Latest / Admonition Podcast / Mark 7 (Lesson 2) - Justin Evergarden - 07-30-2025
Transcript
- 0:02Good afternoon, Good evening.
- 0:08Yeah, my wife gets on to me for that one all the time.
- 0:11It's evening, Justin, it's not afternoon.
- 0:13Yeah, but it's still technically after the noon.
- 0:16We won't argue.
- 0:18Good evening.
- 0:20Welcome to Collierville Your Real Church of Christ.
- 0:22uh Wonderful to see everybody's shining faces this evening.
- 0:25um I'm going to be filling in for Aaron this evening for the Wednesday night class.
- 0:29We will be continuing in Mark chapter seven.
- 0:31oh
- 0:32this evening.
- 0:34But before we do that, let's go ahead and open with a word of prayer.
- 0:39Dear Lord, our Almighty God, Father in heaven, hallowed is thy name.
- 0:43How beautiful it is to sing your praises each and every day we come together to worship you.
- 0:49You are worthy of so much more than the praises that we could ever give you.
- 0:52Lord God, as we go throughout this study this evening, please allow us to retain
- 0:58the memory of what we have learned here tonight and apply its lessons into our daily lives.
- 1:02May we be attentive and have a learning spirit towards Your Word.
- 1:07Lord God, we thank You for Your Son that died on the cross for our sins, and we pray that when we finally leave this place that You will continue to watch over us, guide us, and
- 1:15care for us.
- 1:16And so we pray to You in Jesus' name, amen.
- 1:20So last week, Aaron finished Mark chapter 6, and I believe we...
- 1:25got to verse 8 in chapter 7, ah but first we're going to do a quick recap.
- 1:32We will be continuing where the study left off in verse 8.
- 1:35ah This was when Jesus had come into Galilee um on the boat.
- 1:40So, He had recently done the miracle of silencing the storm, the waters being calmed, and as He arrives on at Galilee, we see large crowds all about Him coming for healing.
- 1:54They had had large crowds before, left them, sailed on the boat, and as soon as they arrive, he is known for this.
- 2:02He's recognized.
- 2:04It's so much to the point that the account in chapter six show that they even wanted to simply touch the hem of his garment.
- 2:10That's the little bit of your garment that has the stitching that holds it all together on the end.
- 2:16Even just that small bit, they believed would completely heal them of their physical ailments.
- 2:22This amount of people that were surrounding Jesus and His disciples at the point looking for answers would have been very intimidating to the Pharisees and scribes at the time.
- 2:34We learned that they went to him with the express goal to look for a fault in Christ.
- 2:40Now as leaders of the ancient world in the religious section, um this would have been a very big grab for power from them.
- 2:50See, Jesus had things that they had never taught before or a faith that they were supposed to be teaching and yet fallen away from.
- 2:58Their goal was to look for a fault in Christ.
- 3:01or particularly his disciples even as Aaron pointed out.
- 3:05When you go looking for a fault in somebody, are you going to find it?
- 3:09I like to think of it the same way as uh vans, right?
- 3:14So everyone here knows that I love the Volkswagen vans.
- 3:16Before I learned about those vans, I never saw them on the road.
- 3:19Then all of a sudden, once I get one, they're everywhere.
- 3:22I see one almost every single day.
- 3:24there goes another one just like mine.
- 3:25It could apply to motorcycles or whatever car that's on the road.
- 3:28The fact is when you go looking for something, you're going to find that something.
- 3:33Sometimes when it comes to personality differences with people, if you're looking for a fault in someone, you're going to find that fault even if the fault isn't there.
- 3:43Your mind is going to be made up so that any small inkling of a difference between you and them will seem as a fault.
- 3:52So, as we know, they couldn't find fault in Christ, so they eventually had to turn to his disciples.
- 3:59In their culture, a teacher or a rabbi was generally considered responsible for the behavior, the actions of their disciples, the ones that they were teaching.
- 4:10This means that the Jewish leaders were insinuating that Jesus should have been reprimanded for His followers and their negligent behavior that they had seen in their
- 4:20eyes.
- 4:20Now, this wasn't actually negligent behavior on the part of the disciples.
- 4:25They simply knew better.
- 4:26But to the rabbi looking for just anything that they could depict on, this is what they found.
- 4:32Similarly how today we have managers who manage the employees of whatever establishment they govern.
- 4:40If we have an issue with the cashier, typically we ask to speak to the manager, don't we?
- 4:44The manager is ultimately, while society tells us there's that pyramid and they're higher up on the pyramid, typical businesses operate more of a reverse pyramid.
- 4:53The higher you are on the totem pole, the more responsibility you have.
- 4:57So it ultimately falls on the manager and the manager is being held responsible because after all, he's the one that hired these people.
- 5:03He's the one that taught them how to do their job.
- 5:05If you go into men's warehouse and one of the sales associates mismeasures you and you now don't have your suit for the right size for the wedding you're going to, you can complain
- 5:17to the manager.
- 5:17Ultimately, it'll fall down to the manager to fix the root of the problem.
- 5:22But this was at the root of their attempt to publicly shame and discredit our Lord.
- 5:28You see what the Pharisees viewed as being sinful was rejecting the opportunity to be cleansed of the impurity that they assumed came from out of the living world living in
- 5:39daily activities.
- 5:40It wasn't necessarily that they thought that just, you you had to wash your hands to spiritually cleanse yourself as Aaron so.
- 5:48noted last week, they wanted to wash the Gentile off of them.
- 5:51They thought that having connections with the outside world made them spiritually impure.
- 5:59In this instance, they were not arguing for purification, but purification before sacrifice.
- 6:07So this was the commands from the Old Testament.
- 6:10The tribe of Levi before participating in sacrifices to our Lord would have to cleanse themselves in a ritualistic manner.
- 6:20But rather than arguing to be poor during even common meals, this is what the uh Pharisees and the scribes were.
- 6:28fighting for.
- 6:29So they had taken something that was strictly for sacrificial purposes taught in the Old Testament under the law of Moses and now tried to apply it to general meals.
- 6:38So breakfast, lunch, and dinner they had to purify themselves.
- 6:42They obviously took this way too far.
- 6:45The law never demanded any such a thing.
- 6:48Let's get someone to read Deuteronomy 12 and verse 15.
- 6:52I always like to get you guys involved when I teach, so.
- 6:57if someone would get Deuteronomy 12 and verse 15.
- 7:24So the roebuck and the heart there would be talking about different forms of deer, but the clean and the unclean they may eat of.
- 7:32Not only that, but they were allowed to eat in the gates of the city, which would imply that they could eat in multiple different parts of the city.
- 7:38Let's jump down to Deuteronomy 12 and verse 22 where it reads, even as the roebuck and the heart is eaten, remember this is deer again, so thou shalt eat them.
- 7:49The unclean and the clean shall eat of them alike.
- 7:54Hmm.
- 7:55Continuing on, and if there be any blemish therein, as if it be lame or blind or have any ill blemish, thou shalt not sacrifice it unto the Lord thy God.
- 8:04Thou shalt eat it within thy gates.
- 8:06The unclean and the clean person shall eat it alike as the roebuck and as the heart.
- 8:12Now if we jump back even further, well a little forward actually, to Leviticus chapter 22, we can read through verses three through nine where it expounds on this a little more.
- 8:22This is talking about the ritualistic clean.
- 8:26This is where we read about the ones who were to be ritualistically clean, but only when they were eating the portion of their sacrifices that were to be made.
- 8:33See, the tribe of Levi were not only supposed to perform the sacrifices in the Old Testament, but they were also supposed to partake of a portion of that meat that was
- 8:42sacrificed.
- 8:44This was not a command for every single meal, and yet the Pharisees expanded this to include just that.
- 8:50So if we can get someone to read Leviticus 22 and then verses 3 through 9.
- 9:00saying to them, whosoever he be of all your seed, all your seed among your generations, that goeth unto the holy thing, which the children of Israel hallow unto the Lord, having
- 9:11his uncleanness upon him, that soul shall be cut off from my presence.
- 9:16I am the Lord.
- 9:17What man soever of the seed of Aaron is a leper, or hath a running issue, he shall not eat of the holy things until he be clean.
- 9:26And whoso touches,
- 9:27anything that is unclean by the dead, a man whose seed goeth from, or whosoever toucheth any creeping thing, whereby he may be made unclean, or a man of whom he may take
- 9:42uncleanness, whatsoever uncleanness he hath, the soul which hath touched any such shall be unclean until even, and shall not eat of the holy things, unless he wash his flesh with
- 9:56water.
- 9:57Then when the sun is down, he shall be clean, and shall afterward eat of the holy thing.
- 10:03because it is his food.
- 10:05That which dith of itself, or is torn with beast, he shall not eat to defile himself therewith.
- 10:11I am the Lord.
- 10:12They shall therefore keep mine ordinance, lest they bear sin for it, and die therefore if they profane.
- 10:21I the Lord do sanctify them." All right, so here we see in verse four and verse six and verse seven,
- 10:29the holy things.
- 10:31He's not talking about every single meal here, he's talking about the holy sacrifice meals.
- 10:37This wasn't to include every single meal.
- 10:39uh
- 10:40But returning back to the public accusation that they laid before Jesus in an attempt to discredit him, he responds appropriately, not by answering their question, but by calling
- 10:50them out as hypocrites, as Aaron noted.
- 10:52Hypocrite in the original Greek referred to the term play actor.
- 10:57It was someone who wore various masks depending on the role that they would play.
- 11:02Typically, this would be in a theater.
- 11:04It reminds me of something uh from Japan which is called Kabuki Theater.
- 11:10There's also, which Kabuki was more heavy makeup, but there's another version called the Nome theater, where they had large abbreviated masks for every type of character.
- 11:20uh Evil men would be portrayed as red masks with really long noses and things like that.
- 11:26And so it's not just a reference to the Greek, but that's where we get the word hypocrite from, is in reference to play actors.
- 11:36We left the quote, we were left at the end of the lesson with Aaron with a quote from Isaiah which sheds more light on the subject.
- 11:44Aaron let me know that he will be the one to go over Isaiah more in depth when he gets back so we're going to jump past that and give you more detail surrounding Mark 7 itself.
- 11:55ah So we're going to continue in Mark that way hopefully you have a better view of things when Aaron does jump back into Isaiah.
- 12:04So moving forward into verse 8.
- 12:06and 9 of Mark chapter 7.
- 12:09It reads, for laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men as the washing of pots and cups and many other such things like you do.
- 12:19And he said unto them, full well you reject the commandment of God, that you keep your own traditions.
- 12:26When the Pharisees were
- 12:27referred to traditions, typically they were talking about traditions of elders, traditions of people.
- 12:34Christ brought it back to their attention that these were very much just the commandments of men, these were not the commandments of God.
- 12:41They needed to remember that someone like their forefathers, Moses, Aaron, people from before, they were fallible men still, they weren't perfect.
- 12:54By doing this, Christ brings to attention the great contrast between humanity's choices and decisions on things and commandments and God's divinity.
- 13:02So you can see the separation there.
- 13:04The Pharisees for many years had put more emphasis on their own manmade traditions than what was actually taught by the Lord.
- 13:12These men were experts at explaining away God's commandment that had conflicted with their own desires and traditions.
- 13:20You could almost think of them as skilled politicians.
- 13:23They were real good at not answering the question.
- 13:27But instead, they would leverage the law of the land.
- 13:31They were misusing the law of our creator many times to suit their own purposes, like what they were doing with the food, the clean and the unclean.
- 13:40They were applying it to every single meal.
- 13:42And that's just one of the issues.
- 13:47These were the type of people who...
- 13:49in a sense, look for loopholes.
- 13:51They were trying to figure out ways to bend God's Word to their will.
- 13:56Now, whether they were doing this knowingly or unknowingly, it would depend on the individual person.
- 14:02I'm not sure why my phone is not on silent, but I will correct that.
- 14:12They look for these loopholes so that it would alleviate them from obeying God's will while simultaneously allowing them to apply their own will to the people.
- 14:21Continuing on in verse 10, he gives them an example of their substitution of God's law.
- 14:26He not only accuses, but then goes straight into showing the proof to back up his claim about the Pharisees.
- 14:32So here it is, starting in verse 10, and we're gonna read through verse 13, for Moses said, so now he's quoting one of the forefathers, honor thy father and mother, and whoso
- 14:41curseth father and mother, let him die.
- 14:44But ye say, if a man shall say to his father or mother, it is korban, that is to say a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited of me, he shall be free.
- 14:54And you suffer him no more to do aught for his mother or father.
- 14:57Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition,
- 15:01which ye have delivered, and many such like things you do." He uses the unfair way some of the Jews dealt with their parents who were getting old and uses it as an example to teach
- 15:15them what's going on.
- 15:17The account back in Matthew chapter 4, which is a parallel account, has it written like this, "'For God commanded saying, honor thy father and mother, and he that curseth father
- 15:28or mother, let him die the death.'"
- 15:31Okay, so at last we find a contradiction in the accounts so we can all go home, right?
- 15:36Mark said, Moses said, and Matthew said, God said.
- 15:40We get to go home now?
- 15:41No, absolutely not.
- 15:43Moses spoke by whose authority?
- 15:45By God's authority, right?
- 15:47So if you say Moses said and God said, that should be the same thing, right?
- 15:50As long as the messages align, there's no contradiction there.
- 15:56But more than this, Christ was very, very clever in how he counters his opponents.
- 16:02Since the Pharisees typically trace their oral traditions all the way back to Moses, time after time after time after time, Christ reminds them of what Moses really said.
- 16:12So instead of saying, he said this and we should follow this, he quotes him.
- 16:18He reads it perfectly.
- 16:20In fact, he starts by quoting the fifth commandment, honor thy father and mother.
- 16:24And this is found in Exodus 20 and verse 12, Deuteronomy 5, 16.
- 16:28And 1 Timothy 5, 4 tells us to show piety at home to their parents.
- 16:34What is piety?
- 16:35Can anyone tell me what piety means?
- 16:40piety would be yes, respect, it's reverence, love, and that could even include financial support.
- 16:47After this, Jesus immediately follows up with the first quote with another one.
- 16:53So we see the first quote, honor thy father and mother, and then this second quote that he does is from Exodus 21 17 and Leviticus 20 and verse 9.
- 17:02He who speaks evil of father or mother is to be put to death.
- 17:06This is a focus on the punishment for abusing one's family and parents.
- 17:11That's a pretty harsh punishment, right?
- 17:13But that should show them the weight of what these decisions were doing to them.
- 17:17This was not just speaking ill of them.
- 17:20He's not just saying, don't speak bad about your parents.
- 17:22Don't talk bad about them behind their back.
- 17:25Remember how we looked at the phase whenever we read the phrase in the Bible to walk?
- 17:30If we're going on a walk with God, does that mean we're physically walking with God?
- 17:35No, it means we're living with Him, right?
- 17:38In His way.
- 17:40So...
- 17:45The same type of thought process can be applied here.
- 17:48Okay, so bringing it back to the Greek and I keep looking at this word and it's intimidating to pronounce but I'm going to try.
- 17:55It's kago logio, I think I nailed it, or can be transliterated as literal curses or reviles, all right?
- 18:05This wasn't just talking about about your parents, this was cursing your parents.
- 18:08This was reviling your parents.
- 18:11This is to criticize an abusive.
- 18:14or an angry and insulting manner.
- 18:17So they're not just talking bad about their parents, they're criticizing them towards an evil goal.
- 18:23Now we reach verse 11 and 12, which opens up a very distinct contrast to what Moses said.
- 18:29He's now stating for the record with everyone they're hearing what the Pharisees are saying and showing that they are in direct opposition to the teachings of Moses, who they
- 18:41had just claimed to hold in such high regard.
- 18:45These Pharisees were teaching people that instead of helping their aging parents financially, they could give their money to the church.
- 18:52You don't have to give to your parents as long as you make a vow and give it to the church.
- 18:56You can donate that to God.
- 18:59By doing this, they would break voluntarily the fifth commandment, which is honor thy father or mother.
- 19:06This practice, as we read in the verses known as korban, was explained by Mark in a parenthetical note as meaning given to God.
- 19:15Now, parenthetical note is a piece of information added to a sentence or a paragraph typically to give more depth to it.
- 19:24Typically, it's enclosed in parentheses and it provides additional explanation for clarification.
- 19:31It's all a parenthetical phrase means.
- 19:32It's a million dollar word for a very simple meaning.
- 19:36The word itself is Hebrew and Arabic in term which means gift or offering.
- 19:42So that's korban that we read there.
- 19:45We have the word actually, and I looked this up, this was very neat to look up.
- 19:49uh Two separate artifacts were found in Jerusalem with the word korban.
- 19:54The first is a fragment of a pot or a vessel of some sort.
- 19:57We're not sure what was held into it, but we do have a fragment of this vessel.
- 20:02And the word is there with an etching of two doves.
- 20:05This could have possibly been associated with sacrifices at the temple at the time.
- 20:09And we see more of that in Leviticus chapter 12, verse eight and Luke two and verse 24.
- 20:16The second is a little bitty box called an ulcerary.
- 20:21This would be uh transliterated as a bone box typically.
- 20:25ah It had on its little bitty box but with a lid that reads everything that a man will find to his profit in this box is an offering to God from the one within it.
- 20:39So the usage of the word korban is very interesting ah because the contents of the box
- 20:45were only to be used by the owner of the box.
- 20:49No one else was supposed to do that.
- 20:51It was very taboo to do this.
- 20:52ah But at the same time, it was also not something that was given to the temple.
- 20:58It stayed in possession, right?
- 20:59ah This would have been where you would bury family members, things like that.
- 21:06At the end of the day though, some think that it's a way to legally exclude one's parents.
- 21:12from being included in what was, whatever was contained in that bone box, in that ossuary.
- 21:19So, if you place something inside and you were, as being a child, change your mind later.
- 21:26You vowed at the church, you, you know, you're on your own little stent, you're a raging teenager, you're wanting to get out on your own.
- 21:32I don't want to give mom and dad part of my money.
- 21:34They should have been able to stockpile some for themselves.
- 21:37Later on, you grow out of that, you think, well, no, I should probably be giving them my mom and dad.
- 21:42Well, you've taken that vow now.
- 21:44You can't change your mind.
- 21:45It's locked in.
- 21:46And so this was like a legal loophole that would keep you from giving things to your parents.
- 21:52So even if the child changed his mind, the scribes would remind them that this vow was binding and that it could not be changed.
- 21:59These type of practices, and we see that as stated in verse 13, the scribes were making the Word of God void in their daily lives, weren't they?
- 22:08They were taking the fifth commandment, honor thy father and mother.
- 22:10and putting all kinds of legal ramifications on it and red tape and things that needed to be written out and boxes that they couldn't access.
- 22:19Not only this, but the verse states that something that that that this was something that they literally handed down to people.
- 22:25So this was not only applied to them, but would also be something that their children, the next generation would also have to adhere to as well.
- 22:33This would not prevent that generation also from obeying the word of God.
- 22:37Obviously, they could have chosen to obey the word of God.
- 22:40But how many traditions of men do we have passed down from generation to generation to generation to generation that now people follow simply because great, great, great, great,
- 22:5110 times granddad did it.
- 22:54And so I'm going to do it the same way.
- 23:00Let's continue on to Mark 14 and verse 16.
- 23:05So, I'm sorry, Mark chapter 7, we're still in verse 7, we're not gonna leave verse 7 very often unless we jump over to Matthew, but in chapter 7, verses 14, and when he had called
- 23:14unto the people, he said unto them, hearken unto me, every one of you, and understand.
- 23:21He's essentially calling everybody, hey, hey, you guys wanna hear this?
- 23:24Come here, listen to me, listen up, I wanna make sure everybody hears this.
- 23:30You see, the Pharisees and the scribes were brazen enough to attack Jesus in front of all the people that He was teaching.
- 23:37And so, in like manner, He wanted to make absolutely sure that their ears were open and they weren't talking amongst themselves about what the Pharisees and scribes were possibly
- 23:47saying.
- 23:49So, here He goes, harken unto me, come here, listen, open up your ears and understand.
- 23:53There is nothing from without a man that entering into Him can defile Him.
- 23:59but the things which come out of them, those are they that defile the man.
- 24:04If any man has ears to hear, let him hear." Christ turns his attention from the Pharisees to the crowd at this point.
- 24:12Remember, they brought this in front of a crowd.
- 24:14What was their attempt?
- 24:16To discredit?
- 24:17To shame him?
- 24:19All right.
- 24:20And yet we see the tables turn very quickly, don't we?
- 24:24And he's not verbally attacking them, but he's teaching the people.
- 24:28His accusers who were a moment ago so brazen, so loud, are now being humbled by their own hypocrisy, aren't they?
- 24:35They hear the words of Moses, stated on two different accounts.
- 24:39He goes back and quotes Leviticus.
- 24:44It's important to note that Christ did not do this to destroy the reputation of the scribes and the Pharisees.
- 24:50He used this as an opportunity to teach his followers.
- 24:54Sadly, for the Pharisees, as many of us know today as adults, embarrassment can be a very good learning tool, can't it?
- 25:03You do something that embarrasses you, especially out in public, you tend not to do that again.
- 25:09This would have been a good teacher for them.
- 25:12If you don't want to be embarrassed again, don't do it again.
- 25:15He invites all those around to listen so they can understand his message.
- 25:19This would have been incredibly embarrassing to the Pharisees and scribes who are supposed to be managers, politicians, top of the totem pole.
- 25:29Jesus then returns back.
- 25:30He goes back to the original issue that needed addressing.
- 25:33This was a claim issue of impurity, right?
- 25:38So if we go back in 7, 1 through 5 of Matthew's account, goes into detail a little bit further here.
- 25:44I'm sorry, in Matthew 15, 11, he goes into this a little bit further in detail where Matthew states, not that which goeth into the mouth defileeth a man, but that which cometh
- 25:56out of the mouth, that is which defileeth the man.
- 26:00So they were talking about ritual cleaning of their hands and their bodies and things before they ate in a social sense and here they're being told by Matthew, well expounded
- 26:12upon by Matthew.
- 26:14That's not the food that enters your body.
- 26:18Everyone here at this time period was thinking physical things.
- 26:22They had a very hard time during the first century applying spiritual lessons, thinking things outside of the physical realm.
- 26:31Jesus finishes the lesson by stating, any man has ears to hear, let him hear.
- 26:38He's saying, if you're going to listen to me, listen to me.
- 26:41Now we have a shift.
- 26:42So we have a break in the text and a little bit of time passes.
- 26:45And we see different sections of events outlined in verses 17 through 23 of Mark chapter seven.
- 26:52So let's continue on for the sake of time.
- 26:54And when he entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable.
- 26:59And he saith unto them, are you so without understanding also?
- 27:04Do you not?
- 27:04perceive that whatsoever thing from without entereth into a man, it cannot defile him because it entereth not into his heart but his belly and goeth out into draught, purging
- 27:18all meats.
- 27:20And he said, that which cometh out of the man, that defileeth the man.
- 27:23For from within, out of the heart of man proceeds evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murderers, thefts.
- 27:34covetousness, wickedness, deceits, blasphemy, pride, foolishness, all these evil things come from within and defile the man.
- 27:51Now we see the Christ leaving the crowd and entering a house with his disciples.
- 27:57When they get there, the disciples do what they tend to do to Jesus after every time he talks in public.
- 28:02They start asking them questions.
- 28:03Teach us teacher.
- 28:05What did you mean by these things?
- 28:08They questioned him about the parables.
- 28:11They looked to him for further explanation and clarification.
- 28:14If we jump back over to Matthew chapter 15, the parallel chapter, through verses 12 through 14, we see the disciples let Jesus know that his words had often offended the
- 28:23Pharisees.
- 28:24They seem almost to be worried since after all, the Pharisees were leaders of the people, right?
- 28:29You don't want to offend the people in power.
- 28:31They could cause you a lot of trouble.
- 28:33Jesus isn't worried about these things.
- 28:34He's worried about spiritual things, isn't he?
- 28:37He knows ultimately what's coming to meet him on the cross, and he goes forth honorably, he goes forth sinlessly, and he finishes the work.
- 28:48Jesus responds to them by stating that every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up.
- 28:57If you're teaching stuff that God has not been teaching, it will get rooted up.
- 29:03It will get found out those teachings are not going to continue forever.
- 29:07He goes on to call them the blind leading the blind.
- 29:10Matthew also gives us the additional information that it was Peter who asked about the parable.
- 29:14So we see Peter asking specifically in Matthew's account.
- 29:18Coming back into Mark chapter seven, I know we keep going back and forth between Matthew and Mark, but the parallel accounts give us a real good view of what's going on at the
- 29:26time.
- 29:26We see Jesus expressing a form of disappointment towards his disciples.
- 29:31These were people who he has been teaching to look towards spiritual things rather than physical.
- 29:37He keeps trying to teach his disciples this, but for some reason they're really locked into that physical thought process.
- 29:44And yet they still seem to have that lack of understanding.
- 29:47So Jesus seems to explain to them in a little simpler terms.
- 29:53In verse 15, he explains, he tells them about what enters a man from the outside, referring to food that enters one's mouth, Matthew 15, 17.
- 30:02The Jews, for a very long time, to give a little more context to this, were very concerned with kosher food laws from the Old Testament.
- 30:10There are people today that even I've met that are very, very stuck on the laws of, I can't eat pork, I can't eat this unclean thing here.
- 30:18And while this was almost a pet peeve of the Jews and the Pharisees because they were obsessed with the ritual purity of eating in general, which we touched on earlier, Jesus
- 30:27here tries to get them to see just how futile this line of thinking is.
- 30:31um He walks them through basically the digestive system, all right?
- 30:36It's almost like a biology class that he gives these guys.
- 30:39um
- 30:42In a sense, he's giving them this biology lesson and then he links it to a spiritual application.
- 30:47He instructs them, looking at Mark, that the food once eaten doesn't enter your soul, does it?
- 30:53No, of course it doesn't.
- 30:56But rather the belly and there's the stomach where it gets processed.
- 31:00And eventually, he says it's eliminated.
- 31:02The Greek term here, aphedron, could be transliterated to literally mean the word latrine or sewer.
- 31:10So.
- 31:12He's not attacking the kosher food laws, rather he's attempting to emphasize that moral purity is a whole lot more significant than ceremonial purity, right?
- 31:23So, I'm very thankful that what the Pharisees were teaching was not true.
- 31:30After all, I myself and many others at one point I'm sure have absolutely smashed a pizza.
- 31:37It's not the greatest food to put in my mouth.
- 31:40But that's not going to make me ceremonially unclean, right?
- 31:43There are lots of food, that giant plate of brownies, uh the cinnamon rolls on the back table that we tend to have during the birthday celebration typically or the ice cream,
- 31:53that's not going to make you impure.
- 31:56Granted, it might make you sick physically, but it's not going to make you sick spiritually.
- 32:01Point is, at this time, most Jews continue to observe the food laws from the Old Testament along with many other Jewish customs.
- 32:09from that time period.
- 32:11However, we know that the visions received by Peter before visiting with Cornelius, pointed them into a new direction.
- 32:17And we see this reflected in Acts chapter 10 and 11, verses two through eight.
- 32:22When meeting at Jerusalem at the, uh the Apostle, they emphasize that both Jew and Gentile were saved through the grace of Christ by having their hearts cleaned by faith.
- 32:32Acts 15 and verse nine.
- 32:34Later we see that the Jew and Gentile were called to fellowship with one another at the table.
- 32:39And we read this in Galatians 2, 11 and verse 17.
- 32:42We read it in Colossians 2, 16 through 21, 23, somewhere in that area.
- 32:50For this happened to be the Jewish food law that had been abolished.
- 32:54Paul even wrote, and we'll take a look at it.
- 32:56Someone get 1 Timothy 4 and we'll look at verses four through five.
- 33:021 Timothy 4, four through five.
- 33:21Every creature from God is good and nothing is to be refused.
- 33:25Okay, so that's totally different.
- 33:27So, is pork okay?
- 33:30Yes.
- 33:31Pork is okay.
- 33:33Is beef okay?
- 33:34Can we eat kosher things?
- 33:36Yes, we can.
- 33:38Jesus continued in verses 20 through 22, going back to Mark, that which proceeds out of the mouth of man, that is what defiles the man.
- 33:45What is in your heart always manifests in your word and actions, doesn't it?
- 33:51I know we have the phrase all the time, you are what you eat.
- 33:54Don't put any stock in that phrase, it's just a sound bite.
- 33:57Matthew touches on this in Matthew 15 and verse 8, the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart.
- 34:03Whatever comes out of our mouth is what we're thinking.
- 34:07Sometimes we don't think long enough before we speak and those things come out straight and they hurt people.
- 34:13He was explaining this to the other disciples that it was not the traditions of the Pharisees that cleaned the heart.
- 34:20washing your hands, washing your body, going through the purification rituals aren't going to clean you.
- 34:25We can only get our hearts cleaned by what?
- 34:28The teachings of Christ?
- 34:30Of course.
- 34:32Someone get Proverbs 5 and verse 23 for me.
- 34:49Proverbs chapter 5 and verse 23.
- 35:00Is that 523?
- 35:02I may have written down the wrong line.
- 35:06423, that's it.
- 35:08Thank you.
- 35:18Yeah, keep thy heart with all diligence out of it springs the issues of life.
- 35:23Back in the text of Mark 7, we read, of the heart of man proceeds evil thoughts.
- 35:27Jesus then proceeds to list several sins that all originate from the heart of man.
- 35:32Let's go through those very quickly.
- 35:34I know we just heard the bell.
- 35:36So fornication.
- 35:37By definition, this would be any kind of sexual relationship outside of God-ordained marriage.
- 35:44Any kind.
- 35:45This would be fornication, incest,
- 35:48Adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, so on and so forth.
- 35:52I'm not going to list them all.
- 35:54Number two, we have red thefts.
- 35:56This great term, clopi, carries the idea of any form of robbery.
- 36:01This would be from petty theft all the way up to armed robbery, murders, phononoid, all kinds of murders, typically stemming from anger.
- 36:13Number four, we see adulteries.
- 36:15Having relations in which one partner is married to someone else.
- 36:19This is a sin that originates from lust that is developed in the heart.
- 36:24Number five, deeds of coveting.
- 36:26This is the desire for someone else's possessions.
- 36:29You're not happy with your own.
- 36:31This would normally go hand in hand with theft, but it's also linked to greediness, which is a form of idolatry, isn't it?
- 36:38We're not supposed to be great.
- 36:40Number six, see wickedness listed.
- 36:42This would be the idea of any form of deception or maliciousness.
- 36:47And then we see a second group of sin to be discussed.
- 36:50We see deceit.
- 36:51This is treachery, falsehoods.
- 36:54It could even be malicious cunning towards an individual.
- 36:58Two, we see situality.
- 37:00This would be a lack of restraint or discipline.
- 37:03Devotry, lewdness is also a sin.
- 37:06Number three, envy.
- 37:07The Greek word literally meaning, and in some translations it even says, an evil eye.
- 37:13This would be a stinginess, a grudging spirit.
- 37:17ah I can't help but think of Scrooge from the Christmas story.
- 37:20He doesn't want to give anybody any kind of money whatsoever.
- 37:23Or maybe Scrooge McDuck if you watch the cartoons and you're a bit younger like me.
- 37:28Four, we see slander.
- 37:30This would be defaming or abusive speech to discredit someone.
- 37:34Five, have pride, arrogance, or haughtiness.
- 37:37That's what pride is.
- 37:39And foolishness.
- 37:40This would just be a general lack of common sense, essentially.
- 37:44Whether moral or intellectual, you're making foolish decisions.
- 37:50You're not taking your time to be wise.
- 37:52And what is wisdom?
- 37:56Okay, what is knowledge?
- 37:57Let's start with knowledge.
- 37:58What is knowledge?
- 38:03It's what you know, right?
- 38:04Yeah, it's not overly complicated.
- 38:06It's what you know.
- 38:07It's all the information and data you gather.
- 38:10Wisdom, by definition, is the application of knowledge.
- 38:15You can know every word of the Bible.
- 38:17Does it do you any good if you do not apply it?
- 38:21Would it be wise to apply it?
- 38:24Absolutely, it would be.
- 38:25So we need to not only have knowledge, but wisdom so that we know how to apply the knowledge.
- 38:34Jesus concludes this section with, these evil things proceed from within and defile man.
- 38:40This is not just a food that you ingest, but rather the actions and attitudes you exhibit in word and or deed.
- 38:47I know I've only got about two minutes left, so we'll go ahead and stop there, since we're at the end of this section.
- 38:53Did anyone have any questions, comments, philosophical meanderings?
- 39:00All right, we'll go ahead and wrap it up there.
- 39:01Thank you very much for your attention this evening.
- 39:05Yes.
- 39:07Sure.
- 39:20Yes, so when it talks about the heart, it doesn't mean physically the heart.
- 39:24Kind of like we said, you know, walk with Christ.