Wash your Hands!

Good Morning and Welcome. I am glad that we can be together again today. Let’s get right into it this morning as we continue through the book of Matthew. Matthew chapter 15 is where we will be today.

Matthew 15:1–9 NIV

1 Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!” 3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: 8 “ ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. 9 They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.’”

Let’s Talk about the Rules

This is an interesting passage because here you have a really direct challenge from the Pharisees with Jesus. What is interesting about this challenge is it is very familiar to me. It is one that I think we hear more than we realize in the church and in our culture. Let’s look at it though.

The disciples weren’t washing their hands before they would eat. I mean first that could be kinda gross. However, be honest do you really wash your hands every time before you eat. Now I know some of you might think.

Yes, I do my mama raised me right.

You never pick up a piece of candy or a small something without having washed your hands.

Someone could be cooking dinner and you walk buy and you do the obligatory steal a small piece of whatever is being made.

Well if you have ever done that you are guilty of breaking the purity laws of the Jewish people.

This is the charge that the Pharisees were giving to Jesus.

Jesus challenges them with directing them to a deeper rule that they are missing. He brings up honoring their mother and father.

Now I don’t know about you when i first read this i was like what does washing my hands have to do with honoring my mother and father.

I mean we could go back to the idea of mom taught me to wash my hands before dinner but is that really what Jesus is talking about.

IT is when we read Verse 3 that we can see the answer.

Matthew 15:3 NIV

3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?

The Tradition

Jesus is challenging the fact that the pharisees can’t focus on anything but their tradition. They are focused on the rules that they have created instead of the ones that God has given them.

To help us better understand that we need to examine the extent that the Jewish leaders took the Law.

There were many people who would spend their days studying and examining the law and provide interpretation. This would lead to deep understanding and extensive lists of expansions of the law that would be required for people to follow.

Sometimes these laws and understandings would be at odds with each other and would lead to problems. To help let’s look at an example.

Exodus 16:29 NIV

29 Bear in mind that the Lord has given you the Sabbath; that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Everyone is to stay where they are on the seventh day; no one is to go out.”

This is the basis for the law of the Sabbath or is often looked at for a deeper understanding. This is the verse from the story of the provision of manna and the instruction to gather a double portion so that people would not have to go out and gather because it wouldn’t be there.

One could argue that this was a specific rule for a specific time. Yet, that didn’t stop them from taking this instruction and go further with it.

The Gospel according to Matthew 1. Blind Leaders of the Blind, 15:1–20

But what if one wished to do a good deed on the Sabbath, such as making a gift to the poor? The Mishnaic tractate Shabbath begins with a situation where a householder wants to give something to a poor person on the Sabbath. If the householder stood inside his house and put his gift outside or if the poor person, standing outside, reached inside and took up the gift, in either case there was a transgression: a person had carried something out of a house on the Sabbath. The pundits decided that the way to do the good deed was this: neither person should cross the boundary carrying the gift. But if the poor man stood outside and reached his hand inside and if the householder then placed his gift into the poor man’s hand, the poor man could withdraw his hand and neither had transgressed (the forbidden act had not been completed by either one). The same result was, of course, obtained if the householder stood inside and held his hand containing the gift outside so that the poor man, standing outside, could simply receive the gift (Shab. 1:1). In this case there is no transgression: neither man has carried the burden across the line.

The Tradition

Are you confused yet? Is it overwhelming to think about following all of those rules. To be honest I can think about times that I have experienced similar things in the church.

Hey Ladies you better not be wearing pants. Or have a skirt above the knee. Actually I found a good Photo for to help us better understand that.

Spiritual Skirt photo

All you ladies remember this when you get dressed next week. We will be judging.

Gentlemen don’t think you are exempt from this. Break out your best dress pants next week and your shirt and tie because if you don’t well you better be at the alters next week.

Purity Culture

The Jewish people were after a culture of purity. Christians are after a culture of purity.

Is that a bad thing?

Really think about it. Is it bad that we are seeking to keep ourselves pure before God.

At its most simple form. No it really isn’t. However, the motivation and the issues lies in the heart of the people who are trying to be pure.

Matthew 15:10–20 NIV

10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.” 12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?” 13 He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.” 15 Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.” 16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”

Pure of Action or Pure of Heart

The challenge we face when we start dealing with things like purity culture is we have to be very careful in how we define and approach it. Purity for the sake of following rules is a foolish endeavor. We can not be stuck in the ruts and problems of the Pharisees and the church before us.

These groups have caused many levels of harm in the past. The Jewish leaders were here doing the same thing they have always done. Attacking the disciples over rules yet missing that they don’t realize how they are rejecting God.

They are consumed with their human traditions and not realizing that as Jesus says

Matthew 15:11 NIV

11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”

It is here that we have to shift our focus from not following the rules for the sake of the rules or trying to earn God’s favor because we follow the rules to the idea that all God cares about is our hearts.

Matthew 15:18 NIV

18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.

The Pure heart

We are called to pursue a heart that is pure. A heart that longs and wants to grow in our relationship with God. It is here that we find freedom. It is hear that we find the joy of what it means to be in a relationship with God. IT is from this position of a heart seeking God that we can move past the things that plague us and keep us from being who we are called to be. Not focused on rules or worried about following a particular set of guidelines hoping that we have done enough.

We are also called to stop holding the positions of other people heart to the standard that God has called us to as individuals. We all struggle and face challenges in different ways. Where one of us may be struggling with alcohol another may be struggling with foul language or pornography. Instead we move to an attitude of prayer and support for one another. Calling each other to serve God with all our heart.

It is when we give into that kind of attitude that we can begin to see amazing things. We can not encounter the divine and not be changed forever. We can not enter into relationship with him and not be transformed. We can not encounter the divine and no want to do the good work that he has prepared for us.

It starts though with our heart and how we build our relationship with God. Let’s start that Journey or continue on that Journey.

Let’s pray