Sermon Tone Analysis

Mark 7:6–7 (ESV)

And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, “ ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

Mark 7:8–9 (ESV)

You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.”

And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition!

Thesis: God does not accept twisted worship.

Intro: We are now entering into the last year of Jesus’s earthly ministry.

Much of what Jesus has done up until this point, when it comes to the Jewish purity regulations, was challenging the way they were to be viewed.

One example, when He healed the woman with the issue of blood in chapter, 5, one of the messages we may receive from that encounter is that the pure should not fear the impure, but restore and bring healing to that which tradition said was “unclean.”

For the first century Jewish man, or woman, purity was a matter of great importance - in fact some Jewish martyrs lost their lives for their stance on eating pork.

The belief behind this legalism was, that their obedience to God’s law would provoke God to come alongside the nation, empower them, and therefore they could rise above any kingdom or nation that would dare to conquer them.

So, the Jewish leaders, especially those within the Pharisees and Scribes, had added traditions that were meant to be an indication of ones loyalty.

Not just to God, but to Israel itself.

They had replaced the true worship that the law required, and the true markings a heart searching after God would have naturally, the fruit of that relationship, if you will, in a person’s life who sought a relationship with Him.

They’d replaced such things with twisted traditions meant to box people in, within the law.

Cages within cages, in a sense.

What is worship, though?

To put it simply, it is the way we show our reverence for God.

In fact, that’s the Greek word used in verse 7, as Jesus quotes Isaiah, it’s sebontai, which means “to show reverence for.”

In Isaiah 29, which Jesus quotes, it’s the Hebrew word “yah-ray”, which literally means to “be afraid or fearful of”.

It’s the awe we show in our reverence for Him, His power, His majesty, His glory, His love and compassion but also His wrath and His justice.

And we demonstrate this awe in how we live for Him...

As our life imitates what we truly believe about Him.

Our theology comes out in our worship.

And this comes to a head today in our text in a dialogue between Jesus and the Pharisees and Scribes.

He quotes Isaiah, who prophesied about this very sort of thing, and the gist of the message is simply, “God does not accept worship done wrong.”

Worship done to the wrong god, the right way, is just as unacceptable to the Lord as worship done to Him in the wrong way.

It is Twisted Worship.

It is, as we saw prior to the series of Mark starting, it is “Strange Fire”.

Twisted by tradition, by legalism, by men… who are set on appeasing themselves, not God.

God does not accepted twisted worship.

And tradition, for the sake of tradition, becomes slavery, it becomes selfish, until finally, it becomes savage.

Allow me to unpack all that this morning.

Tradition Can Become Slavery

Jesus had likely worked His way back, from our text last week, He has found His way back to Galilee.

In fact, John’s Gospel says as much, and goes on to say he would not go back to Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill him there.

(John 7:1)

And Mark gives us insight into what is going on here.

The local Pharisees have called for backup to deal with Him.

The Scribes “had come down from Jerusalem”, and they’re clearly watching both Him and His disciples closely.

It’s not that they begin to notice that the disciples’ hands are dirty when they go to eat, they were unwashed.

The disciples had not followed protocol.

This more than just washing their hands - there was ceremony that had to be performed, purification that must be completed, before a man was allowed to feed himself.

Their hands must have been cleansed in order to separate a Jewish man from any sort of defilement.

For Jesus, it’s the same argument, a different day!

We’ve seen this earlier in the Gospel of Mark.

Back in chapter 2, the Pharisees had issues with Jesus and the way He and His disciples treated the Sabbath, they had issues with how and when they fasted (Mark 2:18, 24).

To clarify, these Pharisees and Scribes are not concerned with hygiene, they’re considered with performance.

And they are there with one goal in mind - to trap Jesus.

He has defied their rules against healing on the Sabbath (Mark 3:1-6) had been plotting, if you remember, with the Herodians

Mark 3:6 “The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.”

This is their way of taking their shot at him publicly, to discredit Him.

If they can make him lose popularity with the public, hurt his credibility, He will be less of a threat, and they may not have to do anything to Him physically.

Or perhaps, the mentality was, “if we can dishonor Him now, nobody will care when He gets murdered.”

So the true fight begins.

In a boxing match, a good boxer may spend the first few rounds learning his opponents moves, range, speed, tells, vulnerabilities...

Good gamblers do the same thing.

Some of you may remember the TV show “Maverick”, but I’m not old enough to remember that - I remember the movie with Mel Gibson.

Where he tells the table, “I never cheat, I seldom bluff, and I’ll spend one hour losing if you just let me play.”

Then he loses for exactly one hour - spending that entire hour learning their tells.

Then Maverick proceeds to take all their money.

That’s what the Pharisees hope to do here.

Feel Him out, see what they can learn.

Try to match wits with Jesus - oops, can’t do that, so let’s call in help from the Scribes in Jerusalem - and the bell rings, the deck has been shuffled.

They watch Him, they watch His disciples, they’re not concerned with winning at this point, necessarily, but...

They’re certainly concerned with validating themselves and their mission...

Now here’s how the ceremony would go:

First, it had nothing to do with really washing dirt off anything.

It was a ceremonial rinsing.

They’d have someone pour water out of a jar onto someone else’s hands, with their fingers pointing up.

As long as the water dripped off at the wrist, that person could proceed to the next step.

Then he had to pour water over both hands with the fingers pointing down.

Then each hand was rubbed with the other.

What about the soap?

Yeah, what about it?

It wasn’t used.

It’s strictly ceremony.

What’s the point?

TO appease ceremony.

Tradition.

The tradition of the elders, the extra-biblical laws and interpretations of Scripture had supplanted Scripture itself as the highest religious authority in Judaism.

It had only come along since the Babylonian exile.

The only time Hebrew Scripture talked about washing ones hands before eating, was when the priests were required to do so by Levitical law.

Now Mark makes this note within verses 3 and 4 for our benefit, for the Gentile reader’s benefit.

Because without understanding this, it would almost make it seem like the disciples were like hungry pigs headed to a trough rather than a dinner table.

They weren’t, they just weren’t as concerned with the traditions of the Jews like the Pharisees and Scribes were.

The actual Greek reads (οι ιουδαιοι εαν μη πυγμη νιψωνται τας χειρας) “unless they wash their hands with a fist”, which basically is Mark’s way of saying, “They’re not washing to get clean”.

The practice was tedious, and mostly symbolic - and the Pharisees expected it of anyone who may see themselves as someone who aspired to be a preacher or teacher of the Law, or even just a religious minded person.

But there’s no real requirement for it...

Oh, here’s something.

“When they come from the marketplace”?

Where did Jesus just come from, back in chapter 6?

Their mentality is, “When we do what you do… we wash” but the thing is, they don’t do what Jesus does, they don’t heal the sick, they don’t teach the poor, and Jesus will expose this of them.

They’re so enslaved by their traditions, their so enamored with their legalistic ideals, what they want Scripture to be about, verses what it’s actually about - they’re going to miss the point completely.

When they come back from the marketplace, by the way, their type of washing is different from that mentioned in verse 3 - they wash their hands and the Greek word is nipsontai (νιψωνται) - to wash.

That’s just the rinsing of their hands, but the word Mark uses here in verse 4, means something else entirely.

They do not eat unless they wash -baptisentai, the root is baptizo (βαπτισωνται) - it’s where we get the word for “baptism”, they purify themselves entirely.

They submerge themselves.

Why would they do this?

They’re not required to.