Reasoning Through the Bible
Taking a cue from Paul, Reasoning Through the Bible is an expository style walk through the Scriptures that tells you what the Bible says. Reviewing both Old and New Testament books, as well as topical subjects, we methodically teach verse by verse, even phrase by phrase.
We have completed many books of the Bible and offer free lesson plans for teachers. If you want to browse our entire library by book or topic, see our website www.ReasoningThroughTheBible.com.
We primarily do expository teaching but also include a good bit of theology and apologetics. Just like Paul on Mars Hill, Christianity must address both the ancient truths and the questions of the people today. Join Glenn and Steve every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday as they reason with you through the Bible.
Reasoning Through the Bible
S20 || When Tradition Collides with Truth || Mark 6:53 - 7:8 || Session 20 || Verse by Verse Bible Study
What happens when human traditions eclipse divine commands? As we study our way into Mark chapter 7, Jesus confronts this timeless religious tension with piercing clarity. As Jesus continues to travel crowds recognize Him immediately, bringing their sick to be healed by merely touching his cloak. Meanwhile, religious scholars from Jerusalem arrive with a pointed accusation: "Why don't your disciples follow our hand-washing traditions?" Their criticism focuses not on a violation of Scripture, but on ritualistic practices developed over generations.
Do we, like the Pharisees, elevate our church traditions, denominational distinctives, or cultural preferences to the level of divine command? Have we developed a "holier-than-thou" mentality that separates us from the very people Christ came to save? The passage reminds us that while traditions can be valuable, they must never replace or overshadow God's actual commands.
Ready to examine whether your spiritual life honors God with both lips and heart? Listen now to discover how Jesus' ancient confrontation speaks directly to modern religious tendencies.
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May God Bless you!! - Glenn and Steve
Hello and welcome to Reasoning Through the Bible, the ministry, where we go verse by verse and even phrase by phrase, through the entire Word of God. Today we're in Mark, at the end of chapter 6, so if you have your copy of the Word of God, turn there. We've been following Jesus. He's going and doing as is the common theme in Mark. We're going to be at the end of chapter 6 and into chapter 7 today, so let's go ahead and dive in. Steve, if you could read 653 to 656.
Speaker 2:When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. When they got out of the boat, immediately the people recognized him and ran about that whole country and began to carry here and there on their pallets those who were sick to the place they heard he was. Whenever they entered villages or cities or countryside, they were laying the sick in the marketplaces and imploring him that they might just touch the fringe of his cloak. As many as touched it were being cured.
Speaker 1:At the beginning of that it says they crossed over, and we've seen a lot of that in this section. They seem to be trying to seek a quiet spot. They cross over the Sea of Galilee and it doesn't really help because as soon as they cross over here again, then he's immediately recognized and there's another crowd that follows. Notice that everywhere Jesus goes now there's a crowd. He can't really stay private. One of his goals is to be teaching and mentoring his disciples and that gets increasingly difficult with all of the busyness of the crowds and the needs of the people pressing in on him. Also, notice in this passage that he heals everyone.
Speaker 1:These were not fake miracles and they were not done in a corner so that the whole region there knew it and understood it. If these would have been some sort of showman-type miracles, then people wouldn't have been following like this. These were legitimate miracles done by the miracle worker, the Lord Jesus Christ. The good news for us is that we can approach Jesus at any time and do not have to have a ticket to get in line. We don't have to wait for the crowd to disperse and we don't have to stand at the back and try to listen to wait for the crowd to disperse and we don't have to stand at the back and try to listen. We have the right and the authority as Christians to go directly into the throne room and we can meet with him anytime, anywhere, and he has time for us. We can approach him with our problems just like these people do, and he will always be available. Steve, I just take great comfort in that.
Speaker 2:We get a sense too of how large these crowds are. Also with the feeding of the 5,000 that we discussed in our earlier sessions. He's going to repeat this with another group a little bit later that we'll get into 5,000 people and in fact one of the other gospels says that was just the men. That's quite a large crowd of people in a time. Whenever they're just walking around, the villages are relatively small. This is a throng of people that are continually following him, going around him, and you have this word picture here, this description that Mark has, that the people, once he gets there, they're running back and forth grabbing the sick people that they have and taking them on pallets to wherever they're hearing that he is. It's to me just a very good descriptive language of putting you in place with the excitement, the feeling of Jesus as he goes through to the different areas and the word of mouth and how it's all working. Just four verses here really, to me put you right in the center of all the action of whenever he shows up into an area.
Speaker 1:We said at the beginning of the book that the book was a lot of action. I agree, steve. You can almost just feel the crowd pressing in. You can almost hear the excitement of them yelling for the Lord. We can take great comfort in what they did because they took their friends and their needs to Jesus, and we can do the same. We can take our needs, we can take our friends and lay them at the feet of Jesus and ask for his blessing and his healing. That's the great news of the Lord, jesus Christ.
Speaker 1:Let's move on into chapter 7. Here Jesus is going to have another reckoning, another interaction with the Pharisees. Let's go ahead and read the first part of Mark, chapter 7. The Pharisees and some of the scribes gathered around him when they had come from Jerusalem and had seen that some of his disciples were eating their bread with impure hands. That is unwashed, for the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they carefully wash their hands, thus observing the traditions of the elders when they come from the marketplace. They do not eat unless they cleanse themselves, and there are many other things which they have received in order to observe, such as the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.
Speaker 1:The Pharisees and the scribes asked him why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders but eat their bread with impure hands? And he said to them Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites? As it is written, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me, but in vain. They do worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men, neglecting the commandment of God. You hold to the traditions of men. Now, with this again, he interacts with these Pharisees. In that first verse, steve, where does it say that? These Pharisees and scribes, or teachers? Where were they from? They're from Jerusalem.
Speaker 2:This is another delegation representatives from the Sanhedrin. They're having to go out to challenge him and to question him. He is staying away from Jerusalem. He being Jesus, he is operating up in this northern western area of the Galilean province. One reason is because earlier, when he was challenged by the Pharisees and he answered them, it says they immediately went out to conspire to kill him. Jesus knows this. He is staying out of the area where they have direct ability to be able to charge him and bring him in front of the Sanhedrin. It makes it much more difficult but nonetheless they're making this trek all the way from Jerusalem up into the Galilean area to challenge him on what he's doing.
Speaker 1:So, as you said, jerusalem is the center of all the religious and scholarly activity. This delegation comes from Jerusalem out to this very remote area, this small town. What might they be doing?
Speaker 2:Well, they're looking for things to catch him and his disciples of breaking the law. Especially, they do it whenever the Sabbath comes around. We've seen that quite a many times. This isn't particularly the Sabbath, but that's what they're doing. They're trying to find every little thing of him breaking the law. Now, as we get into this study in this session today, Glenn, there's a couple of things that is mentioned here by Mark talking about the tradition of the elders and Jesus' words in a different way. It's directly to these extra rules of Pharisaic Judaism. That's really the conflict. Jesus doesn't have a conflict with the Mosaic law. It's these extra laws that the Pharisees have come up with in a group of rules called the Mishnah that supersede the Mosaic laws. That's where the conflict is coming up. Get the picture.
Speaker 1:These people are what we would call religious scholars. They are the educated religious people. They spend their time in libraries and studying these technical religious issues. They've been sent from headquarters in Jerusalem out to this small town to evaluate Jesus. That's why they're there. So what do they find? What's their problem, their problem?
Speaker 2:they said why are you eating, and your disciples, without washing your hands? Well, once again, there were extra rules that were created by these Pharisees that they had to wash their hands, not just their hands, but all the way up to their elbows. That's the inclination that you get here through the words in the Greek that are used here, and they did it continually every time that they would touch food or go to a meal. In other words, it wasn't just whenever they ate. It was a certain ritual and a way of washing their hands that the Pharisees had come up with. That's what they're complaining about here that the disciples and Jesus are not using the proper ritual of washing their hands. That's what they're complaining about.
Speaker 1:I just find this really interesting. The thing they find in all of the complex religious things is that in verse 5, it says why do your disciples not walk according to the traditions of the elders about washing their hands? Was it really the dirty fingers that they were worried about, steve? Well, no, it was these traditions of the elders. Notice, they didn't mention Mosaic law. They're talking about the traditions of the elders. Why would they? Of all the possible things that would be in the ranking of religious importance? You know, there's all the theological issues of God and how we're made right with God following the Mosaic law, and all these things. They focus on hand-washing from the disciples. It's the traditions handed down by the elders. They're, as you said, these extra things. That's what they focused on. Well, I think it's because that's all they could find, right? They couldn't find a bigger, more important doctrinal issue. The only thing they could find was these relatively minor hand-washing rituals.
Speaker 2:Now we're beginning to understand how burdensome these extra rules were on the people. Jesus at one point says take my yoke upon you. My burden is light, my load is easy. These pharisaical laws, the tradition of the elders, the tradition of men, that Jesus later says that they exchanged the Mosaic law for this is how burdensome it was. If you didn't wash your hands in the right way, oh, you broke the rule, and so therefore there was some sort of a punishment that you had to do, or you had to go back and rewash your hands the right way. Yeah, it's the only thing that they're able to find, that him and his disciples, and it even says some of the disciples. It doesn't say that all of his disciples, but this also gives you an indication of how closely they're watching them. Here they are sitting at a meal and they're standing back watching really all of his disciples on how they wash their hands. That sounds kind of boring to me, glenn. I don't know about you, you think.
Speaker 1:These Pharisees came all the way from Jerusalem and they were looking for something to criticize. Guess what? They found it right. If you're looking for something to criticize, you're going to find something. I always carry this down into our day, steve.
Speaker 1:With our churches, there's always something to criticize around a church. We need to be careful of that, simply because generally, the pastors and the leaders are doing the best they can and any given way they move is going to get 5% of the church upset at them and somebody out there is going to criticize. So we have to realize that and work with our church leaders and not against them. We don't want to be the crowd that's criticizing just to criticize. I've seen that just too much in our churches. If we decide to go off and do any new ministry, somebody's going to be critical of it. So sometimes we have to okay, just realize that you're never going to make everybody happy and then move forward. But I think in our churches today we need to not be pharisaical. We need to okay, we can express our opinion and do it in a Christian way, but then move on and support the body of Christ, wouldn't you agree, steve? Yeah, I absolutely agree with that In this passage, though, steve, I think there's one other thing that they were probably motivating their criticism is that Jesus had these great crowds following him.
Speaker 1:Is that Jesus had these great crowds following him and the Pharisees probably didn't? Suddenly, there was this great emotional movement following the Messiah Jesus, and he had these large numbers of people. I think there was a certain amount of jealousy here, simply because there was all these people moving in towards Christ when they didn't get that. People moving in towards Christ when they didn't get that, they were most probably looking for a reason to undermine Christ so they could get some of the crowd back on their side again. What is the relative importance, do you think, steve, because they criticize the traditions of the elders? Now, traditions are not entirely wrong. Right, there's good traditions and there's some traditions. I guess we should question, but what should be the role today of tradition and the relative importance of Christian traditions as opposed to the written Word of God?
Speaker 2:The traditions really should be to remember the Mosaic Law and to heed to what the Mosaic Law says. The traditions shouldn't be to add to the Mosaic Law. This is what had happened. This was the rub that Jesus had. You have missed the actual meaning of the law. He's given his Sermon on the Mount. That's depicted not here in Mark, but it is in Matthew, where he redefines for them what the spirit of the Mosaic law. One of them is you have heard that you shouldn't murder. But I say if you harbor hate for someone in your heart, you have already murdered.
Speaker 2:He did that with several of the Mosaic Laws and the Ten Commandments. They had gotten far away from that and gotten to the point where the traditions of men and the traditions of the elders were burdensome rules. They weren't remembrances of what the Mosaic law was to help them observe the Mosaic law. No, they were laws unto themselves which in many cases were meant to keep the people under the rule of the Pharisees, as you mentioned just a while ago. I think there was quite a bit of jealousy. They could see that their rule over the people was slipping by. Because here is this person doing all these miracles, gathering all these people. There's excitement with him, and he's directly challenging them. Now, I do want to point out his challenge to them, though, is whenever they challenge him first, that's whenever he comes back to them and really answers their question. So another thing you would think that the Pharisees would get the idea is we need to stop asking this guy questions, because every time he comes back and he puts us down in front of these people.
Speaker 1:Now the Gospels spend quite a bit of time criticizing tradition. Let me read this passage again, simply because I want to make sure to get the emphasis here. Starting in verse 6, he says this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. But in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men, neglecting the commandments of God. You hold to the traditions of men. He's quite critical of holding traditions over the commandments of God.
Speaker 1:The Gospels have this as a major theme. It's one of the things that Christ always emphasizes is that we should not hold traditions over the clear written commands of God. Now to contrast that, there's three times in the New Testament where we're told to follow the traditions of the apostles 1 Corinthians, 11.2, 2 Thessalonians, 2.15, and 3.6. Those places the apostles specifically say follow the tradition that we passed on to you. The question then arises what should be the role of the traditions that were handed to us by the apostles? There's some denominations and Christian traditions that put a very, very high emphasis on the traditions passed down, either orally or otherwise, from the apostles and hold to a type of apostolic secession. The question then always arises how should we treat these traditions that have been passed down through multiple generations now for many centuries, compared to the clearly written and passed down Word of God. Twice as many times we're told in the Bible to be careful with tradition and to avoid tradition and not lift tradition up. Twice as many times as there ever is times where it holds tradition up to be good.
Speaker 1:In this passage that we just read here in Mark, it is one of them. Jesus lands squarely and firmly down against holding traditions up as even equal, let alone exceeding the Word of God or the ability to interpret the Word of God. Experience, just practical experience of watching people over the years, tells us that people add to traditions over time and deviate the traditions over time, because we're all fallible humans. They elevate the traditions into the same level as God's Word. This has happened over and over again, so many times that it hardly needs proof to demonstrate that.
Speaker 1:Galatians 1.8 gives us a clue as to how to interpret and how to divide this dilemma. It tells us clearly and passionately, I might add, that even if a message comes directly from an apostle or from an angel from heaven, if it changes the original message given by the apostles, we are to reject it. The original writings of the apostles that were originally given in the written Word of God are the only infallible source we have today for God's truth. The strong warnings against tradition and the mild admonitions to follow the apostles' tradition cannot override the clear command of Galatians 1.8 that even if it is an apostolic tradition that violates the original apostolic message, we are to reject it. I think, steve, that's the way to handle the traditions that have been handed down to us today in the church age.
Speaker 2:Jesus backs that up in verse 8 when he says "neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men". That is exactly what you were just saying, and what Galatians is saying too. If the traditions that you're trying to uphold are neglecting the commandments from God, then no, we shouldn't follow those traditions. How do you check to see if they're traditions that are neglecting the commands of God? You go to the Word of God and study the Word of God and know what it says to be able to say well, I understand that this is a rule that this denomination or that this local congregation has, but there's nothing in Scripture that backs that up. Now Jesus is quoting from Isaiah in verses 6 and 7.
Speaker 2:This also goes back to the Old Testament, people. Whenever Isaiah, the prophet, is speaking to the people, then. So this isn't just limited to these Pharisees in the New Testament that we see here. It's something that the people of Israel had done quite often of getting off and getting astray from the actual Mosaic law, the right path and gone off on the other path. Now, that wouldn't happen to us these days, would it, Glenn? We wouldn't ever get astray and get off on the wrong path in the way that we do things today. Do we?
Speaker 1:Well, it's all too common, actually, which brings up the other things that we can dig out of here is that there's some of these same issues that arise today, that we need to take these same lessons that Christ gives us and apply them to our churches and our lives, because we are just as fallible as these people. As soon as we try to hold ourselves up as, oh, we're too sophisticated and we're too mature, we find ourselves doing the exact same sins. There's other lessons that we can dig out of here. In verse 4, it says they do this hand-washing ceremony. It says when they have come from the marketplace. Well, what is it about the marketplace, steve? That would lead them to say, well, I have to wash my hands because I've come from there.
Speaker 2:They could have come across dead animals. They could have come across other types of food that was unclean food or counted to be unclean food as they're walking through the marketplace. Come too close to it. Might not have actually touched it, but you might have come too close to it. So now we have to have a rule that says then, anytime you go to the marketplace, you come back and you got to ritually wash your hands. Make sure that you're cleansed from that.
Speaker 1:Not only might they have touched something that's really unclean, such as a dead animal, but, think of it, the marketplace. Who's there? Well, the commoners are there. There might even be, lo and behold, a Gentile in the marketplace. So we're out amongst those people, so we may have come close to, or even possibly even touched, a Gentile in the crowd. We have to ritually wash ourselves.
Speaker 1:So I find this to be a somewhat conceited way. Yes, it's a tradition gone to seed that, okay, we're going to do this ritual because we may have committed some sort of an issue there. But I think a lot of it is just I was out amongst the commoners, I was out amongst those unclean people. I find it, steve, this is just a very conceited uppity sort of way of viewing people. They had lifted themselves up in this sort of holier-than-thou attitude that now I have to cleanse myself from being out amongst those unclean masses. That's the kind of thing that we have to be aware of, steve, in our churches, because as we were kind of half-joking earlier, but it's the same type of thing creeps into our churches now. We all too often view ourselves as well. We're the righteous ones and those people are the unrighteous, and I don't need to go rub elbows with them. Well, those are exactly the people that Christ hung around with. Remember they were already criticizing him. You're hanging around with sinners, right?
Speaker 2:Remember they were already criticizing him. You're hanging around with sinners, right? How can we be light to the world and salt to the earth if we don't get out into the communities and talk to them about Jesus Christ and give them the gospel, the good news of who he is, what he's done, what he can do for them to reconcile them back to God? If we sequester ourself off and say we can't get out there and intermingle or mix ourselves with those people, then we're really not fulfilling one of the major things that we are supposed to be doing as believers in Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1:That type of attitude, this holier-than-thou attitude, doesn't attract people to the church. I think it repels it, because nobody wants to be around somebody that thinks they're better all the time. How can we avoid having that attitude? How can we individually because it all has to start with the self right how can I make sure that I'm not carrying around some sort of false righteousness or a holier-than-thou attitude?
Speaker 2:Remember how we were before we came to Christ. Now, with me, I came to Christ at the age of eight, but I was exposed to the world. I was a new creature and I knew that I was, but I was still exposed to the world and I still had stumblings and things that I did that I know weren't pleasing to God. But we need to remember how we were before coming to Christ and the struggles that we have. Remember how luring the world is to pull us away from God.
Speaker 2:First, John tells us that anything of the world is an enemy of God. There's people that are not believers and they're living in that type of a world that's pulling them away from God. We need to keep that reminder of us that they need help. They don't think that they need help. They might even be hostile to the help of not wanting to talk to us, but they need help. They don't think that they need help. They might even be hostile to the help of not wanting to talk to us, but they need help. And I think we should at least do our due diligence to mention Jesus Christ to them, the gospel message, and if they accept it, that's fine. If they don't, that's fine. Too Many times, all we're doing is planting seeds, and God will take it from there. But in order to plant the seeds, we have to sow them.
Speaker 1:We do have to sow them. That's one of our commands is the great commission, which is to go and make disciples, which involves sowing the word of God. We'll stop right here for today, but there's still more great truths to dig out of this same story. We'll be summarizing those and then moving on through chapter seven next time.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for watching and listening. May God bless you.
