The Bread Is In The Red

I don't know if John Wimber came up with this quote or not. I did hear him share it on a teaching tape (remember those?) I was listening to. His statement?  "The bread is in the red!" Meaning that we could study just the "red" words for a number of years and still not glean all that was found there. Of course the red words refer to what Jesus spoke in our written scripture. I've never forgotten this and may in fact attempt such a thing in the near future. So with this in mind, onward and upward. Let us take a look at some of the red words.

Matthew 15
V.17 - "Do you not understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated?"

V. 18 - "But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man."

V.19 - "For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornication's, thefts, false witness, blasphemies."

V.20 - "These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands, does not defile a man."

Jesus has had a run in with the religious gang. They are all up in arms because the disciples did not wash their hands before they ate (according to Jewish law and tradition). Wowzers! Let's go off the rails on this one. They go all off on Jesus with a hidden agenda in their rant. They want to publicly trap Jesus in a false statement so they can scream..."See..Did you see this? This man is a fraud and a transgressor of the law!" 

Trying to trap Jesus in a religious snare is like trying to nail jello to a tree....just ain't going to happen. Old Pete, one of Jesus' disciples, asked Jesus to explain what had just happened in this encounter with the "Religion-R-Us" gang. Jesus begins to teach that the reality of who a person is, is evidenced by the words that come from their mouth. Because such words emanate from the heart. The center of who we are. The place where will, intellect, emotion all convene. In other words from the core of what we believe to be true. 

We are either speaking blessings or curses.  Oh, we could fake it for a moment, but eventually the real deal us would come out and people will see us for who we truly are. I'd rather just let Jesus clean the "inside of the cup" as well as the outside, so I could be free indeed.

Jesus goes on to say that these trumped up laws of cleanliness, such as the washing of hands, serve no purpose to make you holier than you are. Our word, according to Jesus, either confirm us or defile us. Funny part in all of this is that once those words leave our mouth....we can't ever get them back. I am constantly in a state of flux as I unlearn certain things about myself. My personality.....my belief system. God is constantly showing me attitudes and thoughts that I need to correct. To be honest with you....some days I'm good at cooperating with God in this removal of old ways and the insertion of His ways. Some days...not so good. As always, I'm a work in progress. I need to listen to what I say and realize where it is coming from. Change the heart....change the mind. Change the mind....change the behavior. All a part of growing up in Christ.

Food for thought....
God on you...
mbb