What Defiles

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 6, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 18.

No. 556. What Defiles. Mark 7:15, 18, 19.

The question at issue between the Jews and Jesus was not as to what kinds of food was best; he who gave the law of clean and unclean meats, doubtless respected it. The question with the Jews was the transgression of the "tradition of the elders," eating with unwashed hands; with Jesus it was how to convince them that the seat of character was in the heart, the affections. If a man's heart was right, mere ceremonial defilement would do him no harm. Nature would care for what he ate. But the secret of character is in the heart, in the things cherished there. The evil thoughts, purposes, motives, passions of the natural heart, where sin is enthroned, manifest in kindred deeds, are the things that defile. Let the heart be made clean by God's power and the deeds will be right. Let the heart remain uncleansed, and no ceremony will save from defilement. Read Matt. 12:33-35.