What is closest to your heart?
“So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.” Then he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition!
Then he called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”
For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.””
In Mark 7, the Pharisees are again questioning why Jesus and His disciples aren’t doing all the things “good,” “holy” people do. In this case, they don’t wash their hands the right way, according to a detailed set of rules the Pharisees had built in an effort to keep the Law. It was overkill, but it was their way of life.
Jesus wants to make sure they understand this: This wasn’t about God, this was about THEM. Their pride, their checkboxes, their false perception of holiness. Their customs were the important thing, not staying close to the will of God.
Ultimately, the point is this: the same sin that causes you to write people off because they don’t check YOUR boxes of worthiness is the exact thing that leads to all of the “worst” sins (see verses 22-23). You are no better than the sinners you condemn, your heart has simply selected a different idol. In fact, you might be worse off, because you KNOW God and have still chosen your way over His.
So these are the questions we need to ask ourselves:
Is your heart oriented around God’s holiness, or around your own?
If the latter, you will always be swinging between grotesque pride and profound anxiety.
Is your heart fixated on God’s Worthiness, or on others’?
If the latter, you will always be swinging between toxic judgmentalism and a desperate need for approval.
Are your values determined by familiar systems or by the words of Jesus Christ?
If the former, you will always be swinging between an unfounded arrogance and fragile defensiveness.
Especially now, I see people whose actions and words are primarily dictated by (often) good things that aren’t GOD things. Religious behaviors can be helpful, but cannot be the most powerful guiding force in our lives. Politically correct behaviors are often worthy causes and respectful approaches, but cannot be the final determinant of how you move through the world. Loving America and all you’ve been taught that it stands for -- can be a great way of expressing gratefulness, but nationalism SHOULD NEVER be on the same level as the Word of God. God’s Word offends each of these worldviews -- God’s word offends ALL worldviews -- because He is wholly other and wholly HOLY. It could be no other way.
This passage challenges each and every one of us, because NONE of us get to be right! All of us have distorted priorities and gauges of truth, and it is a daily work to submit our values in profound humility to Jesus alone.
What is the closest to your heart?
“Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.”
And likewise, from your heart can spring all kinds of death. Guard your heart, making sure that you are following Jesus like a sheep with its shepherd, like your life depends on it. Because it actually, literally does.