Proper 22
Shelagh Balfour

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

Have you ever noticed how much easier it is to point out someone else’s faults than to see and acknowledge one’s own? This characteristic shows itself early in life. Anyone who has had children, known children, or taught children, will be familiar with indignant cries of “she hit me”, or “I had it first”. One of my shining childhood moments occurred way back in grade 1 when I told on someone who had her eyes open during the Lord’s prayer. I certainly wasn’t giving any attention to my faults at that moment.

We human beings don’t grow out of these qualities as we age. Studies have shown that people in general tend to underrate their own responsibility in a problem situation while significantly overrating the responsibility of the other person. Social-psychologists call this a self-serving bias, and it’s something we all do. We want to look good, both to others and to ourselves, and we are capable of considerable self-deception in the process. For any of us, this can be magnified when we already have negative feelings about someone and are trying to find fault.

Which gives me more than a little sympathy with the Pharisees in today’s gospel. I like to think I’m a good person, not perfect, of course, but “above average” in the good department. But then, every year, along comes Ash Wednesday. I find myself saying the Litany of Penitence and a mirror is held up to the undeniable reality of my faults:

As the list goes on, I am shocked at how easily examples of each come to mind; recent examples right there waiting for me to notice. It’s not like any of them are huge, but they are telling. Like the Pharisees and scribes, and everyone else, I see the world through a self-serving bias. I find it far easier to see when someone else is doing something I think is wrong, than it is to see that my own righteousness may not be as above average as I’d like to think.

So, with that in mind, let’s take a look at the gospel. Mark doesn’t waste words as he tells the “good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God”. In a few short chapters the gospel succinctly makes the case that a) Jesus is the Son of God and, b) there are people who just don’t want to admit the possibility. By the time we get to today’s events, Jesus has stilled storms and restored a girl to life, he has fed 5000 people and walked on water. At the same time, he has frightened people with his power, offended them with his confidence in teaching the word of God, and left them indignant at his disregard for Sabbath laws and Jewish tradition.

Over and over again, people are challenged by Jesus to look at life in a new way, to look at the Law and the traditions and the structures of power not with self-serving eyes, but with eyes that can see God’s good intentions for God’s people. And some folks find that hard to take.

In this reading, the Pharisees aren’t saying that Jesus’ disciples are breaking any laws, but they were pointing out that the disciples failed to follow tradition when they didn’t wash their hands before eating. Over the centuries, revered teachers of the Law had encouraged traditions that “built a fence around the law”. That is, by following the traditions, the Jewish people could ensure that they honoured (that is did not break) the God-given law, thereby giving Glory to God before all the nations. The Pharisees were particularly concerned about this and clearly thought that Jesus ought to be as well.

It’s easy to cast the Pharisees as the bad guys of the gospels. They seem to be trying to catch Jesus out all the time and Jesus, in response, can be pretty blunt. Here he is being blunt about something quite specific. When Jesus called the Pharisees hypocrites he was not saying they were hypocrites because they were Pharisees, nor was he criticizing either their following of tradition or their adherence to the Law. What he was criticizing was their self-serving bias. While pointing out the fault of others, they ignored the fact that their interpretation of the traditions, their “fence around the Law”, was actually helping them to manipulate the Law to their own advantage.

The truth is, though, we are not actually in the role of “good guys” over against the “bad guy” Pharisees. We each have our own self-serving biases. We, too, find our own ways to rationalize our less attractive behaviours. And self-deception being what it is, we are often not aware of it.

If you’re starting to worry that I’m winding up to talk about how awful we can be, fear not. This is really about how human we are and how great our need for salvation through Jesus Christ is. It’s important that we keep this in mind as we come to the core of Jesus’ response to the Pharisees. That way we’ll be open to what this reading has to say to us.

Jesus said "Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come:”

Two quick definitions before we go on. To defile, from a biblical perspective is to make unclean or impure in relation to God.

Heart, in the same context, means not just emotional sensitivity, or warm fuzzy feelings. The heart is like central processing. In Henri Nouwen’s words, “heart in Jewish-Christian definition refers to the source of all physical, emotional, intellectual, volitional, and moral energies. It is the seat of the will; it makes plans and comes to good decisions. Our heart determines our personality, and [is] the place where God dwells, but also the place in which the Evil One directs fierce attacks.” ¹

Like I said, central processing, the place where all aspects of who we are come together and direct what we do. To over-simplify somewhat, Jesus is saying it’s not what we do, it’s why we do it. Because he is responding to a question about ritual defilement, Jesus talks about “all [the] evil things [that] come from within”, and it is a daunting list: “theft, murder, adultery, avarice, deceit, envy,” and more. But that is only a small part of the story.

In his book, In the Name of Jesus: Reflections on Christian Leadership, Henri Nouwen speaks a great deal about the heart. “In our world of loneliness and despair,” he said. “there is an enormous need for men and women who know the heart of God.” ² We will know the heart of God as we come to know and share in the heart of Jesus, God incarnate. In Jesus, we find the “first love” expressed in the epistle of John “we love because God first loved us.” This is “unconditional and unlimited love” in which there is no shadow of self-serving bias.

What Nouwen calls the “second love”, is our imperfect attempts to share God’s love with one another. “Jesus’ heart is the unconditional, shadow-free first love of God.” And he earnestly desires that we dwell in that heart, even as he dwells in us.

So perhaps it is better to say that it is not what we do but with whom, or in whom, we do it. Because, while there is potential in our self-serving hearts for all manner of evil to grow and become visible, the heart is also the place from which all the good parts of our character come. It all depends on who we ask to make their home in us. It all depends on whose heart we trust in when we combine all our physical, emotional, intellectual, volitional, and moral energies into concrete action.

At our best, our lives together as the body of Christ are a continuous exercise in learning, and trusting, the heart of Jesus. As we pray, study scripture, and continue Christ’s mission in the world, we deepen our relationship with him. Individually, as we spend time in contemplative prayer, quietly learning to listen to God’s voice, the relationship deepens further until we find ourselves “home, rooted, and safe in the heart of God.”

Henri Nouwen said that “Knowing the heart of Jesus and loving him are the same thing. ……… And when we live in the world with that knowledge, we cannot do other than bring healing, reconciliation, life, and new hope wherever we go.”

May it be so.

¹ Nouwen, Henri. Spiritual Formation: Following the Movements of the Spirit, © 2010 Estate of Henri J.M. Nouwen, Michael J. Christensen and Rebecca J. Laird. HarperCollins Publishers, New York.

² Nouwen, Henri J. M. In the Name of Jesus: Reflections on Christian Leadership © 1989 Henri J. M. Nouwen, Crossroads Publishing Co, New York. All remaining quotes come from this book.