With A Religious Crowd - Timothy Keller Sermons

welcome to gospel and life on which the teaching is based this morning is printed in your bulletin it's Mark chap 7 I'll read verses 1 to 23 the Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus and saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were unclean that is unwashed the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing holding to the tradition of the elders when they come to the mar 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 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 he replied Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you Hypocrites as is written these people honor me with their lips but their hearts are far from me they worship me in vain their teachings are but rules taught by men you have let go of The Commandments of God and are holding

on to the traditions of men and he said to them you have a fine way of setting aside the Commandments of God in order to observe your own traditions for Moses said honor your father and your mother and anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death but you say that if a man says to his father or mother whatever help you might otherwise wi have received from me as Corban that is a gift devoted to God then you no longer let him do anything for his father or mother thus you nullify

the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down and you do many things like that again Jesus called the crowd to him and said listen to me everyone and understand this 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 after he had left the crowd and entered the house the disciples his disciples asked him about this parable are you so dull he asked don't you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him

unclean for it doesn't go into his heart but into his stomach and then out of his body in saying this Jesus declared all foods clean he went on what comes out of a man is what makes him unclean for from within out of men's hearts come evil thoughts sexual immorality theft murder adultery greed malice deceit lewdness Envy slander arrogance and Folly all these evils come from inside and make a man unclean and this is God's word now what we're doing uh every week here in the morning Services is we're looking at typical events from the

life of Jesus out of the history of Jesus life which we find in the gospels and we're in a sense building a biography and we really can't go through a series like this without at least bringing out one of what you might call Jesus controversialist events Jesus debated Jesus fought Jesus argued with the Pharisees the Sadducees the herodians the teachers of the law people we would call uh religious and civil Elites today and so often when you look at the argument it's so uh it's so easy superficially when you read about these debates to say

wow this is not very relevant for us today it's of purely antiquarian interest who cares about the clean and the unclean laws in the ceremonial Washings and the ablutions that the Jews uh observed who cares about that sort of thing but Jesus never picked a fight unnecessarily Jesus never debated something that wasn't important a universal a profound principle and that's what we have here now there's two ways you might say why did he uh Cho such a large passage and there's two ways to do a passage like this one is to try to deal with

every single individual thought which would take us too long the other thing is to see the general gist and what you have here is in this very long passage three basic sections in the first section verse 1 to5 we are introduced to the fact that we all have a deep sense of spiritual uncleanness moral defilement the Pharisees were not just obsessive compulsive always washing there is such a thing as obsessive compulsive disorder but it's an aggravation of something that is universal we all have a sense of uncleanness of defilement and that's that's what we see

in the first few verses then from verse six down to at least verse 13 Jesus gives us an example one particular example of the way in which all of us are trying to deal with that uncleanness everybody using different forms tries to do self-cleansing and Jesus shows a particular pattern uh that particular pattern to the self-cleansing so first of all we're shown that we all have a problem with this sense of spiritual uncleanness and we all find a particular way of dealing with that uncleanness trying to clean ourselves and then lastly verse 14 to 23

we're told why that will never work and what will now first of all let me take a look at those three parts with you the first part look at verses 1 to5 we have here this discussion about the ceremonial Washings Pharisees were very upset because Jesus disciples did not wash and we're told here in verse three the Pharisees and the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing holding to the tradition of the elders now let's talk about the issue then but then immediately see why this is an abiding issue the

issue then was that the uh the Pharisees were very strict about holding to the ceremonial laws of the Old Testament in particular the clean laws now when you read the clean laws in Exodus Leviticus Numbers they're really quite confusing to Modern people and uh they seem so unnecessary and uh there's many of them and I'll just give you some a basic uh gist of them in the Old Testament you were not allowed to go into the Tabernacle or into the temple to worship God if you had been in much contact with dirt disease or Decay

dirt disease or Decay for example the uh priests had to wash their hands and wash their feet before they came into the sanctuary uh here's another example if you touched a dead animal or a dead person if you touched any dead animal or person you could not go into the Tabernacle to worship God for a week here's another one and this is really where it gets weird if you had diarrhea had an infectious skin disease if you had a hemorrhage so that some part of your body was producing blood or puss in in in uh

uh response to some sort of infection in fact if you even had in your home on youro or on any of your utensils mildew you couldn't go worship there are also a set of foods you weren't allowed to eat especially for and many of the foods we know now like the shellfish that were forbidden were foods that before Refrigeration were particularly uh uh uh prone to infections and things growing in other words if you had relationship to dirt disease or Decay you couldn't go in and the thing that immediately strikes you today you know what

it strikes you as actually for the first time it really began to hit me as I was studying for this that Worship in the Old Testament the worshipper in the Old Testament essentially had to have the same relationship to dirt that a doctor has going into a surgery you'll never see for example a doctor going from an autopsy and just go into into brain surgery from there he would have to she would have to go through the rights of purification in other words you had to scrub up to go into God in the Old Testament

there had to be all kinds of Rights of purification if you had any contact with Decay if you had any contact with anything that even might be Decay or might be disease or or dirt you had a scrub and scrub all over the place you had the same relationship in the Old Testament to God and to the Tabernacle worship excuse me as the doctors today have to going into surgery why and see we're already getting there the point is the clean laws were there to teach something extremely important God was saying and actually it's easier

for us to see now than it was for them because we understand something about dirt and disease and Decay more than the people in those days did and that is that Sin Sin does the same thing to the soul that dirt disease and Decay do the to the body sin defiles the soul the way dirt disease and Decay defile the body defile now what does that mean here for example let's think how does dirt disease and Decay defile a body well let me give you three ways first of all dirt disease and Decay defile the

body in the sense that it isolates you you it alienates you if you go onto a subway car and you may see a very poor person there maybe a probably a homeless person and even if your worldview is incredibly sympath makes you very sympathetic to that person tremendously sympathetic that person and in no way to think ill of that person you can't get within 10 feet of him why because the urine because the feces because the vomit because all the stuff that's on the clothes you can't even get near them there's there's hardly a culture

in the world that doesn't say this if you want to meet people if you want to get close to People Wash clean up because dirt defiles you and of course infection defiles you you can't touch something that's that's infectious see so it defiles you and God is saying sin does the very same thing to relationships secondly give you another quick example very quick um what does dirt disease and Decay do it eats away your insides it's cancerous literally I mean I actually my wife explained this to me I didn't know this but uh you know

actually dirt dirt on a on clothing actually makes the clothing wear out faster if you don't keep your clothes clean because the dirt gets in and wears out the fabric through the friction and so forth but you see it's but of course infection and Decay literally pulls the body apart makes it break down and God is saying sin does the same thing it makes the soul fall apart it make puts it at war with itself instead of cohering it disintegrates and one more thing dirt disease and Decay discolor stain misshapen disfigure just like cancer just

like Milo just like these same things what is God saying God is saying why do you have wars why do you have divorce why do you have conflicts at work why do you have internal uh dissension why do you have conflicts within your soul why why is there twisting and perversion of your own Humanity why do you see the things sin is what ails the world now do you believe that that sin you see defiles you it alienates you it stains you now you might not believe that I only have a couple minutes I got

to move on to the next Point here but I'll tell you this um I know that that's not a very this whole idea that sin morally defiles you stains you makes you clean it's not it's not very not very sophisticated view I noticed this week I saw Woody Allen quote uh quip in the uh New York Times somebody asked Woody Allen is sex dirty and Woody Allen said only if you do it right and uh what is he doing he's making fun of the very idea that some things are dirty some thoughts are dirty some

actions are dirty you know some words are dirty we're grown up people now we live in New York City we're over 30 years old we we you know we're over we're adults and yet you know you can't just quip this stuff away because over the years there is a almost a universal and abiding testimony that people do not when people in spite of themselves feel stained by sin of course you know the most famous one is that place where lady MC Beth is she takes part in murder and after words her guilt the sense of

defilement is so strong that her that her mind cracks under it and she walks around one of the most pathetic figures in all of theater of course and she walks around and she says out see she's she's pushing she's washing her hands she looks at her hands and she's stained and she sees the blood on her hands and she walks around and she can't get rid of it and she says out out damn spot out I say and then she says Ah hell is murky hell is Muddy all the perfumes in Arabia cannot Sweeten little

hand and you know MC Beth watches her going crazy under the sense of defilement her husband and he turns to a doctor and he says can't thou not cleanse oh yes can't thou not with some sweet oblivious antidote cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff which so Wass upon the heart he say she's not clean she needs some sweet oblivious antidote she realizes that hell is murky what's that mean hell is Muddy I did something wrong I did something wrong and I'm stained I'm disfigured I'm alienated now you say well murder all right that

murder but you know I don't you have to decide what is dirty for you listen why does so many of you why are so many of you such perfectionists you can't delegate you don't want anybody to do it wrong why are some of you so driven to succeed I got to be I'm trying to be gentle here why are some of you so obsessed with with look with sleekness that you've got an eating disorder why is it that that many many of you are full of bitterness because you're you're desperately trying to blame somebody else

why your life has gone the way it's gone I'll tell you why you're washing you're washing look Ros col nikof remember the uh he was the great protagonist or whatever he was the central figure of Crime and Punishment by doeski and he said he said you know morality is all in the mind and he kills a woman who is bitter who is hateful who is hated abused power Rich old woman and then he feels defiled and he can't get rid of it till he confesses and Russ skof and 50 years later Jean Paul sarry and

50 years after that Fuko and they all say be bold create your own reality things are only dirty if they're dirty to you you see write your own scripts decide what's right for you and yet and and you're doing it a lot of you are doing that and yet you can't get rid of a sense of condemnation and defilement and there's a voice that calls you a coward calls you a fool and you're washing come on it's there it's not just the Pharisees don't laugh at the Pharisees This Is How They dealt with it they're

always washing so are you so is Lady MCB Beth so are we all that's the first point sin defiles and We Know It And we know we're defiled now what are we going to do about it well the second point is here in verse from 6 to 13 Jesus gives a very very interesting analysis of how the Pharisees deal with that sense of uncleanness and therefore actually a pattern for us all again I'm I'm not going to let us look down at the Pharisees today because Jesus what Jesus is saying to us is the things

that he does they do so do we now he gives an example the issue back then then the issue now the issue back then was that the disciples Jesus disciples were going against the tradition of the elders and the tradition of the elders which Mark makes little asides you can tell here that the gospel writer Mark though he was Jewish was writing to Greeks and Romans who didn't know much about this that's why he has these little parentheses but here's what we can we can tell you know the tradition of the elders which is the

teachers of the law decided to elaborate on what the law said about ceremonial Purity for example in the Old Testament if you go back to Exodus only the priests had to wash their hands and feet before they went in only the priests nobody else had to but the teachers of the law said well if the priests have to do it wouldn't it be safe for us all to do it and then they went beyond that and if you have to if you have to wash your hands before going into God at the Tabernacle wouldn't it

be safe if we always washed our hands before we ever prayed and next thing you know what came up around all the ceremonial laws of the Old Testament was a vast vast past huge number of very very specific and all comprehending rules and regulations which were called the halaka which means the fence around the law and it's the tradition of the elders and they it wasn't in the Bible it wasn't something God had said it was just a whole lot of rules and regulations around that but Jesus points out first of all that not only

do they R raise up many of their traditions and they make them every bit is absolutely NE necessary to obey as the law of God but then along with this Obsession about rules comes the neglect of certain principles of God's law and one of them he mentions here is this he says you're supposed to honor your father and your mother now without going into much detail Leviticus 27 says that God owns everything you own God's claims on all of your wealth supersedes anyone else's claims and on the basis of of Leviticus 27 there was a

tradition in the elders tradition that you could declare all of your all of your wealth God's and uh therefore not be able feel like you say well I can't give to the poor I can't give to my parents I can't help other people because this is God's it would be very similar to somebody today giving 30 40 50% of their income away and then neglecting their own family and what Jesus is getting at is something that is much more Universal it's not you look at that and say what's that got to do with us everything

here's what Jesus says how did you de with your cleaness same way they do you look at the law of God and the law of God is very broad Jesus mentions a whole slew of things in verse 23 you know that long list there at the end these are all aspects of the Ten Commandments don't murder that's murder and Malice you see don't lie that's deceit don't commit adultery that's loudness and adultery uh don't uh don't steal that's envy and and Theft don't covet that's arrogance and greed now if you look at any list of

everything God's law says you will always find something in there that you feel is very very important and a lot of other things you don't feel is important and here's what everybody does we all do what the Pharisees do let me give you a quick example in our modern day let's talk about the culture wars just for a second there's three approaches to the culture wars that I know of it covers almost everybody and I don't know where that leaves us first of all you've got the Liberals then you got the conservatives then you've got

the Beyonds here's what a liberal does a liberal says well there's certain things in the law of God that I consider hateful and and defiling greed materialism and Prejudice they're in the law of God so we lift that up and we also put a whole lot of other rules and regulations around it and we say our kind of people and Only Our Kind of people are inside our boundary and people outside of this we bash we look down our nose at the concern conservatives well the conservatives are doing the same thing conservatives they take part

of the law of God they take the sexual immorality for example you know uh they take certain things they take heresy and they lift that up and then they add all sorts of elaborations and they kind of ignore things like materialism greed and Prejudice and you see whenever you lift up part of God's law and elaborate it and you neglect other parts you create a manageable law a law you can obey a law that you can get on top of a law that's doable and then with it you bash other people who are not doing

it to justify yourself and then of course you've got the Beyonds and you know who the Beyonds are Beyonds are people are saying I'm beyond the liberal and conservative you see I'm beyond politics I'm beyond ideology I'm too creative for that and of course what you're doing is you're looking down your nose at them which is which is what you have to do in order to deal with your uncleanness it's a way of washing to sign up just visit gospeland life.com Adent to receive a daily email from December 3rd through December 24th that's gospel on

life.com Advent in addition to the Daily emails you'll also receive a previously recorded video every Sunday with an advent meditation from Tim Keller followed by a brief discussion with Tim and Kathy again to sign up visit gospeland life.com Advent May the hope of Christ's birth be a source of joy and encouragement to you this Advent season and that's the last Point Jesus says it's very intriguing you know mean I suppose you say well that's all extremely intriguing you all do that we're all trying to cleanse ourselves in these ways but it doesn't work and here's

why first of all Jesus puts lays down the principle he says because he says it verse 151 17 and 23 he says it is not what goes into a person that makes you unclean but what comes out it's not what comes in that defiles you from it's what not from outside in but from inside out and this is incredibly profound listen nobody understands this unless you really grasp the gospel nobody else understands it this is a radical principle this would change the world first of all nobody understands this let me give you some examples the

philosophies of the world don't understand this they don't understand that you can't cleanse yourself because defilement does not come from outside in let me give you one example it's easy to pick on I'll try to be nice Marxism now the reason I it's easy to pick on Marxism because socialism and communism virtually have collapsed but you know I've been thinking about this lately when the people I read who were the disciples of marks were not villains they were not fools they cared about people and you know it's easy for us to laugh at it since

we live in America but there's there's vast Millions populations of people that have been in absolute surf them and peasantry and poverty for years and years and there's no way they're going to get out it's there's no upward mobility and you know see the the people that read Mark said we got to do something about this they weren't fools they weren't villains but what what did Marx what was Marx's mistake he thought defilement came from outside he said you know the means of production were in the hands of the capitalists if we put it in

the hands of the workers things will be different and you know what he did they did and what happened did greed did deceit did arrogance did murder did theft did they go away no because they what my goodness why didn't they go away because they don't come from the outside the the world's philosophies don't get it the world's religions don't get it and again I'll try to be sensitive here when you see people going down the river Ganges to wash when you see people following the five-fold the eight-fold path to Enlightenment through Buddhism when you

see the people trying to use the five pillars of Islam to honor God if you believe that defilement comes from the outside then self-effort will be enough really work really work hard rules and regulations the Bible says and only the Bible says your problems are too radical for that let me go one step further so you don't think I'm beating up on everybody Christians don't understand that defilement does not come from the outside in a lot of people look there's a lot of Christians that hate cities when they meet somebody from Redeemer they say what

are you doing living in New York City that's a terrible place for a Christian to live what are you doing raising your children in New York City they don't believe verse 15 they don't believe verse 27 they don't believe verse 23 they believe that the city defiles you but see Jesus radical principle is that you are defiled it comes from the inside the radical principle is no matter how fast you run you can never get away from your Shadow no matter how fast you run you can't make one millimeter one millimeter of progress to make

distance between you and your Shadow it comes from within you again let me give you one more with qualifications there's very often when a person becomes a Christian in New York City here at Redeemer it's not long before they start to say things like this I can't be a Christian where I work there's so much slee there's so much Doggy Dog maybe I'll go into full-time Christian Ministry and you know look at I'm not against going into full-time Christian Ministry some of you definitely are called to do that I mean you know there has to

be some um and I'm also not saying that you shouldn't leave a job if the Temptations for you to sin are too great but don't you see if you leave a job because of Temptations for sin are too great it's because of the weakness of your heart what really becomes a problem is when you forget and you think there's something defiling about the finance industry there's something defiling about the fashion industry there's something defiling about the media industry I can't be a Christian in the sin is in you this is a radical principle you will

never get rid of it you will never wash it you will never by running from things see Christians here's so radical Christians should be the least squeamish people in the world remember I I don't understand how this game used to work but when I was a kid we used to have a game called cooties and if if if anybody had coties everybody had to run away and couldn't touch them or you get the coties too and Christians very often feel oh my gosh in the city in this there's so much sleev over there I'm going

to get the coties how am I going to be able to be a Christian Christians ought to be the least squeamish people we should go places that we should go places that Tomorrow People say you can't go there that would defile you you're already defiled markx didn't understand it the religions of the world don't understand it Christians don't understand it you can't clean yourself it'll never work well then what will work what will work this is what will work Jesus said thus he declared all foods clean okay stay with me because this is going to

be fast how could he do that at that point mark was saying he declared all foods clean that is not going against the tradition of the elders that's going against the word of God in the Old Testament that said some food some things are unclean how could he do that come on Jesus don't you say that not a jot or tit of the word will pass away till all is fulfilled H doesn't the word of God doesn't Isaiah say the grass Fades and the flower fails but the word of the Lord will endure for forever

how can you do that well the answer is Jesus said I do not come to abolish the law I come to fulfill it and when he said that that means when he said he declared all foods clean he wasn't saying well now God overlooks these things Jesus is not saying here's how you deal with phariseeism you know the trouble of the Pharisees is they were too legalistic that meant they put too much emphasis on the law they put too much emphasis on Holiness but we know that that's not important anymore God accepts you just as

you are is that what he's saying no you know why cuz the problem with phariseeism whether the liberal type or the conservative type or the Beyond type is not that it has too low a view of the law never phariseeism legalism always is too what did I say hi they don't have too high a view of the law they have too low a view of the law phariseeism comes from having too low a view whittling it down it's the high view of the law are you following me after I made that little nonse quitter it's

the high view of the law is the only hope for you to find the way of Salvation the gospel you don't make it lower that's what the Pharisees have done they whittel it down they made it doable you make it higher Jesus is therefore not saying that he's not saying well the clean laws are gone in fact you don't really as long as you just go to God and you try your best no what is he saying there's another way to be clean he is not saying that sin doesn't defile you you know it does

he's not saying that he is saying there's another way to be clean a way that the clean laws pointed to and what is that way the Old Testament there's one place and only one place that really shows what the clean laws are about a friend of mine and a couple of you I see around it was an Old Testament Professor man who's died unfortunately at fairly young age his name was Ray Dillard and he used to preach on a passage in Zechariah and he used to call it the Gospel According to Zechariah and whenever he

would preach he'd burst into tears and it was a great thing to watch and to listen to and the passage was this it's it's a very strange Vision in the Old Testament it says Zachariah suddenly had a vision and he says then I saw Joshua the high priest standing before the Lord and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him for Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes and the angel next to him said take off his filthy clothes and then he said to Joshua see I have taken away your sins so they put clean

turbin on his head and clothed him listen oh high priest said the Lord you are a symbol of things to come I am going to bring my servant the branch and I will remove the sin of this land in a single day now here's what was so astonishing to Zechariah Zechariah sees Joshua the high priest not this is the high priest at the time standing before the Lord now that could only have happened on one day you know what day that was see the temple had three parts to it the outer sanctuary and then the

temple Court I mean where everybody would pray and then you had the most holy place where the priests did their Ministry but then behind the veil there was a very small tiny place called the holiest of holies that's where God himself dwelt that's the where the Ark of the Covenant was and no one went there except the high priest one day of the year and only one day of the year yam kapor the day of atonement and so when Zechariah saw Joshua standing before the Lord he would have known that it was the day of

atonement but he was absolutely astounded to see what he saw and here's why we know quite a bit and I remember Ray Diller when he would preach on this since he was a Semitic scholar he knew much of the information about what happened on the day of atonement from the talmudic and the mishna uh uh writings and here's what we know would happen a week before the day of atonement the high priest would go to an apartment in the temple he'd leave his family so that he didn't get into contact with anything unclean during that

entire week he spent the entire week practicing for the day and on the night before the day he did not get a good night's sleep he stayed up all night he was supposed to stay up all night and on shifts the other priests would be there to help him pray all night and read scripture to him and support him and help him to purify his soul and on the day of he went about his rituals he washed five times from head to foot in public behind a screen but in public because it was that important

for the people to know that their Advocate their high priest their representative before God who was going to atone for their sins was absolutely pure and he did not dress in the normal high Priestly gar garments but in perfect white linen absolutely pure and first he made a sacrifice for his own sins and then he would bathe and get changed again and then he come out he make a sacrifice for the sins of all the priests that were helping him on that day and then he'd go back bathe and and change again finally they killed

two goats pardon me you bring out two goats he killed one goat and they they was right they laid hands on the other goat and they sent it out out of the camp the scapegoat they laid their hands on the goat they confessed their sins and so the goat in a sense received the sins of the people and it was thrown out of the camp and the other goat was killed not two goats one goat was killed and the blood of that goat now the high priest multiple cleansings multiple praying right multiple purification he took

the blood of that goat and went back before the Lord and that was the day that was the moment in which the sins of the people would be atoned for and that was the moment that Zechariah sees Joshua the high priest and to his absolute astonishment it says he's clothed in filthy garments but that's just what the NIV translation says you know what the Hebrew says he was clothed in garments covered with excrement with Europe with feces with all of this stuff and you imagine the emotional impact on Zachariah when he saw that but what

God was doing was he was opening his eyes to show him what we look like before God all the purification all the washing didn't matter because it's the heart the heart the heart anybody who knows your own heart knows what God sees but instead of God smiting Joshua he gives him clean clo and he says I'm going to take away all the sin of this land not multiplying it over the years through all kinds of sacrifices but in one day through my through the branch my servant the branch and I'm sure Zechariah wanted to know

what in the world was that but we know because we know a perfect one that came but when he showed up to be our high priest when he showed up to make the sacrifice for us what happened to him was exactly the opposite of what happened to Joshua the high priest in that Vision exactly the opposite he had a he had a week of preparation too before his sacrifice and the night before his sacrifice he stayed up all night but nobody was supporting him nobody was praying with him they were all falling asleep clueless and

even the father turned away from him and then when he went to make a sacrifice he was not clothed he was stripped and he was not given a perfumed bath but his ritual bath was the spit of the people around him you see and then finally he did not get beautiful garments put on him but what was laid on him was the filth of all the sins of the world the excrement of all of our records and where was he killed outside the camp the place of the skulls Calvary the place of dead things the

place of defilement and he was killed there exactly the opposite happened to him why so that we could be closed than linen because you know what we're told in Revelation 19 it doesn't in Revelation 19 it has this wonderful spot where John has another vision and it says let us rejoice and be glad for the wedding of the Lamb has come and his bride is made ready fine linen bright clean is given to her to wear and that's us see we're cleansed because he was spit on we're cleansed because he was smeared we're clothed because

he was stripped and now we can stand before the father absolutely beautiful do you understand that thus he declared all foods clean because that's not the way you can be cleansed and what does this mean just remember these things number one practical application stay away from sin it does defile you it does don't do it don't do the things that are wrong it will misshape you it will discolor you it will it will eat you away it will alienate you stay away number one number two however make sure if you feel guilty you're not feeling

guilty because you're breaking the tradition of the elders make sure you're breaking the scripture can I just show you something quick you know how liberating it is to actually believe the Bible how are you going to know the difference between true guilt feelings and false guilt feelings how are you going to know the difference between true defilement and false defilement how you going to know when you actually have really defiled yourself or whether you've just sinned against the tradition of the elders your Customs what your family said you know what your culture say how do

you know you're in trouble if you don't believe in this why well are all guilt feelings false are you going to say everybody who feels guilty is false are you going to tell it to Hitler oh that's okay false guilt feelings no you're going to say that's true guilt well if there are true guilt feelings you're going to say all guilt feelings are true no well how are you going to know how do you know the difference you believe the scripture make sure if you feel defiled it's true defilement then Lastly lastly there is a

sweet oblivious antidote and it doesn't matter what you've done and it doesn't matter what has happened to you there's a great list of terrible degrading sins in 1 Corinthians 6 where Paul says you did this and you did this and you did this and then he says but you were washed you were Sanctified you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ first John 1 18-9 if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness for the blood of Jesus cleans us from

all sins don't try to cleanse yourself but anything will come out there's there's a there's a Graham green novel about war in Indochina two men fer and pile I think are working in the underground and at one point fer has to kill pile even though he's his best friend and he does and he's racked up with guilt and he says if there was just somebody to whom I could go and say I'm sorry there is don't be squeamish be careful you don't feel defiled when you're just gone against the ruling of the elders but if

you have been there's a sweet oblivious antidote the blood of Jesus let's pray Our Father we want to be different we do not want to fall into the mistakes and the uh of the ideologies we don't want to fall into the squeamishness of of Christians who have allowed themselves to be affected by this sort of phariseeism we don't want to be continually trying to cleanse ourselves of defilements that aren't real and we also don't want to be sinking under defilements that are and therefore we know that this long but important passage has so many so

many secrets to it so many important and and key uh principles that we need right now and Lord this month's sermons were recorded from 1994 to 19 1997 the sermons and talks you hear on the gospel and life [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] a [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]