We ate goat-brain!

One thing that I really love about Jesus is that when He came back to earth, He said, it’s not what goes inside a man (meaning food) that makes him clean but, rather it’s what is in the man’s heart. Why am I thinking about this, you may ask? Well, it could be because someone made us a goat-brain dinner the other day, but that’s not why. Although, I did eat just a small piece to try it out, and Rachel did touch her tongue to a piece. But, no… That’s not what got me thinking about this. I’ll tell you why, but, first try to stop thinking about eating goat brain ok?
Seriously, check out this passage from Mark 7:18-23: (NASV)

And He said to them, “Are you so lacking in understanding also? Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?” (Thus He declared all foods clean.) And He was saying, “That which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man. “For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. “All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.

Now, what got me thinking about this is that I wanted to tell you all about the BBQ pulled pork I made tonight. It was truly amazing. Dug around the internet for some good recipes and found one that uses a pressure cooker to cut down the cooking time. Aww man! The BBQ sauce was a sweet, citrus sauce with cilantro and the meat was tender and… whew–such a delight after eating pretty much nothing but Indian food for the last couple months. Really. It was so good, I just thought I should journal about it. But, as I was going to do that, I thought, “Well, I wouldn’t want to offend any one with a post about pork.” There are so many Muslims in the area and we often give out this url to people that we meet. But, I really thought about it, and when this scripture came to mind, I wanted to testify that it really is not what goes in the mouth and through the system that counts.
There is just so much do, do, do/don’t, don’t, don’t religion out there that is based on actions but, never really does anything to help someone change their heart. It’s easy to say to someone, don’t sin, but when that person is caught in sin or addiction, and they find their heart in slavery to that sin, the don’t-do-that of the law only serves to make that person feel condemned. Jesus had something different to say. He re-directed the focus to the matters of the heart. He gives us this big list of sins (in the scripture above) and says that these sins procede from the heart! I’ll tell you right now, if you try to stop screwing up in the areas that are keeping you from God, without letting God cleanse you in the inner-man, God knows, you will not succeed.
It is only by letting Christ into your heart that your heart can be cleansed. And, that comes through faith in Jesus. No amount of following rules is going to cleanse out the dirt of your heart. All of us get our hearts dirty. These days are evil, and at one point or another, we have all yielded to the sinfull ways of the world to some degree. No matter how hard we try, we can not cleanse ourselves of the past and we need Him to do it. So, I don’t know if any of you are struggling with any sins that may be proceeding from a dark corner of your heart. But, I do know that when we call Jesus’ name for Him to come and help us, if we sincerely cry out, and are willing to let Him have His way, He will cleanse the inside, and the outside. He is thorough in His cleansing. If you haven’t ever done that, please do it now.
If you have any questions about this, please feel free to contact me.

Blessings,
John

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 9th, 2006 at 9:32 am and is filed under John's Reflections. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.