Welcome to the Plenteous Redemption podcast, where the cross and the culture are on a collision course for discussion. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign The Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified. Under the Jews, a stumbling block. Under the Greeks, foolishness. But under them which are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. Now, here's your host, Thomas Ervin. Amen. Well, God is holy, God is good to us. We'll be in Mark chapter seven this morning as we continue to make our way through the word of God and do our best to learn what we can and become familiar with what it says. Let's read verses one through 23. And then we'll discuss some pertinent notes about this passage. Verse 1, Then came together unto him the Pharisees and certain of the scribes which came from Jerusalem. And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say with unwashing hands, they found fault. For the Pharisees and all the Jews, except they washed their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders, and when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not, and many other things there be which they have received to hold as the washing of cups and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables, And when the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashing hands? He answered and said unto them, Well hath Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites. As it is written, This people honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups, and many other such like things ye do. And when he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. For Moses said, Honor thy father and thy mother, and whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death. But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is korban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me, he shall be free. And ye suffer him no more to do aught for his father or his mother, making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered, and many such like things ye do." Verse 14. And when He had called all the people unto Him, He said unto them, Harken unto Me, every one of you, and understand. 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 the man. "'If any man have ears to hear, let him hear.' And when he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable. And he said unto them, "'Are you so without understanding also? "'Do you not perceive that whatsoever thing "'from without entereth into the man, "'it cannot defile him? "'Because it entereth not into his heart, "'but into the belly, and goeth out into the draft, "'purging all meats. And he said, that which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. all these evil things come from within and defile the man." Now the Lord's not saying people take this too far in multiple directions. He's not saying there's something wrong with let's say, eating well. The point is that what goes into your body does not defile you. Can it make you sick? Sure. Can it make you have all sorts of other problems, medical problems? Sure, absolutely. We're talking about defilement. And so the Pharisees tried to make this correlation between washing your hands before you eat and being godly, and the two are not one and the same. But people make that type of mistake all the time. If you don't eat according to my diet, you're not right with God. If you don't homeschool at home the way that I would, you're not right with God. If you're not a part of my political party, then you're not right with God. People have a long list of of personal preferences that they have, and they confuse those or conflate those with being godly. And that's what the Lord's addressing here. The Lord said that men who place their tradition of men over the commandment of God are hypocrites. It's hypocritical. It's wrong. It's erroneous. You can't take your personal preference, if you like to eat this type of food, or you think everything should be all natural, and all this, and all that, and no preservatives, and no this, and no that, and whatever. Well, that's great. Glad you got that worked out. Hope it's going well for you. But it has nothing to do with your relationship with God. And so what people do is they drag those things into church settings, and churches end up dividing over processed food. Why? Now, it's a personal opinion. I think we should all stay away from as much processed food as possible. But if you don't eat processed food, and you eat all natural all the time, and you never trust in Jesus Christ, you're going to die and go to hell with a cleaner body. It'll burn clean, it'll be clean fuel for the environment. I don't understand how you make that correlation. Your opinion about what to eat, what not to eat, that's up to you. You don't teach that as a doctrine that needs to be impressed upon a church. We've been through churches where the women are all divided over the homeschool curriculum, or if you have your children in public school. Again, I think it's child abuse at this point, that's a personal opinion, for you to put a child into a public school. Depending on where you live, some are better than others, but you're taking a terrible chance, in my opinion. But I have nothing in the Bible that would tell you that you can't send your children to school. I think you're taking a terrible chance. I think we're getting to a point where there might be some biblical issues with what is going to be taught. And again, it's relative to where you live. It's different all over the country, depending on what state you live in, what city you live in, what county you live in. All these things are done differently, and it may be fine or it may be a problem. I think you should have your children at home with you. Why don't you send them away and give them over to someone who is not their mother and father and let them influence them all day long? But then again, some mothers and fathers probably don't need to influence their children. So it might be a blessing that those children are out of the home eight hours a day. It just depends. So none of that has anything to do with Bible doctrine. And so when people begin to conflate those and mix those up, what you end up with is this ungodly admixture of people arguing over things that are not doctrine, that have nothing to do with the Bible. Our goal is to teach the Bible. Our goal is to present people with the Word of God and to help them understand what God has to say. Now, according to the Lord, the source of this hypocrisy and vanity comes when men replace the doctrines of God with doctrine that comes from the traditions of men. They harp on things that don't matter. Politics, health, religious tradition. It's a big problem in this area with religious tradition. Baptist churches in this area are so steeped in religious tradition that they're dying. They are continually dying, and they are clinging harder and harder, not to the Word of God, but to religious tradition. Well, we have always done it this way. Yeah, it looks like it's working great for you. Maybe not do it that way anymore, as long as it's not a biblical matter. If it's just a traditional matter as to how your church has always done it, then it may not be a great idea to continue it if things aren't going well. You don't want to push upon people a tradition of men that can't be linked or is in violation of the Word of God. Paul, he gave instruction in the Bible through the Holy Spirit. He said, keep the traditions. So there are some traditions that we should keep. For example, wearing a tie. I don't know anybody that likes wearing a tie. No, they didn't, but it is a tradition that we have adopted and And it's a good tradition. And the reason it's a good tradition, when you go to watch the news, what are they wearing? They're not wearing t-shirts and shorts. They're not wearing polo shirts and sandals. You go to watch your favorite sports commentator, what are they wearing? They're wearing a suit and tie. You go to do business with somebody, what are they wearing? You go to see a lawyer, you go to see a judge, they're all gonna be wearing a suit and tie because in our country, the standard of professionalism and class and trying to do the best you can for the Lord is set by wearing a shirt and tie. So I wear it, and I think it's a tradition we should keep and maintain. It's not one that we should, because as soon as you let go of it, you know what ends up happening? It gets looser and looser and looser and looser. And the next thing you know, people are showing up wearing things that they ought not. They should not be wearing. So can I open the Bible and show you that you are required to wear a tie? No. But is it a tradition of men that violates the word of God? Absolutely not. And it holds people to a higher standard. It encourages people to do better. So we hang on to it. We keep it. They harp on things that don't matter. We don't want to harp on things that don't matter. Again, I hope you eat healthy. But there's no command in the Bible to eat natural or to eat this or to eat that. There's no command in the Bible for us to eat anything. In fact, the last time I recall it being addressed, Explicitly, the Lord put that sheet down, opened it up, and it was full of creeping things and all sorts of stuff. And the Lord told Peter, arise, kill, and eat. I wonder what he would have picked. Caterpillar? Like what? Why are creeping things there with, you know, the cow and the pig and the deer, and you got all this meat, and you're like, oh, let me... Now, if you were in Uganda, they'd go after the grasshoppers. They love them. They absolutely love... When it's grasshopper season, they get so excited, and they go and they get bags full of them, and they walk around like it's popcorn, popping fried grasshoppers in their mouth. So, you talk about eating all natural, there you go. But I hope you vote in such a way to preserve our freedom. But your political preferences are not Bible. It'd be better to pick a political party that is going to leave you alone and let you maintain your constitution and your freedom and your liberty so that we can continue to serve God the way that we see fit. That'd be the best thing to do. I'd have a hard time hearing you explain to me how you are both a Christian and you voted for someone that is open to abortion, or open to homosexuality, or any of the other ridiculous things that politicians have gotten themselves into today. I don't see how you can do that. But I also can't tell you which party to vote for from the Bible. It should be pretty obvious. Who's the guy that is against all the things God hates, or at least most of them? Well, then that's the guy that we should vote for and get as much done as we can with that. But we're not going to exchange the doctrines of God for a political party. We're just not going to do that. Christians won't stand up for Jesus, but they will vehemently defend everything else. They'll fight you over salt. They'll fight you over preservatives or processed foods. They'll get so mad at you and tell you what you should and shouldn't do. You don't see any of those people go and tell people that they should trust in Jesus Christ, but they'll come, man, pull out a donut. You shouldn't eat that. How about, you know Jesus died for you? How come that's not what's coming out of their mouths? It's always, well, you need to take this, you need to take that, you need to eat this, eat that, go here, go there. How come you never have that much zeal about telling people about Jesus Christ? And they don't. They can tell you what they think you should eat. They don't know anything about your medical background. They have no idea that if you ate this or ate that, whatever they're telling you to eat, that it might send you into the hospital and make things worse for you. They don't know. They just know that somebody online told them, do this, do that, eat this, eat that. And they fell for it. So they think you should fall for it. And so they're going to go and they're going to push it. And so we just want to be careful with that. I think you should eat well. It's better to eat well than not. But I'm not going to open the Bible and tell you that God commands that you eat well. It's just not there. It should be common sense, but You know, if it was common sense, we wouldn't have a country full of foods that are, you know, GMO and processed and full of chemicals and all sorts of things that have nothing to do with food. Cooking oils, you know what cooking oils are made, you know, sunflower oil and, you know, all those different seed oils and cooking oils, you know what they were made for? They were made to be lubrication for machinery. And they found out that it was safe enough that it could be used for cheap cooking oil and began selling it as cooking oil. It's horrible for your body. Now, let me show you where that is in the Bible. It's not there. So it's my personal opinion that it'd be better for you if you just get real butter and that's it. Not margarine, not cooking oils, not any of the other stuff, just butter and that's it. But, you know, people don't want to do that. They want to eat the way they want to eat. They want to cook with what they want to cook with, or they want to get what they can afford, or whatever the case may be. And so have at it. I have no Bible doctrine to tell you what cooking oil to use. It's just not there. I have a personal opinion. I'd be happy to tell you about it. But why are people so zealous about not eating cooking oils, and they're not zealous enough to go and tell people about Jesus Christ? It's a tradition of men, and it's in violation of the Word of God. So, they won't preach Jesus, but they will preach Trump. I've told you before, when we were on deputation and that 2020 election came around, it was such a weird, odd time. It seems obvious that things were not on the up and up, though it's hard to, you know, pinpoint anything specifically, but I had men meeting me at the pulpit to come and tell me, you know, the election's over, Trump lost, and they're coming to tell me Trump's still gonna be the president. That can't be. No, he's got a way to get in there. No, you better hope not, because that'll be the total destruction of our country if he does. And I would just tell them, as kindly as I could, I hope you don't get mad at me, I just feel like I need to tell you this. He's not going to be president. And he wasn't. But man, they would defend it. They were so focused on that. They didn't want to come up and say, man, we're so excited about your ministry. We're so excited about what Jesus is doing. Let me show you this thing I found in the Bible. No, they wanted me to know that Donald Trump was going to be president. That is a problem. That is a serious problem. They won't preach Jesus, but they'll preach against the evils of processed foods. I mean, they'll do it vehemently. And so that's just not good. You know, help people get off processed foods. I think it'd improve their lives. But why can't you help people get to know Jesus Christ, which would improve their eternity? That's just an imbalance there that we need to work out. At no time is it acceptable to replace the doctrines of God with the traditions of men. Too many people are worried about their body and unconcerned about their heart. That's what the Lord was focused on. He's not telling you that eating the wrong things won't make you physically sick. He's telling you it won't defile you. And that defilement is the problem. That defilement is what the Lord is concerned about. It's what's coming out of your heart that will defile you. That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts. How come nobody is so zealous about getting rid of those? Don't eat that. That's got processed foods in it. You shouldn't eat that. Well, I don't think you should think evil thoughts. How come you're not walking around telling people, don't think evil thoughts? You need to stop thinking those evil thoughts. Everybody's concerned about the physical, the flesh, the carnal. They're not concerned about the heart. And it becomes a very serious problem. Adulteries. Tell me adultery's not a problem. How come nobody's walking around telling people you shouldn't commit adultery? You need to be faithful to your husband. You need to be faithful to your wife. Pastors hardly preach it. It hardly ever gets brought up anymore. They don't say anything about it anymore because they're afraid they're going to upset the family and the church, who gives a lot of money. And it shouldn't be that way. Fornications. Man, fornication is just... We went to Second Saturday yesterday and as you walk around and you listen to all the conversation and you got these young people who, this one girl was, she saw some friends and they were saying hello and wanted to see a picture of her son. So she got a picture of her son who lives with somebody else, I guess his father, I don't know where he was. And she's out tonight with another man and their lives are just a mess. And they don't even know it. They think it's perfectly normal. Murders. Man, you tell me that's not an issue today? Nobody needs to walk around today and tell people, could you stop killing people? That'd be a blessing. Just don't kill anybody. It's becoming far too rampant, far too common in far too many places. Thefts. Walk up today to the church, and my wife and family are trying to go out back and put food out there, and there's a pair of underwear laying on the side of the yard. Why? What are you doing? You have no idea what probably happens on this property when we're not here. We probably don't even want to know. It's ridiculous. That light, I have a light to replace that side light. Apparently, they were laying out here doing it. Who knows? I don't even want to think about it. Covetousness. That's probably top of the list of problems in America today. Covetousness. Wickedness. Deceit. Deceit is another word for politician. Lasciviousness. An evil eye. Blasphemy. Pride. Anybody here got pride issues? I mean, other than me, of course. Yeah. Adrian Rogers, again, he used to say, some people are proud of how humble they are. Pride is a monster. Foolishness, man, what does that mean? What does it mean when God says foolishness? I'd imagine we're probably all guilty of it, and the Lord said all these evil things. God said foolishness, pride, deceit, covetousness, all these things are evil and come from within and defile the man." So it's not what you eat, it's not the flesh. It would be better for you, it would be better for you if you took the best care of your body that you can. You can function better, think better, have more energy, have less medical issues. Great. None of that's guaranteed, but there's a good chance that those things will improve if you take better care of your flesh, proper care of your flesh, reasonable care of your flesh. It shouldn't be the center of your life. But why not be more concerned about what's coming out of you? Your heart, these heart matters, these heart issues. Why not get zealous about those and let's deal with those? We exalt Jesus Christ and the Word of God. That is our focus. Everything else is an opinion or tradition of men and up for debate. The Word of God is not up for debate. It is not replaceable with something else. And so we won't allow that here in our lives. We want to be focused on the Word of God. Alright, let's read verses 24 through 30. This is one of my favorite passages in all the Bible. Every time it comes up, it's just a blessing. Verse 24, And from thence he arose, and went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and entered into a house, and would have no man know it, but he could not be hid. For a certain woman, whose young daughter had an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came, and fell at his feet. The woman was Greek, Syrophoenician, by nation, and and she besought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter. It's a desperate situation, horrible situation that she has no solution for other than to come and fall at the feet of Jesus. But Jesus said unto her, let the children first be filled, for it is not meat to take the children's bread and cast it unto dogs. What a horrible thing to say to somebody. But this is the situation. The Lord is, what He's saying here is, I'm taking care of the children of Israel. I don't have time for Gentiles right now. We're not ministering to Gentiles right now. You're going to have to wait. I'm feeding the children at my table, Israel. I'm taking care of them. I'm not dealing with a bunch of Gentile dogs. But man, this woman's response, verse 28, Now, that is not how people answer today. You go out and you tell people you're a sinner. Who do you think you are? God says, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. You don't call me a sinner. You don't know who I am. You don't know what I did. They take offense at the godly rebuke that is meant to lead them to repentance. They get upset about it. This woman, what if you go to a person out on the street today and tell them you're a Gentile dog? How do you think they're going to respond? But look at the tender, humble, sweet response of this woman. Yes, Lord. Yet the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs. And he said unto her, for this saying, go thy way. I don't even know what to say to you after that. You go your way. The devil is gone out of thy daughter. And when she was come to her house, she found the devil gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed. Isn't that a blessing? That is just, that is a beautiful passage in the word of God. So again, the Lord and his disciples would attempt to get away. Remember in the last chapter, he took them out into a desert place apart, so they can get some rest. Remember, Mark is presenting us with Jesus Christ as the servant, and a servant has no time for rest. It's just constant going. You gotta work, you gotta work, you gotta work. Constantly surrounded by people, constantly dealing with others, with their needs, no time for himself. And that's the example that he left for us. So when people say, you know, I just need time for me. Well, the Lord never got time for Him. Your life is supposed to be dedicated to other people. Now, they're trying to get apart, trying to get away from the crowd. And then, you know, the crowd is primarily there for the miracles, but they struggle to get away. Mixed into this crowd there for the miracles are those in desperate need, and they know that Jesus can help them. And we're talking about very just desperate situations that there is no solution for if they don't get to Jesus Christ. And they know that. Now in Matthew, this woman aggressively sought the Lord, crying out for his help. And the disciples, attempting to facilitate that privacy he was wanting, tried to send her away, or at least it seems that way. In Matthew, they turn around and they're like, Lord, send her away. Tell her to go away. She's following them, crying out, son of David, son of David. She would not give in. and they wanted her to go away, but the Lord eventually answers her by reminding her that His current ministry is primarily to Israel. Now, He didn't say it that way. Excuse me, we don't feed dogs. I'm trying to feed my children. We don't feed dogs. Now, I mean, imagine the multitudes there. They hear what he said to her, how that must have felt, how it must have looked. It's a pretty harsh response from the Lord. It's not untrue. It's just somewhat harsh. And man, she handles it so well. She answered back with faith and humility, so much so that the Lord would not turn her away. He said, you go home. Your daughter is fine. That devil is gone. What a blessing! This woman appears to have quick wit, but also great humility and strong faith in what Christ could do for her daughter. Her response to the Lord's harsh treatment sets a great example for us to follow. Too many would have shrieked back in horror and rebuked the Lord for calling them a Gentile dog. Who do you think you are calling me a dog? I thought you were a Christian. That's what everybody says. I need you to pay my rent. We can't pay your rent. I thought you were Christians. Well, I thought you had a job. So the Lord has compassion on her, especially based on that response. This woman was willing to receive such treatment, understanding that this is the son of David who can help her daughter. Now, I don't believe she was just receiving this treatment or those harsh words just so she could get something out of the Lord. I think she truly believed who she said he was. She called him the son of David. That's a reference to him being the Messiah, the future king of Israel. And she's Greek. She's a Syrophoenician. She's not a Jew. She's not Samaritan. She has very little relationship with the God of Israel, as far as we can tell. I mean, it didn't give us a whole lot of background. All we know is she's Greek. But man, she came to Jesus and threw herself at His feet and refused to give up. So she takes the Lord's words and humbly reverses them on Him. True Lord. Yes, Lord. But as a Gentile dog, I am happy to eat the scraps from your children's table." What an attitude. What the Lord seems to be looking for in us is humble reception of our assigned place along with rebuke for our faults and failures. Can you receive it when the Lord rebukes you? It's not always easy, because the problem is, for her, that's Jesus Christ standing in front of her. For us, it's going to be another human being filled with the Holy Spirit standing in front of us. And we don't take that as well. When they come to us and say, the Bible says this, and we need to talk about something that's going on in your life, oftentimes, they look at that person and say, who do you think you are? and say, well, I'm not trying to hurt you, I'm not trying to harm you, I'm not trying to upset you, I'm just trying to help you. Yeah, well, take it somewhere else, I don't want it. And yet this woman could be called a dog in front of the multitudes, and she just bows at his feet and says, true Lord, yes Lord, you're right. But as a dog, I'd happily eat the scraps from your table. and so the Lord was just blown away by it. I believe this is the most simplistic recipe for the person who desperately seeks God's grace. Humble reception of our assigned place, persistent prayer, pleading with the Lord, and faith that will not be greatly moved. So if you will humble yourself and receive the correction that God has, if you will persistently, constantly seek Him in prayer and plead with Him, and then walk away knowing that the Lord can and will do what He promised He would do, then I think this is where you get your help. All right, verses 31 through 37 to finish, verse 31. And again, departing from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, he came unto the Sea of Galilee through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis. And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech, and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue." Well, that'd be odd. Now, you imagine being called a Greek, I mean, a Gentile dog in front of the multitudes. What if the Lord spit and starts rubbing on your tongue in front of the multitudes? You just never know what Jesus is going to do, and you should not assume that you know what Jesus is going to do. You know, people wear them stupid bracelets. What would Jesus do? Well, you're not going to do what he did. You don't even know what he would do. People wear those, and I appreciate the sentiment, If you don't read a Bible, then there's a strong chance you have no clue what Jesus is going to do whatsoever. And even if you do read a Bible, you still read things about Jesus and it makes you scratch your head and say, Lord, why? How is it that He could take this Greek woman and tell her, Go home, your daughter is fine. He wasn't there. He didn't touch her. He didn't have to spit on her. He didn't have to pick dirt up and rub it in her eyes. He didn't have to do any of that. He could just look at the woman and say, that devil is gone. It's done. I did it from here. And yet here you have this other man in front of him, and he's spitting on him, and rubbing on his tongue, and you just don't know how these things are going to go. It's just interesting, I guess. I guess the Lord's trying to shake things up, change it up, and keep it interesting. So they bring unto him one that was deaf and had an impediment in his speech. And they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And he took him aside from the multitude and put his finger into his ears and spit and touched his tongue. Just imagine he's standing over there. It sounds to me like he's giving him a wet willy. You know what that is, right? All right, good. But he's not. He's going to heal that man. Verse 34, and looking up to heaven, he sighed and saith unto him, now this word, everybody knows how to pronounce this word perfectly, ethatha, that's what I'm going with and I'm sticking with it. Yeah, so that is, be opened. That's what it means. So we just say, be open. What did he say to her? He said, be opened. I mean, what's the word he said? He said, be opened. That's what he said. Verse 35, and straightway his ears were open, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain. And he charged them that they should tell no man. But the more he charged them, so much the more, a great deal, they published it. and were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well. He maketh both the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak, and yet they still don't believe Him. Yet it's all just part of the show. He just does everything so well. Oh, do you trust Him? Well, we're just here for the next show. We're just here to see what we can get out of Him. Maybe He'll feed us. Maybe He'll heal us, maybe He'll do something for us, but we're not so much concerned about trusting Him, and that's sad. So, praise the Lord, the Lord is good, even to people who are just there for the show. Now, the time of that grace is running out. You better trust the Lord while you can, because eventually the show will be over, and you're gonna be left with the consequences of your sin. And that's a whole different show that you don't want to be a part of. We hope you enjoyed this podcast. You can learn more about our ministry by visiting www.plenteusredemption.com. You can hear more Plenteous Redemption podcast audio at www.plenteusredemption.media. Please comment below if this podcast has been a help to you. Also, inform us of future topics that would interest you. Thank you again for listening to the Plenteous Redemption podcast.