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Jesus, the Bible, & Southern California

Mark 7:1-13

On this first Sunday of 2013, I want us to think about the role the Bible should play in our lives in the coming year. Since moving here to Southern California in 2007, I’ve been surprised at how people talk to me about the Bible. There are a few who dismiss the Bible as being a lot of legends and rules that need not be taken seriously. And, there are a few who hate some of the things they think the Bible says – like its teachings about marriage or justice or the value of each human life.

But, I’ve been surprised that most people I talk to think there is some value in the Bible. Southern Californians for the most part are spiritual people who are usually quite sure there is inspirational and motivational value to be found in the Bible. They put it alongside other religious books like the Qur’an, the Bhagavad Gita, and writings or discoveries by Joseph Smith or L. Ron Hubbard. The Bible is quoted more and more often even in the media and in political campaigns.

But, a lot of people tell me they don’t know how to read the Bible. I heard that from a group of friends with a Buddhist background who came to our Christmas Eve Services. They loved the reading of Scripture but had no idea what the various passages were talking about. When they pick up the Bible, they see no difference between 1 Chronicles and Revelation – between its poetry and its historic narrative. One person told me, “It would be good if I could have a book with only the good quotes out of the Bible. I get lost when I try to read it.”

This is a big topic, I know. And, I’m convinced we need to have a course about “how to read the Bible” offered in the near future here at LAC. But, today, I’m going to look at what many consider to be a very obscure text in Mark’s gospel in which Jesus talks about a misreading or misapplication of the Bible. It was doing real harm to people’s knowledge of God and love for God. Jesus personally lays down some basic principles that I think are still helpful to us today – not only to people new to reading the Bible but to all of us. He speaks of three:

1. 1. The Bible should shape and direct our beliefs and our lives.
2. The Bible is meant to deepen our relationship with God.
3. The Bible always points to the One who is at its center.

Principle #1: The Bible should shape and direct our beliefs and our lives.

This is a gentle way of stating something that human beings have had a hard time with ever since Genesis 3 – when people first insisted on directing their own lives. Jesus says consistently that the Bible is God’s Word and that those who will live well need to submit to its authority. Submitting to anything outside ourselves is always hard for fallen beings made in God’s image. The tendency is either to become libertarian or legalistic. Sometimes we become libertarians in this and insist of “living any way we want” – with no rules or regulations. That kind of anarchy has always been disastrous. But, at least as often, we become legalistic, developing our own sets of rules for living. People often have said they base their rules on the Bible though the rules themselves are not in the Bible. That’s what was happening in Jesus’ day among some of the religious leaders.

Five times in this short passage, the “traditions of the elders” are mentioned in Mark 7:1-13. Jesus saw real spiritual dangers in these traditions. It’s not that Jesus was opposed to traditions altogether. Traditions provide rhythms and order to our lives and to our society. Without any traditions, life would be chaos. Imagine our church if I were to say, “This tradition of having services at a set time is confining. From now on, I’ll change it up every week. Just keep driving past the church and, if you see my car there, come in and see if we’re meeting.” That would be disastrous! Psychologists tell us that traditions are essential to our emotional health and stability. Sociologists say they are essential for a community or nation to function.

But what Jesus opposed is the tendency that traditions have to take on an authority they were never meant to have. Traditions were to be the wineskins that held the wine. But, by the time of Jesus, the traditions had become as important as the Bible – and sometimes conflicted with the Bible. The traditions had taken on permanence and an authority that only the Bible was to have had. Jesus spoke of two examples:

Example 1: Ritual Cleansing (7:5-8)

The washing being discussed isn’t referring to having our children wash their hands before eating dinner. In Exodus 30, God had told the priests that they were to wash their hands before touching the things being brought as offerings to God. This communicated an important theological message, i.e., that God is holy and knows that people have not lived holy lives. Still, the holy God is ready to forgive sinful people. So, the priest who approached God was to signify that truth by washing his hands before seeking forgiveness on behalf of the people. The priest was confessing, “We are sinners but our holy God is ready to forgive.”

But, by the time of Jesus, rule after rule had been created related to cleansing. The traditions taught that everyone had to wash – not just the priests. And they had to wash for countless offences. If someone had come into contact with any Gentile – or even a carnal Israelite – then all sorts of washing had to take place. So, the Jews who were to be a light and blessing to other peoples according to the Bible had developed ways of ignoring and avoiding other peoples. The main concern for them was not living God and loving people but keeping endless rules about staying away from defiled people. Jesus said this should not be. In v. 8, he says clearly, “You have let go of the commands of God and hold onto the traditions of men.” Notice that he says, “The traditions of men.” The traditions are manmade and must always be evaluated and re-thought in the light of the authority of God’s Word. The authority of the Bible, according to Jesus, trumps all traditions.

Example 2: Declaring Things “Corban” (7:9-13)

Corban was a practice that grew out of the 1^st commandment teaching that God is to have priority over everything. Over the years, the tradition became common for a son to declare that a piece of property belonged to God and so could not be used to help anyone – even a parent. What happened was that the son retained control over the property throughout his lifetime – including all the profits. If a parent went through a tough time, the son would simply say, “I’d like to help but my property is dedicated to God.” Jesus says that this ”tradition” had no specific foundation in Scripture. He was angry that the tradition actually led to the 5^th commandment, i.e., to honor parents, being broken.

And then Jesus forcefully adds – “And you do many things like that (v.13).”

The main point of this becomes clear when Jesus quoted Isaiah 29:13a: “These people worship me in vain. Their teachings are but rules taught by men.” What he’s saying is that if we fail to honor the unique authority of Scripture, we fail to worship God. He’s saying that we are to let nothing have equal authority with Scripture. Not your emotions. Not your own judgment. Not your desires. Not any traditions. We must constantly check and evaluate our practices by the Bible. If we do not do so, we soon will dishonor God – according to the teaching of Jesus.

The two illustrations Jesus used had some basis in Scripture. They were attempts to apply Scripture. They were not in the Bible but grew up around the Bible. Thousands of rules had been created in an attempt to apply the Bible. But, they had become more important to a lot of the people than the biblical foundation for them. And, the rules that might have had some value at one time in Israel’s history actually were doing harm in Jesus’ world. Could the same thing happen today? Using Jesus’ words, we probably do “many things like that.”

I pray God will open our eyes to ways we do the same as the Pharisees did. I remember coming to faith in a fundamentalist church in WV. Make note of that: I met Jesus there! But, it often seemed to me that a set of rules often seemed more important to some churchgoers than Jesus. We identified ourselves more by what we did not do than by our love for God and our love for our neighbors. As high school students, in rebellious moments, we would chant, “I don’t drink and I don’t chew and I don’t go with girls who do.” I know there were some good reasons people had nailed down rules against things like the use of alcohol and tobacco. But those things had somehow become more important than Jesus’ “greatest commandments” of loving God and loving people.

I could say more about this but I think the most important thing to focus on is how Jesus personally used Scripture. Jesus constantly based all his thinking, his actions, and his teaching on Scripture. A word he used often was gegraptai – “it is written.” Read through Matthew 26 and you’ll see that Jesus was guided through the agony of knowing the cross was ahead of him through the Scriptures. When Jesus was offered an armed way out of the struggle in vv. 53-56, he said this: “Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?” In that hour Jesus said to the crowd… “This has all taken place that the writings of the prophets might be fulfilled.”

In his battle with Satan at his temptation, Scripture guided Jesus. Satan misused Scripture (which, of course, many still do) but Jesus was not deterred. Jesus corrected Satan’s abuse of the Word and continued to be guided by it. Jesus filled his mind and heart with Scripture so that when tough decisions came, he was guided by it.

We have to learn to read the Scriptures correctly. We dare not rip passages out of context as Satan did. But, I hope it’s clear how this speaks to our world. It says that if we will live as God created us to live, we must bring the totality of our lives under the authority of Scripture – even when it conflicts with our traditions, our culture and our personal longings.

Principle #2: The Bible is meant to deepen our relationship with God.

Let me ask you a question: What does God want to happen to you when you start obeying the Bible?

I think many people have the strange idea that God want some kind of boring and rigid compliance to a bunch of rules and rituals. I love the way Jesus points us to Scripture as he quotes Isaiah 29:13:

“These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.”

Isn’t it wonderful that Jesus says God’s purpose in giving us the Bible is not to get us to engage in a lot of formal rituals but to change our hearts? The Maker of the universe wants us to be close to him. We’re far away from him when we live on our own – but God wants us to be close.

Jesus was saying to these Pharisees, “Because you focus on adding rules and complying with regulations, you are showing that you think the Bible is like all other religions – just with different rules. You seem to think God is so petty that he mostly cares about formal compliance.” But that leads to people saying:

• “I’m righteous and the other people like the Gentiles are not. See how religious I am…” or
• “Look at all the things I do that are religious and you don’t” – it’s self-righteousness… or
• “God, you have to bless me because of all I’ve done.”

But none of those things are the faith of the Bible. God did not give us the Bible to make us do certain things – or to make us feel self-righteous – or to teach us ways to force God to give us what we want. The Bible is given so we can have a close relationship to God.

I began to understand this when I was listening to a series of sermons on the 10 Commandments in Cambridge, England. The pastor took us to Exodus 19-20 and pointed out that God gave the commandments after he had rescued the people from slavery. So, God’s message was not, “Obey my commands and I will rescue you.” No, the order was this: “I have rescued you – so now obey these commands so that it may go will with you. Obey my commands so that you will know how I created you in my image to live well. Obey my commands so that you can be close to Me as people were before sin entered the world.” The Israelites didn’t have to do any rituals to earn God’s salvation. God did the rescuing.

After the rescue, listen to the Word of God through Moses to his people: “This is what you are to say to the descendants of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel: ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then you will be my treasured possession.’” Se that? God’s “treasured possession”!

If we will have an ever-deepening relationship to God, we will find that the Bible teaches us how to think and to live in order to have it. And yes, the Bible has commands – and it calls for obedience to God. So, if you say, “I don’t like this idea of me having to adjust my life to God’s ways in order to deepen my relationship with God” then I say to you, “You don’t understand relationships very much.”

In any relationship, if you fall in love with someone and long for the relationship to deepen, you want to avoid things that offend the other person. You want to find out the things that please her and make her happy. You want to know what will bring her joy. In other words, you begin to conform your thinking and your actions to the one you love. Why doesn’t that feel like obedience? The reason is that what makes you happy is making her happy. That’s how it is. It’s not exploitation. It’s a response of grateful love. And when both of you are doing what is best for the other, it’s beautiful.

So, religiosity is compliance to rituals and rules. But, the Bible is about a God who made us for himself. And just as we do research to find out what offends a person we love and what brings her joy, so the Bible is the place we find out how to meet God and how please God. Just as a human relationship is a lifelong journey in getting to know and grow with the other person, so a relationship with God is a lifelong journey. And learning how to read and understand the Bible is a key to that journey.

Chaim Potok once wrote, “All beginnings are hard.” But, the best things always start with beginning. So, become the best student of God’s Word that you can be. Get into a small group and learn to read God’s Word with others. Find a church that seems to love God and is relatively healthy and always teaches God’s Word – and go there regularly. Listen carefully. Check all the teacher says by the bible you hold in your hand. Buy a good Study Bible and let it help you (but always be aware of the fact that the study aids are just aids – not the Bible). And read the Bible. Set aside time to read. Listen for whatever God might say to you in it. If you sense there is something God would have you change in the light of it, change it. If there is something it seems he would have you do, do it.

I’ll end with one of the most important keys of all to reading the Bible.

Principle #3: The Bible always points to the One who is at its center.

When you read Mark 7:1-13, aren’t you struck by the fact that with Jesus doing so many things that only God can do in Mark’s first 6 chapters – forgiving sin, controlling the wind and the waves, feeding thousands of people with virtually nothing, and even exercising full authority over evil powers – the religious leaders were completely oblivious to him and only noticed inconsequential things? What they cared about was this: “Why are your followers eating food with ritually unclean hands?” If they had eyes to see who Jesus is, then their conversation would have been completely different.

In John 5:39-40, Jesus said to the religious leaders, “You diligently studythe Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.”

And, after Jesus had been raised from the dead, he told his disciples about how they should have known that he had to suffer first as the Messiah before the great triumph comes. We read in Luke 24:25-27: “How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself. Notice those words – “concerning himself”. All the Scriptures speak of Jesus.

And in Luke 24:44: Jesus said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”

When you read the Bible. Look for how it points to Jesus. The sacrificial system in the Old Testament points to Jesus’ cross -- to the need for sin to be atoned for. Many of the specific OT regulations were established to keep the people of Israel distinct so that the Messiah could be born through their line. The OT prophets point toward the need for and promise of a savior. Even the plot lines point to Jesus. Stories about Moses or David are not there to tell us, “Be like Moses and David.” First, we probably could never do what they did. But, even more, they were flawed people. Even the best of people needed a savior.

We need someone who will come from above who will live the life we human beings were meant to live but haven’t and then died the death we deserve for our sins – and he did it for us – in our place. And the more you learn of him, the more you will love him. So, read the Bible looking for how it points to Jesus.

Speaking of how the Spirit was speaking of Jesus through the Old Testament prophets, Peter wrote this to a group of Jesus’ followers who had not seen Jesus with their physical eyes but knew him through the Scriptures and through the witness of others:

Though you have not seen Jesus, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy…

1 Peter 1:8

I pray these words may be true of you too.

To His glory,

Dr. Greg Waybright
Senior Pastor

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祂的荣耀，

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Greg Waybright • Copyright 2012, Lake Avenue Church