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September 17, 2006
Pentecost 15
Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23
Pastor Joel Zank

Hypocrites

(Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23) The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus and {2} saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were "unclean," that is, unwashed. {3} (The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. {4} When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles.) {5} So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, "Why don't your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with 'unclean' hands?" {6} He replied, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ''These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. {7} They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.' {8} You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men."... {14} Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, "Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. {15} Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean... {21} For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, {22} greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. {23} All these evils come from inside and make a man 'unclean.'"

In Christ Jesus, who alone purifies us from all sin, dear fellow redeemed.

I'll never forget the time I pretended to be a baker. It was December of my vicar year. I decided that being away from home didn't mean I had to do without Christmas cookies. So I got out the one cookbook I owned and got busy. How hard could it be? I had the butter, the sugar, the milk, the eggs, the salt, the flour, I even had vanilla. But wait a minute, the recipe called for one teaspoon of baking soda. That I didn't have. But at the time, it just didn't seem all that critical. I mean, how important could a teaspoon of anything really be in a recipe that called for cups and cups of everything else? And besides all that, I did have baking powder, so I threw in a teaspoon of that, just for good measure. Baking powder, baking soda - close enough. Well, it wasn't close enough. The cookies turned out rock hard, which wouldn't have been a big deal had I not boasted to everyone else in the apartment building that I was baking Christmas cookies. My fellow tenants, all coworkers in ministry, insisted on seeing and sampling my creation. The cookies were inedible and to add insult to injury, my good neighbors drilled holes through them, attached some string, and hung them on my door as Christmas decorations. The only bakery I got to eat for my efforts was some humble pie.

There's a word for people who boast about being something they're not. The word is "hypocrite." In fact "hypocrite" actually comes from the Greek word for actor - a person who puts on a mask and plays at being someone or something else. Today in the Scripture before us, Jesus shows us how dangerous it is to be a hypocrite in our relationship to God. Listen as Jesus tells us that Hypocrites 1) pretend to be what they're not; 2) forget what they really are; and therefore 3) need Christ's saving Word.

Before we say anymore about hypocrites, a little background on our text is in order. Jesus' popularity in the northern most regions of the Holy Land had not escaped the attention of the religious elite back in Jerusalem. The Pharisees and teachers of the law determined that Jesus must be dealt with before his influence with the people surpassed their own. It was further decided that the first step in bringing down this young rabbi should be to embarrass and discredit him publicly. So that's what we find these people trying to do to Jesus here when they ask him, "Why don't your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with 'unclean' hands?" (Mark 7:5).

Keep in mind, there was no one better at following religious law than the Pharisees. They were the absolute picture of piety, portraying closeness to God that was the envy of many in Israel. But these same Pharisees found Jesus and his disciples to be lacking their kind of holiness. In fact, they had spotted some of Christ's disciples eating with "unclean" hands. Now, be sure to understand that we're not talking about the disciple's hygiene here. Their hands weren't covered with grease and grime. No, this supposed filth was spiritual in nature because the disciples had not observed the ceremonial hand-washing that was tradition among the Pharisees. St. Mark explains: "(The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. {4} When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles)" (Mark 7:3-4).

Centuries earlier there were some in Israel who had decided that religious laws were the ticket by which they could earn heaven. Of course, it's quite impossible for sinners to keep God's commandments perfectly. So the Pharisees and their elders invented laws of their own, laws more easily kept, rules that treated sin, not as inborn depravity, but more like an airborne virus that could be avoided or, if need be, removed by the use of certain rituals and ceremonies. For example, the Pharisees saw sin as something you could catch from coming into contact with people or foods that were regarded as spiritually unclean. So if you were to accidentally handle something in the market place that was unclean and then ate without purifying your hands, you would become defiled by sin. But you could easily avoid this problem by a ritual hand-washing. And if hand washing alone couldn't solve the problem, not to worry, the Pharisees had a total of 613 man-made rituals, the strict observance of which kept them pretending to be what they were not - the holy people of God.

You see how this happened, don't you? The Pharisees had changed, if you will, the recipe of God's saving Word, adding to it not only hundreds of laws, but worse, one very damning teaching: the teaching that sinners can somehow save themselves. That's the lie that gives birth to every religious hypocrite, as Jesus would tell them. Jesus and his disciples, of course, had nothing for which to apologize. They were under no obligation to observe man-made traditions. There were living the will of God. The Pharisees were not, so Jesus said, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ''These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. {7}They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.' {8} You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men" (Mark 7:6-8).

Jesus quoted words that were more than 700 years old, but they were just as timely and true in Christ's day as they were in Isaiah's. Now these words are 2700 years old and they're still just as timely and true. Why do suppose God preserved this Scripture for us? Was it so that with his help we might know a hypocrite when we see one? Absolutely-as often as we look in the mirror. You see, our God loves us so that he cannot have us pretend to be something we're not. He cannot have us pretend to be holy when we're holding on to our sin either because we're too proud to acknowledge it, or enjoying it too much to let it go.

How is it with you? Do you have a temper? Are you filled with hatred? Are you greedy, always looking to have the best and the most for yourself? Are you envious of the people around you, constantly upset because they have so much while you have so little? Do you gossip? Are you arrogant? Do you fantasize, treating your thoughts like some x-rated playground? These are just some of the sins common to mankind. These are not the things that make us hypocrites. It's what we do with our sins that can lead to hypocrisy. For example, how often we excuse our sins as nothing more than slight defects of character. How often we justify them, blaming them on others. How often we treasure our sins as an escape from the monotony of life, a little naughty reward we've earn for being so good so much of the time. But don't you see? To think of any of our sins in any of these ways makes us hypocrites right here, right now in our worship of the Savior God. Because if we're going to excuse, or justify, or treasure our sins, then we have no need for a Savior, no reason to praise God, no worship to give; it's all in vain, mere lip service as Jesus says.

That's not all Jesus said about hypocrites. He added, "...their hearts are far from me." That's what this is all about. Jesus says some hard things, not because his feelings are hurt, but because souls are in danger-our souls. The most frightening thing about being a hypocrite is that after spending so much time pretending to be something you're not, you begin to believe it. After while, hypocrites forget what they really are-damned sinners by birth. That happened to the Pharisees in our text. After years of following man-made traditions, they managed to convince themselves that they had no sin. Remember, they had been tampering with the recipe of God's Word. No, they didn't substitute baking powder for baking soda; they substituted their own rules for God's truth, his truth about their natural condition and their eternal damnation. Jesus sets the record straight for them and for us, "Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. {15} Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean... {21} For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, {22} greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. {23} All these evils come from inside and make a man 'unclean'" (Mark 7:14-15, 21-23). Our sin is never just a slight defect; it's a constant reminder of the spiritual cesspool we are by nature. Sin isn't something that others make us think or say or do, it comes from within; it's comes bleeding out of our naturally dead heart. And if we are ever so foolish as to think of sin as some kind of reward, let these words of Jesus remind us that every sinful pleasure we permit ourselves on earth, earns us an eternity of misery in hell. For to stand "unclean" before God is to be eternally condemned in his sight. Hearts that are far from God on earth, will stay that way forever. Friends, we can't afford, even for a moment, to forget what we really are, for in that moment we could lose everything, our Savior, his pardon, and the life it brings us. For this reason, we hypocrites need Christ's saving Word.

We need to hear God's law with its threats to keep us from becoming self-righteous. And more than anything else, we need to hear God's promises in the gospel to keep us from despair and to fill us with new hope and new life. Jesus shows us what hypocrites we can be, so that we might appreciate all the more what a Savior he is. All those sins that he spoke of, all the evil and filth that is ours, he took it all from us. The murder and adultery, the greed and deceit, the lewdness and envy, the slander and arrogance, every last one of our sins, even our hypocrisy, Jesus claimed as his own. You understand, he wasn't simply pretending or acting. He wasn't just playing the part of the sinner. As God who became man, he could and he did assume our identity. He became you and me and the Substitute of all sinners, so that by way of cross, he could face God's anger in hell in our place until all that holy wrath was satisfied, all our sin was burned away, and all our punishment paid forever. All this has happened. We know it for a fact because our Savior lives to tell us so. And because he lives we have no reason to be hypocrites, not ever. We have no reason to pretend we are holy, for Christ lives to cover us with his holiness. We really are holy through faith in Christ Jesus. We have no reason to excuse, or justify our sin, for Christ lives to hear our confession and to grant us forgiveness. And never do we have reason to treasure our sin, for Christ lives to bring us a far greater and everlasting treasure-peace with our God, joy in his service, and bliss without end. You see, dear friends, no need to pretend! All this is really yours, for Jesus' sake. Amen.