Sermon on Mark 7:14-23, for the 14th Sunday after Pentecost, "What's in your heart?"
Grace, mercy, and peace to you, from God
our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Some of us are the
types who dread an unexpected visit to our homes, where someone drops in
unexpectedly, and discovers the mess or the chaos you live in. For some, that’s
an embarrassment we’d do everything to avoid. Others just don’t mind whether
their home is cleaner or messier, and if anyone sees it.
What do we do when Jesus pays an
unexpected visit to our hearts? When He opens up all the closets and checks out
the garage and our storage areas, and sees what we’ve been keeping in our
hearts? What do we think or feel when Jesus lays our hearts bare, with
everything to see in His plain sight? Vulnerable? Exposed? Ashamed? Or
defensive? Defiant? Or we act as if we simply don’t care?
Think of another context—in
relationships. Whether it’s a very close friendship, or in your marriage,
between you and your spouse. In the best of marriages, a husband and wife can
have true transparency and openness with each other, so that they each see one
another’s vulnerabilities, their strengths and weakness, their faults and
fears—and they protect that vulnerability. They love the person in return. The
same deep transparency can happen in a close friendship, between people who
hold each other accountable. But few reach and few dare this kind of
transparency and openness with another person. We fear what letting a person
seeing that deeply inside of us will mean. Perhaps they would respond in shock,
or in laughter, or in rejection. Maybe if someone saw me as I truly am, with
nothing hidden, they wouldn’t want to know me any longer. If they heard my
darkest thoughts, or saw my embarrassing sins. So we hide our heart, we have walls,
we wear masks. Not very often do people allow such deep intimacy and openness
in their lives. And if they ever did and were betrayed, or rejected or hurt
because of it, it makes them all the more likely to raise those walls and
defenses.
So back to Jesus. He’s able to
immediately see through all those walls and defenses and masks. His presence unnerved
those who had sin and hypocrisy to hide, and realized that Jesus saw right to
their hearts. For some it feels like the unwelcome and unexpected visitor, we’d
rather not see right now. For others it might prompt a defensive attack against
Jesus for seeing who we really are. But what does Jesus say? What does He see?
What’s in our hearts?
Jesus pinpoints the heart as the root of
all our problems. The sins and the things that make our lives defiled and
unclean, all come out of our heart. Jesus lists them: “For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual
immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality,
envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and
they defile a person” (Mark 7:21-23). Jesus sees and finds these things in
our heart! A pretty scary thought! Let’s look briefly at these sins.
Evil thoughts come from our heart. We
are always trying to justify our sinful behaviors, words, and actions. Sometimes
we get really good at arguing our case and can be quite convincing. But our
heart is contriving cover-ups for evil. Next is sexual immorality, which covers
the broad range of sexual sins that the Bible prohibits. It’s much simpler to
speak of the positive, God-pleasing ethic and design for sexuality, than the
many ways in which we humans go astray from God’s plan. God intends sex to be
the faithful expression of love exclusively between a man and a woman in marriage.
The Bible celebrates this love in marriage as a wonderful thing! We complicate
our lives and sin against both God and ourselves when we go astray from God’s good
design.
Theft is the stealing or destruction or
wasting of property, especially that doesn’t belong to us. But even what we
think is ours, like our own body and possessions, are really gifts from God to
steward or take care of. So we must not destroy or waste even our own property
or lives, as though they were ours to do with as we please. Paul reminds us in
1 Corinthians 6, you are not your own, you were bought with a price. Therefore
honor God with your body Theft is born at least partly from a discontent heart.
It seeks what doesn’t belong to us by dishonest means.
Murder, the 5th commandment, is the
taking of an innocent life. There have been horrendous revelations recently, about
Planned Parenthood, that go far beyond what we already knew was happening in
their clinics. Innocent blood cries out to heaven, as millions of unborn still
die every year across our country. Murder, when it’s an act of hatred or
violence, is the final outcome of anger and hatred taking root and growing
unchecked in our hearts. Murder, takes away what God has declared
precious—human life.
Adultery returns back to the 6th
commandment and sexual purity. It begins with a dissatisfied heart that lusts
or covets after what isn’t rightfully given to us. Looking to another person
than our spouse, to whom we are married, to provide that love. Adultery sins
against the one-flesh union that God creates in marriage, and threatens to break
the marriage apart.
Coveting is the sin of the 9th and 10th
commandments—when the heart desires what does not rightfully belong to it. Coveting
leads to schemes and evil ideas to steal property, to manipulate to get things
in a way that appears good but is evil at heart, or to break the loyalty of
spouses, family, or workers, from those to whom they should be loyal.
Wickedness is a broad category for sin
that is particularly malicious or evil. Deceit is lying or deliberate
manipulation, to cover sinful actions or motives. It’s a sin of the 8th
commandment. When we are deceitful and lie, we hurt people. Good people can’t do
the right thing in a given situation, if they are being lied to. False
information often leads people to unintentionally do harm, or causes them to be
taken advantage of.
Sensuality or license, is a desire for
pleasure that can never be satisfied. It is when we pursue pleasure and
self-gratification with no restraint, ignoring all laws or conscience, and
exercising no self-control. Sensuality is the pursuit of things in excess—sex,
luxury and wealth, food or alcohol or drugs, or anything that gratifies the
body. It turns pleasure into addiction.
Envy is literally an “evil eye” in the
Greek. When we look jealously or with envy on a person, we have an “evil eye”
toward them, because they have what we want, or we resent what they have. Slander
is evil speech against a person. Slander may start small with gossips, rumors,
insinuations. It grows when we believe and encourage those little lies, and in
the worst form, it attempts the total destruction of someone’s reputation. These
things too, come out of our hearts.
Arrogance or pride is thinking too
highly of oneself. It has little or no love for others and their value, but claims
we are most important. It is the opposite of humility, and blinds us to our own
sins and flaws. Finally, foolishness is the abandonment of wisdom and truth for
following our own sinful desires. Folly does not try to understand right or
wrong, but blindly does what passion leads us to. It is to be unthinking, like
the animals, and driven by lower desires.
Jesus says all of these things come from
within, from the heart, and they defile or make a person unclean. It’s not a
pretty picture. And while we’d rather watch or be entertained by having someone
else’s dirty laundry aired out—Jesus sees these and other sins that spring from
our heart. If we face those same sins with honesty and humility, we may be
shocked at what comes out of our hearts. It’s too late to scramble to clean up,
or hide the mess. Jesus has already seen and already knows. So what does He do?
The surprise, is that with all that
Jesus knows about our hearts, and all that He knew about His disciples’ hearts,
and the betrayals and denials, and fears that would overrule their better
decisions and actions—He still loved them to the very end. Even when they
scattered and fled when He was arrested and tried, and sentenced to death on
the cross. We expect or fear that Jesus would back away from us, maybe even run
from us. Reject us or turn away in disgust. But instead with piercing eyes, and
with nail-pierced hands and feet, He comes to us, welcoming us. Offering us His
pure heart, and the forgiveness of our sins, in exchange for our broken heart
and our sins. He knows every evil thought and inclination of our heart, and He
comes to help us. To heal and forgive. To take away the shame, the uncleanness,
the guilt, and to pay for it on His cross. He calls, “Here, let me come in, and
clean this heart of yours. Be still, this is beyond your power to fix. Let me
do my work.”
And Jesus takes sin-filled hearts, and
replaces them with a living heart, that trusts in Him. He answers the prayer of
repentant David, that becomes our prayer also, “Create in me a clean heart, Oh God, and renew a right spirit within me!
Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and renew me with your free spirit.”
Jesus, you’ve seen the mess in my heart. You’ve seen right through all my
masks, and know my innermost sins. Cleanse me as you have promised! Don’t take
me away from your presence! Stay with me! Renew and restore me, so I know your
true joy. This is life with God. This is life with Jesus! An amazing love and
transparency that God sees so clearly to the depths of our soul, and wants only
to heal and forgive our brokenness and sin. Jesus takes it all away, so that
His love for us is unchanged and unhindered. He makes us new and clean, and
lovable again. He lives in our hearts, so that we are a new person, and that
transformed from the inside out, something new and good will flow out of our
hearts, instead of what is evil. By Jesus living in our hearts, by forgiving
and cleansing them by His blood, we have the source of a new life and of good
thoughts, words, and actions to flow out of our hearts. Jesus! Make me yours
forever! Amen.
Sermon Talking
Points
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1.
In Mark 7:1-13,
Jesus taught the Pharisees that the external traditions of ceremonial washings
did nothing to transform the heart, but produced an “empty worship” where their
heart was not in it. In 7:14-23, what does He explain is the true source of what
“defiles” a person, or makes them unclean?
2.
For the Jews, and
the laws they followed from the Old Testament, a major concern was clean and
unclean foods. In Mark 7:19, what did Jesus declare about all foods? What did
this mean for the relations between Jews and Gentiles (non-Jews)? Acts
10:14-15; 10:28-29; 10:34-36.
3.
Jesus describes what
“comes out” of a person in Mark 7:21-23. How are evil thoughts and motivations
already sinful? Matthew 5:22, 28; James 1:13-15. What does sin that starts
small in the heart, grow into?
4.
Several of the
things that Jesus says come from the heart relate to sexual sins of all
types—sexual immorality, adultery, coveting, sensuality. Why are sexual sins
harmful to us and others? 1 Corinthians 6:12-20, esp. vs. 18. How should we
live properly concerning our sexuality? Hebrews 13:4; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-4.
5.
How are theft,
coveting, and envy sins against the 7th Commandment? What is the
right attitude to have towards our own possessions and those of others?
6.
Slander and deceit
are sins against the 8th commandment. What is each of those sins?
What are we to guard and protect in the 8th commandment? How are we
to speak, so as not to break it?
7.
Murder is the taking
of an innocent life. How are the lives of innocent humans placed in danger ever
day? Who are the weakest among us, whose
lives need our special help and protection?
8.
Does Jesus turn away
from us when He sees all the evil and unclean things that come from our hearts?
What does He do instead? How does He cleanse our hearts? What does He give us?
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