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I am never ungrateful for my mother teaching me that 'cleanliness is next to godliness.' One of my abiding memories of childhood is my mother's voice calling after me, 'Have you washed your hands?" as I approached the meal table. I had to wash my hands and face for all sorts of occasions: On getting up in the morning; on coming in from school; on coming in after playing with my mates; before visitors arrived, and before retiring to bed, or 'going up the wooden hill', as she sometimes said.
No, I am not ungrateful but wish, in retrospect, that she had taught me what exactly this 'godliness' was, that cleanliness was next to. Church, or chapel in our house, never played a meaningful role in every day affairs, indeed not even on Sundays when we were, nevertheless, often told to keep our voices down 'because its Sunday.' That puzzled me for years. I hesitate to call her a Pharisee, apart from anything else she didn't even have a semblance of religion - except on Sunday mornings when we had to be quiet, and Sunday afternoons when we were sent to Sunday School at a chapel she barely ever attended (weddings, funerals etc.).
I do know what Pharisaical thinking looks like however. It's the kind of thinking that says character and morality are all about keeping the rules. The worse kind of Pharisaical thinking doesn't even bother to find out what the rules are - it makes them up. Like being quiet because its Sunday; speaking in hushed tones because 'we're in chapel', changing the tone of your voice because the minister has called around. It is insisting that you are with the non-conformist chapel party and not the church in the town, even though you never attend chapel, never even think about God. It is cultural rather than practical.
For people who go to church and claim to be devout it can mean feeling superior because you use a particular translation of Scripture, or dress in a particular way, or speak in hushed tones (what is it about God and being quiet? Does He try and get some sleep in on Sundays? The way we act in church sometimes I wouldn't blame Him for switching off). Jesus faced this problem in this passage. The Pharisees were convinced that cleanliness was godliness.
They judged others by whether they had 'washed their hands and face' before coming to the table (v.v.1-50); they made up the rules to suit themselves and fit in with what they found convenient (v.v.9-13). Have you ever heard someone say, 'I don't have to go to church to be a Christian'?. In Jesus' words:
You have let go of the commands of God and are
holding on to the traditions of men (v.8).
He then taught:
Listen to me, everyone, and understand this.
Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather,
it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean' (v.v.15-16).
This sums up the problem we face when we come to God's standards. What is in a man is unclean. Paul tells us in Romans 3:
We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all
under sin. As it is written,
There is no one righteous, not even one;
There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.
All have turned away, they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good, not even one...(Romans 3:9-12)
That is why Jesus declared that a man or woman must be 'born again' (John 3:1-21). That is why he came:
Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert,
so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him
may have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his one
and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have
eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn
the world, but to save the world through him (John 3:14-17).
No amount of outward observance can make us right with God but:
"The word is near you: it is in your mouth and in your heart," that
is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your
mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him
from the dead, you will be saved.
For it is with your heart you believe and are justified, and it is with
your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, "Anyone
who trusts in him will never be put to shame." For there is no difference
betwen Jew and Gentile - the same Lord is Lord of all, and richly blesses
all who call on him, for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord
will be saved" (Romans 10:8-13).
The problem of godliness is so fundamental that God Himself has to come and do something about our sorry state. There is a wonderful promise In Ezekiel:
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit
in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart
of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my
decrees and be careful about my laws (Ezekiel 36:26-28).
This is the promise of the gospel. This is the work God wishes to do in us this week and every week. May we know the reality of a new heart and spirit and may it issue in fruit that brings Him glory.
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