defiled by what comes from your heart” (Mark 7:14-15 NLT).
His disciples seem a little confused, so they pull Him aside afterward and ask for some clarification:
“Don’t you understand either?” he asked. “Can’t you see that the food you put into your body cannot defile you? Food doesn’t go into your heart, but only passes through the stomach and then goes into the sewer… It is what comes from inside that defiles you. For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.” (Mark 7:18-23 NLT)
Jesus wants his followers to know that spiritual purity is not a matter of the hands—it’s a matter of the heart.
We find a powerful visual demonstration of this in the Old Testament book of Zechariah. Zechariah is one of the prophetic books of the Old Testament, and in the first line of chapter three, Zachariah transports, in a vision, to the center of the Temple. He says: “Then the angel showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord” (Zechariah 3:1 NLT).
Now, the Temple had three parts: the outer courtyard, the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies. A thick veil completely surrounded The Holy of Holies. Inside was the Ark of the Covenant, and mercy seat, and the shekinah glory of God—the very presence and face of God. Only one person was ever allowed into the Holy Of Holies and only on one day a year—the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. On that holy day, the high priest—in this case, Joshua—went through an elaborate ritual before entering into the Holy Of Holies.
First, he spent an entire week in seclusion. The other priests brought him food to ensure that he didn’t touch or eat anything unclean. The night before Yom Kippur, he would stay up all night praying and reading Scripture in order to cleanse or purify his soul. Then on Yom Kippur, he bathed head to toe and dressed in pure, unstained white linen. Then he went into the Holy Place and offered an animal sacrifice—a pure, unblemished lamb—for his own sins. Then he came out, bathed again, and put on a whole new set of fresh white linen robes. Then he offered a sacrifice for the rest of the priests. Then he came out a third time and bathed again and dressed again in brand-new pure white linen. Finally, he could enter the Holy of Holies and atone for the sins of all the people.
He went through this elaborate ritual not so that he would be physically clean, but spiritually clean, holy, pure and unblemished as he stood in the glorious presence of God. But as Zechariah looked up, he saw “Joshua was standing there, wearing filthy clothes” (Zechariah 3:3 GNT). The word translated filthy mean nauseatingly vile. Zechariah couldn’t believe his eyes! How could this have happened? There’s no way the Israelites would ever allow the high priest to appear before God like that.
God gave Zechariah a prophetic vision so that he could see us the way God sees us. In spite of all our efforts to be pure, to be good, to be moral, to cleanse ourselves, God sees our hearts and our hearts are full of filfth.
“For out of the heart,” Jesus said, “come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person” (Mark 7:20-23).
There is hope, though.
As Zechariah’s vision continued, God order Joshua to take off his filthy clothes and said, “See, I have taken away your sins, and now I am giving you these fine new clothes… You are symbolic of things to come. Soon I am going to bring my servant, the Branch…and I will remove the sins of this land in a single day” (Zechariah 3:4-9 NLT).
God prophesied the coming of another Joshua. Jesus, Yeshua, Joshua—it’s the same name in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. Seven centuries later, Jesus held His own Day of Atonement—offering Himself as a sacrifice to take away our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The Pharisees are flustered and frustrated over clean hands. Meanwhile, Jesus offers to clean our hearts and clothe us in robes of righteousness.
Conclusion
The Pharisees unwittingly teach us some valuable lessons. First, we need to be cautious when it comes to traditions. While many traditions are wonderfully helpful; they can become harmful if we value them too highly. Furthermore, few things repel God quicker than a Christian whose character doesn’t match his creed. Let’s not pretend to be something that we’re not. Finally, we need to realize that apart from the precious blood of Jesus we are all unclean, impure and defiled. We need Jesus to remove our filthy robes and replace them with beautiful new ones.
Next week, we’ll continue following Jesus through the Gospel of Mark.
Invitation
In the meantime, legalistic list-makers focus on having clean hands. Jesus doesn’t stop at our hands; He gives us pure hearts. I want to invite you to bow you heart and bend your knees before Jesus today, allow Him to wash not only your hands, but your heart as well. If I can help you with that, then please talk with me while we stand and sing. Let’s stand and sing together.
