Matthew 15.12-20

Jesus is training his disciples, and this conflict with the Pharisees about washing is HUGE!!!!! Jesus knows that this is going to be one of the biggest conflicts for his inner twelve after he is gone, so Jesus sees this conflict as an opportunity to set some things straight with those who are going to take over his ministry, his kingdom, before he leaves. Let's read the passage as a whole:


¹² Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
 ¹³ He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. ¹⁴ Leave them; they are blind guides. If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”
 ¹⁵ Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”
   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? ¹⁸ But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ ¹⁹ For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.²⁰ These are what make a man ‘unclean’; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him ‘unclean.’”


To understand the magnitude of this conflict, we have to continue to remember the original question posed by the Pharisees. 


Matthew 15.2, "Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don't wash their hands before they eat!"


Why did they care about washing your hands before you eat? This is not a hygiene situation. It isn't like they were good Jewish boys and girls trying to make sure there were no germs on their hands. They didn't know about bacteria at this time. The purpose for washing had to do with holiness. 


Remember, holiness simply means "set apart". All of the different political groups of the Jews were trying to be be holy. They were all trying to do the thing that they thought would make them God's set apart people again. 


The Sadducees were trying to worm their way with the Romans into political power, thus ushering in God's kingdom as his set apart leaders. The Zealots were trying to overthrow by force the Roman government, thus setting up the kingdom of Israel again as God's set apart people. And the Essenes, or the Qumran Community, actually left society and separated themselves from everyone in a monastic type community, thinking that this would make them the true people of God. 


The Pharisees were trying to do the same thing. But they were trying to separate themselves as God's people in yet another way. They were trying to be extra clean and holy. Basically, the stipulations that God said the priests had to do when offering sacrifices in the temple, the Pharisees believed that all of the Jews had to practice these ultra strict stipulations. They believed that if everyone were ultra holy and clean and set apart from everyone else, then God would claim Israel again as his people, and then the Messiah would come and overthrow the Romans. 


This is what this conflict over washing before dinner is all about. The Pharisees believed that you had to wash just like the priests did in the temple, before every meal. And the Pharisees said that this was one of the major defining marks as to who the people of God are. 


This is the conflict that they brought to Jesus, and Jesus critiques them in the previous passage. What we have today is Jesus critiquing his disciples. 


Look how this passage starts: 


¹² Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”


The disciples were confused, and who could blame them. They have been hearing different points of views their entire lives as to what to do to be God's people. The Pharisees and Sadducees are always arguing, the Zealots were inducing fear into the lives of everyone, and those weirdo Essenes out in the desert seemed to hate everybody. 


Who is right????!!!


What does it mean to be the People of God???!!!


They probably had deep deep respect for the Pharisees, yet Jesus just nails them against the wall in the previous passage. And look at what Jesus says next: 


¹³ He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. ¹⁴ Leave them; they are blind guides. If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”


Jesus basically refers to the Pharisees as the weeds in the parable of the weeds and the wheat. He says that although they say they are right, they are actually weeds, and they will be pulled up by the roots. He calls them "blind guides"!!!!!


This is fighting language for the Pharisees. 


The Disciples are bewildered at this strong language from Jesus. And Peter asks him to explain this parable, this saying about foot entering the mouth and going out of the body and etc. This is when Jesus gives his disciples the definition of what it means to be God's clean, separate people. He says: 


 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? ¹⁸ But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ ¹⁹ For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. ²⁰ These are what make a man ‘unclean’; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him ‘unclean.’”


Your heart is what makes you clean or unclean, God's people or not God's people, separate from the world or like everybody else. And Jesus knows that this will be a HUGE issue in the early church. 


We see conflict over what it means to be holy in Acts 10.9-16; 15.20; Romans 14.13ff; 1 Cor. 8. The Church was almost split in Galatians 2 when Peter was eating with unclean Gentiles but when some Jewish Christians show up, Peter distances himself from the Gentiles, basically saying that they were unclean. 


The Church could have split between Jews and Gentiles over this issue of what it means to be the clean, separate people of God. Yet Paul confronted in front of everybody, saying that this was wrong. 


The big point of all of this is this, the religious acts of going to church, abstaining from Drinking, smoking and chew and going with girls who do, does not make one set apart, clean. This is not what defines the people of God. What defines the people of God is your words, your heart, the way you treat the poor, which are all an overflow of your heart. 


So how do you get your heart in a place that the overflow is love of God and love for others? You put good things in it. You put God's word in your heart. You put the Holy Spirit in your heart by listening and praying to him daily. You put selflessness in your heart by serving others. 


What you put in comes out. 


So eat your bible, and stuff yourself so full of scripture that when we cut you, you bleed Bible. 


This is what defines who the people of God are.