“You don’t get your own personal Jesus!”
In spite of what a recent “He gets us” television ad says, that’s the emphatic title of a little booklet written by popular east-coast Baptist Pastor J. D. Grear.
He confesses that he first said it, actually yelled it in the middle of a television interview he was watching in which someone kept arguing his point by saying, “Well, My Jesus would or wouldn’t say that.”
It came as a result of his repeated frustrations with people who didn’t like something about the true Biblical Jesus. In one witnessing encounter, a young lady told him that she didn’t want a Jesus who insisted that He was the one and only way to God.
His point is not that Jesus isn’t personal—Jesus is very personal and personally interested in us. But his point is that you don’t get to choose whatever version of Jesus you prefer—that if you’re going to have a personal relationship with Jesus, it has to be with the real Jesus—the Jesus presented to us in God’s revelation, the Bible—the real Jesus of the Word of God.
The problem with many of us, He notes, is that we want to make Jesus after our own image—we want a Jesus who agrees with us and is pleased and supports us in whatever we want to do or say. It’s the same problem we all have in our relationship with God. As one sage put it, “God made man in his own image, and we have been returning the favor ever since.”
And so, as we continue our series this morning on meeting the Real Jesus, we continue talking about people who encountered the real Jesus 2,000 years ago in the Gospels. And this morning, we’re going to talk about some people who encountered the Real Jesus and didn’t like Him and ultimately rejected Him because He would bow to their opinions, and refused the meet their expectations of what the Messiah would be like and what He would do.
And so, the question for each of us this morning as we examine this passage is this: Do I follow the real Jesus, or merely a caricature of Jesus, a Jesus of my own imagination who just so happens to agree with Me whenever I need Him to. Am I about living up to Jesus’ expectations of me, or do I serve a Jesus who serves my expectations and demands.
So, this morning, believe it or not, the people we’re going to be talking about who didn’t like the real Jesus because He didn’t live up to their expectations were the most respected religious authorities of the Day, the Pharisees and the Scribes who were respected by all the Jews.
Now the Pharisees were the strictest sect of the Jewish religion. As I’ve noted before, they were absolute nitpickers in attempting to follow the Law of Moses, and even went beyond its demands of Moses’ Law by adding to their list of do’s and don'ts the “Traditions of the Elders”—that is the commands of the revered Jewish rabbis of the past, the oral Law of the Jews. The scribes were the scholars, the experts in the Old Testament Law, which was not only the religious revelation, but it was literally the political and governmental Law of the nation of Israel. They were, in a sense, religious lawyers, who dictated what Jews should and could do in Israel—those who handed the theory of the Old Testament Law while the Pharisees tried to excel in the outward practice of the Law.
In Mark 1, we’re told representatives of these two groups gathered around Jesus, having come perhaps as a delegation from the seat of religious authority in Israel, the capital city and site of the temple, Jerusalem.
It is now toward the end of Jesus’ Great Galilean Ministry—when Jesus became a sensation in Israel by healing everyone and anyone who came to Him. He’s in Galilee, and these Pharisees and scribes, the religious authorities have travelled a considerable distance north from Jerusalem just to check him out. After all, He’s created quite a stir in the nation, He’s been critical of the religious establishment, and they’re probably looking for any accusation they can bring against Him because, from their perspective, he’s been involved in subversive activities. He's challenging their credibility as the ruling religious elite.
And it doesn’t take them long to find something to critique. They had observed as some of Jesus’ disciples are eating food with impure or unclean hands, and this is a taboo, not according to Old Testament Law, not according to the Word of God, but according to the “tradition of the elders.”
Now our Gospel writer Mark is very carful in verse 3 to describe for us exactly why this was a problem. “For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they carefully wash their hands, thus observing the traditions of the elders, and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they cleanse themselves; and there are many other things which they have received in order to observe, such as the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.)
So, the impure or unclean hands of Jesus’ disciples as they ate was the problem, and more specifically the problem was that they had not washed their hands thoroughly or cleansed them (the word is to baptize them) before they ate. The Pharisees especially observed this tradition all the time before they ate, and all the Jews followed their example. And so, when Jesus’ disciples didn’t wash their hands before they ate, it was a huge cultural taboo! It was a taboo not because it violated the Word of God, the Old Testament Law, but it was a taboo because it violated the human tradition of the elders, or rabbinic teachings. And they had many such traditions and washing that were observed with regard to cups, pitchers and copper pots. This was not an isolated instance—there were all sorts of religious regulations that the Jews had to follow to be Kosher that had nothing to do with Keeping God’s Word but had everything to do with following the teaching of men—the teaching of the rabbis. So, this delegation of religious experts had found what they were looking for, some way to discredit Jesus and possibly even destroy Jesus.
Now, just a quick remark here: Washing hands may be a sanitary and good thing to do before you eat. But the issue here wasn’t sanitation or good hygiene. The issue is spiritual and religious. The Pharisees and scribes had made the washing of hands a spiritual issue. You couldn’t be right with God-- you couldn’t gain merit with God--unless you baptized your hands before you ate, despite the fact that the Word of God said nothing of the kind. It was merely their rule, not God’s.
So, Jesus responded in verse 6-8. “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written,
‘This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far away from Me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching as Doctrines the precepts of Men.” Neglecting the command of God, you hold to the tradition of men.”
Now there are probably a multitude of truths and applications that can be brought from Jesus’ words here. But I’m going to focus this morning on two:
The first is this: “Don’t demand Jesus submit to your expectations; rather submit your life to Him.”
The problem these pseudo-religious leaders, these play-acting hypocrites had with Jesus is that He didn’t live up to their expectations of what the Messiah would be and do. It’s very much like what J. D. Great meant when He said, “You don’t get your own personal Jesus.” That is, you don’t get your own personal version of Jesus. After all, if Jesus is God in the flesh, then He is in charge. He’s the authority. He is God and you’re not. By virtue of the fact that He is your Creator and Judge, you submit to His expectations; don’t try to make Him submit to yours, because it will fail. If you do, you will be guilty of the ultimate form of idolatry, worship of self, rather than God, and you will be in rebellion to God.
As Jesus once said to His own disciples, in Luke 6:46, “Why call you me Lord, Lord, and do not the things I say.
And Jesus affirmed this concept repeatedly in the Gospels. On one occasion, when his mother and brothers came looking for him concerned that He had lost his mind, He replied to those who told Him of their coming, “For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother” in Mark 3:35. In other words, this matter of submitting to and doing His will is so important to Jesus, that He is willing to identify those who does His will, instead of theirs, as members of His own family. That’s how personal Jesus will get with those who submit to the real Jesus and His will.
And in perhaps the most chilling of all Bible passages, at the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says our eternal destiny will depend on our willingness to do God’s will rather than our own, no matter what we say about our relationship to Jesus. ““Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. 22 Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”
So, this matter of demanding that Jesus fulfill your expectations rather than you submitting to His is no small matter. It can determine your eternal destiny. And with respect to these religious people who pretended to have a right relationship with God, it did. They ended up rejecting the real Jesus and will ultimately be rejected by Jesus as their judge in the end.
So don’t mess with who Jesus is, or with what He’s all about. It could be eternally fatal.
But you might ask, how can we know what the real Jesus is all about. Well, we know what He’s all about from God’s Word. And if we fail to recognize that, all of our efforts to worship or serve Him will fail.
Our second point this morning: Beware of wasting your worship of Jesus because you’ve replaced God’s word with man-made teachings. I’ll say that again, this is so incredibly important. Beware of wasting your worship of Jesus because you’ve replaced God’s Word with the teachings of men.
Now don’t miss this, this morning. This is perhaps the central point of all Jesus has to say. Jesus quotes from Isaiah 29:11, written some 650 or 700 years earlier and says that what Isaiah had written many years earlier was a prophecy about the very people he was talking to hear—the religious leaders of his day: And Isaiah wrote this: “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from Me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the the precepts of men.”
Now notice the frightening possibility for anyone here. It is possible to worship God in vain, to no purpose, with absolutely no effect. In other words, your attempt to worship God may not count at all. Why wouldn’t they count at all? It’s because your efforts to worship God are based on “the precepts of men”—the teaching of men that may well be in error, rather than on the infallible teachings of God’s Word.
So, Jesus is saying that this is exactly what was happening with these religious leaders who were confronting Him. They were absolutely devoted, at least outwardly, to their own concept of God and His will, but they were completely wasting their time in all their devotion. They were not worshiping or pleasing God, because they were doing so according to the faulty teachings of men, rather than God’s Word.
Now Jesus drives his point home in verse eight. This is precisely his point here with respect to where these religious people were missing the mark: “Neglecting the command of God, you hold to the tradition of men.
Now this was no accident for the Pharisees and scribes. It was deliberate. Warren Wiersbe writes, “History reveals that the Jewish religious leaders came to honor their traditions far above the Word of God. Rabbi Eleazar said, “He who expounds the Scriptures in opposition to the tradition has no share in the world to come.” The Mishan, a collection of Jewish traditions in the Talmud, records, “It is a greater offense to teach anything contrary to the voice of the rabbis than to contradict Scripture itself.”
Wow, that’s blasphemy.
But that is exactly what is going on in thousands and probably tens of thousands of so-called churches of Jesus Christ today. Among Roman Catholics, the precise statement of the Roman Catholic Church in a popular Catholic Catechism by John Hardon: “A Catholic must believe with divine faith the whole of revelation which is contained in Holy Write (the Bible) and Sacred Tradition (the teaching of the church). And that’s where Catholicism goes astray, because in actual practice, “Sacred Tradition,” the pronouncements of popes and General Councils contradicts and supersedes the Word of God on the most essential teaching of the Bible necessary for salvation.
Likewise, the same is true for Mormons, who believe in the books authored by Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon and others and actually replace the Bible’s teaching with their human teachings.
Likewise, it’s true for Christian Scientists, which put Mark Baker Eddy’s writings above the teachings of Scripture.
And it’s true for Seventh Day Adventists, who regard the writings of Ellen G. White as sacred as the teaching of Scripture.
And it is true of anyone, even you and me, when we begin to put our opinions, or some other mere man’s beliefs, above the clear teachings of Scripture.
You replace God’s revelation with man’s teaching, and you risk wasting your worship—all that you do for God, and give for God, and serve for God, not counting—being in vain.
So, listen up. All Scripture, and only Scripture is inspired by God—is God breathed and is profitable for teaching, reproof, training and correction in righteousness. And Jesus said, "The Scripture cannot be broken."
In other words, the real Jesus is the Jesus of the bible. He is the Jesus of the Word of God. And if you follow Jesus, you will follow the Word of God. And if you don’t, you'll be wasting your worship. It will not count. And there will be eternal consequences.
And that leads us to our third and obvious point, this morning. Worship the true Jesus of the Bible by following God’s Word, not man’s traditions. Worship the true Jesus of the Bible by following God’s Word, not man’s traditions.
And again, that was Jesus’ point in verse 8-13: “Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men.” In other words, on this occasion and on many occasions, because these religious leaders followed the traditions, the teaching handed down from the rabbis, they, as a result, neglected following the commandment of God. Why, because the teaching of men often directly contradicted and countermanded the commandment of God! Who would dare do such a thing?
And then Jesus provides these religious leaders with an example. Verse 9: “He was also saying to them, “you are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition. For Moses said, “Honor your father and our mother” and he who speaks evil of Father or Mother is to be put to death.’”
So, Jesus quotes two Old Testament verses here, the first one of the Ten Commandment with which we are familiar but often forget. And the second, Exodus 21:17 and Leviticus 20:9 which puts a point on the command. If anyone curses his father or mother, he is to be put to death.” Wow, did God really say that? Yep, He did. In other words, He’s dead serious about this matter of honoring our parents, perhaps because he is so accustomed to being dishonored by His offspring. And so, Jesus is making sure these religious leaders understand the seriousness of God’s command to honor parents here. And then He shows them how they have nullified and replaced God’s Word in their own practices: Verse 11: “But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or his mother, whatever I have that would help you is Corban (that is to say, given to God), You no longer permit him to do anything for his father or his mother,; thus invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down, and you do many thigs such as that.”
In other words, the practice of these religious leaders was to allow an adult son or daughter to declare all of his property as Corban, or given to God, and once that statement or vow was made, the religious leaders would not permit that person to use anything he had committed to God to help his parents, even in their old age. It’s interesting here how Jesus indicates that there are some things at some times that are more important than giving to God’s work—namely taking care of one’s parents when they need you. Now I don’t think he’s saying it’s necessarily either or, but most times both and. Nevertheless, Jesus was dead serious about our taking care of our parents, making a return to our parents as the New Testament would put it.
So, again, where was all that money going? Well, guess what, it went to the temple service, and the priests. The Pharisees were known to be lovers of money, who devoured widows houses for themselves. I suspect there was just a little covetousness and greed involved here.
Now, at this point, it’s really easy for me to point the finger at some other church or religious “tradition." But something we always need to be aware of is our own traditions or teachings which may not be supported by the Word of God.
As Warren Wiersbe once also wrote: “Each new generation must engage in a similar conflict, for human nature is prone to hold on to worn-out, man-made traditions and ignore or disobey the living Word of God. It is true that some traditions are helpful as reminders of our rich heritage, or as cement to bind generations, but we must constantly beware lest tradition, take the place of truth. It does us good to examine our church traditions in the light of God’s Word and to be courageous enough to make changes.”
So that’s a question I sometimes ask myself with regard to the evangelical traditions I have inherited. And at times, I find something these are not necessarily Biblical, but are simply the way we have done things, because certain noted teachers or evangelists in the past have popularized them, not the Bible.
Now I hope I don’t offend anyone this morning, but I have to admit that I was confused for a long time as a new Christian about what it was that a person had to do exactly to be saved. That’s because the way the Gospel was presented to me from the very beginning was that the bottom-line most basic, "this seals the deal" thing I needed to do was to pray a prayer to ask Jesus into my heart, because that’s what Billy Graham or Bill Bright said.
Then I began to wonder what was so magical about that. How did that fix the problem between me and God? I didn’t have an answer, until, one day, seven years into being a believer, I came across a tract entitled, “What Is the Gospel?” I had been a believer for seven years, was in full-time Christian work as an editor at Back to the Bible Broadcast, and I didn't have a clue! I had heard here or there that it was loving your neighbor or feeding the poor. The booklet then revealed, from the Word of God, what the Gospel was, from I Corinthians 15:1-4. And as we read it, look to see if there's any place in this passage, which defines the Gospel by which we are saved that it says that someone must ask Jesus into their heart:
I Corinthians 15:1-4: " Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, 2 by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you [b]as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."
Again, where do we see it says we must invite Jesus into our hearts to be saved? Can't find it. Guess what, it's not a part of the biblical Gospel--the good news message of how to be saved then. What it tells us here is that the essential response to Christ's death for our sins and resurrection is that we continue to believe it by holding fast to it.
So how did this whole matter of praying to ask Jesus into our hearts becomes so essential to going to heaven.
It's because we have our own rabbis, our own respected teachers and evangelists of the past, like Billy Graham, who certainly always mentioned that Christ died for our sins and rose again was part of the deal, but then always concluded his Gospel invitation with the idea that a person must ask Jesus into their hearts. Many people have probably come to faith in Jesus, at that point, but they are saved not because they asked Jesus into their hearts, but because they believed Jesus, the Son of God, died on the cross to pay the penalty for their sins.
But the Word of God nowhere tells us we must ask Jesus into our heart. You'll never find the
Apostles Peter or Paul in the book of Acts exhorting people to ask Jesus into their hearts. Instead, they always emphasize that Jesus is the Savior/Messiah who died on the cross for our sins, and rose again, and promised the forgiveness of sin or heaven on the basis of repentance or faith in Christ alone.
So, you want to follow Jesus? Beware of the subtle temptation for all of us of wasting our worship by replace God’s Word with man’s traditions.
The point is this: we can't make Jesus to be anything we want Him to be. If we would truly follow and worship Jesus, we must worship the Jesus of the Bible, not of our imaginations or traditions. We must worship the Jesus of the Word of God, who is indeed the Living Word of God.
Let’s pray.
