WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.040 I'm going to have a look at the passage we read from Mark 7. 00:00:06.040 --> 00:00:10.320 It's a bit of a longer text today for the amount that we've been looking at in the Gospel 00:00:10.320 --> 00:00:11.439 of Mark. 00:00:11.439 --> 00:00:12.439 We carry on our series. 00:00:12.439 --> 00:00:16.879 We've got about a month left till we take a break for the summer from Mark. 00:00:16.879 --> 00:00:18.559 This is a really important passage. 00:00:18.559 --> 00:00:24.640 Jesus here answers the question, what defiles us? 00:00:24.640 --> 00:00:26.839 So let's think about that. 00:00:26.839 --> 00:00:29.640 What defiles us? 00:00:29.640 --> 00:00:32.359 How can you become clean? 00:00:32.359 --> 00:00:35.679 And then what kind of freedom does that bring to you? 00:00:35.679 --> 00:00:36.759 So what defiles you? 00:00:36.759 --> 00:00:38.719 How can you become clean? 00:00:38.719 --> 00:00:41.000 And then what kind of freedom do you get from that? 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:44.679 All right, so first, what defiles us? 00:00:44.679 --> 00:00:50.920 Jesus here, if you were reading along, Jesus is having a debate with the Pharisees and scribes. 00:00:50.920 --> 00:00:54.880 Maybe the very first thing you can learn from this is that theological debates are good, 00:00:54.880 --> 00:00:55.880 not bad. 00:00:55.880 --> 00:00:57.400 Sometimes they become bad. 00:00:57.400 --> 00:00:58.880 But Jesus never had a bad debate. 00:00:58.880 --> 00:01:00.960 They were always good, right? 00:01:00.960 --> 00:01:05.320 And Jesus often entered into these debates, and here's one of them. 00:01:05.320 --> 00:01:09.600 And we've learned what it's about right here in verse two. 00:01:09.600 --> 00:01:15.120 The debate is about the fact that the disciples, the Pharisees say, are not washing their hands 00:01:15.120 --> 00:01:17.320 before they sit down to dinner. 00:01:17.320 --> 00:01:19.879 So the Pharisees and scribes are upset. 00:01:19.879 --> 00:01:21.680 They can see the disciples eating. 00:01:21.680 --> 00:01:26.920 So when you eat in the first century, the eating places are actually public. 00:01:26.920 --> 00:01:30.560 So they would oftentimes be along the main path that people would walk through. 00:01:30.560 --> 00:01:34.560 So you could always see Jesus and the disciples gather around a table eating dinner. 00:01:34.560 --> 00:01:37.400 The Pharisees could stand right outside a house and see that. 00:01:37.400 --> 00:01:39.280 And that's what happens here. 00:01:39.280 --> 00:01:45.320 And they say, why are your disciples not washing their hands before the meal? 00:01:45.320 --> 00:01:52.359 And they use the word actually to wash is the word in Greek to baptize, baptize. 00:01:52.359 --> 00:01:57.599 So immediately you have the sense that this has something to do with religion. 00:01:57.599 --> 00:02:01.239 In other words, they're not saying we're upset because you're going to spread germs. 00:02:01.239 --> 00:02:05.840 People are going to get COVID if your disciples keep eating dinner without washing their hands 00:02:05.840 --> 00:02:08.159 before it has nothing to do with germs. 00:02:08.159 --> 00:02:12.280 They had no concept for that, not really, not like us. 00:02:12.280 --> 00:02:15.439 And instead, they're talking about a religious problem. 00:02:15.439 --> 00:02:19.280 And the word that gets used in verse two is they're not washing their hands. 00:02:19.280 --> 00:02:21.680 Therefore, they are defiled. 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:27.319 And that's the New Testament term for the word unclean in the Old Testament. 00:02:27.319 --> 00:02:29.599 So they're saying they're not washing their hands. 00:02:29.599 --> 00:02:32.560 Therefore, they are unclean. 00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:36.520 And we're told here the Pharisees, they would wash their hands if they went to the marketplace 00:02:36.520 --> 00:02:39.159 because the marketplace made them unclean. 00:02:39.159 --> 00:02:42.680 They would wash their hands before meal because they know that there are all sorts of ways 00:02:42.680 --> 00:02:43.800 to become unclean. 00:02:43.800 --> 00:02:50.920 They would wash their hands if they interacted, even came in proximity of a Samaritan, a foreigner, 00:02:50.919 --> 00:02:55.639 of a different ethnicity because they were afraid that it was going to make them unclean. 00:02:55.639 --> 00:03:00.119 And that means that what they're talking about here is the cleanliness laws from the Old 00:03:00.119 --> 00:03:01.719 Testament. 00:03:01.719 --> 00:03:07.959 So Exodus, mainly Leviticus, Summon Numbers, we have these laws about cleanliness. 00:03:07.959 --> 00:03:13.279 And this is the part of the Bible where if you started your January reading plan, you 00:03:13.279 --> 00:03:17.560 broke down and gave up by the time you get to the cleanliness laws. 00:03:17.560 --> 00:03:20.319 The cleanliness laws are strange for modern people. 00:03:20.319 --> 00:03:22.000 They're difficult to read. 00:03:22.000 --> 00:03:25.199 There's lots of them, several hundred of them. 00:03:25.199 --> 00:03:30.439 And they're very hard for a modern person to say, how in the world could this be in 00:03:30.439 --> 00:03:32.439 the Bible? 00:03:32.439 --> 00:03:36.199 And what's going on with the cleanliness laws is the background to this passage. 00:03:36.199 --> 00:03:40.599 You can't really see what the Pharisees are saying and what Jesus is saying without getting 00:03:40.599 --> 00:03:46.039 some idea of what's going on in the Old Testament with the cleanliness laws. 00:03:46.039 --> 00:03:49.799 We covered the cleanliness, I'm going to say this, cleanliness. 00:03:49.800 --> 00:03:50.800 I can't say it. 00:03:50.800 --> 00:03:54.439 Cleanliness laws last semester in some detail. 00:03:54.439 --> 00:03:58.480 So I won't go through them in as much detail as we did last year. 00:03:58.480 --> 00:04:01.640 But basically it's this, that there's all these commands. 00:04:01.640 --> 00:04:04.320 Don't eat this type of food. 00:04:04.320 --> 00:04:09.960 Wash in these types of situations, particularly before you go into the temple. 00:04:09.960 --> 00:04:11.560 If you have leprosy, you're unclean. 00:04:11.560 --> 00:04:15.160 You got to go outside the camp, away from the people. 00:04:15.159 --> 00:04:20.519 If you have a baby, a mother has a baby, unclean. 00:04:20.519 --> 00:04:24.779 And many more situations, any kind of discharge of blood, any kind of skin problem, anything 00:04:24.779 --> 00:04:26.000 like that. 00:04:26.000 --> 00:04:30.159 There's particular ways to become unclean as a man, particular ways to become unclean 00:04:30.159 --> 00:04:31.500 as a woman. 00:04:31.500 --> 00:04:35.240 Don't touch a dead body, including an animal carcass, even after you're hunting, you become 00:04:35.240 --> 00:04:36.800 unclean. 00:04:36.800 --> 00:04:39.040 So there's all sorts of situations. 00:04:39.040 --> 00:04:44.399 And what you start to realize is there is no way to avoid this. 00:04:44.399 --> 00:04:47.079 You have to become unclean. 00:04:47.079 --> 00:04:49.639 And in some ways that was exactly the point of the cleanliness laws. 00:04:49.639 --> 00:04:55.719 In other words, what they were doing, what God was doing, is creating a visible external 00:04:55.719 --> 00:05:03.000 reminder in almost every life situation that there is wrong, there is something wrong with 00:05:03.000 --> 00:05:05.479 the inside of us. 00:05:05.479 --> 00:05:08.679 Another way to think about it is that these are like anti-sacraments. 00:05:08.680 --> 00:05:15.759 When the sacraments, Lord Supper or baptism, we have visible pictures of God's gospel. 00:05:15.759 --> 00:05:18.879 You can see the gospel happening in the sacraments. 00:05:18.879 --> 00:05:20.319 These are anti-sacraments. 00:05:20.319 --> 00:05:24.280 You can literally see that there is something wrong with you. 00:05:24.280 --> 00:05:26.720 And the something that's wrong with you is not giving birth. 00:05:26.720 --> 00:05:27.960 Of course, God loves children. 00:05:27.960 --> 00:05:30.600 It's not having leprosy even. 00:05:30.600 --> 00:05:33.399 There's no sense that your sin has created that. 00:05:33.399 --> 00:05:40.039 No, in other words, these are simply visible pictures to say at every point in life that 00:05:40.039 --> 00:05:44.519 the outside is to remind us there's something wrong with the inside. 00:05:44.519 --> 00:05:46.039 They're just symbols. 00:05:46.039 --> 00:05:47.039 They're just signs. 00:05:47.039 --> 00:05:51.879 And so God took normal practices of life and said, because this is cursed and you live 00:05:51.879 --> 00:05:54.199 in a cursed world, this is a sign of uncleanliness. 00:05:54.199 --> 00:05:58.959 Or he took things that are taboo already in the ancient world, like eating certain type 00:05:58.959 --> 00:05:59.959 of things. 00:05:59.959 --> 00:06:02.639 It was already taboo to eat pork, for example. 00:06:02.639 --> 00:06:06.319 Many, many countries, many nations in the ancient Middle East, before Israel said, don't 00:06:06.319 --> 00:06:07.319 eat pork. 00:06:07.319 --> 00:06:08.680 And you see what God's doing? 00:06:08.680 --> 00:06:13.120 He's taking something that's normal in the culture, just like we have our own normal 00:06:13.120 --> 00:06:16.879 things we all think it's gross to eat, and saying, I'm actually going to take that and 00:06:16.879 --> 00:06:22.560 say, well, I'm going to make that a symbol to remind you that when you see things that 00:06:22.560 --> 00:06:27.199 we say are unclean on the outside, it tells you there's something actually wrong on the 00:06:27.199 --> 00:06:28.360 inside of you. 00:06:28.360 --> 00:06:30.000 It's just a simple reminder. 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:33.560 And if you were unclean, you couldn't go into the temple. 00:06:33.560 --> 00:06:38.439 The biggest message was that if you're unclean, you cannot enter into the presence of God 00:06:38.439 --> 00:06:39.519 in the temple itself. 00:06:39.519 --> 00:06:40.639 You can't bring a sacrifice. 00:06:40.639 --> 00:06:43.279 You have to wait a certain amount of time. 00:06:43.279 --> 00:06:47.480 And the Pharisees here, you see the problem with the Pharisees, they're coming and saying, 00:06:47.480 --> 00:06:52.319 verse five, the tradition of the elders, you've got to do everything you can to make sure 00:06:52.319 --> 00:06:54.839 you never become unclean. 00:06:54.839 --> 00:07:01.039 And so what they did was they created all these extra ways to prevent yourself from 00:07:01.039 --> 00:07:02.539 becoming unclean. 00:07:02.539 --> 00:07:08.279 So in the Old Testament, when does God say you have to wash only one time? 00:07:08.279 --> 00:07:10.799 And that's before you enter the temple. 00:07:10.799 --> 00:07:14.639 So the only time that you would have to wash before the Lord is wash your hands before 00:07:14.639 --> 00:07:15.639 you go to the temple. 00:07:15.639 --> 00:07:17.919 But the Pharisees are saying, you've got to wash in the market. 00:07:17.919 --> 00:07:20.479 You've got to wash if you get in contact with the Samaritan. 00:07:20.479 --> 00:07:22.279 You've got to wash before every meal. 00:07:22.279 --> 00:07:24.439 You've got to wash in every single situation. 00:07:24.439 --> 00:07:27.639 And you see what they're doing, they're not maximizing God's law. 00:07:27.639 --> 00:07:30.680 They're actually minimizing God's law. 00:07:30.680 --> 00:07:32.120 That's what Jesus is going to say. 00:07:32.120 --> 00:07:37.720 And all of this comes from an oral tradition that would get written down shortly after 00:07:37.720 --> 00:07:40.720 the first century called the Halakha. 00:07:40.720 --> 00:07:45.480 And the Halakha is this group of traditions, the traditions of the elders. 00:07:45.480 --> 00:07:50.159 Verse five, the commandments of men, Jesus calls it at the end of verse seven from Isaiah 00:07:50.159 --> 00:07:51.240 29. 00:07:51.240 --> 00:07:55.759 And these are traditions that have been heaped on top of the actual laws. 00:07:55.759 --> 00:08:00.000 And they're traditions that have been given as ways to prevent yourself from ever becoming 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:02.439 unclean before God. 00:08:02.439 --> 00:08:04.879 They're ways to behave. 00:08:04.879 --> 00:08:06.759 For the Sabbath, there are 39. 00:08:06.759 --> 00:08:09.920 For the washing of hands, there are more than 20. 00:08:09.920 --> 00:08:12.480 There's all sorts of long list of these rules. 00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:17.319 And the point is not that easy to see at first, but here's the point. 00:08:17.319 --> 00:08:21.160 In making all these extra commands to try to prevent yourself from becoming unclean, 00:08:21.160 --> 00:08:26.120 and the Pharisees have actually ruined the cleanliness laws. 00:08:26.120 --> 00:08:27.800 Why? 00:08:27.800 --> 00:08:34.800 Because the point of the cleanliness laws was to say, over and over again, you cannot help 00:08:34.800 --> 00:08:36.000 but become unclean. 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:41.560 You see, the Pharisees have multiplied them to try to say, I can actually prevent myself 00:08:41.560 --> 00:08:43.720 from ever becoming unclean. 00:08:43.720 --> 00:08:49.120 And the cleanliness laws were always there to say, no, you have to become unclean. 00:08:49.120 --> 00:08:53.720 Because it's just an outside symbol that's trying to tell you about an inside reality. 00:08:53.720 --> 00:08:55.720 What really defiles you? 00:08:55.720 --> 00:09:00.759 You see, Jesus' battle with the Pharisees here is to say one thing, you miss the point. 00:09:00.759 --> 00:09:05.120 And the point is, you cannot wash yourself. 00:09:05.120 --> 00:09:07.080 You can't cleanse yourself. 00:09:07.080 --> 00:09:08.519 The Pharisees thought they could. 00:09:08.519 --> 00:09:11.240 If they washed their hands enough, they would truly be clean. 00:09:11.240 --> 00:09:12.679 But he said, no, that's just external. 00:09:12.679 --> 00:09:14.720 You can never wash yourself. 00:09:14.720 --> 00:09:16.159 You can never really become clean. 00:09:16.159 --> 00:09:18.600 You can't make yourself clean. 00:09:18.600 --> 00:09:25.920 Now the fact that the Pharisees did this, I think is just a slight pointer to the fact 00:09:25.920 --> 00:09:32.560 that no matter what you believe in here today, every single person here this morning, every 00:09:32.560 --> 00:09:38.519 single person throughout the world, has some sense of their uncleanness. 00:09:38.519 --> 00:09:45.519 Now every single human being at times in their lives gets some type of sense that they're 00:09:45.519 --> 00:09:50.319 willing maybe to say, I need to be washed. 00:09:50.319 --> 00:09:53.120 I need to have my heart cleansed. 00:09:53.120 --> 00:09:54.799 We all get a sense of that. 00:09:54.799 --> 00:09:59.360 And the Bible calls that the problem of sin. 00:09:59.360 --> 00:10:00.360 All right? 00:10:00.360 --> 00:10:02.559 So if you're a Christian, you say, I grew up in the church. 00:10:02.559 --> 00:10:03.559 I know this. 00:10:03.559 --> 00:10:07.480 Look, the Bible calls this the problem of sin. 00:10:07.480 --> 00:10:15.360 And the question of the passage is in some way, do you really believe in this problem? 00:10:15.360 --> 00:10:20.240 Out of all the things that are going on in your life right now, in my life right now, 00:10:20.240 --> 00:10:26.200 the list of problems that you could lay out, the money problems and the relational problems 00:10:26.200 --> 00:10:32.120 and the anxiety and all of it, are you really willing to say this morning that your biggest 00:10:32.120 --> 00:10:35.480 problem is your sin? 00:10:35.480 --> 00:10:39.840 That what really defiles you is actually something that's going on in your heart, something that's 00:10:39.840 --> 00:10:42.560 going on on the inside. 00:10:42.559 --> 00:10:48.519 This idea that every single one of us need washing, we're defiled, we're sinners, is obviously 00:10:48.519 --> 00:10:52.279 not popular in the modern world. 00:10:52.279 --> 00:10:53.279 Not at all. 00:10:53.279 --> 00:10:54.279 I don't know if you knew that. 00:10:54.279 --> 00:10:55.799 It's not popular. 00:10:55.799 --> 00:11:01.079 And there was a French philosopher in the middle 20th century named Jean-Paul Sartre. 00:11:01.079 --> 00:11:06.439 And he wrote a number of famous books, one called The Stranger, a novel. 00:11:06.439 --> 00:11:09.319 But Sartre is a great illustration of this. 00:11:09.319 --> 00:11:12.319 Sartre said that sin is an illusion. 00:11:12.320 --> 00:11:16.120 So he's one of the big voices of the 20th century that helped the modern world come 00:11:16.120 --> 00:11:22.080 to terms with the fact that sin is an illusion, that guilt is just a construct. 00:11:22.080 --> 00:11:27.320 So if there's no God, then there's no such thing as sin or guilt. 00:11:27.320 --> 00:11:31.560 Guilt, the courtroom type guilt is something that we've actually constructed from the ground 00:11:31.560 --> 00:11:32.560 up. 00:11:32.560 --> 00:11:36.320 But you can't say that it's metaphysically or philosophically real because there's no 00:11:36.320 --> 00:11:41.160 one above you to actually be guilty before or towards. 00:11:41.159 --> 00:11:43.519 So Sartre said, of course, sin's a construct. 00:11:43.519 --> 00:11:45.679 Sin is not real, and therefore guilt is not real. 00:11:45.679 --> 00:11:49.039 But listen to what he also writes. 00:11:49.039 --> 00:11:52.000 He wrote a really famous book called Being and Nothingness. 00:11:52.000 --> 00:11:54.639 And it's very philosophical, not funda-read. 00:11:54.639 --> 00:11:55.639 But this is what he says. 00:11:55.639 --> 00:12:00.480 He says, I am haunted by nothingness. 00:12:00.480 --> 00:12:05.759 Nothingness becomes Sartre's term for what the Christian calls sin. 00:12:05.759 --> 00:12:12.000 And in one place he describes it, he says, nothingness is the sense of having fallen. 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:13.000 And this is what he says. 00:12:13.000 --> 00:12:16.559 He says, we are perpetually haunted by nothingness. 00:12:16.559 --> 00:12:23.600 We're continually brought face to face with the fact that we cannot realize our own ideals. 00:12:23.600 --> 00:12:24.600 And you see what he's saying. 00:12:24.600 --> 00:12:28.600 He's saying, I don't believe in sin because I don't believe in God, and therefore there's 00:12:28.600 --> 00:12:34.960 no such thing as guilt, but I am haunted by the fact that I cannot live up to the ideal 00:12:34.960 --> 00:12:37.600 that I feel in my heart. 00:12:37.600 --> 00:12:41.200 He said, I don't believe in sin, but I know I need to be washed. 00:12:41.200 --> 00:12:43.200 That's what he said. 00:12:43.200 --> 00:12:48.120 And you know, Karl Marx a century before that, he said, I don't believe in sin. 00:12:48.120 --> 00:12:53.440 I don't believe in God, but I know society needs to be washed. 00:12:53.440 --> 00:12:58.560 I know that society needs to be cleansed of its problems, of its guilt and shame. 00:12:58.560 --> 00:12:59.560 And remember what he said. 00:12:59.560 --> 00:13:02.560 He said, you know, the problem is the greed of the rich. 00:13:02.559 --> 00:13:06.959 And if we could push down the greed of the rich and lift up the lower classes and actually 00:13:06.959 --> 00:13:13.519 create eventually a classless society, we could wash, we could cleanse society of all 00:13:13.519 --> 00:13:14.519 its problems. 00:13:14.519 --> 00:13:18.479 On the one hand, there's no sin, there's no guilt, there's no reality of any problem 00:13:18.479 --> 00:13:19.479 at all. 00:13:19.479 --> 00:13:25.199 It's all a construct, and yet we desperately need society to be washed. 00:13:25.199 --> 00:13:31.319 Heather and I were watching a film, a movie a couple weeks ago called The Triangle of Sadness, 00:13:31.320 --> 00:13:34.640 and it won a couple of awards at the Cannes Film Festival. 00:13:34.640 --> 00:13:44.720 And it's about the Uber Rich, the.0000001%, not the 1%, but that many zeros before the 00:13:44.720 --> 00:13:45.720 1%. 00:13:45.720 --> 00:13:52.400 And these four or five billionaires, couples go on this cruise on a luxury yacht, and I 00:13:52.400 --> 00:13:54.680 think it's in the Mediterranean. 00:13:54.680 --> 00:14:00.840 And they, you know what they're like. 00:14:00.840 --> 00:14:02.639 They're abusive. 00:14:02.639 --> 00:14:04.000 They treat the staff terribly. 00:14:04.000 --> 00:14:08.800 Of course, there are probably some very kind billionaires out there, but on this movie, 00:14:08.800 --> 00:14:10.440 they treat the staff terribly. 00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:17.160 One man made all of his money because he sold grenades and machine guns to everybody in 00:14:17.160 --> 00:14:18.160 all the wars. 00:14:18.160 --> 00:14:19.480 It didn't matter what side. 00:14:19.480 --> 00:14:23.440 And then the next person became a billionaire because they bought the right amount of Bitcoin 00:14:23.440 --> 00:14:25.759 at just the right time and sold it on. 00:14:25.759 --> 00:14:30.879 Another one became a billionaire because they have hundreds of millions of social media 00:14:30.879 --> 00:14:34.480 followers, and so there are a couple that just post pictures of themselves every day. 00:14:34.480 --> 00:14:35.480 And they all became billionaires. 00:14:35.480 --> 00:14:41.159 And they're on this luxury yacht, and they treat the staff so poorly, demanding the 00:14:41.159 --> 00:14:48.200 most ridiculous things, offering the staff Rolexes to meet impossible demands, foods 00:14:48.200 --> 00:14:52.480 that aren't even on the boat that they demand, all sorts of things like that. 00:14:52.480 --> 00:14:56.960 And then everything goes wrong and the cruise ship takes on water. 00:14:56.960 --> 00:14:58.740 The power goes out. 00:14:58.740 --> 00:15:03.259 It hits rocks and lands on a deserted island. 00:15:03.259 --> 00:15:08.519 And there's these three or four billionaire couples and only a few other survivors. 00:15:08.519 --> 00:15:14.200 And one woman, one of the survivors, she cleaned their toilets on the ship, but she had grown 00:15:14.200 --> 00:15:16.840 up in the jungles. 00:15:16.840 --> 00:15:20.759 And on the deserted island with no inhabitants, she knows how to make fire. 00:15:20.759 --> 00:15:22.200 She knows how to fish. 00:15:22.200 --> 00:15:23.600 She knows how to capture animals. 00:15:23.600 --> 00:15:25.200 She knows how to clean meat. 00:15:25.200 --> 00:15:27.320 She knows how to do everything. 00:15:27.320 --> 00:15:28.320 And you know what they do? 00:15:28.320 --> 00:15:29.800 They come to her and they say, I'll give you my Rolex. 00:15:29.800 --> 00:15:31.080 I'll give you my diamonds. 00:15:31.080 --> 00:15:32.840 I'll give you everything. 00:15:32.840 --> 00:15:35.759 I'll hand over a portion of my company to you. 00:15:35.759 --> 00:15:38.800 Just teach me how to make a fire. 00:15:38.800 --> 00:15:41.480 And you know what she does? 00:15:41.480 --> 00:15:43.400 She abuses them. 00:15:43.400 --> 00:15:45.200 She enslaves them. 00:15:45.200 --> 00:15:52.160 She makes ridiculous demands of every single one of them, and she becomes the billionaire. 00:15:52.159 --> 00:15:56.000 And that's exactly what Marx missed. 00:15:56.000 --> 00:16:00.399 You see, circumstances are not the problem. 00:16:00.399 --> 00:16:03.959 And Jesus says it very clearly at the end of the passage in verse 23. 00:16:03.959 --> 00:16:08.159 All evil things come from within. 00:16:08.159 --> 00:16:09.159 And you see what he's saying? 00:16:09.159 --> 00:16:12.399 He's saying, it's not the things outside us that make us what we are. 00:16:12.399 --> 00:16:15.120 It's actually that the heart is defiled. 00:16:15.120 --> 00:16:16.120 It's sin. 00:16:16.120 --> 00:16:17.439 It's what comes from the inside. 00:16:17.439 --> 00:16:21.959 Jesus gives his own example of this here in the passage. 00:16:21.960 --> 00:16:26.560 He says that this, even when we're trying our best to become clean, to make ourselves 00:16:26.560 --> 00:16:28.160 clean, this is what we actually do. 00:16:28.160 --> 00:16:34.400 He says in verses 10 to 13 that the Pharisees had taken this command, the Fifth Commandment, 00:16:34.400 --> 00:16:37.240 honor your father and your mother. 00:16:37.240 --> 00:16:42.800 And this command required in the first century and before that, that any family take care 00:16:42.800 --> 00:16:44.160 of the elderly. 00:16:44.160 --> 00:16:47.840 So oftentimes a family might own a piece of land. 00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:52.000 They might own some crops or an extra house next to them. 00:16:52.000 --> 00:16:58.080 And if mom and dad became ill, needed help taking care of themselves, couldn't farm 00:16:58.080 --> 00:17:02.720 the land any longer, then it was your responsibility, of course, honor your father and mother to 00:17:02.720 --> 00:17:06.880 take them in, to feed them, to support them, to give them a plot of land for somebody else 00:17:06.880 --> 00:17:08.640 to work. 00:17:08.640 --> 00:17:13.400 But the Pharisees, the tradition of the elders saying that we're washing ourselves, we're 00:17:13.400 --> 00:17:14.480 making ourselves clean. 00:17:14.480 --> 00:17:15.480 You know what they did? 00:17:15.480 --> 00:17:16.480 They said, well, you know what you can do? 00:17:16.480 --> 00:17:20.240 You can take that plot of land and you can pronounce the word Corbin. 00:17:20.240 --> 00:17:23.079 You see that there in verse 11. 00:17:23.079 --> 00:17:27.360 And that means in Hebrew, I've given this thing to the Lord. 00:17:27.360 --> 00:17:30.200 And this is basically a deferred gift. 00:17:30.200 --> 00:17:34.519 So what you're saying there is, I'm taking this plot of land, I'm taking this house, 00:17:34.519 --> 00:17:38.240 and I'm dedicating it to ministry. 00:17:38.240 --> 00:17:42.759 And that meant that when you died, all the money that would come from the crops, that 00:17:42.759 --> 00:17:46.200 would come from the house, would go straight to the temple, to the ministry of the Lord, 00:17:46.200 --> 00:17:47.640 to support the priest. 00:17:47.640 --> 00:17:50.400 And so what you could do is if you didn't want your mom and dad to get the house, you 00:17:50.400 --> 00:17:54.640 didn't want your mom and dad to take the crops, you could declare it dedicated to the Lord, 00:17:54.640 --> 00:17:58.480 Corbin, and it would be yours all the way to the point of your death. 00:17:58.480 --> 00:18:02.440 And then when it died, when you died, it would go to the temple. 00:18:02.440 --> 00:18:06.519 That way nobody could touch it because it had been dedicated. 00:18:06.519 --> 00:18:13.640 And you see what Jesus is saying, you human beings, you're corrupted. 00:18:13.640 --> 00:18:18.240 And what's happening is a both end, you at the same time want your religion and you want 00:18:18.240 --> 00:18:20.560 your sin. 00:18:20.560 --> 00:18:23.480 You want to follow the rules and you want to wash yourself. 00:18:23.480 --> 00:18:25.920 You want to try everything you can to make yourself clean. 00:18:25.920 --> 00:18:30.800 And you'll attach that to religion, but at the same time, figure out ways to hold onto 00:18:30.800 --> 00:18:33.160 your sin simultaneously. 00:18:33.160 --> 00:18:37.840 You'll figure out ways, clever ways to wash yourself, but at the same time sin in the 00:18:37.840 --> 00:18:39.120 very same moment. 00:18:39.120 --> 00:18:42.600 That's exactly what this law was. 00:18:42.599 --> 00:18:44.039 Jesus's point, let's move on. 00:18:44.039 --> 00:18:47.839 Jesus's point is this. 00:18:47.839 --> 00:18:52.119 Do you believe that today? 00:18:52.119 --> 00:18:55.279 That your biggest problem is your heart? 00:18:55.279 --> 00:19:02.399 That this list of sins in verse 22, 21, evil thoughts, that actually comes from within 00:19:02.399 --> 00:19:04.759 you? 00:19:04.759 --> 00:19:07.240 Now the question is, how do you become clean? 00:19:07.240 --> 00:19:09.119 Briefly. 00:19:09.119 --> 00:19:10.799 And Jesus tells us that too. 00:19:10.799 --> 00:19:13.000 He tells us that in verse 19. 00:19:13.000 --> 00:19:22.000 In verse 19, Jesus says at the very end, Mark tells us, he declared all foods clean. 00:19:22.000 --> 00:19:31.319 Now what Mark is doing there is saying Jesus declared food to be clean, but only as a summary 00:19:31.319 --> 00:19:34.519 of the end of all the cleanliness laws. 00:19:34.519 --> 00:19:38.119 So in that moment, Jesus, in other words, in declaring all foods are clean, you can eat 00:19:38.119 --> 00:19:39.680 pork. 00:19:39.680 --> 00:19:43.880 He's saying all the cleanliness laws are now finished. 00:19:43.880 --> 00:19:48.640 Now we have to be careful here because you might think that when he does that, he's minimizing 00:19:48.640 --> 00:19:49.759 the law. 00:19:49.759 --> 00:19:54.519 He's saying the cleanliness laws didn't matter that much and now we can put them away, but 00:19:54.519 --> 00:19:57.680 actually what he's doing is maximizing the law. 00:19:57.680 --> 00:19:59.600 Remember the Pharisees minimize it? 00:19:59.600 --> 00:20:04.000 They think the clean, they can actually obey them when the point was exactly the opposite 00:20:04.000 --> 00:20:06.680 to show that you can't, you can never make yourself clean. 00:20:06.680 --> 00:20:07.680 But what is Jesus doing? 00:20:07.680 --> 00:20:13.880 You know, he said, Jesus said that these laws are going to stand until every jot and 00:20:13.880 --> 00:20:15.920 tittle is completely fulfilled. 00:20:15.920 --> 00:20:19.440 Every tiny little bit of it is completely obeyed and fulfilled. 00:20:19.440 --> 00:20:25.279 That means that he believes that when he stands right here in their presence and says, all 00:20:25.279 --> 00:20:30.400 foods are clean, the cleanliness laws are finished, that he is fulfilling the entirety 00:20:30.400 --> 00:20:32.560 of the law. 00:20:32.559 --> 00:20:38.720 And the reason he believes that is for two reasons. 00:20:38.720 --> 00:20:41.159 And the first is this, this is what he's saying. 00:20:41.159 --> 00:20:43.480 Remember the cleanliness laws that they're a sign and a symbol. 00:20:43.480 --> 00:20:49.599 They're saying there is something wrong with your heart and the biggest issue you have 00:20:49.599 --> 00:20:55.079 is that your sin has separated you from the presence of the living God. 00:20:55.079 --> 00:20:58.119 We have a separation problem. 00:20:58.119 --> 00:21:02.919 And the cleanliness laws were there to say to you over and over again, you cannot enter 00:21:02.919 --> 00:21:04.239 God's presence. 00:21:04.239 --> 00:21:10.919 You have a separation problem in the only way, the only way that it can be fixed. 00:21:10.919 --> 00:21:19.559 You know, if you can't draw near to God, you have to hope that God might draw near to you. 00:21:19.559 --> 00:21:25.319 And the reason that Jesus in this moment can say the laws are finished is because he's 00:21:25.319 --> 00:21:29.519 saying, you can't come close to God, so I came. 00:21:29.519 --> 00:21:32.599 You see, he's saying, I fulfilled it. 00:21:32.599 --> 00:21:37.319 The problem was separation, but in other words, he's saying, you know, you want to go to the 00:21:37.319 --> 00:21:41.960 temple to see God, but you're separated from God by your sin, but today the temple's come 00:21:41.960 --> 00:21:44.279 to you. 00:21:44.279 --> 00:21:45.799 I'm the temple. 00:21:45.799 --> 00:21:47.399 Jesus is saying, I'm the temple. 00:21:47.399 --> 00:21:49.480 I'm standing here right in front of you. 00:21:49.480 --> 00:21:52.480 It's no longer a separation problem. 00:21:52.480 --> 00:21:54.519 I've come to you when you couldn't come to me. 00:21:54.519 --> 00:22:00.440 The second reason and one in the final and one commentator really helped me to see this. 00:22:00.440 --> 00:22:08.559 He pointed out that the background of what's happening here is found in the prophet Zechariah, 00:22:08.559 --> 00:22:11.119 one symbol at least you might say. 00:22:11.119 --> 00:22:16.319 Chapter three, Zechariah chapter three, we have a vision. 00:22:16.319 --> 00:22:18.559 Zechariah sees this high priest once a year. 00:22:18.559 --> 00:22:21.759 The high priest would wash himself. 00:22:21.759 --> 00:22:26.879 The high priest would actually go spend the night a whole week in fact away from his family 00:22:26.879 --> 00:22:31.680 and he would do that because he didn't want to become unclean in any way. 00:22:31.680 --> 00:22:35.000 So anybody that is unclean that you interact with, you become unclean. 00:22:35.000 --> 00:22:40.119 So he would separate himself, live in his own little shack for a week. 00:22:40.119 --> 00:22:45.279 But when it came time for the Sabbath day, the day of atonement for the day before the 00:22:45.279 --> 00:22:48.920 Sabbath, the day of atonement, the high priest would come out, stand in public and he would 00:22:48.920 --> 00:22:51.480 wash himself five times. 00:22:51.480 --> 00:22:54.559 So a complete ritual washing five times. 00:22:54.559 --> 00:22:59.000 And it's because he is the only person all year, one time, one time only, that can step 00:22:59.000 --> 00:23:01.000 into the holy of holies. 00:23:01.000 --> 00:23:05.839 So he steps inside the holiest part of the temple to offer one sacrifice before the Lord 00:23:05.839 --> 00:23:10.240 that would atone for the sins of all the people. 00:23:10.240 --> 00:23:16.559 And here in this vision, Zechariah three, the high priest has spent the night away. 00:23:16.559 --> 00:23:24.799 He's washed himself ritually five times, but we see a glimpse of heaven. 00:23:24.799 --> 00:23:30.919 And there is the angel of the Lord and Satan. 00:23:30.919 --> 00:23:36.480 And Satan says to God, the angel of the Lord, he says, look at the high priest. 00:23:36.480 --> 00:23:38.919 You know, he's done all your laws. 00:23:38.919 --> 00:23:41.079 He's washed himself five times. 00:23:41.079 --> 00:23:43.039 But look at what he really is. 00:23:43.039 --> 00:23:47.519 And the curtain is pulled back and what does the high priest look like? 00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:49.759 He's covered and he's covered. 00:23:49.759 --> 00:23:53.559 The ESV says he was filthy, but the Hebrew doesn't say filthy. 00:23:53.559 --> 00:23:55.920 The Hebrew says he was covered in excrement. 00:23:55.920 --> 00:23:59.879 He was covered in dung completely from head to toe. 00:23:59.879 --> 00:24:00.879 You know, he had washed himself. 00:24:00.879 --> 00:24:03.359 He had done all the cleanliness laws and there he was. 00:24:03.359 --> 00:24:04.720 The truth was pulled back. 00:24:04.720 --> 00:24:08.639 It showed his heart and he was covered in dung. 00:24:08.639 --> 00:24:11.879 And Satan says, you see, he's guilty. 00:24:11.880 --> 00:24:16.480 He can't come into your presence and the angel of the Lord turns and says, I'll just 00:24:16.480 --> 00:24:19.080 give him a new robe. 00:24:19.080 --> 00:24:22.920 And so in the vision, the angel of the Lord takes off the high priest's robe and he covers 00:24:22.920 --> 00:24:26.880 them in white, in a white robe. 00:24:26.880 --> 00:24:29.120 Here we are. 00:24:29.120 --> 00:24:32.320 You know that the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament, I can't prove this to you right 00:24:32.320 --> 00:24:34.040 now, but we've done it before. 00:24:34.040 --> 00:24:37.160 The angel of the Lord in the Old Testament, you know who he is? 00:24:37.160 --> 00:24:39.880 He's the Son of God himself. 00:24:39.880 --> 00:24:44.320 And here we are in the midst of the gospels and the angel of the Lord, the messenger of 00:24:44.320 --> 00:24:49.040 the Lord, the Son of God himself has come down and what he's saying when he declares 00:24:49.040 --> 00:24:54.800 all foods clean, he says, I'm here to give you new clothes. 00:24:54.800 --> 00:25:01.520 And Jesus Christ is saying, you can't wash yourself, but I've come to wash you. 00:25:01.520 --> 00:25:04.840 I've come to put a new robe on you. 00:25:04.840 --> 00:25:09.840 Look, there's a real danger here. 00:25:09.839 --> 00:25:15.919 Christian friends that have grown up in the church, do not let this be old news to you. 00:25:15.919 --> 00:25:17.799 You cannot clean yourself. 00:25:17.799 --> 00:25:19.599 You cannot wash yourself. 00:25:19.599 --> 00:25:21.679 You cannot get rid of your sin. 00:25:21.679 --> 00:25:24.359 You cannot push away your defilement. 00:25:24.359 --> 00:25:28.879 Only Jesus Christ, the angel of the Lord can wash you. 00:25:28.879 --> 00:25:30.240 He's the only one that can. 00:25:30.240 --> 00:25:36.119 And he came to give you new clothes. 00:25:36.119 --> 00:25:39.759 And so he was stripped naked. 00:25:39.759 --> 00:25:42.519 He came to wash your sins away. 00:25:42.519 --> 00:25:47.279 And so he was bathed in the death of his own blood. 00:25:47.279 --> 00:25:49.359 He came to bring you night to God. 00:25:49.359 --> 00:25:51.920 We're going to sing that in a minute near to God. 00:25:51.920 --> 00:25:55.700 And so he was ultimately separated from God. 00:25:55.700 --> 00:26:00.799 He came to take on everything we deserve at the cross so that he could wash you and make 00:26:00.799 --> 00:26:02.720 you clean from the inside out. 00:26:02.720 --> 00:26:04.400 And it's the only way. 00:26:04.400 --> 00:26:07.240 That's the uniqueness of the Christian message. 00:26:07.240 --> 00:26:11.519 In him, in his price, love and justice met. 00:26:11.519 --> 00:26:12.720 He loved you so much. 00:26:12.720 --> 00:26:16.480 And so he took on the justice you deserve in that moment. 00:26:16.480 --> 00:26:21.599 Now let me close with this. 00:26:21.599 --> 00:26:25.160 Food cannot clean you. 00:26:25.160 --> 00:26:28.359 Washing, ritual washing cannot clean you. 00:26:28.359 --> 00:26:33.640 The five ways, the five ways of Islam cannot clean you. 00:26:33.640 --> 00:26:40.120 And the eightfold path of the Buddha cannot cleanse you. 00:26:40.120 --> 00:26:44.560 The 12 steps cannot ultimately deal with your greatest problem. 00:26:44.560 --> 00:26:48.000 And a classless society cannot cleanse you. 00:26:48.000 --> 00:26:52.960 And equality and achieving equality cannot cleanse you. 00:26:52.960 --> 00:26:55.720 Human rights cannot cleanse you. 00:26:55.720 --> 00:26:58.800 Asceticism cannot clean you. 00:26:58.800 --> 00:27:00.720 Fitness cannot help you. 00:27:00.720 --> 00:27:02.480 Philanthropy cannot cleanse you. 00:27:02.480 --> 00:27:05.120 Society will not cleanse you. 00:27:05.120 --> 00:27:09.660 Religious rights and any other thing you want to attach to the list cannot help you. 00:27:09.660 --> 00:27:12.360 Not with the problem of sin. 00:27:12.360 --> 00:27:14.599 Only Jesus Christ can. 00:27:14.599 --> 00:27:18.640 Now let me tell you three freedoms that gives you and we'll finish. 00:27:18.640 --> 00:27:21.599 First one is this. 00:27:21.599 --> 00:27:27.640 If you believe that today, you have freedom from guilt. 00:27:27.640 --> 00:27:34.000 Satan remember stood before the Lord and said, you see that man, he's the best of the land, 00:27:34.000 --> 00:27:37.600 yet he's still incredibly guilty before you. 00:27:37.600 --> 00:27:43.040 When you trust in Jesus Christ, you need to know the very simple but majestic reality 00:27:43.040 --> 00:27:48.560 that you are truly guilt free before the Lord. 00:27:48.560 --> 00:27:57.600 Now some of us here today may, some of us probably do, I know, struggle with guilt 00:27:57.599 --> 00:28:02.759 and shame from the things that we've done in our life. 00:28:02.759 --> 00:28:07.879 Some of you struggle today with guilt and shame and a burden that's on your back all 00:28:07.879 --> 00:28:13.599 the time because of the current issues you have, the addictions maybe. 00:28:13.599 --> 00:28:15.219 It's either past or present. 00:28:15.219 --> 00:28:17.719 Some of you both. 00:28:17.719 --> 00:28:22.559 And you need to ask yourself this question today. 00:28:22.559 --> 00:28:29.639 If Jesus Christ's blood was sufficient for God, the Father in heaven to say to you, you 00:28:29.639 --> 00:28:35.000 are clean, you're guilt free, you are shame free. 00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:36.440 Can you accept that? 00:28:36.440 --> 00:28:42.399 You know, is that enough for you to say the burden is gone? 00:28:42.399 --> 00:28:46.960 The guilt that I feel, the shame that I feel all the time. 00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:51.480 If God, the Father can say the blood of Christ was enough, are you willing to say that about 00:28:51.480 --> 00:28:53.759 your own guilt and your own shame? 00:28:53.759 --> 00:28:56.599 You know, you have freedom from guilt in Jesus. 00:28:56.599 --> 00:29:02.160 Secondly, you have freedom from the commandments of men. 00:29:02.160 --> 00:29:05.480 Let me ask you, maybe you're here today and you're struggling with these ideas. 00:29:05.480 --> 00:29:09.599 You're saying I'm not buying, I don't know if I'm sold on the concept of sin. 00:29:09.599 --> 00:29:13.240 I don't know if I'm sold on the concept of defilement and the way you're describing it. 00:29:13.240 --> 00:29:15.880 Let me ask you this. 00:29:15.880 --> 00:29:24.040 How can you ever know, how can you ever know if your guilt feelings are real or just a 00:29:24.040 --> 00:29:27.880 product of the construct that you're living in? 00:29:27.880 --> 00:29:32.720 You know, if you buy the message of the 20th and 21st century, there is no such thing as 00:29:32.720 --> 00:29:34.160 guilt. 00:29:34.160 --> 00:29:36.160 It's a construct from the ground up. 00:29:36.160 --> 00:29:39.880 But let me ask you, every single one of us has guilt feelings. 00:29:39.880 --> 00:29:43.880 How can you know which one of those you can trust and which one of those you can't? 00:29:43.880 --> 00:29:47.600 You know, you say, well, I don't actually know that I believe in guilt. 00:29:47.600 --> 00:29:52.160 But then you look out and you see Paul Pot, you see the gulag, and you see Hitler, and 00:29:52.160 --> 00:29:55.400 you say, but at the same time, when I look at that, I know I want to say, I'm pretty 00:29:55.400 --> 00:29:59.120 sure that's guilt. 00:29:59.120 --> 00:30:01.160 On the one hand, you're told guilt is a construct. 00:30:01.160 --> 00:30:02.160 There's no such thing as sin. 00:30:02.160 --> 00:30:07.800 On the other hand, you know at the same time, you feel the fact that there are guilty people. 00:30:07.800 --> 00:30:10.480 And let me simply ask you, how can you know which one? 00:30:10.480 --> 00:30:12.360 And you see what Jesus does here? 00:30:12.359 --> 00:30:17.879 He says, you can either listen to the commandments of men or the word of God. 00:30:17.879 --> 00:30:19.799 That's the distinction He makes. 00:30:19.799 --> 00:30:25.599 The commandments of men come from every culture, every construct, every tribe, every nation. 00:30:25.599 --> 00:30:27.639 Our culture tells us this is okay. 00:30:27.639 --> 00:30:31.240 And then in 10 years, they'll tell us it's not okay. 00:30:31.240 --> 00:30:33.679 And we all know that these things flip-flop all the time. 00:30:33.679 --> 00:30:37.439 How can you ever know what actually makes you guilty? 00:30:37.439 --> 00:30:41.719 You see, you have freedom in Jesus Christ from the commandments of men because you've 00:30:41.720 --> 00:30:43.720 been gifted the word of God. 00:30:43.720 --> 00:30:47.799 How can you know unless you have a word from God, a true authority in your life to tell 00:30:47.799 --> 00:30:51.640 you this is actually what makes you guilty? 00:30:51.640 --> 00:30:55.039 And in Jesus Christ, not only are you free from guilt, but you're free from people's 00:30:55.039 --> 00:30:56.559 opinions. 00:30:56.559 --> 00:31:00.079 You're free from culture's opinions about what's wrong and what's right and then what's 00:31:00.079 --> 00:31:02.039 right and what's wrong. 00:31:02.039 --> 00:31:05.039 Lastly, you have freedom from guilt. 00:31:05.039 --> 00:31:07.000 You have freedom from the commandments of men. 00:31:07.000 --> 00:31:09.799 You have freedom from sin itself. 00:31:09.799 --> 00:31:11.319 Simple. 00:31:11.319 --> 00:31:17.399 Maybe the most important takeaway from this passage is simply this. 00:31:17.399 --> 00:31:19.639 Sin defiles you. 00:31:19.639 --> 00:31:25.119 So go and sin no more. 00:31:25.119 --> 00:31:32.639 It's very easy as a Christian to live a Christian life and to miss this simple fact that Jesus 00:31:32.639 --> 00:31:37.119 wants us to go and sin no more. 00:31:37.119 --> 00:31:41.399 Not so that you can get into his kingdom, but because you already have. 00:31:41.399 --> 00:31:45.519 And so Jesus will say a couple more times in the Gospels, you've been forgiven. 00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:47.639 Go and don't sin anymore. 00:31:47.639 --> 00:31:48.639 Sin defiles you. 00:31:48.639 --> 00:31:49.799 Sin makes you miserable. 00:31:49.799 --> 00:31:51.079 Sin makes you sad. 00:31:51.079 --> 00:31:52.359 Sin breaks everything. 00:31:52.359 --> 00:31:54.839 Sin breaks your relationships. 00:31:54.839 --> 00:31:57.279 Let me ask you this as we close. 00:31:57.279 --> 00:32:02.079 If you're a Christian this morning, are you serious about the fact that sin really does 00:32:02.079 --> 00:32:03.079 defile? 00:32:03.079 --> 00:32:06.959 Do you want, do you say, you know, I want to go and sin no more? 00:32:06.960 --> 00:32:10.960 I want to, I want to put away my sin. 00:32:10.960 --> 00:32:19.759 But when you do sin, you have a consistent and faithful advocate before the Father, Jesus 00:32:19.759 --> 00:32:29.400 Christ the righteous, who stands before God the Father for you pleading with his own blood. 00:32:29.400 --> 00:32:33.279 And so you see that Jesus's blood frees you from sin because it actually gives you the 00:32:33.279 --> 00:32:40.879 power to go and sin no more and to know that when you do sin, you're okay. 00:32:40.879 --> 00:32:41.879 You're guilt free. 00:32:41.879 --> 00:32:44.599 Both of those things go together at the same time. 00:32:44.599 --> 00:32:50.440 Nothing can separate you from the love of God, not even your sin. 00:32:50.440 --> 00:32:54.039 And so go and sin no more. 00:32:54.039 --> 00:32:56.160 Let's pray together. 00:32:56.160 --> 00:33:03.320 Lord we ask now that you would help us to see the emptiness in the culture's construct, 00:33:03.320 --> 00:33:10.920 the commandments and traditions of men and that we would instead find hope in the authority 00:33:10.920 --> 00:33:11.920 of the Word of God. 00:33:11.920 --> 00:33:17.800 And in the Word of God here you tell us that the blood of Jesus makes us clean. 00:33:17.800 --> 00:33:21.240 So Lord, we confess today nothing but the blood of Christ. 00:33:21.240 --> 00:33:22.680 We confess the cross. 00:33:22.680 --> 00:33:28.360 I do pray Lord that you would help someone here today to find the power of the cross 00:33:28.360 --> 00:33:33.560 and to find the power of being what it means to be washed Lord. 00:33:33.560 --> 00:33:37.240 So for those here that are struggling right now, you know their hearts Lord. 00:33:37.240 --> 00:33:42.640 You know the hearts of those who bear the weight of guilt in their lives. 00:33:42.640 --> 00:33:44.240 Free them. 00:33:44.240 --> 00:33:46.759 Free them Lord by the Spirit. 00:33:46.759 --> 00:33:50.120 Show them what it means to be washed. 00:33:50.120 --> 00:33:52.400 Give them great trust in Christ. 00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:58.240 And so we ask for this for all of us Lord and we lift this prayer before you as we sing 00:33:58.240 --> 00:33:59.560 to you about just this. 00:33:59.560 --> 00:34:00.920 And we pray this in Christ's name. 00:34:00.920 --> 00:34:22.920 Amen.