Words in italic type have been added for clarity. They are not found in the original Hebrew or Aramaic.

Fear Cancels Faith

Matthew 15

Defilement Comes from Within

Matthew 15:¹ Then the scribes and Pharisees who were from Jerusalem came to Jesus, saying,

Matthew 15:² “Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.”

Matthew 15:³ He answered and said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition?

Matthew 15:⁴ For God commanded, saying, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’

• Matthew 15:⁵ But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is a gift to God”—

Matthew 15:⁶ then he need not honor his father or mother.’ Thus you have made the (word) commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.

Matthew 15:⁷ Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:

Matthew 15:⁸ ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth,
And honor Me with their lips,
But their heart is far from Me.

Matthew 15:⁹ And in vain they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”

Matthew 15:¹⁰ When He had called the multitude to Himself, He said to them, “Hear and understand:

Matthew 15:¹¹ Not what goes into the mouth defiles a man; but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man.”

Matthew 15:¹² Then His disciples came and said to Him, “Do You know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?”

Matthew 15:¹³ But He answered and said, “Every plant which My heavenly Father has not planted will be uprooted.

Matthew 15:¹⁴ Let them alone (let both the weeds and the wheat grow together). They are blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.”

• If we do not realize we are blind we will act as insane as blind man who gets behind the wheel of a car to drive it. The driver of a car full of people is a leader. These are the leaders of the Jews.

Being spiritually blind is to be blind to your blindness. It is a frightful thing to see a blind man get into a car when he thinks he can drive. That man will bring death and destruction to himself and everyone who gets in his way.

• When sin came into the world it infected everything in the world. Sin is a disease that causes blindness.

• If a man is born blind, without anyone to tell him differently, would he know he is blind?

• It is God’s job to tell us we are blind and once we believe it, God can heal us.

• Blindness is an appropriate symptom of sin’s disease, both physical and spiritual.
  
• Zephaniah 1:17 “I will bring distress upon men,
  And they shall walk like blind men,
  Because they have sinned against the Lord;
  Their blood shall be poured out like dust,
  And their flesh like refuse.”
  
• Isaiah 42:16 I will bring the blind by a way they did not know; I will lead them in paths they have not known. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. These things I will do for them, and not forsake them.

• Revelation 3:17-19 Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked— ¹⁸ I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. ¹⁹ As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent.

Matthew 15:¹⁵ Then Peter answered and said to Him, “Explain this parable to us.”

Matthew 15:¹⁶ So Jesus said, “Are you also still without understanding?

Matthew 15:¹⁷ Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated?

Matthew 15:¹⁸ But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man.

• What comes out of the mouth that can defile a man? Lies, anger, words that reveal an evil heart.

Matthew 15:¹⁹ For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.

Matthew 15:²⁰ These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.”

• Washing hands for eating is a physical act of cleanliness, not a spiritual act unless it is done as a lesson concerning spiritual cleanliness.
• The spiritual life takes precedence over the physical life because the physical life dies but the spiritual life is eternal.
• From the Pharisees point of view, the physical takes precedence over the spiritual, and this is why they are blind. They are blind to the meaning (the spirit) of the law.
• Reference Verses:
  • Matthew 23:25 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence.
  • Matthew 23:23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith.
• God made the law for man’s best interest. The law was made for man, but man was not made for the law.
• It’s the spirit of the law that gives eternal life while the letter of the law condemns a man. No man can keep the law. He misses the perfect mark, therefore; the law reveals to that man that he is a sinner and it condemns him.
• The blood of Jesus covered the mercy seat on the Ark of the Covenant. Inside the Ark were the Ten Commandments of the law. Jesus had to die and shed His innocent blood to cover the law.
• The Hebrew definition of “Ark” is “coffin”. Like Kryptonite for Superman, the law kills men.
• Therefore; the law cannot save a man.
• Reference verse:
  • Ephesians 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves (by the law); it is the gift of God,

A Gentile Shows Her Faith: Sheep and Dogs

Matthew 15:²¹ Then Jesus went out from there and departed to the region of Tyre and Sidon.

Matthew 15:²² And behold, a woman of Canaan (a Gentile woman whom the Jews called “dogs”) came from that region and cried out to Him, saying, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! My daughter is severely demon-possessed.”

Matthew 15:²³ But He answered her not a word.

And His disciples came and urged Him, saying, “Send her away, for she cries out after us.”

Matthew 15:²⁴ But He answered and said, “I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Matthew 15:²⁵ Then she came and worshiped Him, saying, “Lord, help me!”

Matthew 15:²⁶ But He answered and said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”

Matthew 15:²⁷ And she said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs (gentiles) eat the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.”

• She understood God’s line of authority which was ascribed to her as faith.

Matthew 15:²⁸ Then Jesus answered and said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be to you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed from that very hour.

Jesus Heals Great Multitudes

Matthew 15:²⁹ Jesus departed from there, skirted the Sea of Galilee, and went up on the mountain and sat down there.

Matthew 15:³⁰ Then great multitudes came to Him, having with them the lame, blind, mute, maimed (crippled), and many others; and they laid them down at Jesus’ feet, and He healed them.

Matthew 15:³¹ So the multitude marveled when they saw the mute speaking, the maimed (crippled) made whole, the lame walking, and the blind seeing; and they glorified the God of Israel.

• God calls Himself “The God who Heals.” The name of God is Yĕhovah Rapha’: Jesus is God.
  • “Heal” means to straighten that which is crooked. Lies are crooked but Truth is straight.
    Mark 1:3 “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; Make His paths straight.’ ” (Heal your path to your relationship with the Lord.)
• Truth heals people and nations to put them at ease. To put at ease is the opposite of being “dis-eased” So, when everything is going wrong…go straight – with God. Be healed and relax. God has it under control. He is the “God who heals” and the God who makes straight.
• Kids believe what they hear. If they hear lies, they believe them. When they believe the lie, they act on it, and when they act on it, they become disillusioned and “dis-eased” (not at Ease)
• God heals both the body and the soul: Marah (bitter) is the name Naomi used in the book of Ruth because of the bitter circumstances in her life. God’s answer was Boaz, a Kinsman-Redeemer. Jesus is mankind’s kinsman redeemer. This is why Jesus called Himself “the son of man”. He had to be a relative to men to qualify for being man’s kinsman redeemer.
• God heals people, nations, and the elements … with His truth: Jesus.
  • PEOPLE:
    • The deaf, blind, maimed, demon-possessed, and lame.
  • A NATION FOR NATIONS:
    • God “chose” Israel to show the world an example of how He heals. He separated them from other nations and made a contract with them. They are the chosen people.
    • But instead of an example of healing, they became an example of rebellion and illustrating how God relates to rebellious nations.
      • Exodus 15:26 And said, “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you.”
      • Judges 2:20-22 Then the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel; and He said, “Because this nation has transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers, and has not heeded My voice,²¹ I also will no longer drive out before them any of the nations which Joshua left when he died, ²² so that through them I may test Israel, whether they will keep the ways of the Lord, to walk in them as their fathers kept them, or not.”
      • Jeremiah 6:19 Hear, O earth! Behold, I will certainly bring calamity on this people— The fruit of their thoughts, Because they have not heeded My words Nor My law, but rejected it.
      • Joshua 24:15 “… choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve … But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
      • Nations die from the top down. Bad government kills schools. Bad schools kill churches, bad churches kill families. Bad families kill their children. Bad children kill animals, each other and at the last gasp of a dead nation: they kill their parents.
  • THE ELEMENTS:
    • Waters of Marah (bitterness) Exodus 15:23
      God told Moses to throw a tree in the water. The tree healed the water (made it sweet).

Feeding the Four Thousand

Matthew 15:³² Now Jesus called His disciples to Himself and said, “I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat. And I do not want to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way.”

Matthew 15:³³ Then His disciples said to Him, “Where could we get enough bread in the wilderness to fill such a great multitude?”

Matthew 15:³⁴ Jesus said to them, “How many loaves do you have?”

And they said, “Seven, and a few little fish.”

Matthew 15:³⁵ So He commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground.

Matthew 15:³⁶ And He took the seven loaves and the fish and gave thanks, broke them and gave them to His disciples; and the disciples gave to the multitude.

Matthew 15:³⁷ So they all ate and were filled, and they took up seven large baskets full of the fragments that were left.

Matthew 15:³⁸ Now those who ate were four thousand men, besides women and children.

Matthew 15:³⁹ And He sent away the multitude, got into the boat, and came to the region of (Magadan) Magdala.