It Doesn't Matter What You Eat

Pastor Nathan Norman

Mark 7:1-23
Mk 7:1 The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus and
Mk 7:2 saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were “unclean,” that is, unwashed.
Mk 7:3 (The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders.
Mk 7:4 When they come 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.)
Mk 7:5 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders j  instead of eating their food with ‘unclean’ hands?”
Mk 7:6 He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: “ ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
Mk 7:7 They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’ 
Mk 7:8 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men.” 
Mk 7:9 And he said to them: “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe 21 your own traditions! 
Mk 7:10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’and, ‘Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.’ 
Mk 7:11 But you say p  that if a man says to his father or mother: ‘Whatever help you might otherwise have received from me is Corban’ (that is, a gift devoted to God),
Mk 7:12 then you no longer let him do anything for his father or mother.
Mk 7:13 Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition r  that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”
Mk 7:14 Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this.
Mk 7:15 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.’ ’”
Mk 7:17 After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him s  about this parable.
Mk 7:18 “Are you so dull?” he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him ‘unclean’?
Mk 7:19 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 t  “clean.”) 
Mk 7:20 He went on: “What comes out of a man is what makes him ‘unclean.’
Mk 7:21 For from within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery,
Mk 7:22 greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly.
Mk 7:23 All these evils come from inside and make a man ‘unclean.’ ”