Human beings have a natural tendency to lower the bar when it comes to rules in our lives. You see it time and again – in theory people are very clear on what is right and wrong; what is acceptable and not acceptable. But then when life gets complicated and tough decisions need to be made, the rules become flexible and standards are lowered to enable us to still make the grade. For example, how many of us have gotten angry when someone cuts us off on the road, but quickly find an excuse for doing exactly the same thing ourselves the next day? And how many times haven’t we seen high profile public figures with high morals quickly revise them when they find themselves compromised by some questionable decisions they have made?
Despite our best efforts in life this tends to happen. We set the bar high in our rules and expectations for ourselves and others, but before too long we start lowering the bar to make things more manageable. We lower the standards to make it easier for ourselves to meet those standards. This is, I think, just the reality of our human nature and how we respond to rules and expectations.
And if this is true of human laws, it’s even more so of God’s laws. In every age, people try to water down God’s commands so that they can achieve them. We have this innate tendency to reset the Law of God in such a way that we can fulfil it. And the Jews of Jesus’ day were no different.
We heard today about how they washed their hands and pots and pans, their cup and plates – constantly. And the reason they did this was they believed that going through the motions of religious ceremonies would make them right with God. That if only they could protect themselves from the stain of unbelievers, they would be OK.
It seems ridiculous to us today, but these Jews thought that if they just did the right things – washed themselves and their pots and pans, stayed away from particular kinds of people, and so on, then they would be ok with God.
This was the thinking of those who criticised Jesus in our text. They weren’t concerned with how the disciples treated those around them. They weren’t worried about what was in their hearts or what they believed. They were much more concerned that Jesus insist His disciples do the ceremonial washing. They expected them to do the ‘religious thing’ which would make them look good and holy and make them feel as though they’d done enough to please God.
Although we often point out how thick headed the disciples were, at least at this point they’d understood Jesus’ teaching. They didn’t worry about going through all the ceremonial washing before their meal because they knew it didn’t do any good.
Washing the germs off your hands is one thing, but washing your sins away by bathing your hands before each meal is quite another. And they knew all the washing in the world wouldn’t help because they knew the problem was more than skin deep. No amount of ritual washing could get to the root of the problem.
The Pharisees demand for absolute adherence to the laws of ritual cleansing before meals was typical of their approach to life and faith, and indicative of their understanding of sin. So long as you can deal with the outward appearance, you don’t need to acknowledge or address the underlying issues. So the key thing was to go through the religious motions and show everyone – including God – how faithful you were by what you did. And so the emphasis was on how pious you appeared by ritual washing at every opportunity. On making a big noise as you prayed. On showing off how much you give and so on. They lowered the bar of God’s law to a few outward acts, meanwhile the sin grew within their hearts.
It seems to me that this is exactly where we’re at in society today. We try with all our might to give a good public appearance. To display a kind of outward righteousness that presents us as ‘good people’ who ‘deserve’ to be saved and liked and respected. But we don’t worry about what lurks beneath the surface. Lust-filled hearts. Hateful attitudes. We pretend they’re ok so long as we don’t act on them. And then, like the Pharisees we claim we’re OK with God because we show up to church and pray table grace most meals. As if going through these motions was all that counts and what pleases God. But Jesus and His disciples refused to simply go through the motions.
No wonder Jesus calls this hypocrisy! Our problem is not dirty cups and saucers or whether we wear pants or a dress. Our salvation is not secured when we simply give the appearance of being holy so that people think well of us. If our problem were that simple, why was it necessary for Jesus to come and shed His blood on the cross for our sins? No amount of washing, no amount of good works will remove the stain of sin and guilt because that comes from our unclean hearts. The Pharisees’ problem is the same problem facing millions today – they didn’t see that there was anything wrong with their hearts.
The common claim these days is that most people can be described as a ‘good person’. This usually means they’re caring and kind (at least some of the time), they don’t rip too many people off, they don’t go around killing and raping, and mostly they’re nice to those they know and like. Now while all these traits are good, the outward appearance of someone’s actions does not change what’s going on inside. Our standing before God is not based just on how clean our public image is, it’s based on exactly who and what we are. And as Jesus points out the heart of all people is a place of all kinds of evil and uncleanness – often never going beyond our thoughts – and yet these condemn us just as quickly as our sinful actions.
We don’t just need to be cleansed on the outside, we need to be washed right to our heart. Thank God that’s what He does in Holy Baptism. In baptism God gets to the dirty core of things as our whole being is cleansed in this promised filled washing. Baptism is not concerned with outward appearances. It is God’s means of operating on our defiled hearts, and cleansing them through and through by applying the forgiveness won for us on the cross.
Our clean-ness before God does not depend on what other people think of us. And it doesn’t even depend on how well we think we obey the Law of God. Jesus makes it clear in our text (and elsewhere) that out of hearts comes all kinds of evil. And so He calls us to trust in the cleansing He accomplished for us on the cross.
If we are relying on your own works to prove we are worthy, then we are not trusting solely in the Lord Jesus. He offers us the free gift of cleansing through the forgiveness of sins – pouring it out upon us in His word, in our baptism and in the Lord’s Supper. And as we are cleansed, as we are forgiven free of charge, His Holy Spirit will start to change our hearts. We will learn to love God and show it in your actions. We will learn to fear God more than people and we will start to make choices that please God above all things. As James says we will become hearers and doers of the Word.
But we can only DO what God’s word says because we have first been cleansed by the blood of Jesus. We have been set free from sin by the washing of renewal in holy baptism. We have been recreated as His holy ones. As forgiven children, with salvation already secured, we are free to love and serve, to DO God’s word – not in order to be saved – but in order to praise the Lord for the salvation that is already ours.
The emphasis of the Pharisees in today’s text may seem a long way from our context today. But really it’s not that different. We all try to manipulate God’s law so that we can achieve it ourselves. In view of that Jesus calls us to radically trust in His grace for salvation, and not to trust in ourselves. To be freed from a life of burden and doubt and to rejoice in His forgiving love.
