The heart of the matter - Matt 15:1-20 - jason hoet

Title: the heart of the matter
Passage: Matt 15:1-20
Series: Defining Moments
Speaker: Jason Hoet
Date: 2 October 2005

Introduction
To the letter of the Law

It is a Texas law that when two trains meet each other at a railroad crossing: each train shall come to a full stop and neither train shall proceed until the other has gone. (archaic)

Alabama (archaic)
Putting salt on a railroad track may be punishable by death.

West Virginia
When a railroad passes within 1 mile of a community of 100 or more people in it, they must build a station and stop there regularly to pick up and drop off passengers.

Mississippi
It is illegal to place soap on railroad tracks.

Australia
Lawmakers are proposing a new law that will not allow anyone to come closer than 100 meters from a dead whale's carcass.

A life sentence is 25 years.

Children may not purchase cigarettes, but they may smoke them.

You may never leave your car keys in an unattended vehicle.

It is illegal to roam the streets wearing black clothes, felt shoes and black shoe polish on your face as these items are the tools of a cat burgular.

It is illegal to walk on the right hand side of a footpath.

Under Australian Communications Authority (ACA) regulations, a modem can't pick up on the first ring. If it does the, ACA permit for your modem is invalid and there's a $12,000 fine. -Telecommunications Act 1991.

Taxi cabs are required to carry a bale of hay in the trunk.

Bars are required to stable, water and feed the horses of their patrons.

In Victoria
Only licensed electricians may change a light bulb. The fine for not abiding by this law is 10 pounds.

It is illegal to wear hot pink pants after midday Sunday.

You must have a neck to knee swimsuit in order to swim at Brighton Beach.

A ridiculous question?
Tonight seems a case of a bunch of people going to a lot of effort to pin a dumb law on Jesus.

If you know anything about Jesus – you know that he didn't get along with the religious authorities of his day!

Consistently throughout the book of Matthew Jesus and the Pharisees are in conflict. Todays passage is not the exception – it is the rule!

The Pharisees were looking for ways to do away with Jesus.
In fact Matthew tells us the blatently were doing so after a confrontation between them and Jesus about the Sabbath

Matt 12
11He [Jesus] said to them [Pharisees], "If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? 12How much more valuable is a man than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath."

13Then he said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. 14But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.
God's Chosen Servant

15Aware of this, Jesus withdrew from that place. Many followed him, and he healed all their sick,

They were looking for stuff to pin on Jesus. Anything!

The Pharisees War Room
At first glance it seems amusing to imagine how they came up with this plan to catch Jesus out.
I mean compared to what they had tried:
the charge of blasphemy when he forgave the sins of a paralysed man
by association: the charge of 'sinner' because he hung out with sinners
calling him the prince of demons because he could cast out demons
law breaker because he broke the Sabbath by healing
would try to trick him by asking whether people should pay taxes to Caesar

At first glance this seems such a lame plan.
Imagine the Pharisee War room
“anyone got anything on this Jesus – we have to do away with him”
Murmurings around the room.

small voice from across the room
I noticed his disciples don't wash their hands when they eat!
Oh, that's a good one...that'll get him!
He is in Genneserat, You, and the 50 blokes behind you, catch the next camel train up there

Seems just a little lame!
Seems like it is on par with being convicted in Victoria for wearing hot pink pants after midday on Sunday!
Got him on a technicality!

Matthew's context.
Seems especially lame when you consider how Matthew is telling the story:
Jesus has just come off from
feeding 5000 people with 5 loaves and 2 fish
walking on water
and the sick being healed – in some cases through simply touching his cloak!

Each time a plain declaration that Jesus is God's agent at work.

And the Pharisees come all the way from Jerusalem to ask Jesus why his disciples have poor sanitary practices!
Strange. Don't you think!

But not to the Pharisees.
Something deeper is going on here.

The Pharisee problem with Jesus
Israel had a problem. For a significant length of time Israel was a nation that was not living as they believed God had promised they could live.
Their land was under foreign rule
There was no Davidic King on the throne
Their temple and religious practice was at best bad: influenced and controlled often by unfaithful Jews and pagan Gentiles
And they constantly wrestled with what would it mean to live as God's faithful people in this world.

You see the Jews understood the reason why Israel was living like this was because of their unfaithfulness to God.
There were many different solutions to getting the true Israel back
The Pharisees represented one of these.

The Pharisees saw the solution was found in Israel being more faithful to God, especially as they understood from the first few books of what we call the Old Testament.
For them the formula was:
Judgement came because of Israel's unfaithfulness, Salvation will come when Israel is once again faithful.

“Their goal were the honour of Israel's god, the following of his covenant charter, and the pursuit of the full promised redemption of Israel” Wright, p189

So although the Pharisees were not priests – they became in their day some of the best teachers of the Torah around.
They studied the Scripture and looked for ways to help people apply the scriptures to the everyday lives: and these became the “tradition of the elders.”
They were really interested in Circumcision, the Sabbath and ritual purity.
Now circumcision is pretty easy to work out: you either are or you are not.
Ah, but Sabbath and Ritual purity – now there is a complicated set of ideas

For instance:
The Torah said lots about the kinds of food God's people were not allowed to eat to remain ritually pure:
no seafood, pork, camel, vegemite on Passover...so on
And they got down to real detail:
as they studied the Torah they discovered that God in his law said that people were ritually impure if they were to eat and drink things that had touched a dead body.
So what if something dropped into your drink and then died? What then – do you chuck it away?
Well the agreed solution was – if the object was no bigger than a lentil – it would be OK. So if a fly, or a gnat dropped into your drink and died– go ahead, you'll be right!

For the Pharisee this wasn't mainly about going to heaven – this was about the way God would rescue Israel. The more faithful Israel is – the more likely God will rescue her from these pagan rulers.

What is the Pharisee's problem with Jesus?
He is not getting with the program.
In fact he appears to be undermining it.
he doesn't keep the Sabbath
Those who are his most faithful – the ones he is teaching the most – what are they doing?
vs 2 Not keeping with the traditions of the elders: not ritually washing before they eat.

Jesus' response
Jesus' response to them is – you get with the program!
vs 3 Jesus replied, "And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?

the Pharisees think that their tradition will lead Israel to great faithfulness towards God
Jesus says in fact the opposite is true: your tradition is leading Israel away from God.

He illustrates with the way they encourage people to dishonour their parents in the name of God – breaking the 6th commandment.
It appears he could have used any number of examples, and in fact he does in Chapter 23,
23"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. 24You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

25"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.

27"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. 28In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.

In straining the ritually impure gnat they have swallowed the ritually impure camel.
In other words they completely missed the point.

Jesus' summary of the Pharisee's program:
15:7
7You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8" 'These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9They worship me in vain;
their teachings are but rules taught by men.'[d]"

What is a stake here – is the Pharisee's program for Israel's rescue versus Jesus' program.

What is Jesus program?
10Jesus called the crowd to him and said, "Listen and understand. 11What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.' "

And I can imagine the disciples off to one side, nodding their heads wisely, but on the inside wondering what it all meant!

Reminds me of the times when my mother would warn us that if we didn't clean our rooms we didn't get to watch TV.
we didn't stand around saying “when she said we couldn't watch TV – did she really mean that we wouldn't be allowed to watch TV”
we knew she plainly meant what she said.

The Disciples don't get it because they assume that Jesus does not mean what he is plainly saying. They think there is some deeper truth down there somewhere.
vs 15 Peter asks for a 'please explain':

AND Jesus can't believe it – don't you understand something so plain
16"Are you still so dull?" Jesus asked them. 17"Don't you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' 19For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' "

The core issue is not what goes into the mouth – but the heart.
All the ritual purity in the world doesn't fix an evil heart.
We need something far more drastic than the tradition of the elders: we need a heart transplant!

In fact Matthew gives us an illustration straight away in the comparision between the ritually pure Pharisee's, and the ritually impure Canaanite Woman – who is accepted? The Canaanite woman (sworn enemies of Israel).
Why – Her heart was right: she came to Jesus in faith.

Jesus' point is that the Pharisees miss the point.
When the Pharisee's looked at Jesus what did they see?
A man who couldn't teach his disciples to wash their hands

When the Canaanite woman looks at Jesus what does she see?
“Lord, Son of David”

Their habit of missing what God is on about means they miss what God is on about in Jesus.
that is why they are blind.
and the worst thing about their kind of blindness – is they don't even know it!
Problem with building a program on our own terms – is it makes us feel good/ right for all the wrong reasons.
We could be falling into a pit, and we wouldn't even know it, until we hit the bottom.

When it comes down to it – how does your picture of the ways things should be block what God is doing?

Jesus point is he doesn't mind shaking people up to make his point
7You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8" 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
9They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men."

Could this be about us?
Could it be that we are doing the Christian thing
attending Church
Christian friends and family
listening to preaching
good Christian service
don't swear, do drugs, cheat, steal
these are the signs of belonging to Jesus.
I have a feeling Jesus wouldn't mind shaking us up and saying “you can have your definition”
- this is not about you been a good person, this is about you loving God.

A heart of faith – love for God – obedience where it matters.
Do we have it?

Are we teaching a Christian lifestyle but not about real heart change?
are we raising good citizens or faithful disciples?

Jesus' point is that at the heart of it all lies the heart.
Both the Pharisee's and Jesus were on about faithfulness
the Pharisees measured faithfulness by their markers of Sabbath, Circumcision, ritual purity
Jesus measures faithfulness by a change of heart.

Jesus didn't come to give us a good example
another way of teaching
another tradition to live by
He came to change our hearts.
vs 19 the place where
evil thoughts; murder; adultery; immorality lies.

We want to break sin down to what we do (and it is)
BUT Jesus says it is our whole orientation
Jesus came to operate on our core values, priorities, desires, worldview.

Application
All our tricks and programs aside:
take out your keys / wallet / purse / watch / family photo
things which symbolise what you fill your life with.

Hold it up to God.
God – it's yours: everything.
Not on my terms, but yours.

Don't be like Peter – where you go does Jesus really mean what he is saying – I need to give up everything!
Yes he does. Jesus wants our hearts changed – where is counts – not our behaviours

Ezekial 11
17 "Therefore say: 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will gather you from the nations and bring you back from the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you back the land of Israel again.'
18 "They will return to it and remove all its vile images and detestable idols. 19 I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. 20 Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God. 21 But as for those whose hearts are devoted to their vile images and detestable idols, I will bring down on their own heads what they have done, declares the Sovereign LORD."