When You Are Favored Part2

Again, there is nothing from without a man that entering into him can defile him, but the things which come out of him those are they that defile a man. Now what can that possibly mean? If the thing that goes into a man doesn’t defile him. But it’s the things that come out of a man those are the things that defile him. Defile. What does defile mean? It’s very interesting that religions teach so many things that we can not do, things that will defile us. But what Jesus is saying here that the things that you take in, or the things that you do, the things that you can put your hands to do don’t defile a man. What defiles a man are those things which emanate from the heart of the man.

If we read back again in the same chapter 7 in the book of Mark starting in the sixth verse, it reads, “He answered and said to them, well have Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites as it is written these people honor me with their lips but their heart is far from me.” Their heart. Okay? What defiles a man according to Jesus is what comes out of the heart. “But far is their heart from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God you hold the tradition of men. As the washing of pots and cups. And many such other things the washing.

We spend so much time trying to look good, trying to present an image of a particular thing. When what Jesus is saying here is not these outward appearances, it’s not these things that we portray… its the things that emanate from the heart of a man. Those are the things that are good or bad. We can doctor and pretty ourselves up. Jesus often in Scripture talks about painted graveyards. Looking pretty and nice on the outside, but corrupt on the inside. And then it’s the prophet speaking of David before he was to become king that God doesn’t judge a man based on his outward appearance, but God judges the heart of a man. It’s very important to recognize that in this day and age we’ve gotten so caught up in how things look. We have surgery, we have things that cover us up… masks. We have all kinds of things the way to project ourselves as being something that we are not. And you can full me, I can fool you. But, God judges a man’s heart. We can’t fool God.

And this is what we are going to examine. The traditions of men. The mask that we wear. The games that we play. The paint that we use to paint the sepulchers of that which we call lives. Giving an impression and the appearance that we are something that we are not. And that wouldn’t be so bad if we would just stop there. But we not only present ourselves as being a way that we are not, then we accuse others and we point fingers at others who are not the way that we think they should be, the way which we are projecting ourselves… the way in which we truly are not. And, again what Jesus saying in this seventh chapter of Mark the sixth verse, “Well hath Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites… Hypocrites. What is a hypocrite? A mask. Hiding behind a mask pretending to be something that were not. And then accusing those who are not what we are pretending to be. Hypocrites. We need to recognize that there is no need to pretend that we are something that we are not because nobody is. We’re all kind of messed up. That’s why we need Jesus, right? To make us right in the eyes of God.

We are going to discuss some things that might be somewhat controversial. We well talk about God. Were going to talk about Jesus. We are going to talk about philosophers and Christians of old. We find even as we study philosophy many of the Western philosophers were Christians. St. Thomas Aquinas. St. Anselm. Kierkegaard even. These guys some of which you may have heard and some of which you may not have heard believed in God some of the very frustrated realizing they couldn’t walk the walk. They couldn’t do what they believed was expected of them. Some of them acquiesced to realize, “Oh well over whatever …you can’t.” And some of them got really frustrated because they believed that you had to be or walk a certain way or you weren’t right in the eyes of God, or you weren’t a Christian. And, so they became very disillusioned. Nietzsche, “ God is dead!” Nietzsche’s dad was a preacher. Did you know that? It’s very interesting that you often find that atheist have religious backgrounds. Why? Because they know. Especially the intelligent ones because they know. They studied Scripture and they recognize that there’s a problem. And so rather than investigate deeper… we say, “Well, God just cannot exist.

 I met an atheist recently. A young man 28 years old and raised in the evangelical church. The past two and a half years, an atheist. ‘It can’t possibly be true. The religion can’t possibly be true.” I met a young girl as well, a Catholic 20 years old. She began looking at the eightfold path that Buddhism teaches, and other teachings as well. And confessing that she realizes, she’s a “good Catholic girl” but some of the things that they believed (to her) just can’t possibly be true. That’s the problem with the age old philosophers… those thoughtful folks. It’s like the more you don’t read, the more you don’t understand, and you shelter yourself from insight, knowledge and understanding… the more content you are. You’ve heard the old saying ignorance is bliss? Well it is. Because when you begin to understand and see and grasp more, you begin to realize the things that you once held onto… Well, there are some holes in those things. We want to investigate them.

I believe that God exists. I believe that God loves us. I believe that God made a way for all humanity to be well. What I find very interesting especially in this nation, when we talk about someone being atheist, right off the bat we think, “Well, they don’t believe in God. They don’t believe in the Christian God. They don’t believe in the Bible, so they must be an atheist. But being an atheist is not believing that there is any God… or gods. But we automatically correlate them to Christianity, because we see God and Christianity as being synonymous and if you reject Christianity you reject God, right?