Clean on the inside!

Mug! Jesus is Lord!

Who is the only true Lord of our lives, hearts and consciences?

Hymns: Who has held the oceans 543 585

Reading

Introduction.

Saying the wrong thing! What career when education finished?

Saying the wrong thing! What career when education finished?

Declan Mcgee – I want to join the IRA

Jesus is in trouble….invited for a meal and . Something radically wrong with the religious life of the professing people of God. There were ideas and teachings that needed to be contradicted and rejected. There was a whole new way of thinking that needed to be embraced with the mind and the heart.

Ultimately Jesus was rejected and murdered on the basis of his claims to be the Messiah and the Son of God but there was a whole set of differences between him and the religious leaders which resulted in their rejection of Him and all he stood for. There was a whole different view of what was wrong with humanity and what needed to be done about it. View of the Law of God.

Law of God is about the Heart! Not about the outside which you can see.

trivialising and externalising of the law of God – trivialising of the whole matter of human sinfulness – trivialising of the whole matter of what needs to be done to deal with human sinfulness- They did not see the need for a Messiah to come to save them from sin.

Is Jesus unclean? This was a question which should never have been asked…not outwardly asked…just maybe some mutterings! What was the problem?

613 commands - Mitsoth in the Torah. 365 negative, 248 positive. Oral law- interpret all of these and guard the lives of Jews from breaking any of the laws.

“Tradition of the elders”- Whole section of the Mishnah devoted to this called the Yadaim. Not a matter of hygiene but ceremonial cleanness before God.

Rabbi’s Hillel and Shammai – in the course of ordinary life the hands might become unclean by touching something that may have touched something that was unclean. If unclean hands touched clean food then the food was unclean. If the unclean food was eaten then the person became unclean- () was used to justify! Had to be running water- poured over the hands up to the wrist.

Jesus does not seek some kind of compromise on this! On purpose. Deliberate act of obvious offence.

Going wrong at this point is very serious! Vs 13-14 echo of the tares- rooted up.

What is the law and where does it come from? Our nation is going seriously wrong at this same point!

What is our conscience bound to?

Make right and wrong from our own ideas of right and wrong?

Richard Baxter: “Men think God’s laws too strict, and yet make more of their own and are anxious for them to be kept!”

114,000 pages, or seven full editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica!

114,000 pages, or seven full editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica!

2. Jesus’ new teaching!

Jesus takes a very public stand on his rejection of the hand-cleansing ritual and all that it meant!

Luther nailing the 95 Theses Witemburg. You can have someone cleansed by purchase of an indulgence!

Whole new interpretation to a section of OT law on uncleaness. To worship and enjoy God the Jews had to be clean to enter the temple. For the priests to go about their priestly duties they had to be holy. Whole mass of external things that had to be done to press this point home to them. Their whole lives would be affected by thoughts of being clean and able to join in with temple worship.

Jesus is saying that this was simply a picture lesson of something spiritual! They had made the pictorial lesson the reality and ignored the spiritual reality!

A new radical teaching! Its not external uncleaness that makes you unfit for God…. It is what is in your heart!

3. The real problem is inside!

Disciples did not understand! Took Peter a long time to escape this sort of thinking – even at Antioch.

The Law doesn’t focus on the outside but on the thoughts and choices and desires of the heart. Law breaking and guilt and uncleaness before God is a heart problem. Sounds simple and obvious to us- But it was a radical teaching for Jesus day.

They had made the outside more important than the inside and the small things more important than the big things! Tithing of garden herbs! Not much to say about the big things! Justice of God! Love of God!

Interesting how Paul the self Righteous Pharisee - learned this

Interesting how Paul the self Righteous Pharisee - learned this

A defiled heart needs radical cleansing! It is contact with Christ himself that cleanses a man. Lepers, dead, issue of blood- uncleaness- totally cleansed by the touch of Christ or by the word of Christ. Peter about Cornelious learned this lesson well! – It is faith in Christ that brings this cleansing.

Jesus is the end of this horrible infection! He alone of all the human race is truly clean. All who trust and rest in Him are made perfectly clean in God’s sight.

Do you feel dirty and unclean? Do you have a restless guilty, accusing conscience?

Conclusion.

As Christians to what laws are we ultimately bound? God is the only true Lord of the conscience- His word alone can bind the conscience. Know what Luther was talking about when he said ‘My conscience is captive to the Word of God.’ Some merely human laws or customs seek to overturn the reality of God’s law- Classic case was ‘Caesar is Lord’ Title Augustus – Caesar as divine. Burn a pinch of incense – Caesar kurios! In our situation- nature of human sexuality – Jesus chose to be regarded as offensive in a very obvious way. Our faith is still Jesus is Lord! – Biblical teaching on human sexuality and marriage is an integral part of what it means to be a Christian.Is Jesus’ focus our focus? – Love the Lord your God. Love your neighbour? My Son give me your heart! Are we uncomfortable with the idea of a heart religion? That is what Jesus is interested in.

Prayer

A - Righteousness higher than mountains

Justice deeper than the depths- Judge of all the earth does right!

Love of God- God is love-Greatest demonstration of love.

C- Uncleaness of heart – engine room- fountain – polluted – We cannot mend.

T- Gifts and Gift.

S- Young – Unwell – Andrew & Eve- Grieve – holidays-

Persecuted believers - Mission