Chapter # 7 Paragraph # 1 Study # 9
May 31, 2022
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
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Thesis:   "Hear and understand" is Jesus' insistence that His "hearers" embrace the reality that man's "problems" with a "relationship with God" are already present; they are not generated by their actions.

Introduction:   In our last study, we considered the roots of Jesus' insistence that the "crowd" embrace His basic message as Mark recorded it in 1:15: the promised kingdom was imminent so that it was absolutely the time for "repentance" and "faith in the Gospel".

This evening we are going to take the next step in our studies and consider exactly what Jesus insisted that the crowd "buy into". In His words we have a contrast between two possibilities regarding how a man is "defiled": the first is that man is defiled by proscribed foods that enter into him; the second is that man is already defiled as evidenced by "things" that come out of him.

Because this is a crucial issue, and both parts of it are of equal importance, we are going to look into the first of the possibilities in this study and reserve the second possibility in the next study.

• I. An Initial "Grammatical" Fact.
  • A. In 7:15, both the NASB and the KJV, translate the second use of the present tense, singular voice, verb "is" as "are", the verbal form that typically goes with the plural voice.
  • B. There is, in this, a subtle indication that the plural "things" which proceed out of a man is tied to a singular root.
• II. Jesus' Very Important Truth, Part I.
  • A. "There is nothing outside of the man...".
    • 1. This "nothing", in this context, refers to the "things" associated with the dietary code of the Mosaic Law.
      • a. At issue in the context is the disciples' behavior of eating (in this case, "legitimate") foods without first washing their hands in submission to the tradition of the elders.
      • b. Additionally, Mark makes Jesus' words signify that no longer were any "foods" to be considered "illegitimate" (7:19b) since all foods bypass the heart in their trip through the digestive system.

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This is article #312.
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