Matthew 15:10-20

TRUE RELIGION INTERNAL & SPIRITUAL

Matthew 15:10-20; Mark 7:14-23. Matthew: “Calling the multitude to Him, He said to them, Hear and understand. Not that which cometh into the mouth defileth a man; but that which goeth out of a man, that defileth a man. Then His disciples, coming, said to Him, Do you know that the Pharisees, hearing the word, were offended? and He, responding, said, Every plant which My Heavenly Father did not plant, shall be rooted up.” The subject here is the Pharisaic traditions, and an infinite diversity of burdensome human rites, ceremonies, and institutions which had been foisted on the Jewish Church, covering up and literally hiding the heavenly superstructure, till the people, seeing nothing but humanism, were following the shadow, ignorant of the substance, led by the blind clergy in the way of death. All that was smashed up by the Roman armies, a few years subsequently to this awful prophecy, sweeping their institutions from the face of the earth, and annihilating the Jewish polity. A similar doom awaits the Pharisaical institutions of the Gentile Church, when the bloody revolutions of the Armageddon shall roll their desolating billows over the world, eliminating from the Church all her human inventions, and reducing her down to primitive simplicity and apostolic purity, unfurling the New Testament standard to all nations, and thus verifying the prophecy of Jesus, “Every plant which My Heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” We would better all take warning, and come up at once to the simplicity of Jesus and His apostles revealed in the New Testament. “Let them alone; they are blind leaders of the blind; and if the blind may lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.” We have no right to shove this back and leave it with the fallen Church, apostate membership, and godless clergy, of our Savior's time. It is written for us. The unspiritual leaders all around us, stickleristic for their human institutions, and ignorant of God's grand spiritual truth, are leading the multitudes to ruin. Jesus makes no mistake. Leaders and followers shall altogether fall into the ditch of irretrievable woe.

Mark: “And when He came from the multitudes into the house, His disciples asked Him concerning the parable.” As he was at Caperuaum, His home after His expulsion from Nazareth and, having no house of His own, it is believed that Peter's house was His home it is more than likely that this in the house into which He entered. “And He says to them Are you truly yet without understanding? Do you not know that everything without, entering into the man, is not able to defile him? Because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach; and goes out into the excrement, purifying all edibles;” i.e., in the gospel dispensation we have large liberties on the question of eating and drinking, as these edibles and potables do not go into the heart, but into the alimentary canal, portions being eliminated for the nutriment of the physical being, and the residue becoming soil, and perfectly purified by the chemical agencies brought into activity by earth, air, and water, so there is actually no ultimately surviving impurity. On this problem we are to walk in the light which God gives us, sedulously observing the laws of hygiene with reference to eating and drinking, as to time, quality, and quantity. We should all beware of side issues, calculated to absorb undue attention, and deflect us from the grand trunk-line of holiness to the Lord. In that department, fanaticism is prone to bivouac. “And He said, That which cometh out of the man defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of the people, proceed evil reasonings, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, hypocrisy, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, folly. All these evils come out from within, and defile the man.” O what an appalling and horrific den of rattlesnakes, here catalogued by the Infallible, constituting the black cohort of inbred sin, occupying the heart of poor, fallen humanity, till extirpated, eradicated, washed away by the cleansing blood, consumed and annihilated by the refining fire of the Holy Ghost, poured down from heaven in Pentecostal floods and sanctifying baptism!

“Evil reasonings” are most adroitly manipulated by demons, who will crowd around you and argue you down, answering all of your objections to something, painted fair as Eden flowers, but black as the pit.

“Adulteries and fornications,” so nearly synonymous that Jesus, in view of their awful power over their wretched victims, here almost indulges in tautology by way of emphasizing this vice, which is, probably more than any other, productive of human ruin in time and in eternity.

“Wickedness” is a generic term, in the plural number, comprehending every vice conceivable, whether included in this catalogue or not.

“Deceitfulness” lies deep down in the subterranean jungles of the fallen spirit, cropping out in all phases of guile, craft, stratagem, trickery, chicanery, and hypocrisy, so utterly irreconcilable with that unsophisticated simplicity, innocence, and guilelessness characteristic of angels and redeemed spirits, and yet, by many pseudo-preachers and saints, winked at and apologized for as shrewdness in trade and business sagacity.

“Murders.” Do not forget, “He that hateth his brother is a murderer.” “Man looketh on the outside, but God looketh on the heart.” The spirit is the essence in the Divine estimation, God seeing the anger, wrath, malice, envy, jealousy, revenge, which are the spirit of murder, deep down in your heart, and consequently condemning you, as if you had imbued your hands in the blood of your neighbor.

“Thefts.” If you cheat a person out of a dollar, you are as really a thief in the sight of God as if you had gone at midnight and stolen a horse. The reason why Churches are dead is because they are so frequently ruled by criminals, who grieve the Holy Spirit away, the man who can steal most by cheating promoted to the highest office.

“Covetousness.” This is the fatal and magnitudinous sin of the day. It sent an apostle to hell, and almost ruined Jacob. It is the crying sin of the Church today, alone disqualifying her to girdle the world with missionaries, and envelop the nations with sunbursts of light and glory.

“Impurity.” O how black and how impudent this monster, intruding into homes, withering and blighting the fairest domestic flowers, blasting the dearest social bliss, turning communities into battle-fields and homes into hells!

“Pride.” John Wesley pronounced pride the great mother-sin, generating whole groups of vices and follies, which prove rattlesnakes in the bosom, and develop perdition in the home, superinducing ruined health, dissipated fortunes, and alienated friends.

“Folly.” This is a very comprehensive term, as it is the opposite of wisdom, which, in the Bible, means the grace of God that saves soul and body. As a rule, pride and folly are more prevalent with women, sending millions of the fairer sex to be brutalized by demons in the bottomless pit; while the dark, vulgar vices e. g., murder, theft, robbery, and blasphemy roll their pestilential billows over men and boys, precipitating them into hell by millions before their time.

“Blasphemy.” This vice, to all human appearances, is the most unapologizable, as Satan bates his hook when he goes fishing for the participants of all other sins, while in case of blasphemy lie just drops down the naked hook, and, to the surprise of angels, disgust of good men, and the ridicule of devils, the poor dupe opens his mouth in blasphemy against the God who gives him breath, for which he couldn't give an excuse nor a reason to save his life. N.B. All repetitions of God's name are blasphemy, unless taken in prayer, supplication, adoration, praise, with due reverence and solemnity.