St Matthew, Chapter 15, verses: 15 - 16, Understanding: Those without

Our paragraph topic is:  (Christ explains what defiles a man) Part 1.    
 
Christ had taught the people.  He had informed the crowds that followed him of the difference between being unclean, defiled, and being clean.  For years the Pharisees had taught the people that they were unclean if they did not wash before eating.  They had impressed upon the people that they were an unclean people because they did not have access to water as the did the rich, the powerful, the educated, the well to do, those with influence.  For water was not readily available to everyone.  One had to go to the well and carry water to the home.  One had to walk miles to the river and transport water to where one lived, to have access to it, readily.  So to wash before eating was a luxury.  To be able to clean up before eating was the pastime of the rich, and yet this was the sentence that was placed upon the people, they were unclean.

But Christ came and taught different.  Christ came and opened the eyes of the people.  Christ came and gave new insight to the people to lift them out of the grave of uncleanness.  He instructed that it was not what one put into the mouth that made one defiled but what one brought out of the mouth that made one unclean.  And the Pharisees heard these words and took offense.  For it was they who were unclean. 

And understanding came upon the people.  A light awareness was brought to the people.  They understood the difference and the cloak of ignorance was lifted from their understanding and they became clean.  They became undefiled.  They became new children in the eyes of God through their understanding of who they were.  And the Pharisees took offense.  And then came the disciples seeking understanding.  For they were lost.  They were confused.  They were still under the cover of the trickery of darkness.   But Peter spoke to him, saying, "Explain to us this parable."  And he  said,"Are you also even yet without understanding?"

Are you yet even without understanding?  These were Christ's words to his disciples.  These are Christ's words to us today.  With all that has be spoken to you, do you still not have understanding of the words?  Seek their meaning.  Search their truths.  Desire their wisdom and it will come to you.  Christ left us his words to enlighten us, just as he spoke them to the crowds that followed him in his time.  His words lifted the veil of darkness from the minds of the people who believed that they were defiled.  His words open the minds and the hearts of the people who believed in him.  His words made clean a people who believed they were soiled.  And yet today we still are without understanding. 

Today we still do not grasped the spiritual meanings of the words he spoke and the cleansing that they bring to our hearts and minds and bodies and souls.  Christ came that there would be light in the world and men would no longer have to walk in darkness.  Yet even today we prefer the darkness.  Even today we prefer to live in the world instead of living in the understanding and the enlightenment of the words of the living God who provides all for us.  Christ opened the door.  Will you follow?  Christ gave us the path to follow.  Will you seek it?  Christ gave us the words to instill within us.  Will you feed on them?  The choice is yours.  Live in the light of Christ or exist in the darkness of the world.  Which will you choose?

St Matthew, Chapter 15, verse: 14, The Lesson: Blind Guides

Our paragraph topic is:  (Disciples warned to shun the Pharisees) Part 4.  
    

Christ had spoken and the Pharisees heard and took offense.  Christ called the people to himself.  He called their attention to what he was to say.  He told them to hear and understand, and his words opened the eyes and the hearts of the people.  For he told them that what goes into the mouth does not defile a man as had been preached by the Pharisees.  He told the people that it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles a man.  It is what is spoken that indicates that a man is defiled and unclean.  And the Pharisees had taken offense for this was against their teachings.

And the disciples heard the murmurings of the Pharisees.  The disciples listened to the Pharisees and they were upset that the Pharisees were upset.  The disciples were concerned that the Pharisees had taken offense to the words of Christ for they did not know the evil that possessed the Pharisees.  And Christ calmed their minds.  Christ spoke to his disciples and reminded them of the power and majesty of his father who did not plant seeds in the Pharisees.  He reminded them of outcome of those seeds that were planted by evil and what will happen to them in the final days.  They would be rooted up and thrown into the fire to burn.  And finally he spoke to his disciples in a way to let them know that the Pharisees were blind.   Let them alone; they are blind guides of blind men.  But if a blind man guide a blind man, both fall into a pit."

And so it was spoken that the disciples could understand.  And so it is written that we, today, may understand.  Who is blind and who is sighted?  How do we know who we follow?  Are we being led by blind men, the blind guide?  Or are we being lead by the teacher, the Advocate, that Christ promised?  We go to church, we perform our religious duties, we pray, we fast, we do all the things that we are taught to do.  But who is teaching?  Who is leading?  Who is our guide?  Christ has given us instructions.  He has left us his words.  He has provided us a path to follow that we may not be misled.  Hear and understand, he commanded us, that we may know.  Every plant that the heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up.

Will you continue to follow an uprooted plant?  Will you continue to believe in the words that come from the seed not planted by the Father?  Will you continue to follow the blind guide that will lead you into the pit?  Seek and you shall find the true guide that leads to the Father.  Knock and it shall be opened to you that you may have sight beyond your earthly vision.  Ask and it shall be given to you that you may have the wisdom of heaven to understand that which is given you.   For those who seek will find, those who knock will have doors opened to them.  And those who ask the Father, it will be given to them that they may see.  The true teacher seeks to teach you.  The true guide seeks to lead you.  The true spirit of Christ seeks to dwell within you that you may know your Father in heaven and yield fruit a hundred fold. 

St Matthew, Chapter 15, verse: 13, The Lesson: Plants to be uprooted.

Our paragraph topic is:  (Disciples warned to shun the Pharisees)
Part 3.  

Christ called the crowd to himself.  He spoke to them concerning what makes them clean and what makes them unclean.  For the Pharisees had taught the people that they were unclean when they did not wash before eating.  And many followed the teachings of the Pharisees.  Many believed that if they did not wash before eating then they were unclean.  So everyone made an effort to wash in order to practice the teachings of the Pharisees.  But the disciples did not follow that teaching.  They were the disciples of Christ.  They were the disciples of the Messiah.  And Christ did not teach them that they were unclean when they eat before washing.  And the Pharisees saw this.

They saw the teaching of Christ.  They saw the actions of the disciples.  And they were not pleased.  Here was a teacher, a Rabbi, who did not follow the traditions and the teachings of the Pharisees.  So they questioned him about his teachings.  Christ in turn questioned them about their authority to change the commandments of God.  Who gave them the authority?  Who made them greater than God?  Who told them that they could make changes to the laws of God, handed down to Moses?  And yet, in their arrogance, they made changes and taught the people to follow the changes that they made to God's Laws.  And now they questioned Christ about his teaching against the traditions they had made and instituted to the people.  

They took offense to Christ.  They took offense to his teachings.  They took offense to his popularity.  They took offense to his miracles.  They took offense to everything that Christ did for the people.  And the evil within them brought them to anger.  The evil within them made them mad.  The evil within them had them conspire against Christ.  And the evil seed within them made them speak out against the actions of Christ.  But Christ instructed his disciples against the Pharisees.   But he answered and said "Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up."

The disciples did not know.  The disciples did not understand that within each of us there is a seed planted.  There are two types of seeds, a seed for good and a seed for evil.  There is no in between.  There is either one or the other.  The two do not exist within us together.  We may not believe that we are evil but the seed is there in a small way.  And the seed grows.  It starts to germinate from its shell and pushes outward.  It expands and branches out into our soul and our mind and our heart.  And the result of a full grown seed of evil is to become a tree with evil fruit.  Christ has said that we know a person by their fruit.  The parable of the weeds tells us the state of the world we live in.  It tells us the nature of the people in the world.  And it gives us an understanding of the environment we live in.  What seed do you have?  Do you know?  Do you care what seed grows within you?

Most of us are so in the world that we do not concern ourselves with the good seed or the bad seed.  We only concern ourselves with the day to day issues we face in living our lives.  We put aside the long term issues as to our spiritual nature and growth.  Yet the seed grows, without our knowledge and our effort.  It is only with the knowledge of who we are and the daily and hourly maintenance of our seed that we are able to separate ourselves from the world that would have us sleep in the knowledge of who we are.  Wake up! Christ's seed is within each and every one of us.  But evil will come and take the good seed away.  Evil will come and choke and kill the good seed planted by Christ.  The decision is yours.  Choose the seed of Christ.  Nurture the seed of Christ.  Water the seed of Christ and watch over its growth.  For your seed will grow.  Your seed will flourish.  Your seed will blossom and produce fruit that will be pleasing to God. 

St Matthew, Chapter 15, verse: 12, The Lesson: The Pharisees take offense.

Our paragraph topic is:  (Disciples warned to shun the Pharisees) Part 2.  

 Christ had called the people unto himself that he may give them instructions.  He called their attention that they may hear, that they may listen, and that they may understand the lesson being taught.  He told the people that it was not what they put into their mouths that defiled but what came out of the mouth that made a man defiled.  And the Pharisees heard and understood.  And the Pharisees heard and were angered.  And the Pharisees heard and took offense.  For they, the Pharisees, had taught, for hundreds of years, that a man was unclean and defiled if he did not wash before eating.  They, the Pharisees, had impressed upon the people that they were unclean if they did not follow the traditions as they were taught.  And many people felt and believed in the teachings of the Pharisees.  Many people believed that they were unclean.  Many people, because of the limited availability of water, believed the teachings of the Pharisees.  

They did not have flowing water available to them as the rich, and the wealthy, and the powerful.  They could not wash before every meal, as the rich, and the wealthy, and the powerful were able to do.  They could not follow the traditions as handed down by the Pharisees, as the rich, and the wealthy, and the powerful.  So they believed that they were unclean.  But Christ came and made a change.  Christ came and taught differently.  Christ came and made the people clean, for he taught that it is not what is put into the mouth that makes one unclean but what comes out of the mouth that makes one unclean.  For from the mouth the heart speaks.  And many, spoke evil from their mouths and were unclean because of what came from their heart through their mouths.  The disciples came and told Christ .  Then his disciples came up and said to him, "Dost thou know that the Pharisees have taken offense at hearing this saying?"

The disciples listened to the Pharisees.  The disciples heard the talk of the Pharisees.  The disciples believed in the teachings of the Pharisees because they did not know.  The disciples did not know that if the heart is clean and pure then the mouth speaks no evil.  The disciples did not know that what is put into the mouth does not make one clean or unclean.  And so Christ had to teach.  Christ had to inform.  Christ had to give a lesson to his disciples and to the people gathered around him.  And Christ had to offend the evil in the Pharisees.  For the Pharisee took offense to what was spoken by Christ.  The evil within the Pharisees arose and brought forth the anger against the teachings of Christ.  The evil within made the Pharisees spoke against the teachings of Christ and took offense.

Christ taught a lesson 2000 yrs ago and it still rings true today.  The Pharisees objected.  The Pharisees were compelled to speak.  The evil within them had to come out.  Is this still true today?  Are you compelled to speak?  Does your mouth speak before you have had to time to think about what you are to say?  Does your heart know what comes forth from it or not?  Defilement comes out of the mouth.  Unclean words are an indicator of what lies within.   And when the words of truth are spoken to us the unclean spirits come forth.  For we do not speak of and by ourselves.  We do not know what is to be said in the heat of an argument.  Only the evil that is within us comes out and we are made unclean.  Only the darkness that hides within our hearts comes out and is spoken through and by the mouth giving evidence of the state of our being. 

God is love and within his being is love.  We are created in his likeness.  We are created in his image.  Yet we can be infested with evil.  We can be filled with evil.  We can be taken over by the darkness that is in and of the world.  But there is a choice.  Christ came, a light into the world.  Christ came that we may not walk in darkness but in the light of his life.  The choice is ours.  Which do you choose?  Do you choose darkness or do you choose the light?  It is a conscious decision.  It is a decision that requires action.  It is a decision that means walking a different path than what the world would have us walk.  Come!  Walk the path with Christ.  He will walk with you and give you the light of life to walk with you.  And you will know the treasures of the kingdom of heaven in your walk.