Out of the heart the mouth speaks

Gracious God, as the Bible is read and taught to us today, deliver us from unbelief and disobedience. Help us to exhort and encourage one another that none may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, producing us the fruit of your spirit for the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Imagine for a moment that you agree to have every word that you say for the next 48 hours recorded. Every compliment, every grumble, every curse, thoughtful words, unthoughtful words, every prayer, every lie. In our social media age, we will also include messages you send, emails you write, comments you make on Facebook or Instagram. And then after 48 hours, your recording is transcribed into a really long word document and then analyzed. What will that research reveal? What will your words expose? Today, as we look at the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus teaches us about what our words reveal. The great miracles of Jesus that revealed who he is, the walking on water, the feeding of the 5,000, they take a backstage. And in Matthew 15, Jesus' conflict with the Pharisees comes to the forefront. And so it'd be great if you've got your Bibles there open into Matthew chapter 15. Now the Pharisees in the Bible, now we're not talking about this Pharisee, but the Pharisees in the Bible, they are your respected religious leaders in the first century. If you see them in the street, you honor them. They dress well, they know their prayers, they're the ones that you'd go to with your tricky religious questions. The Pharisees were seen as the good people. And this is what makes Matthew chapter 15 quite phenomenal. Because Jesus is confronting not a bunch of Ruffians, but the respected people who taught about God. Here, the Pharisees' words are assessed by Jesus and they are exposed. So let's jump into the text and find out what is going on. And first we see the problem. The Pharisees approach Jesus and ask in verse two, why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don't wash their hands before they eat. Shock, horror, gasp. In our post COVID world, we might be doing that because we're encouraged to wash our hands at any and every opportunity that we have. However, the Pharisees were gasping not because of bacteria, but because washing hands before a meal had come to present to them their cleverness before God. And yet there is no law in the Old Testament about washing your hands before you eat. The closest is there's a law that priests must wash their hands when ministering in the temple. That everyone had to wash their hands is a man-made tradition, not a God-made requirement. Man's words, not God's words. And the Pharisees had made this man-made tradition something that they said reflected their relationship with God. And the Pharisees had books and books of these man-made traditions, which they said that God's people had to keep on top of the commands in God's word. Now the Pharisees, they are trying to catch Jesus out for breaking these man-made traditions, but Jesus turns the conversation back on them and their words. And to do this, Jesus draws attention to another Pharisee man-made tradition. It's in verses four to seven. The tradition Jesus draws attention to says that people can disobey God's command to honor their father and mother. Because what they said was, is if you had a big lump of money and you said, I'm going to devote this to God, then you could not use that money to honor your father and your mother. And so by doing that, they were saying that you could not honor your father and your mother. And Jesus assesses this and he says, in verse six, thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition, putting a man-made tradition over and above God's word. You see the natural order of things is that God's word is the final authority because of who God is. It's not a word we can choose to ignore. But this is what the Pharisees are doing by honoring their traditions above God's word. And actually this is the heart of sin, isn't it? It's ignoring God's work. We see it in the Garden of Eden when humanity rebelled against God's word. They chose to make up their own rules, their own traditions. Well, Jesus assesses the Pharisees' words, their words of teaching. And he concludes using God's word found in Isaiah, it's written for us in verse eight, these people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain. Their teachings are merely human rules. The Pharisees claim to worship God. They're in the synagogue gatherings on Sundays. They look like, and only look like, they're saying the right words. But they're actually teaching man-made traditions over and above God's word. And Jesus says their words betray them. Their words are elevating. Human made rules above God's word. And it's revealing what is in their heart. It's revealing that there is not a love for God there, but a love for human made traditions that nullify the word of God. And that's a problem. It's a problem for the Pharisees because they are not right with God. Their hearts are far from Him and they don't even recognize it. They might be sincere and lovely people to have a chat with, but they've made a critical error by not listening to God's word. And it's a problem because that means that they don't recognize that Jesus is God's word become flesh. They don't see that Jesus is someone that they should listen to. Instead, they're spending their time trying to catch Jesus out. And so they miss out on God's big plan of salvation in Jesus. And that's what happens when we put human words over and above God's word. We will stop listening to God's word. This is what happened in the Reformation in the 1600s. The church had stopped listening to God's word in the Scriptures. Tradition had become the authority. The words of people ruled the day to the point where the official teaching was that you could buy salvation with money, that you could work your way into heaven. The word of God was being hidden from people and the traditions of the church were placed over the word of God. And it meant that God's grace in Jesus Christ was hidden. Salvation by grace through faith in Jesus who died in our place for our sin was obscured. The Reformation which subsequently happened and gave birth to the church of England and then the Anglican church. I came about because people like Martin Luther and John Calvin and Thomas Cramar wanted to put God's words back into the hands of ordinary people like you and me. So we could listen not to the tradition of people but the word of God and see clearly that salvation is found in Jesus. In the Reformation, God's grace to us in Jesus was once again made the center of Christianity and the church. The focus was again on listening to God's word. And it's a fight that still goes on today. There are movements today that wanna get rid of God's word. There are people who teach that the Bible is not God's word but it's just the words of humans. There are some churches which focus on mysticism and experience and they have their Bibles but they leave them on the floor gathering dust. Both movements put human words and human teaching over and above the authority of the Bible and the result is devastating. The grace of God in Jesus Christ is once again hidden. Jesus' death and resurrection ends up being denied and the words of Scripture ignored. But we need to go back to the Bible. All Scripture is God breathed. God spoke His word and He's written for it down for us in the Bible. And this has implications for us today as we think about our human traditions. We are part of a church that has a great many traditions. We've got roads and candles and prayer books and stained glass windows and there is nothing wrong with traditions but tradition should never be put above God's word. Tradition should always come under God's word and we should never rely on the traditions that have been handed down to us for the assurance of our salvation. Our confidence is not in our traditions. Our faith is not in traditions but in the word of God that leads us to put our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. If all the traditions that we know and are familiar with were stripped away tomorrow our faith would live on because it rests solely upon Jesus and His death and resurrection. Now in saying that, we do need to make sure that our traditions are not leading our hearts away from Jesus like they were in the Pharisees time. We need to test our traditions against the word of God and if something that we're doing does not magnify Jesus but leads us away from Him and the truth of the gospel as it is found in God's word, well we need to change it. And so that's the problem. Listening to human words over God's words. And then we come to our problem. Now the disciples in verse 12, they highlight that Jesus has made a social blunder. He has offended the Pharisees. Our Jesus often said things in love that upset the status quo. And when people are not using God's word as the authority particularly when they're in leadership and they're leading others astray it is appropriate to raise the issue with love and clarity and risk offending. But ultimately though, it's up to God to remove the false teacher. Verse 13, Jesus replied, "'Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted "'will be pulled up by the roots, "'leave them their blind guides. "'If the blind lead the blind, "'both will fall into a pit.'" Those who put human words above God's words, their lack of listening to God will end in their destruction. They will lead into each other into the pit. God will pull them up from their roots. And so while Jesus called out the Pharisees hypocrisy, his mission was not to dethrone them from their posts. In the end, it was the Pharisees who signed off on handing Jesus over to the Romans for crucifixion. Jesus left the outcome to God. In the midst of false teaching, what will win the day is faithfully teaching God's word of his grace to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. If the church next door, and I'm not saying that the church next door is doing this, but if they were teaching a man-made doctrine, yes, I think it's right, they're like Jesus, we called them out on that. But in the end, it's not our responsibility to close them down. We need to lead that to God. Now the disciples are slow to understand. And they ask Jesus to explain what he means for the disciples. They have grown up with these man-made traditions. They have grown up thinking that whether they wash their hands before a meal affects their relationship with God. And so Jesus returns to the hand-washing question. In verse 17, he says, Don't you see that whatever enters the mouth and goes into the stomach and then out of the body, but the things that come out of a person's mouth come from the heart and these defile them. Food eaten with dirty hands does not affect our heart, does not defile us before God. But do you notice what Jesus does say here? He says there's a direct connection to what is in our heart and the words that come out of our mouths. It's not about what goes in, but it's what about comes out. It's like toothpaste. When you squeeze the toothpaste tube, what comes out? Toothpaste, because that's what's stored in there. Well, what is stored in our heart comes out of our mouth. And what is stored in our heart? Well, Jesus tells us, verse 19, For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person, but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them. It's the sin stored in our heart that defiles us, that makes us unworthy of God. Out of our heart comes sin, a lie isn't just a slip of the tongue. It's a reflection of our heart before God. Writing a spiteful comment online or sending an angry email isn't just about you getting your anger out. It's a reflection of your heart before God. Speaking even in jest at the expense of another person isn't simply you just trying to get some laughs. It reveals something of your evil heart. Grumbling and complaining, reveals something of what is in your heart. The prophet Jeremiah agrees with Jesus and he tells us that the heart is deceitful above all else, that the heart, our heart is engraved with flint and it is engraved sin on our hearts, our evil, our rejection of God's word. From our heart comes our sin. And today I think people are at risk of putting their own hearts above God's word. Have you heard the phrase, follow your heart? That's the theme of most Disney movies. Listen to your heart. Do what your heart tells you. That's a message that says, put your own heart above God's word. But actually without God's intervention, what Jesus is telling us that our own hearts are gonna lead us away from God, away from Jesus, towards listening to human words and obeying human traditions. And it means that we will be far from Jesus just like the Pharisees. And what that means is that we need a new heart. We need a clean heart. And this is what Jesus gives us. When we place our faith in Jesus, it's like we undergo heart surgery. He puts us on the operating table, He opens us up and Jesus sends His Holy Spirit to dwell in us, to transform our heart and our minds. Our heart is undergoing a renovation, a transformation. So that if our faith is in Jesus, what will be on our hearts, then what will be on our lips will not be vain worship, but hearts that through the grace of Jesus are near to God. Lips that praise God with sincere thanks, with the declaration of true faith. Without this transformed heart that Jesus gives us when we have faith in Him, we will keep listening to human words over and above God's words. Our hearts will continue to defile us. Okay, so pause for a moment. Return back to that 48 hour transcript of your words. What does that reveal about you? Would it reveal a transformed heart through faith in Jesus? A heart that praises God for His grace to us in Jesus. Would it reveal a penitent heart like the psalmist in Psalm 51? A heart that is aware of our own sin and rebellion and confesses that sin to God. Would your words reveal that you're a saved child of God who praises Him, worships Him, praise to Him? Would it reveal that you are someone that instead of grumbling and complaining, gives thanks in all circumstances? Would your words show that you are someone who is seeking to encourage and build others up? Would it reveal that you are someone who teaches God's word faithfully to your family who talks about God's word with your spouse and your friends? What would your words reveal about you? We are all sinful, all of us, including me. In the 48 hour test, I imagine that if our faith is in Jesus, we will see evidence of those things that I just asked you about, but we will also see evidence of sin, won't we? Where things that have come out of our mouths where we're like, why did I just say that? Words that would reveal the depths of the darkness of our own heart. And this is gonna be the case until we're with Jesus in the new heavens and the new earth. But if our faith is in Jesus, the 48 hour test should also show us how Jesus is transforming our heart and how we now worship Him. But here is the thing, as we do this assessment, we cannot rely on our own hearts for this assessment. We're not so would look inward and think, oh, what is my heart revealing about me today? When we're feeling alone or ungodly or feeling anger or hatred or on the opposite side of the spectrum, or even if we're feeling joy or exuberance or happiness, we can't look to our heart for an assessment of how we're going with God because the heart is deceitful above all else. Now the place where we need to look for our assessment is God's word. And God's word tells us that through faith in Jesus that we are forgiven. That through faith in Jesus, we are His child. That through faith in Jesus, we are clean and no longer defiled. We need to look to God's word. And so we do need to guard our heart. Proverbs chapter four, verse 23, above all else guard your heart for everything you do flows from it. How do we guard our hearts through God's word which endures forever? We need to keep coming back to God's word. We need to keep reading God's word. We need to keep listening to God's word. I talked before about the traditions of the church. One of the traditions that I think is great about the Anglican church is that every service we read huge chunks of scripture as a great tradition to have. Our prayer books, which our services are based on are steeped in the word of God. And we need to keep coming back to it. We need to keep applying it to our hearts and minds and lives and asking God by His spirit to continue that work of transformation in us. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you that you speak and that your words reveal you to us, your holiness, your perfection, your righteousness, your justice, your anger and your wrath at sin. We thank you that you sent your son the word to become flesh. We thank you that his words lead us to eternal life through trusting in him. We thank you Heavenly Father that when we place our faith in Jesus you begin a transformation of our own hearts so that the words that come out of our mouths would reflect your glory, your honor and your praise. And so we ask Lord that you would help us to be people who keep coming back to the word of God, who keep putting your word above the human words and human traditions, that we would not be defiled but that we would honor you and give you all the praise. May we ask this in Jesus' name, amen.