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Introduction:
“Lord, command what You will and grant what You command.”
That was a famous prayer from the church Father Augustine of Hippo.
Augustine is asking God to grant grace to obey God’s commands.
In other words, in our fallen humanity, we are unable to obey God’s commands unless God grants grace to help a fallen sinner obey the commandment.
This sparked a debate in the 5th century called the “Pelagian” controversy.
Augustine taught the biblical view of original sin, that in the Fall of Man, man became blinded, foolish, darkened, and enslaved to sin.
That he lost his ability to choose righteousness because of sin.
On the other hand, Pelagius taught that Adam’s Fall did not affect us as much as Augustine taught.
Instead, Adam made a mistake.
Adam’s Fall affected only Adam and did not pass his corruption onto humanity.
Man has free will and the ability to fulfill God’s righteousness on his own.
The early church condemned Pelagius and Pelagianism in the Council of Ephesus in 431 holding to the biblical doctrine of original sin.
Because of the Fall of Adam, we all are guilty and have inherited corruption in Adam.
Augustine, taught what the Bible taught..
The Bible teaches that Man is not basically good, but man is basically wicked and does not seek God.
This is a foundational doctrine of the Christian faith.
If you don’t understand this doctrine, you will not understand the significance of the doctrine of God’s free and sovereign grace in salvation.
And this is what Jesus is going to teach us today in Mark 7:14-23.
Recap
You remember last week the Pharisees confronted Jesus and his disciples for not eating with unwashed hands following the tradition of the elders.
We said that tradition is not wrong in of itself, it is wrong when it is elevated to equal status or even going beyond Scripture.
The pharisees were merely concerned with external righteousness while Jesus was concerned about true righteousness.
The pharisees were merely concerned about external worship, while Jesus was concerned about purity of heart.
The pharisees were merely concerned about upholding tradition, while Jesus was concerned about upholding Scripture, the Word of God.
And Jesus continues his discussion about where true defilement and corruption comes from.
As we look at this next section in Mark, which is really continuing the discussion where we left off last week, we will ask three questions:
Where does corruption come from?
(vv.
14-18)
2. How is corruption manifested?
(vv.
21-23)
3.
Where can we be cleansed?
(v.
19)
Scripture Reading:
Mark
I.
Where does corruption come from?
Now if you turn to the news, the world will tell you corruption comes from the outside.
It comes from a broken government.
It comes from a lack of education or resources in impoverished communities.
It comes from a failure of leadership.
Or it comes from our surrounding environment.
It comes from our family upbringing.
But Jesus goes deeper than this, Jesus says that corruption does not happen ultimately happen outside of us, but inside of us.
For the Pharisees, corruption comes from not upholding the tradition of the elders.
You remember how popular Jesus was in Galilee.
And he gathers the crowds and he wants to teach them a foundational and basic truth.
He is summoning the crowds to listen and understand these basic truths.
Christianity is a listening religion.
It is a religion that does not turn of one’s mind, but he says listen and understand.
Corruption or pollution does not come from eating certain foods, but corruption and defilement comes from within.
In other words, external acts do not make you dirty.
What makes you dirty is a dirty heart.
Verse 16 “If any man has ears to hear, let him hear.”
KJV.
Notice in the ESV, there is no verse 16, because if you look at your footnote, verse 16 is not in the earliest manuscripts.
And Jesus would often dismiss the crowd and explain privately to the disciples.
A Parable was a extended word picture to illustrate a spiritual truth.
The disciples did not understand what Jesus was talking about.
So they asked.
The disciples were often slow in understanding just as we are.
Jesus is pretty explicit here.
He gives a mild rebuke to the disciples.
Even as disciples we still don’t get it.
Have you been with me for so long and you still don’t get it?
Are you guys just as clueless as the crowds?
What patience our Lord had with his disciples.
What comes in cannot make a person unclean?
Why?
Because it is expelled, eliminated CSB, draught KJV, sewer NLT.
You eat something bad, your stomach feels bad, and then it goes into the toilet.
It is not the things on the outside that make you dirty because it is expelled.
Corruption comes from a sinful heart.
The heart is the control center of the self.
The heart is where the self wills, feels, thinks, acts, reasons.
When the Bible speaks of heart, it is not thinking about a human organ, but the inner being or self where its personality, decisions, and thinking is manifested through the body.
When Adam fell, we inherited guilt and corruption.
Not only we are guilty before God, we are corrupt before God.
But pastor I’m not that bad?
I don’t hurt people or I try to be a good person.
“Original sin is in us like our beard.
We are shaved and look clean; tomorrow our beard has grown again, nor does it cease growing while we remain on earth.
In like manner original sin cannot be extirpated from us; it springs up in us as long as we live.”
Luther
Sin can also be manifested in righteous deeds or external actions
Isaiah
You remember Augustine said, “Grant what you command?” Augustine taught that when Adam fell, he lost his free will.
After the Fall, man does not have the ability to choose good, but he only chooses what is displeasing in the Lord’s eyes.
The debate not only goes back to the 5th century, but even the 16th century in the time of the Reformation.
The Reformers taught that when Adam fell, we fell in Adam and also inherited his guilt and corruption.
The Reformers held the Augustian view of sin which really the biblical view of sin.
What does Paul mean that we are dead in sin?
How did the Fall affect mankind?
To what extend did sin affect us?
Luther wrote a book called the Bondage of the Will which he debated a humanist named Erasmas.
Humanist stress the value and goodness of man and the progress of the human individual.
Luther, believed that man was inherently corrupt.
This debate was even between the Calvinists of the 16th century and the Remonstrants, who were protesting against Calvinistic doctrine on free will.
Jacob Arminius taught that with God’s pervenient grace, man is able to choose God and will the good.
The Reformers taught that man is unable to please God.
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