Last week’s sermon passage (Matt 15:1-20) was confusing! It began with Jesus condemning the Pharisees for their religious traditions (v. 3), that were specifically designed to ensure strict adherence to the OT Law. Jesus then turns around and seemingly contradicts the OT Law (cf. Lev 11) by claiming that food doesn’t make a person unclean (v. 11). Yet he concludes this episode by declaring that a person’s behaviour is important (v. 19). So which is it Jesus? Does God care about our obedience or not? The key to unlocking this riddle comes in Jesus’ quote from Isaiah 29:13:
‘These people honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me’.
God is not interested in formal compliance. Jesus’ issue with the Pharisees was they saw obedience as a way to earn God’s favour. God instead wants our hearts; a deep and intimate relationship with Him. God wants this so badly that he sent his only beloved Son to cleanse us of our sin, so that we can now enter His presence. If an unclean (sinful) human comes into the presence of a holy God, he/she is burned up by God’s holiness, just like paper is burned up if it comes into contact with fire. Yet Jesus stood in God’s presence, wearing our uncleanness, and was burned up in our place. We no longer have to please God through obedience.
But does this mean that obedience is now discarded? Not at all! It just comes from a different motivation. Christians do not obey God to please Him; we obey God because He is already pleased with us, seen in the cross.
So may Christians obey God with all of our strength; just not for the reasons the Pharisees did. If we have given Jesus our heart, then we should want to please him, through obeying his word.
