The Doctor Is In

heart monitor

In Mark chapter 7, we find a group of religious leaders clashing with Jesus once again over an aspect of His life and teaching. This time, the issue involved the long standing traditions and customs that were followed by the religious leadership of Jesus' day. These customs were known as the "Tradition of the Elders" and they represented the collected teachings and commands of well-known religious teachers from the past. These traditions included many detailed interpretations of the Old Testament law and spelled out things that you could and could not do in particular situations.

These traditions had built up over the years and had become the accepted standards of behavior by Jesus' day. These rules were strictly followed by the religious leaders- but not necessarily by Jesus and His disciples. So not surprisingly, this lead to a disagreement between Jesus and these men...

"So the religious leaders asked him, 'Why don't your disciples follow our age-old customs? For they eat without first performing the washing ceremony.'"

"Jesus replied, 'You bunch of hypocrites! Isaiah the prophet described you very well when he said, "'These people speak very prettily about the Lord but they have no love for him at all. Their worship is a farce, for they claim that God commands the people to obey their petty rules.'"

How right Isaiah was! For you ignore God's specific orders and substitute your own traditions. You are simply rejecting God's laws and trampling them under your feet for the sake of tradition'" (Mark 7:5-9).

In answering their question, Jesus quoted Isaiah 29:19 and said in effect, "Your tradition cancels out the direct commandment of God." You see, the Old Testament law did require various washings and rituals in certain situations but these men went beyond what the Scripture called for and created a tremendous burden upon people because of it.

So Jesus was not criticizing the law itself but He was criticizing the way that it was interpreted by those who placed their tradition on an equal or higher level than the Bible. He then took the opportunity to get to the issue that was really important...

"Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, 'Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean'" (Mark 7:14-15 NIV).

Jesus here identifies the core issue involved with being "clean" and "unclean." Jesus points out that cleanliness before God is not a matter of washing up in a certain way because it's not what goes into someone that makes them unclean but what comes out.

"After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. 'Are you so dull?' he asked. 'Don't you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him 'unclean'? For it doesn't go into his heart but into his stomach, and then out of his body.' (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods 'clean.')

He went on: 'What comes out of a man is what makes him 'unclean.' For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and make a man 'unclean'" (Mark 7:17-23 NIV).

So in answering the disciple's request to explain His statement, Jesus' response is to basically say, "Don't you get it? What you eat has no effect on the heart." This is important for us to understand for when Jesus speaks of "the heart" here, He's not talking about that big muscle in your chest that pumps blood 24 hours a day. When used in a spiritual sense, the "heart" is a symbol for the part of you that thinks, feels and makes decisions.

Used in this way, the heart represents your innermost emotional and spiritual being. Like our physical hearts, our spiritual hearts are not immediately visible to others but just as you will eventually see the ill effects of someone with a physical heart ailment, you will eventually see the ill effects of someone whose spiritual heart is not right with God too. That's because your heart represents who you really are. And what's in your heart will eventually reveal who and what you really are to others.

So what are these things that come from our hearts and defile us (or make us unclean) before God? Well, Jesus goes on to list a few of them...

Evil thoughts (or destructive thoughts designed to cause injury to others)
Sexual immorality
Theft
Murder
Greed or covetousness, the intense desire to possess more of something that you already have enough of
Wickedness (or evil purposes and desires)
Deceit (literally "to bait or snare" someone)
Lewdness or "undisciplined, unrestrained behavior"
Envy
Blasphemy or slander
Pride or arrogance (this would include someone with an inflated opinion of themselves or someone who looks down on others with contempt)
Folly or foolishness

The Apostle Paul picks up on this same idea a little later in the Bible...

"But when you follow your own wrong inclinations, your lives will produce these evil results: impure thoughts, eagerness for lustful pleasure, idolatry, spiritism (that is, encouraging the activity of demons), hatred and fighting, jealousy and anger, constant effort to get the best for yourself, complaints and criticisms, the feeling that everyone else is wrong except those in your own little group-- and there will be wrong doctrine, envy, murder, drunkenness, wild parties, and all that sort of thing. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God" (Galatians 5:19-21).

The Apostle John sounds a similar warning in the book of 1st John...

"Stop loving this evil world and all that it offers you, for when you love these things you show that you do not really love God; for all these worldly things, these evil desires-- the craze for sex, the ambition to buy everything that appeals to you, and the pride that comes from wealth and importance-- these are not from God. They are from this evil world itself" (1John 2:15-16).

Jesus says that it's not the lack of following a tradition that messes people up. The real deciding factors are the evil thoughts and intentions of someone's heart. These are the things that defile people and make them unable to enjoy a relationship with God. So how can we get our hearts right before God? Well, here's the answer from the Apostle Paul in the book of Romans...

"For salvation that comes from trusting Christ-- which is what we preach-- is already within easy reach of each of us; in fact, it is as near as our own hearts and mouths. For if you tell others with your own mouth that Jesus Christ is your Lord and believe in your own heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in his heart that a man becomes right with God; and with his mouth he tells others of his faith, confirming his salvation." (Romans 10:8-10)

Remember Jesus' promise to those with pure hearts...

"Happy are those whose hearts are pure, for they shall see God." (Matthew 5:8)

The Doctor is not a real doctor but he plays one on the Internet. E-Mail prescriptions are also available on an individual basis.

Questions Or Comments

Back to YOUTHlinks