Why Don’t You Wash Your Hands?

13th Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

Have you ever noticed how much people like to tell other people what to do? I’ve tried to become a little more selective when I offer my suggestions to others. I’m still willing to offer an opinion, but offering suggestions to others takes on an entirely different set of “problem possibilities.” I’ll mention just a couple of these problems. First, there’s always the possibility that you will be caught not doing the very thing that you suggested the other person do, and you then end up with the label “hypocrite.” Another possibility would be that you suggest something to another person, not knowing all the possible ramifications of the possible outcomes of your suggestions, and then the other person heeds your advice, and life begins to go badly for that person. Then you are saddled with the label of being a “giver of bad advice.” We could probably play this little game for quite a while.

When we arrive at chapter 7 of Mark, the Pharisees and their scribes have returned to the scene. They were rather obviously missing from chapter 6, but evidently they have now “regrouped” and have shown up in force to take their next best shot at Jesus. This time, the target was His disciples.

Jesus’ disciples were under constant scrutiny. It was true in Jesus’ day, and it is true today. This time they are the target of the religious leaders of that day. It seems that often Jesus’ disciples are under the scrutiny of those obsessed with greater and greater orthodoxy.

That’s one thing that bothers me about orthodoxy. Orthodoxy presupposes regulation on relationship. I can illustrate. I have three siblings – you’ve met all three of them. I am close to each of them, but was closest in age to my brother, Tony. We were separated by only 13 months, and were raised a little like twins are raised. I still remember the day that Dad let me go someplace, and Tony wasn’t allowed to “tag along.” But that was when I was in the seventh grade. Up until that time, we were rather inseparable. During our childhood and youth years, Mother and Dad would instruct us in how we were to get along with one another. He and I got along rather well, for brothers, but there was the occasional disagreement. They, and others, tried to help us define our relationship.

However, there came a time in our lives when it really became no body else’s business how Tony and I defined our relationship. We knew how we wanted to relate to each other, and no one could really tell us how we were “supposed” to relate.

I’ve noticed two groups of people in our world. There is the one group who presupposes that they know how every person is to relate with God, and there is the group who realize that they can’t possibly define another person’s relationship with God. I am most disturbed by the former group, and so I attempt to live as a member of that second group of people. I don’t always succeed.

Well, I’ve gone to preachin’. Let me take us back to the text. The Pharisees and their scribes were strict followers of the law. Barbara Reid of Catholic Theological Union in Chicago says that “prescriptions for ritual washing of hands and feet before entering the tent of meeting are given by Moses to Aaron and his sons in Exodus 30:19; 40:12. By the second century B.C.E.. some Jews who were not priests had voluntarily assumed the practice of washing hands before morning prayer and before eating. Some wanted to impose these and other such observances on all Jews. It was mainly urban elites who defined and maintained this ‘traditions of the elders’ (v.3). This tradition would be very difficult to observe for itinerants such as Jesus, or for his followers who were mainly peasant farmers and fisherfolk, due to lack of water for ritual ablutions and contact with pollutants such as dead fish.”[1] In other words, the orthodox practices originally given to the Priests were now by the Pharisees being translated into ritual practices which were becoming reasonably accepted as practices to be imposed on the general population of Jews.

Jesus identified this practice and their intent with a quote from Isaiah – “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.” Then Jesus said to them, “You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”

It seems that even then, the practice of adding to the law was in vogue. That kind of thing happens all the time in Christianity these days. We assume a personal position of obedience, come to a realization that “if it’s good for me, it’s got to be good for everyone else,” and then we go full force trying to impose it on others.

Cornerstone – here is the caution for us – individually, and as a congregation of faithful followers. Jesus’ teachings are often in opposition to mainstream thinking – to what most consider the “obvious” way of thinking. We must always be careful not to impose our human thinking on the spiritual direction of God. Through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, God is perfectly capable of interpreting the will of God for other’s lives. As witnesses to the Father, we are to tell the world what God has said, and then allow the Spirit of God freedom to interpret as He desires.

Did you find yourself squirming a little this morning as the scriptures were being read? I know that I did. James always has a way of “eating my lunch,” and these words from our Lord are indicting to even the most trustworthy of servants. Defilements come out of us all – defilement is universal. There is not a man, woman, or child among us who does not stand guilty of the things Jesus lists in this passage, or the things that James mentions in his epistle. We are all guilty. We are all defiled.

To answer the question asked by the Pharisees, Jesus doesn’t tell us not to wash our hands. Right living is never a bad idea. And doing things to show God our attempts at being pure as we approach God are all good things. There is a sense in which we ought to let the Pharisees off the hook a little. A little disclaimer here – I stole this morning’s title from Samuel Candler. He wrote a powerful sermon on this passage 6 years ago. I know it was powerful – because several people that I read referred to his sermon. Anyway, Candler suggests that the Pharisees were doing something that you and I still try to do today – they were attempting to make holy acts which were common. They washed before their meals, trying to make something holy out of what was merely a common meal. Candler suggests that you and I do the same thing today. We offer blessings before we eat, attempting to make something holy out of a very common act. We pray before we do a lot of things – always attempting to invoke God’s blessing and favor on the act we are about to perform.[2]

It’s not a bad thing, asking for God’s blessing. It turns into a bad thing, though, when we try to hold God responsible for our irresponsibilities, our lack of preparation, our unwillingness to follow the teachings of God, and our insistence that the mere act of praying itself ought to guarantee the outcome of our actions. And we don’t do ourselves any favors when we insist that everyone else approach their prayer lives the way we approach ours.

A couple of other things for our consideration this morning. Earlier, I said that Jesus’ teachings are often in opposition to mainstream thinking – to what most consider the “obvious” way of thinking. Jesus has a tendency to radically flip our thinking upside down. This is a great example. The Pharisees were insistent that it was what went into the person that defiled the person. They avoided ingestion of all kinds of things. Go back and read your Levitical law – there was a laundry list of things that the Jews were to avoid.

Jesus turned their world upside down. He was pretty adamant about it when He said, “Listen to me, all of you and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.” It’s not what goes in – it’s what comes out. The stuff that God made – it’s all good. So it’s not the good stuff that goes in that defiles a person – it’s what comes out – that which is conceived in our minds and our hearts and ultimately expressed in our actions that defiles a person.

I tell you, friends – this list that Jesus puts out there haunts me. Elsewhere in the scriptures, He says that if we’re guilty of any sin, we’re guilty of them all. There’s some of these sins I don’t want to be guilty of – but I am.

Jesus said it’s what comes out of our mouths that defiles us. I think that statement is true in a general sense, and it’s true in a specific sense. I’ll mention one item that’s on the list. Slander. You could add gossip to that list, quite easily. It has about the same effect. When we speak about other persons, we do harm to that person. That’s the lesson from James, later in the chapter. He talks about the tongue, and reminds us that the tongue is like the rudder on a large ship – it steers the direction of that great vessel. It’s the same in our lives.

I have a friend who has a statement that he makes when a well-meaning church member starts to tell him something about another person. He says this: “Be careful what you tell me, because in telling me, you really tell me three things: you tell me what you think of that other person; you also tell me what you think about yourself; and in your telling, you tell me something about what you think about me.” That turns out to be a pretty good rule of thumb when it comes to slander and gossip. We accomplish so much more than we intend. We inform our hearers, certainly, what we think of the person of whom we speak. That was probably our intent. But we do more than that – we tell our hearers what we think about ourselves – about our ability to love, tolerate, and forgive others. And finally, we tell our hearers something of what we think of their character – are they the kind of person who likes to listen to complaints and charges brought against another person?

Paul makes five statements in the 4th chapter of Romans that help us with application this morning. He says:

1. v.13 “Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather determine this-- not to put an obstacle or a stumbling block in a brother's way.”

2. v. 15 “For if because of food your brother is hurt, you are no longer walking according to love. Do not destroy with your food him for whom Christ died.”

3. v.17 “for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”

4. v. 19 “So then let us pursue the things which make for peace and the building up of one another.”

5. v. 22 “The faith which you have, have as your own conviction before God. Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves.”

Wise words for us all. You and I – we seek to please God. Every person in this room wants to please God. We do so best as we serve others. Rules are important, but we serve others best when we remember that relationships are a whole lot more important. We help others the most when we encourage the development of the faith relationship that they have with God – that personal relationship which exists between God and every autonomous individual God has created.

Richard W. Dunn, PhD.

1 Lectionary Homiletics, “Proper 17 – Exegesis,” Barbara E. Reid, vol. 17, No. 5, p.37.

2 Samuel Candler - "Why Don't You Wash Your Hands?" - http://www.day1.net/index.php5?view=transcripts&tid=214