Saturday, February 01, 2025

2025.02.01 Hopewell @Home ▫ Matthew 15:1–20

Read Matthew 15:1–20

Questions from the Scripture text: Who came to whom in Matthew 15:1? What did they come to say (Matthew 15:2)? How does Jesus answer their question (Matthew 15:3)? What commandment does He give as an example (Matthew 15:4)? What does He quote to show the importance of the commandment (cf. Exodus 21:17, Leviticus 20:9, Proverbs 20:20)? Which of their traditions does He give as an example (Matthew 15:5-6a)? Whose prophecy does He affirm (Matthew 15:7)? In what area had their corrupted hearts resulted in great offense to God, when thy thought they were doing good (Matthew 15:8-9)? How did the worship become so corrupted (Matthew 15:9b)? Whom does He call to Himself (Matthew 15:10a)? To do what (verse 10b)? What does He say doesn’t defile a man (Matthew 15:11a)? What does (verse 11b)? Who come to Him in Matthew 15:12? About whom do they ask Him? How had they taken His teaching? But how does He respond about them (Matthew 15:13)? What is the only way not to be uprooted (cf. Matthew 13:24–30)? What does He tell the disciples to do (Matthew 15:14)? Why? Who asks what in Matthew 15:15? What does Jesus ask back (Matthew 15:16)? What does His rhetorical question imply about food (Matthew 15:17)? Where do words come from (Matthew 15:18)? What does a wicked heart do to a man (verse 18)? What other things, which proceed from the heart, defile a man (Matthew 15:18-19)? What does not defile a man?

How can a man be clean before God? Matthew 15:1–20 prepares us for the sermon in the morning public worship on the coming Lord’s Day. In these twenty verses of Holy Scripture, the Holy Spirit teaches us that a man must have his heart changed and purified, which only Christ can do.  

A question that defiled those who appeared to be holy. The scribes and Pharisees come to the remote region of Gennesaret to pick a specific fight. The last time we saw them in Matthew, they were blaspheming the Spirit by accusing Jesus of being demonic, and demanding a sign (which demand Jesus called “evil and adulterous”). 

Now, they think they have Him on the charge of not caring enough about keeping the holiness code. The traditions of the elders (Matthew 15:2) seemed wise and good to them. Who knows what one might have touched? Better safe than sorry to make sure to put no unclean thing into one’s mouth (verse 2b, Matthew 15:11a).

A principle and reality that should make us unwilling to add to the law of God. But what they don’t realize is that when man adds his own tradition to God’s Word, man inevitably corrupts it, because man himself is corrupt. These scribes and Pharisees, who so carefully wash their hands, showed by their continued rejection of Jesus that they were rejected by God. What went into the disciples’ mouths was not defiling them, but what came out of the scribes’ and Pharisees’ mouths was indeed defiling them. 

Jesus gives two examples of places that sincerely intended traditions end up corrupting God’s own commandments. First, there is the fifth commandment example (Matthew 15:4-6), in which they thought they were honoring God, but were inducing people to commit death-accursed sin. Second, there is the second commandment example (Matthew 15:7-9), in which the addition to God’s worship of anything commanded by men makes people false toward God, and makes their worship worthless.

What a man really needs, if he is going to be clean. At this point, He broadens the instruction to the entire multitude (Matthew 15:10) to teach them that holiness before God cannot come by keeping one’s hands ceremonially clean, because what is within a man is morally corrupt (Matthew 15:11). For a man to be clean, it is not his hands, but his heart, that needs cleansing.

When His disciples note the Pharisees’ response, Jesus reminds them that, within the church, only the elect will be saved (Matthew 15:13; cf. Matthew 13:24–30, Matthew 13:36–43). And, He instructs His disciples to stop engaging with the Pharisees (Matthew 15:14a), who lead those who follow them right into stumbling. 

Finally, Peter asks (Matthew 15:15) about the saying, “what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man.” Jesus explains that our problem is much worse than words that defile us. Our problem is a defiled heart, from which comes defiled thoughts, actions, and words like those in Matthew 15:19.

If we are to be cleansed, we will need something much stronger than ceremonial washing. The Pharisees’ hand-washing couldn’t do it. John’s baptism couldn’t do it. Only the Lord Jesus can do it. He gives His Holy Spirit, Who gives us a new nature. He takes the defiled heart, the heart of stone, and exchanges it for a heart of flesh to make a sinner into a child of Abraham. The Holy Spirit makes a sinner into one who has the faith of Abraham, believing God’s Word about Christ, and being accounted as righteous before God for the sake of Christ’s own righteousness. The Holy Spirit gives to a sinner to confess His defilement, and trust in Christ, through Whom the redeemed sinner is forgiven of his sin and cleansed from all unrighteousness (cf. 1 John 1:9). This is how a man may truly come to be undefiled!

What is your habit for confessing your sin to God? What is it that continues to make you unclean and unholy? Who can help you? What does He use to help you? What use are you making of those things? Whom are you trusting to make the use of those things effective?

Sample prayer:  Father, we confess that what comes out of us defiles us, because out of our hearts come all manner of sin. But what is in Christ can make us clean. So, grant the ministry of Your Spirit, to bring us to faith in Your Son, and to conform us to His image, we ask in His Name, AMEN!

Suggested songs: ARP98 “O Sing a New Song to the Lord” or TPH552 “Come, Ye Thankful People, Come” 

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