Mark 7:21 Commentary and Bible Study

Evil thinking, which lead to evil acts.. Adulteries, fornications – sins of uncleanness, sexual sins. Murders, and we know how Moses defined murders. Not only the literal taking of life, but in the murder family of sins in the book of Exodus following the giving of the Ten Commandments, slavery is defined, kidnap and taking someone into slavery is clearly defined as coming under the murder sin, because you've taken, not just life, but liberty. To take away somebody's happiness and make their life miserable, as a bad husband or a bad wife or cruel parent, is actually under the family of murder sins. The murder of the body is perhaps the worst of all, but these others are in the same family. Hatred – It’s in the murder family of sins. It’s in your heart. Your infested with it. Perhaps, if you're young, it has so far just emerged as dislike, resentment, bitterness against somebody. It will be expressed countless times lifelong, but for the Saviour and conversion. Thefts of all kinds. Covetousness, greed, wanting more, wanting to be special. Covetousness applies not only to possessions and substantial things, but to how people view you. Alongside pride, I want notice and fame. I covet authority – all this type of thing. Wickedness – wicked schemes, ‘malice’ the moderns translate it, and that's good. Deceit, lies. How many lies are there? How many forms does the lie take? Have you made an excuse this week? That's a lie. Have your exaggerated something? That's a lie. The lie takes so many forms. Have you lightly promised something you never intended to carry out? It's a lie. Lasciviousness, which probably means from the Greek word more ‘lawlessness’. It would include lasciviousness, but it is lawlessness. An evil eye – envy. Blasphemy, in the old-fashioned sense of the word: slander, abuse, gossip. Do we gossip? Have you told somebody something about someone which spoils their reputation and you had no business saying that? It's what is translated here as blasphemy, slander. Pride, foolishness. ‘All these evil things come from within and defile the man.’ They are within you. They are sinful, as you think of them and relish them. Take for instance this whole issue of the same sex attraction. There are people saying nowadays – and it's quite wrong to say this – ‘Oh, it isn't a sin while it's only a temptation. It's only if it leads to an unclean act that it becomes a sin, but the thought is not sinful.’ But that's not the teaching of the Bible. The thought is sinful too, and the thought needs to be repented of and cleansed out, and the mind diverted from it. All these things defile the person, and they are within, and that's why we need conversion to Christ. Reformation of that bats’ cave, that wasps’ nest, is impossible. Only the new birth, only conversion, can take in hand sin from within, so that sin shall not have dominion over you. Think of Calvary. Here is Christ; this is his view of the human heart. This is what he has come to deal with. He is going to go to Calvary's cross, and he's going to bear the filth, the infestation and contamination, and the consequences of all these sins. Insofar that they have been committed by those who will be forgiven and saved, he is going to take all of that and bear its punishment on Calvary's cross on our behalf. He's going to cry out to his Father, ‘Punish me instead of them.’ And the Father will, as the poet put it, veil his face and pour out upon the Son the terrible eternal weight of punishment for all that sin. The Saviour could see it so clearly, and he could see what he had come to do, and the pain he would have to bear in his holy soul. When you see the Saviour's view of the human heart, you're all the more astonished that he would do such a thing for such people as we are. The love of Christ and his goodness in his atoning sacrificial death. These are the sins we are fighting against, and by the grace of God we can overcome with the new heart that Christ has given.