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
S22 || The Heart of Sin || Mark 7:14-30 || Session 22 || Verse by Verse Bible Study
What truly makes us unclean before God? Is it what we eat, drink, watch, or listen to? Or is there something deeper at work? In this eye-opening exploration in Mark chapter 7, we uncover Jesus' revolutionary teaching about what actually defiles a person.
"From within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts..." With these words, Jesus locates the true source of our sin problem. Our challenge isn't managing external temptations but addressing our internal desires. This teaching cuts straight through both legalism (setting up rules to prevent sin) and license (letting ourselves sin freely). The solution isn't more rules or fewer rules—it's transformed hearts.
What might change in our lives if we stopped focusing on external behaviors and instead sought heart transformation? How would our relationships, churches, and communities look different if we approached Jesus with the persistent humility of the Syrophoenician woman? Listen now and discover the liberating truth that what we need isn't more rules but new hearts.
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May God Bless you!! - Glenn and Steve
One of the issues that's traditionally plagued the Christian church, or at least wrestled with by many Christians, is the tension between legalism on one hand and license on the other. Legalism is setting up a series of rules to keep us from sinning, and license is letting our flesh go free to sin as much as it feels like. Where is the balance? We know we can't work our way to God, but we also know we're not supposed to sin. Today's passage in the Gospel of Mark is going to help us determine a path forward with this, because we're going to be reasoning through Jesus' direct commands on a subject that will help us with this topic.
Speaker 1:Hi, my name's Glenn. I'm here with Steve. We have a ministry called Reasoning Through the Bible where we go verse by verse and even phrase by phrase through the Word of God. Today we're going to be talking about something and reasoning through it that I think has a lot of practical application. Even though the topic initially seems rather simple, I think it'll help us with some rather complex issues. If you have your copy of the Word of God, open it to Mark, chapter 7. Steve, can you read from verse 14 down to verse 23?
Speaker 2:After he called the crowd to him again, he began saying to them Listen to me, all of you, and understand. There is nothing outside the man which can defile him if it goes into him. But the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man. If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear. When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples questioned him about the parable and he said to them Are you so lacking in understanding? Also, do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, because it does not go into his heart but into his stomach and it is eliminated. Thus he declared all foods clean and it is eliminated. Thus he declared all foods clean and he was saying that which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man From within. Out of the heart of men proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.
Speaker 1:First of all, those of us that aren't Jewish or weren't raised in a strict, dietary-driven home. We don't always get the importance of what he's saying here at least the gravity of it home. We don't always get the importance of what he's saying here at least the gravity of it, steve. How would this have come across to the Jewish ear in those days when he said all foods are clean and nothing that you eat can defile you? How would that have been received by the average Jewish home?
Speaker 2:There are many, many verses and even chapters in Leviticus and Numbers that outline specific foods that are clean and are unclean. There's a categorization between the two of the types of animals that are considered to be avoided and other ones that are okay to eat. Here we have Jesus coming along and saying this about being able to eat things and that it's eliminated into the latrine. The disciples, or Mark, is making a commentary here that through this he was actually also letting them know that all foods were clean. This would have been a game changer for them in many, many ways, because their daily routine worked around the proper types of foods that they were supposed to eat so that they wouldn't break the Mosaic law.
Speaker 1:This was huge to the Jewish era, simply because, as you said, these large parts of the Old Testament get into quite a bit of detail on exactly how the animals are supposed to be eaten and how they're cut up and how they're killed, and which ones are edible and which ones aren't. So there's all these rules and this was a major major part of life when Jesus were to stand up here and say all foods are clean. Oh, my goodness, remember in Acts, chapter 10, where Peter has the vision of the animals coming down on the sheep and the Lord says kill and eat. And it had all these clean and unclean animals in it. Well, peter refused three times and says no, lord, I've never done any of that. Well, this was even after he had been a Christian for a number of years.
Speaker 1:We have here a major, major thought pattern that is really being broken. This would have been a very radical shift in those days to say that nothing you eat is going to make you unclean. We have to take this of what he's actually saying. The clean and unclean is a ritually clean or unclean as far as righteousness before God. What he's saying here is that nothing you ingest is going to make you sin before God. He's not saying everything in the world that you could possibly swallow is good for you or healthy. That's not what he's saying. What he's saying is that your righteousness before God is not measured by keeping a kosher diet, or whether you eat meat or only vegetables, or whether you eat pig meat or things like this. Our righteousness before God is not measured by whether we eat bacon, cheeseburgers. That's what he's saying. We can ingest these things and still be right before God. That's the point. Now, what he's saying here, though, can be applied in many areas, I think In verses 15 and 18, what comes into a person from the outside does not defile us. That's what he says very clearly At the end of verse 19,. God makes it very clear we're no longer under the Old Testament dietary laws. In the church age, foods are ritually unclean. He says that very clearly here, and it's clearly taught, but let's take this idea of there's nothing we can ingest or put into ourselves is going to make us ritually unclean. This not only cuts against the Old Testament dietary laws, but it also gives us a chance to talk about what, in the church, is called legalism.
Speaker 1:Legalism is setting up rules in order to make sure that we're not sinning. For example, adultery is a sin, so we don't want to be committing adultery. That's clearly listed out in the Bible. The legalism turns into well, I don't want to be tempted to do adultery, so I'm never going to talk to a woman. Now I consider it wrong to talk to a woman. Then I'm going to cross the street every time I see a woman come. If a woman is in need of something, then I'm not going to help her because I'm alone and I'm a man. Well, that's legalism. It's taken the principle to a point where it's causing more trouble than it's solving.
Speaker 1:Legalism is this belief that if we set up a series of rules on what we're to do and not do, then that is what is really holy and righteous and good. Jesus says no, that it is not the things in the world that make us unclean and sin, it's what comes out of our heart. That's what he's saying here. It's not the ham sandwich that makes you unrighteous, it's what comes out of your heart. He has that horrible list at the end. It's the murders and the slanders and the adulteries. Those things come out of our heart. What makes us unrighteous is what's already in us. That's coming out. Let me boil this down into something that's not conceptual. I think our audience will really understand where I'm going with this. Many churches have all kinds of rules on things like alcohol and card playing and whether you can go to the theater or not.
Speaker 1:My friends, what Jesus is saying here is that it's really not the alcohol and the drugs and the sex that are what makes us sinners. What makes us sinners is what's already in us. That's what causes the sin. He's saying that what makes us evil, it's not the alcohol, it's not the drugs, it's not the sex. It's what's already in us. Our hearts become regenerated from the inside out when you become a born-again Christian. Now our desires change. I won't go after the alcohol and the drugs and the sex, but setting up some rule about whether or not I can drink alcohol or go on a date with a woman or things like this.
Speaker 1:One of the best places I've ever heard it was J Vernon McGee put it this way there's no way to put enough clothes on a woman that'll take the lust out of a man's heart. But if you take the lust out of a man's heart, then how much clothes the woman's wearing is not going to be an issue. So, steve, I think that can all be applied in this section, because he's saying it's not what goes into you, it's really not what you look at or what you hear, or what you swallow that's going to make you righteous or unrighteous. It's what's in your heart that's going to draw you towards the sin or towards the righteous acts. Steve, what are your thoughts on this? This?
Speaker 2:is right after he has confronted the Pharisees in the previous verses and called them out as hypocrites because they have taken their traditions of men and elders and it has superseded the Mosaic law. He has told them that you master doing these type of things because you go out of your way in order to stay adherent to the traditions of men, at the neglect of keeping the actual Mosaic law. And right after that he turns to the crowd and calls them together and says I want to let you know that it's not what is outside that defiles the person that they take from the outside to the inside, because what you take from the outside as far as food. He later explains to the disciples when they questioned him what does the parable mean? He says the natural process for that is for it to be eliminated. That word there that is used for eliminated in verse 19 is the word in Greek that's used for a restroom for a privy, for a place for somebody to go and sit and void the food that they have eaten. He's letting them know there is a natural process, that when you take something from the outside, your body is going to eliminate it naturally. But it's rather what's inside your heart, it's what you harbor in your heart. That is what defiles the man. The process of how that gets out is through all of that long list at the end of what we read the sexual immorality, the envy, the other things that are listed there at the end. That's the natural way that that is going to be expelled from the body.
Speaker 2:Once again, he is redefining what the Pharisees are telling these people, and the Sadducees as well the leadership.
Speaker 2:They have gotten the people away from the actual true meaning of the Mosaic law. Jesus now, just like several times before, is pulling the people back to the true meaning of the law In this way that he's doing it. He's letting them know that it's what's with your heart, in this case, what you harbor in your heart. That is what's going to defile you when it comes out as one of these items or multiple things of these things, these sins against God you just put it so rightly, glenn is that whenever we become a believer in Jesus Christ and trust on him to have a relationship with God, that we are regenerated, we have a new heart, we become a new creation and therefore we have a different outlook and we don't want to harbor those things. We don't want to have those type of things that are in our heart anymore, and that is what the crux of what Jesus came for and the belief and trust in him is has nothing to do with the type of physical food that we eat.
Speaker 1:Right, exactly, we talked about legalism. So it's not a license that we talked about at the beginning. It's not okay, I'm going to turn my flesh loose to do whatever it wants. No, just the opposite Regenerate our heart, and then I won't want to go and do those sins. That's the point. Then he gives, in verse 21, this list of things that come out of people. So, steve, what are the types of things that come out of the human heart?
Speaker 2:He says things that precede the evil thoughts sexual immorality, pride, foolishness, deceit, immorality, pride, foolishness, deceit, envy, slander. Many of these things are noted in the Ten Commandments Adultery, don't lie, don't steal. The basic things that have been laid out for these Jewish people to live their lives by are things that are listed here. I think by this he's saying these are natural things. Unless you have a regenerated heart, these are natural things that are going to come out and are going to come for mankind. That's going to defile him or make him unrighteous in the sight of God.
Speaker 1:Notice here in verse 21,. There's a theological point here that can be made, For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts. Where do the evil thoughts come from? They come from the heart of man. They originate in the heart. There's many a philosopher that arm wrestle over whether or not we can originate evil within us. Well, the Lord Jesus Christ tells us that evil can have its beginning inside of a human heart, not caused by some external force. But I can originate an evil thought within my own evil heart and without my heart being regenerated it will continue to regenerate evil within itself. Humans can originate decisions to commit sin. That's the implications of here. We don't need to be caused to commit sin. We do a pretty good job all by ourself. This list has, interestingly, six singular nouns and six plural nouns and the Bible has a complex literary structure to help memory. But it's a really ugly list here. Murders, thefts, adulteries, and in that same list with all those horrible things. What are the last two things on the list? Steve Pride and foolishness.
Speaker 1:Pride and foolishness, or some of the translations say arrogance and folly. But if we were to look at it just from a human standpoint and say foolishness is on the same list as murder and adultery and thefts, well, yeah, that's what the Lord thinks of. We should not be foolish people and we should not be prideful people. Pride can originate many of the other sins, and so we should take pride and foolishness, arrogance and folly to be very, very serious sins we need to take out of our lives. Where again, do all of these things come from? Within the heart of man. It's not the things that we ingest, digest, listen to things like that that make us unrighteous. And avoiding eating and drinking doesn't make us righteous. It's the sin that is already in us that makes us unrighteous. We are causing the unrighteousness. Once the heart gets cleaned up, then everything else will kind of take care of itself. What we really need is a heart transplant, right, steve?
Speaker 2:And that is one thing. Whenever we tell people the good news, glenn, of you need to believe in Jesus Christ in order to have eternal salvation, here is what he did on his death, burial and resurrection. That is true. We do need to tell the people that, but we also need to tell them this there are evil things from within our heart, such as what's listed here in these verses. That is what separates us from God. That is why we need to believe and place our trust in Jesus Christ in order to once again have a relationship with God is because these are the things.
Speaker 2:So it's not just going to somebody and saying you need to believe in Jesus Christ and place your trust in him in order to have eternal life. They need to understand that they're sinners and the things that they do are separating them from God and that there's not a relationship there, and the only way to have it is to believe and trust in Jesus, and then their heart will be regenerated so that these evil things can be replaced by Christ-like things, where Paul tells us that we are to become more Christ-like every day and to put on the coat of Christ. So that we can do that. It changes our heart. God gives us a new heart of flesh from the heart of stone that we have. So this is a very critical part, I think, glenn. Whenever we're witnessing to people and leading them to Christ, they need to understand why they need to place their belief and trust in Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1:Lastly, before we move out of this section, if you look at verse 16, in our New American Standard translation that we use, it's bracketed. If you look in some of the other modern English translations, some of them include verse 16 and some of them don't. What that is is the large amount of Greek manuscripts that we have for the Gospel of Mark. Some of them don't include this verse, and so Christianity is open and honest about where the Greek manuscripts agree and might not agree. There's some variances, but there's nothing that affects the meaning of the text. It's really an issue around. There's a huge amount of texts. What we find is that the scholars that study these things tell us that there's a 99.5% agreement between the many thousands of documents and many thousands of pages.
Speaker 1:This is just one of those small areas that don't. Either a scribe added that in at one point or somebody left it out somewhere, but it doesn't affect any of the meaning of the text and it certainly doesn't affect the clear teachings around salvation and clear teachings around God or the Lord, jesus Christ. We can still hold to strong inerrancy and the strong infallibility of Scripture. Moving on to the next section, we have Jesus interacting once again with another person. We have now one of these very interesting people that we're going to meet, a Syrophoenician woman. Steve, can you read Mark 7, verses 24?
Speaker 2:to 30?. Jesus got up and went away from there to the region of Tyre, and when he had entered a house, he wanted no one to know of it yet he could not escape notice. But after hearing of him, a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately came and fell at his feet. Now, the woman was a Gentile of the Syrophoenician race and she kept asking him to cast the demon out of her daughter. Asking him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And he was saying to her Let the children be satisfied first, for it's not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. But she answered and said to him yes, lord, but even the dogs under the table feed on the children's crumbs. And he said to her Because of this answer, go, the demon has gone out of your daughter. Going back to her home, she found the child lying on the bed, the demon having left.
Speaker 1:With this, we have Jesus going to an area in the far northwest part of where he would usually travel. So where is he?
Speaker 2:Steve. He's up in an area of Tyre and later on he's going to go to an area of Sidon. These are two cities in this area called Syrophoenicia and it's part of a greater area where Assyria was and Assyria was later before the birth of Christ. This is a region and it's where a group of Gentiles live. It's also the region up in there where Elijah went at one time whenever he dealt with the woman in Sidon.
Speaker 1:So in the end of verse 24, it tells us a reason why he was going up there. Remember, this is pretty far from the main body of the Jewish population down, it's certainly from around Jerusalem. Why does it say he was going up there?
Speaker 2:He was trying to escape these large crowds that were coming. His word was spreading everywhere that he went as soon as he would go across the Sea of Galilee to try and escape the crowds. Whenever he would land on the other side, word would get out that he was there and the crowds would throng around him again. Now he has gone up into this area where there's a lot of Gentiles and he is trying to get away from the crowds for a little bit of seclusion. And we see that Jesus wants to do that from time to time and he tries to get into this house without anybody knowing about it. But this has failed and this woman has found out that he's there.
Speaker 1:Again, he's trying to get some privacy to be able to mentor his disciples. He goes up there trying to get some privacy, stay hidden. It says there at the end of verse 24,. Yet he could not escape notice, or it might say he could not be hidden. He was unable to hide himself simply because his reputation preceded him. There were so many people watching for him. They had heard about and seen what he had done in other times, so they were seeking him out. In verse 26, we ask ourselves who is this woman and what is the significance of where she's from. Well, the point is she's not Jewish. This is a Syrophoenician woman, which is somebody that is not Jewish. So this Gentile woman comes with a request. So what is the?
Speaker 2:request. She has a daughter that has a demon and she's asking him to cast the demon out. It gives you a picture of the type of information that is preceding Jesus as he goes into these regions that people are being healed wherever he goes and that he's also healing them. People are saying, if I could just touch his garment and be healed, much like the woman with the issue of blood that she had for 12 years. Things like that happen and then it gets around what did happen? And other people come to the point of just saying we just need to touch him.
Speaker 2:But she comes nonetheless a Gentile, which I think also gives us a picture that he had gone down into the capitalist area many times. That was predominantly Gentile, which I think also gives us a picture that he had gone down into the Decapolis area many times. That was predominantly Gentile. She has at least some confidence that if she comes to him, a Jewish person, that he will heal her daughter, who is also a Gentile. I think that's a little bit of thing to note here that she does have a faith of her that he will heal her daughter.
Speaker 1:She has this daughter that's demon-possessed. She had heard about Jesus and she knew as well as anyone how the Jews and the Gentiles typically interacted, which was not very much so. She knew that he was Jewish and had spent most of his time talking with a Jewish group of people. She nevertheless says I need help, I'm going to Jesus. The middle of verse 25, what does she physically do when she approaches him? She came and fell at his feet, Came and fell at his feet. And the next verse says she kept asking, or begged the verb tense. There is she's ongoing action. She's asking. She didn't just ask once and give up. She kept asking, or begged the verb tense. There is she's ongoing action. She's asking. She didn't just ask once and give up. She kept asking. She wasn't half-hearted. She did this very intentionally. She purposely fell at his feet. She wasn't demanding. She was asking, but she kept on asking. She would have been begging. She was really wanting him to help her.
Speaker 1:Every parent should fall at Jesus' feet and beg him to save their children. Our children need Jesus. And what do we do? We fall at Jesus' feet and say Lord, please help my child. Every parent has prayed that prayer for their child. Then in verse 27,. What's his response?
Speaker 2:He says let the children be satisfied first, for it's not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. Now people sometimes want to make a big deal out of this that he's calling Gentiles dogs. But he's really not saying that. This Greek word here is a word for puppies. He's saying the little puppies. I think what he's saying is that he's here to reach the Jewish people, to offer the kingdom and to seek the ones who are lost from the Jewish people. That's his main purpose at this point in time. He's telling her I'm here for the Jewish people and what is it that I got to do for this Gentile girl? Is it good for this food to be at the children's table to be given to the puppies?
Speaker 1:She comes up with this request. She falls at his feet with this request. She asks, even begs for a response, and he says I've rebuked you a little bit here. I've said I'm really sent to the house of Israel. At that point she could have gotten huffy and said well, who do you think you are better than me? And walked off. No, what does she do? She keeps asking. She even says well, even the dogs, even the puppies, will feed from what falls off of the children's table. The last section we read.
Speaker 1:Steve had pride as one of the great sins, and this is an example of how the lack of pride can really help us. A prideful response from this woman would have shown that she thought she was wiser than Jesus. But by humbling herself at his feet and saying I will submit to you, I know my place compared to the Lord Jesus, I am but a person that would sit here at his feet and beg If, lord, you'll just give me what little bits you think are wise, please help my problem. Then he had compassion on her. If, on the other hand, she had had too much pride, then she would have walked away hurt. That was the difference between her and the Pharisees. The Pharisees had too much pride. What does this tell you about this woman? Well, she didn't want to raise herself up above Christ. She was willing to be whatever position Jesus wanted her. She had great faith in Jesus. Because of that, her child ended up getting healed. What happens, steve, to prideful people?
Speaker 2:Pride goes before the fall and we see that in Scripture throughout that prideful people. Good things usually don't come out with them. We have the stories from the Old Testament of Nebuchadnezzar and his son Belshazzar, both prideful people. God intervened in their life directly and it cost them greatly in many ways and they're just two examples them greatly in many ways, and they're just two examples. Pride is something that is not pleasing to God and it can get in the way of our relationship with Him.
Speaker 1:We should all, in one sense of the word, put ourselves in the place of this Syrophoenician woman.
Speaker 1:We have found ourselves before Jesus and we have needs. If we would but fall at his feet and be willing to subject ourselves, if we were to all realize how majestic he is, how powerful he is, how immense he is, and we realize how sinful and low we are, then all of us would be the same place. That's the lesson of the Syrophoenician woman is that all of us have no grounds for lifting ourselves up and saying I have any ability to make demands or any kind of ability to say I'm somewhat of an equal to the Lord Jesus. No, no, thousand times, no. We all must fall at his feet and say I will be satisfied with where I am because I know, lord, you're good. If we truly realize the immensity of God and the sinfulness of mankind, then we would respond just like this woman and Steve. That's one of the lessons here is if we would just but fall at his feet and continue asking, continue praying, then he will have compassion on us and he will reach down and touch us and bless us.
Speaker 2:And she uses this illustration, glenn, to her advantage. His illustration is that feeding the children shouldn't go to the puppies, and she says, yes, but even when the children drop food, the puppies then get nourished from it. So, through her humbleness of saying that, that's something that convinces him to go ahead and free her daughter from the demon.
Speaker 1:Next time we're going to be reasoning through where Jesus heals a deaf man, and we'll do that here next time.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for watching and listening. May God bless you.
