Matthew chapter 15 verse 11. If you want another account of this same story, Mark chapter 7
might be something good for you to look at this week. Compare some of the differences
in them. Very similar, but there are some differences. Matthew chapter 15 verse 11.
We'll read the verse and then we will pray and get started. It's not what goes into the
mouth that defiles a man, but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man. Let's pray.
Father God, we come to you. We come to you today, dear Lord, because we need you. God,
we come to you today because we want to hear your word. And I pray, dear Lord, that your
Holy Spirit would be among us today. God, that we would hear from you, that you would
protect us from any of the attacks of the enemy, any distractions or anything that may
be in our mind or in our heart today, dear Lord, that in these few minutes that your
Holy Spirit would work in our life, dear Lord, that your word would speak to us. God, I pray
that you would hide me behind the cross, that you would give me the ability, dear Lord,
to preach and teach in a way that brings glory to you. Dear Lord, I am incapable and unworthy
to preach your word today. But God, you have called me and you've placed me here, dear
Lord, so I pray that your Holy Spirit will work so that each one of us would hear from
you, dear Lord, so that we would grow in you, so that you would receive all the glory, dear
Lord. I pray that you bless these people. I pray that you just bless this time that we
have. And I ask these things in Jesus' name, amen. Jesus is dealing with the issue of defilement.
And in the passage we just looked at, in the verse we looked at, Jesus said, look, defilement
does not come from what goes in your mouth, but defilement comes from inside. It's not
what goes into you that makes one defile, but what comes out of you proves that there
is defilement that is already there. But what does all this mean? Well, Jesus' apostles
were about to ask the same question in the verses to come. But let's talk about what
got us to this verse. Now, Jesus, in the chapter before, had been doing some miraculous works.
And Jesus had just fed the 5,000, 5,000 men, it says, not included women and children.
Now, certainly there would have probably been many thousands more than the 5,000, possibly
10, 15, 20,000, who knows? That's certainly the largest crowd that is recorded for us
anywhere in scripture. Maybe there were larger crowds, but at least that's the largest one
that we know of. And many people were coming to follow Jesus because he was preaching with
authority unlike any who had come before him. Now, certainly there were lots of rabbis around
at the time of Jesus who were preaching and teaching the Word of God. But when Jesus
came along, he was one who talked like one who had authority, as we see at the end of
the Beatitudes. And so he was really able to catch people's attention. They recognized
there was something different. And then on top of that, you begin to see that Jesus does
these miracles. He begins to heal people. He begins to cast out demons. He raises people
from the dead. He feeds these 5,000 with five fish, excuse me, five loaves and two fish.
And Jesus is able to do all of these miraculous things. And word is getting around, as you
can imagine, probably very quickly about who Jesus is. Now, this story seems to be taking
place around the area of Genesirat. Now, Lake Genesirat, you've probably heard of that in
the scripture. That's the same place as the Sea of Galilee. And that's where we see in
the chapter before that that's where his disciples are. They're kind of in that region. And it
says at the beginning of Matthew chapter 15 that there's a group of Pharisees and scribes
from Jerusalem who come to see Jesus. They're coming to confront Jesus. Now, the best way
maybe to describe the Pharisees, the simplest way is that they were a very religious group
of people. And they really practice religion well and that they really thought that they
were doing God's work and they knew God's word, but they really didn't know God's word
quite as good as they thought they did. And so they were doing a lot of stuff that gave
a good outward appearance, but they didn't really have a good understanding of the word
of God. Paul, for instance, would be a good example of a Pharisee. He was a Pharisee of
Pharisees, he says. He knew all the stuff that they taught. But Paul, as we see in the
book of Acts, was right there holding the coats of those who were stoning Stephen, who
was preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now, certainly Paul didn't really have a good
understanding or at least not as good as he thought of the word of God or at least not
how it applied. And so this kind of describes for us who the Pharisees were. And it says
that the scribes were with them. Well, the scribes were those people who would have copied
the text. They would have copied what we would call the Old Testament text. They would copy
it from one scroll to the next scroll. And so they too had a pretty good knowledge of
the word of God, at least a head knowledge. At least the Pharisees and the scribes had
a head knowledge of the word of God. But there was a disconnect somewhere. They knew the
word of God, but they didn't really understand the word of God. Now, this is what Jesus so
beautifully helps us to see when we read the Beatitudes. That's a good thing for you to
read, starting in Matthew chapter five. Jesus begins to talk about that really the key,
the key to understanding God's word and the key to understanding how we should live and
the key that God really wants us to focus on is not so much the letter of the law, but
to realize that the letter of the law or the word of God is trying to deal with our heart.
It's trying to deal with what's inside of us. And that's what Jesus tries to bring the
point across in the Beatitudes. And it's after he brings these points across that the crowds,
many recognize, wait a minute, this guy, there's something different about him. So no doubt
these scribes and Pharisees, they had heard about who Jesus was and they had traveled
approximately 75 miles from Jerusalem to where Jesus and the disciples were. And they came
really to confront Jesus. They came to ask Jesus a question. Now, of all the questions
that you might want to ask Jesus today, think for just a second, what question would you
like to ask Jesus? Maybe you've heard the scripture, maybe not. Maybe you don't know
what you'd ask him. Maybe you don't know much about Jesus, but maybe you have heard the
scripture. You know a little bit about who Jesus is and maybe there's something you'd
like to ask him. I mean, there's a lot of things that you could imagine that this group
might like to ask Jesus. They hear about all these healings he's doing. Maybe they say,
hey, let's get together boys. Let's get us a caravan. We'll go up there. Some of us are
sick. We'll ask Jesus to heal us. We'll ask Jesus to heal our family. We'll ask Jesus
to help us to understand the Word of God better. We'll ask Jesus if he's the Messiah who was
spoken of through the prophets and what we would call the Old Testament. There's a lot
of things that these guys could have asked Jesus about. But do you know what they asked
Jesus about? They went all that way. They went before Jesus and this is what they ask
him. Why don't your disciples wash their hands? Now, of all the things that you could ask
Jesus, this man who is preaching with authority and doing miracles that had never been seen
before and of all the things they could ask him, they said, why don't your disciples wash
their hands? That's not the tradition. That's not the tradition that we do as Pharisees,
us good religious Pharisees who know the Word of God, us and our rabbis who teach us. They
know better than that. And here you're coming. Here you're in this position as a rabbi. You've
got these people that are following you. Surely you know what their tradition is and what
the rules are. So why don't your disciples wash their hands? Now, the Pharisees weren't
concerned with hygiene. That was not really a big deal. You know, it wasn't until the
1800s, 1847, this German doctor by the name of Simawise figured out that doctors and surgeons
need to wash their hands to stop germs from spreading. 1847, it took that long for people
to realize you need to wash your hands. He discovered that all the babies in one wing
of their hospital was dying and was able to determine that, hey, those who were dealing
with corpses and doing autopsies were then delivering babies. And that's the problem.
They were bringing germs. That's a whole other story. Anyway, they weren't concerned with
hygiene. The disciples, the Pharisees, they weren't concerned with hygiene. That didn't
come to them much later. What the Pharisees were concerned with was what they thought
was what God desired. Now, what they thought was what God desired was far beyond any of
the commands of scripture. What they were talking about when it talked about the disciples
did not wash their hands was not hygiene. It was about defilement. It was about uncleanliness.
Because in the Old Testament law, God had quite a few laws. And some of those laws dealt
with people being unclean. Sometimes you may hear it referred to as ceremonial unclean.
Now, to be unclean does not necessarily mean that someone is a sinner. It doesn't mean
that. Now, certainly there's symbolism there. I believe that's part of the reason why God
talked about that uncleanness and maybe part of the reason why God implemented some of
those unclean uncleanliness laws and restrictions maybe was partly due to hygiene. It's possible
that some of the reasons that God told them to do the things that they did was to keep
them safe on some level. But God gave a lot of commands in regards to things that would
make someone unclean. And not even bad things. Some of them were just normal good things,
things that just occur naturally that would result in people being unclean. And some of
these things were very serious. Some of the things that people would have like lepers,
for instance, people who had leprosy. Well, they were unclean and they had to be separated
from the rest of the people. It was a very serious thing. Now, again, it's not that lepers
were sinful or that they were evil or that they were being punished. But nonetheless,
God said, hey, look, these who have this skin disease, they need to be separated from the
rest of the group. And anyone who encounters a leper would be unclean. And there are a
variety of things which would make someone unclean. Here's one example, just so we can
kind of know what we're talking about. One example of that is found in Numbers chapter
19 verse 11. The person who touches any human corpse will be unclean for seven days. He
is to purify himself with water on the third day and the seventh day. Then he will be clean.
But if he does not purify himself on the third and seventh days, he will not be clean. Anyone
who touches a body of a person who has died and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle
of the Lord. That person will be cut off from Israel. He remains unclean because the water
for impurity has not been sprinkled on him and his uncleanness is still on him.
OK, so the Old Testament is full of a lot of commands like this. In this example, if
you touch a dead body, you're unclean until you go through the proper washing. You wash
your clothes and you wash up in the way that's prescribed that God tells you to. This is
the idea that the Pharisees have in mind when they approach Jesus and say, why don't your
disciples wash their hands before they eat? What they are saying is any good rabbi would
know that what you should do is that you should make sure that you are clean and that you
are not unclean before you eat food. Now, what the Pharisees did, what their problem
was is that they were following traditions of men because nowhere in the Old Testament
did God ever command the people. You have to wash yourself in a certain way every time
before you eat. You have to wash all the utensils you use. You have to wash the furniture that
you'll be seated on. Yet these are all things that the Pharisees believed and did. Mark
7 gives us a little more detail about that. These are the types of things that they would
do. Here's what the Pharisees would do. Kind of give you an idea of how this would play
out. They would look at a command like this, anybody that touches the dead body is unclean.
They would say, okay, well that person's unclean, but what if that person touched another person
and that person maybe touched the utensils that we're going to use or sat on the chair
that we're going to use. If it's unclean to touch a dead body and somebody might have
touched somebody who might have touched something, then therefore that uncleanliness could have
spread. So the only way that we can make sure that we're always clean is that we always
wash all the time. And so this was a tradition that was passed down by men. This was not
a command of God. This was a man-made tradition. And so what these Pharisees were saying to
Jesus is, why are your disciples and you not following this tradition that we have made?
So they asked Jesus this question and as Jesus does from time to time, he answers them with
a question. And he says, why do you not follow the commands of God? Now they say, why don't
you follow the commands of men? He says, why don't you follow the commands of God? And
he gives them an example at the beginning of Matthew chapter 15. He says, why are you
not honoring your parents? Because Moses said that you need to honor your father and your
mother. But what it appears as though this group was doing is that they were neglecting,
taking care of, and honoring their parents in some way, shape, or form. And what they
were doing, Jesus says, is he says, what you say is that any help that you were going to
give to your parents, you don't give to them because you say, oh, I've given that to the
temple. Now some of your translations say you've given a gift of Corbin or you've given
Corbin, which just means a gift to the temple. That is to say they were shirking their responsibilities
to their parents for whatever reason. Oh, I'm sorry, I don't have the money or the means
or the ability to help you because I've given it to the temple of God. And so they were
justifying their not fulfilling and living by the commands of God saying, but we're doing
something better. We're given to the Lord. So there's, I mean, hey, I wish I could help
my parents, but I can't. There's nothing left. I'm giving it to the Lord. Well, maybe they
could have took something else that they were using and given that to their parents, still
give the Lord the Lord's, but maybe they could have helped in some other way. But it's pretty
clear that their hearts weren't right. And they did many things like these, it says in
the book of Mark. So they had lots of these little things and lots of these ways that
they knew the word of God and the commands of God, but they did not understand the heart
of the command. The heart of the command is to love your parents and to take care of them
and to respect them and to honor them even into their old age as they took care of you
and you were young. So you take care of them when they're old. You don't try to shirk that
responsibility and say, ah, the letter of the law says, and I'm fine. And that's what
they would try to do. They would try to twist and pick these things out of the word of God
to make it fit what they wanted to do. So they say to Jesus, Hey, why aren't you following
these manmade rules that we go by? And Jesus says, why aren't you following the word of
God? Now you can imagine this probably did not sit well with them. And we see that later
on as you continue to read Matthew chapter 15 and then Jesus quotes from Isaiah chapter
29 verse 13. He says, the prophet was right when he said this of you for these people
honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Now that's a good verse. That
is a good verse and that is a tough verse. And that's a verse that we need to think about
for a second today. Now we can look at these Pharisees and these scribes and we can say,
oh, these horrible people. Oh, they're just so religious and they just, they just, they're
living for themselves and not for God, but hold up a second. And we need to make sure
that we don't fall into the same trap because maybe it's very easy for us, even those who
are Christians to get into these routines of, of religion and these routines that are
traditions of me. And we have lots of traditions that I'm not saying that they're bad, but
churches generally have lots of traditions that, that aren't commands of God. It are
just things we do and they're not, they're not bad or good. They just are. But sometimes
we, we get so, so caught up on our traditions that we kind of forget who we're here to serve,
that we kind of forget the word of God and that our whole religion really becomes nothing
more than just, well, I come to church sometimes and I know God's word pretty good and I pray
every once in a while, I do all the things that a religious person should do and that's
good enough. And those are things that we should do. But is that all we're doing? Because
if that's all we're doing and our heart is not focused on God and we're just going through
the motions kind of every week and every day, but we really have no desire, no heart to
serve God and to serve others, then perhaps today, if we are honest with ourselves, we
are those who honor God with our lips, but our hearts are far from it. And we don't like
to think of ourselves as being those people, but we have to test ourselves because sometimes
we fail. And it's okay today if you hear that word and the Holy Spirit speaking to you and
you say, you know what? I failed in that way, God. Praise the Lord. That's why we read God's
word. God's word, it's like a microscope that gets down into the deepest, darkest parts
of our heart, parts and things that we may bury away that we may not realize and recognize.
These folks that come to see Jesus, they thought they were pretty holy men. Turns out they
weren't. Turns out Jesus says that they're blind, that the blind lead the blind and they
both fall into the pit. We don't want to be those who are blinded today. We want to be
those who say, God, let your word speak to my heart. God, let your word open my eyes
so that I can see. God, let my mouth, when it speaks of you, speak words that come from
the heart that honor you and praise you, words of service, words that lift you up, God, so
that we don't become those who honor God with our lips, but that our hearts are far from
Him. I want to read you that passage from Isaiah 29, 13 from a different translation.
This is from the New English translation, kind of a more modern take on it, but nonetheless,
it gets the point across in a good way. These people say they are loyal to me. They say
wonderful things about me, but they are not really loyal to me. Their worship consists
of nothing but man-made rituals. Are we those who say we are loyal to God? Are we those
that say all the right things? Amen. Praise God. God is good. Do we really care in our
heart? Do we really care? Do we just say the words because we know the words? You don't
have to go to church long. You go to church a couple of months. You know all the words.
You know all the phrases. And sometimes we might just get caught in the loop of saying
those phrases and saying those words when we pray and saying them when we think the
right time to say them is because that's what we're supposed to do. Well, saying those words
are good. Saying amen and praise the Lord and all these things are good, but sometimes
we don't say them from the right heart. Sometimes we say them because we know that's what we're
supposed to say, but that's not really what our heart's feeling. It's good for us to be
honest with ourselves and say, you know what, my heart's not always right. Jesus gives a
hard word here. Maybe this word is speaking of us today. Maybe we fall into that trap
of those who honor the Lord with our lips. We sit on the pew every week. We do some pretty
good things. But what's your heart like today? What's your heart like? What's really deep
down inside? And Jesus speaks this to these people and certainly they weren't happy to
hear it. And maybe some of us aren't happy to hear it today. Maybe we are happy to hear
it. If God has revealed to us today that our heart is not right, then praise God, we need
to rejoice and we need to repent. God speaks to us through his word and through his Holy
Spirit. And when God reveals to us things in our heart that shouldn't be there, then
we need to say, God, you've got to help my heart. And so these guys didn't care about
washing their hands. They cared about the traditions of men. And Jesus said, look, I'm
not worried about man-made traditions. I'm worried about serving God and following his
commands. And more importantly, what Jesus is most concerned about is what's in our heart.
And so he said in the verse we started with, defilement does not come by what you eat.
You see, this group said, oh, if you eat something that's touched something unclean, you're going
to be unclean. And Jesus is saying, no, no, no, no, no. That uncleanness in the Old Testament,
certainly in some way it was symbolic of what our sin is. Now, again, not to say that all
those in the Old Testament who were unclean were sinful. Some of them were natural things.
But nonetheless, it's symbolic of you and I that we are unclean before God, that we
are like those leopards who are separated from God because of our uncleanliness, because
of our sinfulness. And the only way for those who are unclean to be made clean in the Old
Testament was to be washed. That's the only way. And certainly that's pointing us forward
to Jesus Christ, who washes us by his blood so that our sins may be forgiven. That we
are those today whose hearts are as black and as dark and as evil as they can be. And
even when we strive to do our best and we seek God and we read his words and we desire
to live by his commands, there are things in our heart that creep up. There are things
that should not be there. And Jesus said, look, don't worry about what you eat. These
Pharisees didn't need to worry about what they ate. These disciples of Jesus didn't
need to worry about what they ate. What Jesus says, what comes from the mouth is what defiles
a man because what comes from the mouth comes from the overflow of the heart. So not just
what we speak, but all of our actions. Everything we do shows what's in our heart. Now we can
fake people out for a little while. You can have a lot of real evil in your heart. You
can be a pretty rough person, a pretty bad person, and you can hide that for a little
while. But ultimately our heart will reveal itself. And that's a scary thing. And you
know that's a scary thing because there's been some times in your life that there's
some things in your heart that revealed itself. That you said that thing that you've been
harboring for years and then one day it comes out. That you acted in such a way that you
shouldn't have acted. Sometimes those things that are deep down in our heart that shouldn't
be there, they make their way out and Jesus wants us to examine our heart. Chances are
I'm going to go on a limb and say every one of us has something in our heart today, maybe
a lot of stuff in our hearts today that shouldn't be there. And maybe some of it we hadn't dealt
with and we hadn't wanted to deal with because we're just stewing over something. And maybe
some of them we are dealing with and we're praying to God and we're saying, God, I need
you to help me. It's there. I don't want it to be there. And we keep failing and we keep
struggling and those thoughts keep coming and those feelings keep coming. Then we just
keep coming to God and say, okay, God, I need you to help change my heart. Change my heart,
oh God. Open up my eyes. I want to see your glory coming in my life. You know those are
the words of a VBS song. That's the importance of VBS. I learned those words years ago. That's
my prayer sometimes, the words from that kids song from VBS. God, change my heart, oh God.
Open up my eyes so I can see your glory coming in my life. That's what Jesus is talking about
here. He's not talking about what we eat. He's not talking about washing our hands.
So he says this and the disciples come to him and they say, look, Jesus, these guys
has come up to you. They're not happy about this. And he says, look, leave them alone,
he says. Let them be. The blind lead the blind. They'll fall into a pit, he says. Leave them
alone. And then his disciples come to him as they often do. When you read God's word
and you're confused and you say, I do not know what that means. Don't feel bad. Jesus's
disciples did it all the time. They would say, Jesus, can you explain that to us, please?
We don't get that. It's hard sometimes to understand. And then Jesus explains it and
often, more times than not, he's like, oh, well, that's super easy now that he's explained
it to us. And so when you don't understand the word of God, don't fret. Don't think that
you're dumb or you're not a good enough Christian. Do what the disciples did. Say, Lord, I need
you to help me to understand this. God, I don't quite understand your word. I need you
to help me to understand your word. And that's exactly what Jesus did.
In Matthew chapter 15, verse 15, then Peter replied to him, explain this parable to us.
Are even you still lacking in understanding? He asked. Don't you realize that whatever
goes into the mouth passes into the stomach and is eliminated. But what comes out of the
mouth comes from the heart. And this defiles a man. So even Jesus's disciples, they weren't
quite sure about all this defilement, what this man about eating and washing your hands
and what this had to do with anything. And Jesus gets to the heart of the matter. And
the heart of the matter is the heart of the matter. That Jesus says, look, defilement
comes from within you. What is within you needs to be changed. Our hearts that are within
us that are full of evil and full of selfishness and full of sin. Jesus says that is where
things need to start. Now, if you want to flip with me to Mark chapter seven, Mark chapter
seven, very similar to what comes next in Matthew. However, Mark elaborates a little
bit more on the last part of this. Mark chapter seven, Mark chapter seven, verse 21. In Matthew
15, Jesus gives a list of some things that are in the heart. And Mark gives the same
list except he gives us a few more things to chew on, a few more things to think about.
Now think about this as we read through this list of things that Jesus says come from the
heart. And let's examine our hearts today. Let's see if there's any of these things
that are in our heart. Mark chapter seven, verse 21. Far from within, out of people's
hearts come evil thoughts, sexual immoralities, thefts, murders, adulteries, greed, evil actions,
deceit, promiscuity, stinginess, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness. All these evil things
come from within and defile a person. That's a pretty good list right there. I suspect
that if we are honest, there are probably some things on that list that we struggle
with. Maybe a lot of things on that list that we struggle with. And Jesus says, look, these
are the things that defile a man. These are the things that are in our hearts. Evil thoughts.
If we can stop for a second without even reading the rest of these things, if we begin to focus
on our thoughts and refocus our mind, we would probably be able to eliminate a lot of the
things on this list. But we get these evil thoughts in our minds. We get jealousy in
our mind. We see people and we are so jealous of who they are and what they have. It causes
a hatred to build us in us and hatred leads to murder or a variety of other things. We
see the things that other people have and we become envious so much so that we want
to do anything we can so that we can keep up with them and have what they have. And
that leads us sometimes to being greedy and wanting more and more and more. And a lot
of things that we dwell on in our mind, that we focus on in our mind, they just consume
us because we think about these evil things all the time. And then eventually when we
think about enough, eventually they come to be. Eventually we act on those things. And
we need to deal with those things. We need to deal with our mind, that our mind is a
mind that's focused on God. That our heart would be a heart that does not dwell on these
sinful things. But that our heart would be a heart that is changed by God. So maybe there
are some of these things in our heart today that shouldn't be there. Maybe there are some
of these things that are built up in your life, in my life. These are things that we
need to begin to deal with. I don't know what your heart is like today. I don't know. I
hope your heart is good. But I know this, none of us have a perfect heart. There are
probably some things in there that's been kind of hiding and tucked away that maybe
you don't realize are there. Maybe there are some obvious things that you do realize are
there. Maybe there's some hatred you have for another person. Maybe somebody has done
you wrong. And maybe you know you shouldn't harbor that kind of hatred and those kind
of feelings, but you just can't bear to let it go. And so you just let it grow in your
heart. And that affects us. When sin grows in our heart and we don't deal with that sin
and we don't repent of that sin, then it affects us. It affects our attitudes. It affects how
we treat other people. It affects our relationship with God. But what Jesus desires is that our
hearts are changed. And the only one who can change our heart is the Lord. The only one
who can change it is the Lord, is Jesus Christ. And our hearts must be changed. Jeremiah said
that our heart is deceitful above all. It's full of wickedness, Jeremiah says. So we've
got to be careful with our hearts. Our hearts can lie to us sometimes. We have to be real
careful because sometimes people will say stuff like this. They'll say, oh, well, I
feel like this is right or I need to do this because I just feel it in my heart. Well,
your heart is deceitful above all. So you need to recognize that. Sometimes what your
heart is telling you is not really from a good heart because our hearts full of all
this junk that's there. Let's flip to Jeremiah. We'll close with these scriptures. Jeremiah
chapter 17, nine is the passage I just read to you. Jeremiah chapter 17, Jeremiah chapter
17, verse one, that's in the Old Testament. God is getting on to Judah here because of
their sinfulness. That's what we see in Jeremiah 17 verse one. It says this, the sin of Judah
is written with an iron stylus with a diamond point. It is engraved on the tablets of their
heart. That's pretty serious with an iron stylus with a diamond point. Now, diamond
is one of the hardest, if not the hardest mineral that we have in this world. You can
use a diamond to cut through everything. And what does God say here in reference to that?
He says with a diamond, their sin is engraved on the tablet of their heart. That's to say
their heart's in a bad shape. There's a lot of sin there. It is ingrained in the hardness
of their heart with a diamond. They're in pretty bad shape. And there may be some of
us in here today, if we're honest, that we're in pretty bad shape, that we've been living
in a lot of sin and a lot of disobedience to God and our heart is hard and our heart
is in a bad shape and our sin is ever before us. And then it's not long after that that,
he says in Jeremiah 17 verse nine, the heart is more deceitful than anything else and incurable.
Who can understand it? So our hearts are pretty wicked. Praise the Lord. God desires to change
our hearts and even God's people whose sin was written on their heart. As we see in Jeremiah
17, God gives them good news. God gives them good news. And Jeremiah 31 and Jeremiah 31
33, God says this, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those
days, the Lord's declaration. I will put my teaching within them and I will write it on
their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. Do you notice what God
said there? What happened before in Jeremiah 17? What was written on their heart? It was
sin that was written on their heart. But God says, I want to establish and will establish
a new covenant with my people and then in their heart will be written me. God will be
written in our hearts. And what a beautiful, beautiful truth that is for us today. That
we may have come into this room today with hearts that are full of things that should
not be there. But if God is going to begin to work in our lives today, tomorrow, next
week during our revival, if God is going to move in our life, then we have to have a heart
that is ready for God to move. We have to have a heart that is ready for God to hear
God's word. The Pharisees and scribes that came to Jesus, they did not have a heart that
was ready to hear God. They did not have a heart that was ready to listen to Jesus. What
about you and I today? Do we have a heart that is ready to listen to God? If we're living
in sin, then our heart's not where it needs to be. If we're living in sin and we're not
studying God's word and we're not repenting of our sin and we're not seeking God, then
we're not going to find him. I ask and it will be given. Seek and you will find. Knock
and the door will be opened. God is there for us today if we would only call upon him.
God is here today if you would seek him. We come into this room today with hearts that
are just wicked, with things that we would cringe if people knew today what was in our
hearts. God knows what's in our hearts. You know the craziest part? God knows what's in
your heart, that thing that you would not even dare want anybody else to know. God says,
I love you and I want to forgive you of that. God says, I want to change your heart. I want
to cleanse your heart. I want to make you a new man and a new woman. I want to write
my words and my commands on your heart. I want to be your God and I want you to be my
people. That's what God tells us and that's what Jesus wants us to get. He wants us to
understand what he's talking about here. He wants us to understand where we are and the
evil that's within us so that we can call on him, the only one who can save us, the
only ones who can cleanse our hearts and make them as white as snow is Jesus Christ. May
we be those today who pour out our heart before God, that we would open up our heart to God
today and this week as we prepare for these cottage prayer meetings, that this would be
a time that we would confess our sins to one another, that we would be those who lift up
our burdens to one another, that we would be those who praise God, that we would be
those who say, God, I need a heart transplant. Here I am, dear Lord. I'm ready for you to
come and work in my life. I hope that we choose that option. But those Pharisees and scribes
that heard Jesus speak that day, it doesn't sound like they chose the right option. It
sounded like they heard the word of God and dismissed it. I pray that this morning that
none of us would be those who would hear the word of God and dismiss it, that we would
hear the word of God and put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, that our hearts can
be changed to hearts that live for God. Let's pray. Father God, we come to you this morning.
We thank you for your good word. Dear Lord, I pray that you be with us. God, we need you.
God, I know for sure there are certainly things in my heart that need work. And maybe there
are others in this room today that know that their heart's not what it should be. Maybe
there are some things that they're struggling with. I pray that you just help them, dear
Lord, just to keep struggling, not to give in, to keep fighting those temptations, dear
Lord, of the things that are within us, dear Lord. But God, we don't even want to have
to deal with those things. We want to overcome those things. Dear Lord, temptation will always
be before us. But the closer we draw to you, the more that we seek you, the more that we
live by your commands, the stronger we become, dear Lord. And it's through your power that
you forgive our sins and you help us to overcome those temptations in our life. So dear Lord,
I pray that today that your Holy Spirit, even now, has started to show us things in our
heart that maybe we don't realize. Maybe we give ourselves a little bit too much credit,
dear Lord. Sometimes we think we're a little better than we are. But dear Lord, what we
are is we're wretched sinners in need of a Savior. So dear Lord, I pray that today that
we would seek Jesus Christ, that we would call on him, God. Maybe there are some in
this room today that do not know Jesus. Maybe they have come into this room today and they
are no better than Judas we saw in Jeremiah, dear Lord. And their sin is engraved on their
heart today, dear Lord. But God, I pray today that their heart would be changed. That God,
it would not be their sin that defines them. That they would no longer give in to that
sin, dear Lord, but it would be a new life in Jesus Christ that would define them. That
they would repent of their sins today. That they would put their faith in Jesus today.
That they would ask you to forgive them today, dear Lord. That they would give up the sin
and that they would turn to the Savior. That you would write a new law in their hearts,
dear Lord. That you would make them a new man and a new woman today, a new creation
in Jesus Christ, dear Lord. I pray that you'd be with us as a church as we prepare for revival,
God. That you would help our hearts as individuals to be where it needs to be. I pray, God, that
you'd bless us and help us to prepare to hear your word and to grow in your word in the
next couple of weeks. God, I pray as a church that you would help us as a church to have
a good heart. That you would give us a heart, dear Lord, that focus on the things that you
want us to focus on, dear Lord. That our heart would reflect your heart. That we would not
look to our own man-made traditions and our own human desires, dear Lord. But that we
would seek you in all that we do, God. That we would seek your words and your commands.
And I pray, God, that you bless these words today. Let your spirit work among us. Bless
us as we prepare for these baptisms. God, if anyone's made a decision today, if anyone's
put their faith in Jesus today as we prepare to sing, I pray that they would come forward,
dear Lord, so that we can rejoice with them. God, maybe there are some today that just
need prayer. I pray that they would come forward in this time of invitation. And I ask these
things in Jesus' name. Amen.