Matthew 15: And so you cancel the word of God for the sake of your own tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote, 8 ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. 9 Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God. It is amazing what we can learn about a person’s heart from their actions and words. The religious leaders were trying to use the law to discredit the teachings of Jesus. The only problem was they had bent the law so much to meet their own personal agendas, that now those personal changes to what they were trying to stop Jesus with were becoming an indictment of their own conditional faith. This classic example of political positioning might have worked with weak-willed people who were lorded over by evil, but it wasn’t going to work on the Son of God. Jesus calls them out by what was being said by them and in verse 11 Jesus says 11 It’s not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth.” Can we not learn from our Savior that the changes in our lives are internal changes to our soul and it changes our outlook on everything. If we are not changed at our core, then we may not be changed at all, meaning no Jesus in our lives. This may be offensive to some, but no more challenging and convicting than what Jesus said. Some may worry about sharing such a straightforward word of truth and drift back from displaying the full message. Look at what Jesus’ disciples said to Him in verse 12 12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you realize you offended the Pharisees by what you just said?” Then Jesus explains the condition of those He was talking to about this subject in verse 13-14 Jesus replied, “Every plant not planted by my heavenly Father will be uprooted, 14 so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch.”
If you want to stay out of the ditch then don’t follow those people who hold to truths they themselves have made up. Nothing good can come from those people and Jesus gave this warning in Matthew 7:15-20 15 “Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. 16 You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way, they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? 17 A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. 18 A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. 19 So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. 20 Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.
It is time for all those who call Jesus Savior to “spill your guts” and let us see what comes out!! If the result of doing this is love, encouragement, faith, and other good fruit, then you are one of us. If not, you are not right and need a Savior. At least, that is the case by the example Jesus set….if you can accept that example? Of course, there is the problem. You have not allowed Jesus to be Lord in your life and the end result is a separate teaching that is not God-centered and Spirit-led. Those who know Jesus have experienced something Paul writes about in Romans 6 5 Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised to life as he was.6 We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. 7 For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. 8 And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him.
Anything less than that and you have a problem. NO JESUS!! So spill your guts. Do you know Him? Then show some evidence by how you approach living for Him.
The Pilgrimage continues…..
David Warren
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