September 2nd,
2018 “A Matter of the Heart” Rev. Heather Jepsen
Mark 7:1-23 and
James 1:17-27
This morning we return to our study of
the gospels with a reading from the Gospel of Mark. We will be in Mark this whole month, and you will
soon find that in the Gospel of Mark Jesus is quick as a whip. Jesus is full of sharp retorts, on the spot
Scripture quotes, and general quick wit with even a hint of a bad attitude. This morning’s reading is no exception as
Jesus mixes it up with the Pharisees and the disciples.
Our lectionary would have us jump
around and skip parts but I just hate that as we lose all context, so we are
looking at all 23 verses today. Jesus
has been busy healing the masses and now the Pharisees approach while he and
his disciples are enjoying a much deserved rest. There was no time or space for ritual washing
and everyone just grabbed a snack. The
Pharisees sense an opportunity for criticism and point out that JC and his
followers aren’t doing things the way that they should.
Ritual washing was important to the Pharisees
and others as this was a way that you showed honor to God. You took the time to wash properly and do
things right as a way of marking who and whose you were. Just like saying a prayer before dinner,
washing your hands was an important part of the ritual, and Jesus and his gang
had left that part out.
Jesus isn’t in the mood to be trifled
with (we will see that a lot in Mark’s gospel) and so he snaps back with a
nasty bit of Scripture. You guys are
just like the folks Isaiah was complaining about, “This people honor me with
their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me,
teaching human precepts as doctrine.”
That ought to take them down a peg, as he basically calls them sinners
and their religion a sham.
He then offers an example by way of the
tradition surrounding parents. He says
that the Pharisees abandon the commandment to honor father and mother by giving
all their money that they should use to support their parents to the church
instead. The Pharisees benefit from
offerings to the church and so this false charity is a way to ignore the
commandment to honor their parents and to keep the money within their own
circles. By saying they are giving the
money to the church; they are getting away with a sin of neglect.
Now it’s a teaching moment and Jesus
calls everyone over. “Nothing outside a
person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what
defile.” The disciples nod their heads
at this wisdom but the moment they have Jesus alone again they make it clear
that they have no idea what he is talking about. Doesn’t eating with dirty hands make you
dirty???
And so Jesus explains again, saying
what we eat is only what we eat, no more and no less. Mark claims that Jesus declares all foods
clean here which the other gospel writers would certainly find to be a
debatable point. Jesus then gets to the
real heart of the issue, literally. It
is what comes from the heart that makes us dirty, all our bad behavior, all our
sinfulness, comes from within. We could
follow all the rules until the cows come home but if our hearts are rotten, so
too will we be.
At issue here of course is our love of religious
rules and ritual purity over the actual substance of a heart that is in love
with God. One doesn’t have to look far
to see this problem alive and well in our world today. The Catholic Church has been all over the
news these past few weeks for precisely this exact problem. In their desire to pursue religious purity
through requiring celibacy of their all-male clergy, they have prevented their
leadership from knowing the value of healthy human familial relationships. I just want to point out that this wouldn’t
have happened if they had an all-female clergy!
Seriously though, the Catholic Church’s pursuit of purity over anything
else has led to their downfall, as unhealthy expressions of sexuality continue
and leadership allows it to go on. The
evil in their hearts and in their system of religious governance is now on full
display and it is heartbreaking for everyone to watch. And so we pray, for our Christian brothers
and sisters in the Catholic Church.
Our church too, needs to be wary of
such sin. We must be careful that our
own sense of religiosity and self-righteousness don’t inadvertently separate us
from God. We need to be careful that the
lives we live as individuals and as a community actually reflect the words that
we preach, pray, and sing here each Sunday morning. Our reading from James encourages us in this
direction, reminding us to be doers of the word and not just those who claim to
follow God. Our lives should show the
fruits of our labor in the faith and James would remind us that how we treat
those in need is the true mark of what lies within our hearts.
Of course there is a tension here
between these two texts. James
encourages us to follow the laws of God in action and not just belief. Weren’t the Pharisees doing just that? They were following all the laws to a T and
that is precisely the point where they clashed with Jesus. So is it doing or is it believing that
matters? Is it the law and religious
rules that save us or is it the stuff inside of us that saves us? A healthy answer, I believe is that it is
both.
Religious laws that are pure, like
showing charity to the poor, worshipping and honoring our God, setting aside
time for Sabbath rest, and honoring the stranger in our midst are what are necessary
to live a life of faith. On the other
hand, Church rules about when and where we say what prayers, those are not that
important. But equally important to the
pure religious law is the heart of the follower. Do we follow the religious rules for a good
life because we want to check all the boxes and save ourselves? Or do we follow the rules because we want to
follow our God? See the difference? A person who follows God’s law for their own
selfish interest really isn’t following God’s law at all. Only when our hearts first love God, above all
else, will our religious devotion be pure and acceptable.
I want to bring in another author here,
a Pharisee, to help us understand. In
his letter to the church in Corinth Paul writes “If I speak in the tongues of
mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging
cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers,
understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to
remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I
hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain
nothing.”
Paul reminds us that it doesn’t matter
how perfect our lives are, it doesn’t matter how many rules we follow, and it
doesn’t matter how much we sin or don’t sin; if we don’t have love in our
hearts for God. Without love, all of
our good deeds, all of our following the rules, everything we do is
worthless. Jesus would respond to the
Pharisees in today’s reading by saying, “It doesn’t matter how clean your hands
are, if you don’t have love you are filthy.”
Clean hands are worthless without a pure heart.
That is what Jesus was trying to tell
the Pharisees, the crowds, and those confused disciples. Remember that quote he gives them from
Isaiah? “This people honor me with their
lips, but their hearts are far from me.”
Where are our hearts, far from God or closely connected with God?
God desires our hearts, not our
words. God desires our hearts, not religious
rule following. Above all else, it is a
matter of the heart. What comes from our
hearts, from the core of who we are, will reveal our love of God. We will either have hearts of charity and
love, or we will have hearts of greed and ugliness. It is simply a matter of the heart.
And so today I ask you to consider your
own heart and what lies within it. Are
your good deeds motivated by a pure love of God, or are you simply following
the rules in order to earn your ticket to heaven? Only you can answer this question. Paul would remind us that without love we are
nothing. James would tell us that
without acts of love, our religion is worthless. And Jesus would remind us that true faith is
simply a matter of the heart. So, what’s
in your heart today? Amen.
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