WWUTT 2176 Jesus Declared All Foods Clean (Mark 7:14-19)

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There are man -made rules, even today, where people are afraid of, you know, whatever goes into me is going to make me unclean.

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But Jesus points out it's not what's outside a person that makes him unclean, but what is inside when we understand the text.

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Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text is committed to teaching sound doctrine and rebuking those who contradict it.

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Visit our website at www .utt .com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

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Thank you, Becky. In our study of the Gospel of Mark, we're in chapter 7, picking up where we left off last week.

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Here, Jesus is going to explain to the crowds and to his disciples how what goes into a person is not what defiles him.

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I'm reading from the Legacy Standard Bible, verses 14 to 23, hear the word of the

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Lord. And after he called the crowd to him again, he began saying to them,

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Listen to me, all of you, and understand. There is nothing outside the man which can defile him if it goes into him, but the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man.

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And when he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples were asking him about the parable.

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And he said to them, Are you lacking understanding in this way as well? Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and goes to the sewer?

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Thus he declared all foods clean. And he was saying that which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man.

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For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, sexual immoralities, thefts, murders, adulteries, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.

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All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.

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This explanation here is picking up after Jesus' rebuke of the Pharisees for what it was that they were teaching.

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If you'll remember back to what we were reading last week in verses 1 through 13, remember that the

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Pharisees were teaching that if a person has unclean hands and they eat food and defile their food with their unclean hands, then that food, when they eat it, is going to make that person unclean.

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And this was not about hygiene. It had everything to do with spiritual cleanliness.

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And so the Pharisees were teaching, you got to wash your hands. If you don't wash your hands, you could potentially contaminate your food.

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And then going into you will make you unholy. And they would even say that this had salvific implications to it.

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Like you could go to hell because you were eating your food with unclean hands. That's how much weight they gave to this particular teaching, which was not out of the law of God at all.

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So hence Jesus' rebuke of the Pharisees. These people acknowledge me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

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Quoting from Isaiah 29 and also saying to them, you leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.

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And I quoted to you last week, too, from Jewish sources in which it was said, even from ancient

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Jewish teachers, that the words of the elders held greater weight than even the scriptures themselves.

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So they had elevated their traditions over what God's word says.

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And Jesus even used the scriptures to rebuke them and show them their error. So because of this particular teaching, that if you eat with defiled hands, you could potentially make yourself unholy, unclean.

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That's why Jesus is teaching here to the crowds and then to his disciples, that nothing you eat that is outside of the body can make the person unclean.

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The disciples don't even understand what it is that Jesus is talking about, and he rebukes them for not understanding.

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So let's come back to the passage here and see what it is that Jesus is saying to the crowds, to the disciples.

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And this also contains one of my favorite verses. Thus he declared all foods clean so we can all eat bacon and do so to the glory of God.

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All right. I'll make that point a little bit later. Verse 14. And after Jesus called the crowd to him again, he began saying to them, listen to me, all of you and understand.

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So this crowd has been led astray by the Pharisees teaching. Jesus means to clarify for them what they are telling you is not true.

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God's word doesn't say it. There's nothing in the law that says it. And then gives them a common sense understanding that they can they can grasp this with their understanding of the law and come to recognize that what

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Jesus is saying exposes the errors of the Pharisees. Verse 15.

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There is nothing outside the man which can defile him if it goes into him.

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But the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man.

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Now, Mark doesn't expound on that anymore. Jesus is teaching the crowds. He surely said more than that.

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I mean, we just have two verses here. Listen to me, all of you and understand is basically calling them to himself.

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And then here's the teaching in verse 15. But Mark is giving us a very brief understanding of that teaching.

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What Jesus says next to his disciples was likely also in what

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Jesus said to the crowds. But as the disciples didn't understand it, then he gets down with them again and helps them to see.

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Here's what it was that I taught. Why don't you get this? And rebukes them for it because they don't understand it.

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Now, I actually skipped verse 16 when I did the reading at the beginning because verse 16 is not in the earliest manuscripts.

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This was a later edition. It came centuries later, in fact, like sometime around the 5th or 6th century or even later than that when this line was added in.

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And if anyone has ears to hear, let him hear. Okay? Someone added that in.

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That wasn't originally what Mark wrote. And it was probably, as I've talked about this before, some

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Byzantine monk just got a little overzealous, thought he could help the writing out a little bit. Mark kind of ends that without much more.

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So what can we say here that will help people understand it? I know we're going to borrow a phrase that Jesus had used previously.

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We'll just stick it right here, and it will help people get it a little bit better. And if anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.

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This is one of those verses that a King James only -ist might use to say, see, some of the later translations have actually edited out parts of the

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Bible, but that doesn't change the meaning of this text whatsoever. It was more common in the copying of manuscripts for stuff to get added in rather than stuff to get taken out.

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And so this verse was something that was added in. It was not what Mark originally wrote.

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But in our desire to be most faithful to the earliest manuscripts, that's why some later translations have taken out verse 16.

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If you read it in the ESV, it just goes from verse 15 to 17. Verse 16 isn't in there at all, except for maybe a footnote at the bottom.

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I'm reading from the Legacy Standard. The Legacy will put it in brackets. It's still there.

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Verse 16 is there. But I know to skip it, because in brackets it was not in the earliest manuscript.

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Anyway, that's just kind of an aside. It doesn't really have to do with the lesson today. But just so you're aware that when

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I did the initial reading, I did skip verse 16. So then in verse 17, now we're going away from the crowds.

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So Jesus addressed the crowds with that. He left the crowd. He entered the house. And his disciples were asking him about the parable.

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Now, that's an unusual word there. It's unusual for Mark to use parable in that way, because this isn't a parable, technically.

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In the technical sense. In the way that we've seen parables mentioned previously, like the parable of the soils that we had seen in previous chapters.

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So why would he use that word parable here? Jesus didn't really give an illustration or a word picture or something like that.

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Well, this is just a word synonymous with a hard saying. So parable can have two different definitions to it.

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It could be to use some sort of an illustration in order to convey a particular point.

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Or it could mean it could be a word for a hard saying that's difficult to understand. And here the disciples don't understand it.

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So it gets referred to as a parable. We don't get what it was that you just said. In verse 18,

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Jesus said to them, Are you lacking understanding in this way as well? Remember that Jesus rebuked them previously for them not being able to understand what it was that he was teaching.

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So he says, you don't get this either? Like, how many times do we undo this, guys? Why is it that you don't understand what it was that I said?

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Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him?

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Now, the way that Jesus words that here when he asked the disciples that implies this is a common sense concept.

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You should be able to get this, that what goes into a person doesn't defile him.

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Why not? Well, then he gives them an anatomy lesson. He talks to them about their own digestive system.

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Verse 19, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach and goes to the sewer.

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So it goes into him. It goes right back out again. You've got a filtering system in your body.

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So if there was anything unclean in the food that you ate, your body is going to filter it out.

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And that which is unclean comes out of you and goes into the sewer. So how can the rest of you be defiled if what went into you has already come back out?

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This is Jesus using general revelation to help them understand a profoundly spiritual point.

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Now, the apostle Paul does the same thing with the Corinthians. He will refer to natural revelation or general revelation just by what you observe in nature.

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You can understand complicated spiritual doctrines just through what you're able to observe and what

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God has created and presented to us that we can see the marvel of his work in that which has been made.

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So if we can discern these things from that which is physically around us, then it helps us to understand these spiritual things as well.

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With the Corinthians, when Paul is talking about the resurrection of the dead, this is in 1

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Corinthians 15, he refers to a seed. A seed goes into the ground and it becomes something else.

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What goes into the ground dies and then it comes to new life. It is a new growth that emerges from that seed.

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And so helping the Corinthians to see this concept of the resurrection of the dead should not be difficult for you because you can see it even in the physical world, how one body will receive a new body.

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And so it is with every one of us in Christ Jesus. Our body goes into the ground and we will be raised with a different kind of body.

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So this is wonderful how in this apologetic explanation, the apostles, Jesus himself, will use general revelation to help us understand these spiritual concepts.

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And so here, using this understanding of general revelation to teach the disciples that what goes into you cannot make you unclean.

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Now all of us reading this explanation might be sitting here going, why don't the disciples get this?

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Makes sense to me. I get it just fine. Why don't they get it? Would you have gotten it in those days?

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Would you have been there with the disciples asking Jesus the same questions or would you have been, yeah, come on guys, and smacking them.

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I kind of wonder if there was one of the disciples among them that would be a smart aleck like that. When Jesus would explain this and he would be like, come on guys,

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I knew that. Why didn't you get that? It's just like I told you. Trying to score some teacher points perhaps.

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But anyway, Jesus explaining this in this way. The food or that which you might think to be unclean does not go into his heart.

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And the heart is the seed of the emotions. It is the very core of the person. It is the center of a person.

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What Jesus is talking about here is not his physical heart. It's his spiritual or moral center.

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And so what a person eats doesn't go there. It goes into his stomach. And so Jesus even explaining to his disciples, you understand the difference between where stuff goes spiritually and where stuff goes physically.

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It's not the same. So the food won't go into his heart and make him unclean. How can that make him unholy?

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It goes into his stomach. How does the stuff that goes into your stomach, how does that make you unclean?

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And it goes to the sewer then, he says next. So it's expelled out. That's where all the unclean refuse is.

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It's not in you anymore. Your body has filtered it out. And then we have this parenthetical reference here in verse 19.

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Thus he declared all foods clean. Now I've referenced that verse a lot, especially with regards to the

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Hebrew roots movement. I've got a few videos in which I respond to Hebrew roots and reference that particular video because the

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Hebrew roots guys love clinging to the dietary laws in Leviticus 11. And will say that, no, pork is still unclean for you.

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You can't eat shellfish. You cannot eat pork. These things will make you unclean. And I will point right to Mark 7.

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Jesus said what goes into you cannot make you unclean. And thus, as Mark points out, he declared all foods clean.

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And these guys will push back on that concept to say, well, see, it's a parenthetical reference. It's in parentheses.

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And so that means that Mark did not originally write it. We inserted that in as like a commentary note.

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So Jesus declared all foods clean. But he didn't really declare all foods clean. That's not what the text says.

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No, we put parentheses around it because that's how our language works.

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So in good grammar, we make it a parenthetical reference. But it is Scripture.

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This is the word of God. That is actually the phrase that is translated from the Greek. Jesus did indeed declare all foods clean.

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And lest there is any confusion about that, you can go to Acts 10, where the

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Lord tells Peter to rise up, kill, and eat, says this to him three times.

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Peter is going, I've never done this before. I've never eaten anything. I've never eaten what the

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Gentiles eat. I've never done anything like this that would make me unclean. Jesus says to him, what

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God has cleansed, no longer consider defiled. The Jews held so much of these dietary laws that they wouldn't even eat with Gentiles.

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Wouldn't have anything to do with Gentiles because the Gentiles don't keep the dietary laws. So what they eat makes them unclean, and I can't go hang out with them, or I'm going to be made unclean.

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So that was the thought among a lot of the Jews, and that's why Peter thought he couldn't go to the Gentiles and preach to them because that would make me unclean.

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Jesus has to tell him, and does indeed tell him, what God has cleansed, you don't call it defiled.

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And so we have it said in Mark 7, Jesus declared all foods clean. We have it come up again in Acts 10, and among those creatures that Peter could kill and eat were all kinds of four -footed animals and crawling creatures of the earth and the birds of the sky, which included pig.

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You can eat pig now, it's just fine. There are still people out there trying to hold to these dietary laws, which

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Christ fulfilled. The dietary laws had to do with ceremonial cleanliness, and there wasn't really anything about certain animals that made them more unclean than other animals.

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It really didn't have anything to do with that. It was just that God was calling his people to be pure, and so there were certain foods that they were required to eat out of obedience to God.

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Everything, it was like everything in their lives had some sort of ceremonial significance to it.

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And so God gives them these laws that this people would be set apart from other people, and they could not eat these things lest they become ceremonially unclean and would not be able to come into the tabernacle then to sacrifice.

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When Christ died on the cross for our sins, as our great high priest, he fulfilled all of those ceremonial aspects of the law.

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There's not any of them that we are expected to keep, even with regards to the dietary laws. So yes, you can eat anything to the glory of God.

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And the apostle Paul talks about this in Romans 14, in Galatians, in Hebrews, even with Timothy.

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Paul said in 1 Timothy 4 that those who are banning certain foods, who are trying to tell you that you could be sinning by eating certain foods, this is the doctrine of demons.

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It is Christ who has declared that all he has made is good and to be enjoyed unto the glory of God.

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So here he has declared all foods clean, and thus it is so for us even today.

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Do not feel like that you are defiling yourself unless your conscience is weak. In which case, hey, if you have a guilty conscience over certain something that you eat, then don't eat it.

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Because even if God has said it's fine, you believe that you've sinned and therefore have made yourself unclean by what was inside of you, not what you put inside of you.

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You understand? Because that's the point that Jesus is making here. It's not what goes into you that makes you unclean.

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It's what proceeds out of the person. It's his own defiled heart that makes him unclean.

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Now we're going to come back to this point again tomorrow. And finish off with these final four verses.

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As Jesus was saying, that which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man.

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And then gives this list of vices in verses 21 and 22. And then saying in verse 23, all these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.

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We're going to look at those sins and consider this more deeply again tomorrow as we return to this passage.

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But in the meantime, enjoy a BLT today. On me. And by on me,

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I don't mean I'm going to pay for it. Just know that you can eat it without a guilty conscience. Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we've read here today.

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And I thank God for this teaching. That we would understand that it's not what we put into us that makes us unclean.

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We have all these laws and regulations and things like that we want to write up and think that we can be righteous if we keep all of these rules.

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But it's not what is outside of us that goes into us that makes us unclean.

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It is the heart of a man that is unclean. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We need

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Christ's righteousness to cleanse us and make us clean before the Father. And all who believe in Jesus will be saved.

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As said in Romans 4, 5, the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, it will be counted to him as righteousness.

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So may we walk in the righteousness of Christ today, putting off sin and all of those things that indeed defile us and desiring to be holy and honor you with all we say and do.

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It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to When We Understand the

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Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. If you'd like to support this ministry, visit our website, www .wutt

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.com. Join us again tomorrow as we continue our Bible study when we understand the text.