Today on the verdict with Pastor John Monroe. They say, well, how can I deal? with this spiritual contamination. Only Jesus Christ can Cleanse your heart. This is the good news of the gospel.
This is incredible news. You can go through all of the trappings of religion, but that will never ever cleanse your heart. Only Jesus Christ can cleanse and change your heart. Welcome to The Verdict, the Bible teaching ministry of Pastor John Monroe. Since COVID, we've become more aware of physical contamination.
But what's even worse? Today, on the verdict, we're going to learn about the dangers of spiritual contamination. Jesus is most concerned with the condition of our hearts.
Now continuing our study in Matthew, here's Pastor John Monroe with his message titled, Avoiding Contamination. Religious and spiritual contamination. That's our subject today. All of us are aware of contamination. And since the onslaught of COVID-19, were all much more aware of passing some illness to others.
Also, in our disposable world, we have to confess, that we have often contaminated the beautiful world. which our great God has given us. But what about a greater, a more insidious contamination? The contamination of the soul, of that which is inside us, but inevitably. manifests itself.
Let's learn as the Lord is in dialogue with the Pharisees and scribes regarding their religious scruples. But they are ignoring the true spiritual contamination. In their passage, Today the religious leaders accuse The disciples of Jesus are beating with unwashed hands. And the accusation then is one of defilement, is one of contamination. And Jesus takes the opportunity in this very important passage to give a succinct exposition of what constitutes spiritual.
Defilement. And in doing so, he gives us a warning about ritualism. Without reality, of formalism without faith, of legalism without life, of ceremony without Christ. of religion without. relationship.
What do you do? Turn with me in your Bible to Matthew 15. We're going to be looking at the first 20 verses today, but first of all, I want to read the first nine verses. Here is the word of God to you and to me. Today.
Then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat. He answered them. And why do you break the commandment of God? for the sake of your tradition.
For God commanded, honor your father and your mother, and whoever reviles father or mother must surely die. But you say If anyone tells his father or his mother, what you would have gained from me is given to God, he need not honor his father.
So For the sake of your tradition. You've made by the word of God. You hypocrites.
Well did Isaiah the prophet of you Prophesy of you when he said. These people honors me with her lips. But their heart It's far from me. In vain do they worship me. teaching as doctrines the commandments.
of men. Think. of the cutting Penetrating. Truth. of Jesus As once again He and the religious rulers are in conflict.
I want us to learn, first of all, that religion cannot erase personal contamination. Religion And it comes in thousands of ways. Whatever you describe it. It cannot erase personal contamination. We could describe religion in many ways, but religion is always man-made and man-centered.
It focuses on man. It exalts man. It is made by man. And here in this passage, as we read, the Pharisees and the scribes are emphasizing their traditions their traditions which have been handed down orally from generation to generation. The Pharisees are the leading Jewish sect.
The scribes are the legal experts. They're the lawyers. They interpret the law. They expound the law. They spend their time in the minutiae of the law.
These two groups Call Israel the To adhere to their strict, their very strict and their very pedantic interpretations, which they regarded as almost of equal authority to Scripture. This is key. They have their tradition. Do they deny the word of God? Do they say we don't believe the Old Testament, their scripture, the Torah?
Of course not. They uphold the scriptures. But as their interpretations And the rules and the regulations have developed down through the centuries. At the time of Jesus, their traditions and the Word of God are almost of equal authority. And the conflict arises as the disciples of Jesus Are not following their legalistic interpretations and traditions.
See, there always have been two ways. Two basic ways of approaching God. There's religion or there's the grace of God. As I say, religion is man-made. Religion loves.
The pump. the splendor, the rules, the regulations. The formalities, the ceremonies, the hype, the excitement. And it is ultimately man-centered. trying to please God or reach God by our own efforts.
Religion says in some forms, do the best you can. Follow the rules, comply with the rituals, be good. Grace. The grace of God, biblical Christianity is always God-centered. and God exalted.
A good test of a religion is who is it exalting? Who is exalted as we worship? God. What about you? You cut up in an outward form, whatever that is, or Do you have an inward faith?
Do you have religion or do you have a true relationship with God? Biblical Christianity looks not to the externals. It's not that there are not externals, but true Christianity looks to what God has done in Christ Jesus. It looks to the redemptive work of our Lord Jesus Christ, His death, His burial, and His resurrection.
So Paul can write. In Titus 3, verse 7, so that being justified by His grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. What is it that saves us? It is the grace of God. And religion can do many things.
Can religion can make you look and can make you feel very, very good. We can say in this context, religion can cleanse your hands, but it can never, ever, ever Cleanse your heart.
Now, we read here in verse 1 that the Pharisees and the scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem. This is a in a sense, a kind of official delegation. And they come and they criticize As they've done before, they criticize the disciples of Jesus. They say there's a breach of our religious traditions. Ceremonial washing.
Verse 2, why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? for they do not wash their hands when they eat.
Now this is not a matter of hygiene. It's not a matter that you've got actually dirt on your hands and you you Your mother would say, Make sure your hands are washed. That's not the point. It is religious defilement. It is a ceremonial washing.
Defilement was obtained in many ways. contact with an unclean animal. eating unclean food. Touching a dead body. Touching a dead animal.
coming into contact with a Gentile in purity. After any defilement is restored by a ritualistic washing.
So the issue here is not one of hygiene, it's one of ceremonial Cleanliness. And they Pharisees and scribes, as they do here, they take this to ridiculous lengths. Religion loves the externals. The ritualism. The ceremonialism.
And it equates these things with true Spirituality. And there's a certain comfort with religion, isn't there? But such ritualism And such legalistic observance leads to pride. It leads to hypocrisy, which is the accusation Jesus makes against the religious leaders. And It leads to judgmentalism.
You ever been part of a group that judges you? By the Externals? Very easy, isn't it?
Now Jesus responds by demonstrating their hypocrisy. Notice what he says. In uh verse three. He says in effect, you're accusing my disciples of breaking the traditions of the elders. You have broken the commandments of God.
What's greater? Your traditions are the commandments of God. And then in verses three through six, he gives an example of this. First of all, he reminds them, and they knew the scripture. He quotes from Isaiah 29 verse 13 in verse 7, in verses 8 and 9.
He says, you hypocrites, verse 7, well did Isaiah prophesy of you. That prophecy 750 years ago, Mr. Pharisee and Mr. Scribe, was directed in fact to you. Because you honor God with your lips.
But your heart is far from God. In vain do you worship me, teaching us doctrines the commandments of. God. Notice in verse 9, he describes their worship as vain, as empty. coming from the lips but not from the heart.
That's terribly convicting, isn't it? Because here we are. We're praying. And we are presenting our worship. To the Lord.
Is it possible that all of that could be in vain? Yes. Very possible. If it's not from your heart, Because what God is concerned about is not just your profession. Religion makes you look good.
Religion makes you feel good. But Jesus is saying to the Pharisees, you are in fact hypocrites and your worship is absolutely empty. It's hollow. It's hypocritical. Because what you say sounds so good, but your heart, did you notice it in verse 8?
Your heart is far. From Me. You said today And your heart is far. From God? There's some of us here.
are worshipping. And their hearts Or fire. From God. See, there is the outward profession. Is that unimportant?
No, it's not unimportant. But it is very, very secondary. What God is concerned about is not your outward profession, but the inward reality. And religion is always more concerned with the externals. Rather than a correct, a true, a living, and a vibrant relationship with the living God.
Now you say How how do we know? Whether We've embraced a form of cultural religion here. or whether there is true worship. I'll give you a very basic Test. In fact, the one which which Jesus gives us in the passage.
is that religion always displaces The word of God. Have you noticed that? Pick any religion. Religion displaces God's living word. Here, The Pharisees and scribes Are teaching their traditions with the authority of God's Word.
And Jesus gives an example. of their tradition making void God's word in verses three through six. Verse 3, why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? In fact, your tradition Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
demonstrated in such a way that the very commandments of God are broken. Verse 6.
So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made void the word of God. No, please notice. The scribes and the Pharisees Are not outwardly denying the Word of God. They would say, We believe the Word of God, we honor the Word of God, we're scribes, we spend all of our time reading and dissecting and expounding the Torah, the Hebrew scriptures. And Jesus is saying, No.
You've made it of null effect. And he gives an example. He gives an example from the Ten Commandments. One of the Ten Commandments is: you shall honor your father and mother. Do you hear that?
Children, students, honour your father and mother. Do you hear that? Mums and dads. Honor your father and mother. You got an older.
Father and older mother. Perhaps they're they're they're very old. Perhaps in the eighties or the nineties. Do you stop honoring your father and mother? Uh w when you rea when you reach eighteen, no?
No, there is a time when you get married, when you leave them. When the primary responsibility in your life is to your spouse, that is true, but as followers of Jesus, We are always to honor our father and mother. And the scribes and the Pharisees would agree with that. But here's the point. Here's an older couple.
and they find themselves financially destitute. And uh their son or their daughter are quite well off.
Now honoring your father or mother would mean that if you're in a position financially to help them, you should do so. Here's my mother in Scotland. She's now with the Lord, but when she was in her 80s or 90s, I remember having a conversation with my brothers. How is mum taken care of financially? We are her her sons.
We all had more money than our mother had. Are we able to take care of her? Yes. We're going to take care of mom. That's what it means to honor your father and mother, isn't it?
Along comes the Pharisees and the scribes. What you do is you go through a formality of saying Corba, and you're going to give a gift to your parents. Ah, but you're not going to give it now. You're going to Give it to the Lord in an act of worship. You're going to say, God, here is the money I'm going to give to my parents, but You don't give it now.
It's delayed. And of course it may never be given to them. And in that way, you have manipulated the very commandments of God. and your traditions and your legalistic interpretations of the Ten Commandments have resulted that the clear word of God, honor your father and mother, is rendered null and void. This says Jesus verse 7, it is hypocrisy.
He says in verse 14 very strongly, leave them alone. Have nothing to do. with these hypocrites, with these scribes and Pharisees.
Now let me ask you. Is there anything added to the Word of God today? In religion. Can you think of any examples? I'm going to give you three examples.
One of them. The example of the Roman Catholic Church. Rome, and I'm going to quote from its catechism, I'm not making this up. This is not anti-Roman Catholic, it's just stating what they believe. Roman Catholics add what they call the magisterium, the traditions, to Holy Scripture.
Here is a quotation from the Catechism. of the Roman Catholic Church? Here it is. As a result, the church, they mean the Roman Catholic Church. To whom the transmission and interpretation of revelation is entrusted.
Notice that. Does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from the Holy Scriptures alone. Underline the word of the law. Both scripture and tradition must be accepted and honored with equal, underline the word equal, with equal sentiments of devotion and Reverence.
So, in Roman Catholic theology, Roman Catholic practice, do they believe in the Bible? Yes, of course, they believe in the Bible. But they also believe In the tradition The magisterium of the church. And they, as the statement says, are to be accepted and honored with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.
So their tradition is added to the authority of Scripture. Not only that, but we, the church, will interpret because we alone have been given the The task of interpreting the Word of God. Yeah. To the Word of God. They're tradition.
Here's another example. Number two. The example of Mormonism. I remember walking the street and these two young Mormons approached me. And they said to me, Do you ever read the Bible?
I said, Yes, I sometimes read the Bible. And they then said, Do you ever wonder why God didn't give us another book.
Now you know where they're going with it. And I said, no, I've never wondered that. Oh, they said, why would you wonder that? I said, when God has given us one perfect book. Why would we need another one?
If the Bible is perfect, If it is God's word containing all we need for our salvation and our sanctification, why would God add something else? But in Mormonism, You talk to a Mormon? Do they believe the Bible? Oh yeah, we believe the Bible, but we also believe the Book of Mormon. The pearl of great price because Joseph Smith, with these magical glasses, with this wonderful angel Moroni, gave him these other scriptures, and so.
The word of God. is being Displaced. and another authority is being added. I'll give you another example, perhaps a more controversial example, but we have more and more today self-professed prophets. You heard about them?
Prophets, people who call themselves apostles? Or you get these preachers. Who claim these revelations, these visions from God, extra-biblical revelations that God told me to tell you. And so what we have in these cases Revelation, so-called being added to the Word of God. The magisterium of the church, the book of Mormon, someone's prophecy, someone's vision, and in all these cases.
When anything has been added to the word of God in practice, What becomes important is not the word of God, but to what you've added. And so in Rome, the tradition becomes more important than the scripture. Certainly in Mormonism, the continuing revelation which goes on today becomes much more important than Scripture.
So it is in churches which are emphasized by celebrity preachers and prophets and apostles. What they say always becomes more important than Scripture. That's religion. Displacing. The living word of God.
And that, of course, can never, ever, ever deal. with your personal. contamination. This is the verdict featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor John Monroe. There's still more to hear when John returns in just a moment, so stay with us.
From matters of truth and identity, to the subjects of love and grace, our world seems more confused than ever. but to find truth and certainty about who we are and find peace, we must turn our attention away from the world and look to the Word of God. To help you do that, John wrote a booklet titled Eternal Security, Finding Certainty in a Chaotic World. Through this special resource, John shares his personal testimony, along with a careful examination of Scripture, to offer us clarity on matters of eternity. Get your copy today by visiting our website at theverdict.org.
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Now, here's Pastor John Monroe.
Well, what's your verdict? I know you don't want to be contaminated in any way. But If someone could see into your heart, Your thoughts, your very soul. What would their verdict be? Jesus is challenging us that we may look good on the outside but be inwardly contaminated.
No. That's why God sent his Son, our Lord Jesus. to cleanse contaminated people like you and me. I'm asking you. Have you received this cleansing, this spiritual cleansing, which comes from knowing the Savior of the world?
Thanks for joining us today on The Verdict. I'm Michelle Davies. Today's program with Pastor John Monroe was produced and sponsored by Calvary Church in Charlotte, North Carolina.
