Day 29. What Defiles?
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"What goes into a man's mouth — does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth — that is what makes him 'unclean.'" Matthew 15:11
There are many applications of this principle. The food we eat does not affect our moral character. No external ceremonies really touch the soul. Indeed, nothing in this world has any power to defile a heart while it remains outside and is not allowed to enter. A man may be a coal-miner, always black and grimy, and always working in dirt — and yet he may have a white and unspotted soul. This is true of living amid temptations. So long as we keep them outside — they have no power to injure us.
Luther says that we cannot prevent the birds flying over our heads — but we can prevent them building their nests in our hair! We cannot prevent temptations buzzing around us continually — but we can keep them from entering our hearts and nesting there. And so long as we do this — the worst things in the world cannot put a spot upon our souls.
The Saviour says further, that it is what comes out of the mouth, which defiles. So, then, there may even be evil in the heart which does not defile — unless it is allowed to shape itself in thoughts, words, or deeds. The suggestion of wrong-doing is not a sin — until the suggestion is accepted and entertained. Temptation to sin — is not itself sin. Jesus was tempted. Suggestions of evil were made to Him by Satan; yet He never sinned, because these suggestions never found any lodgement in His heart, and therefore never found any expression in word or act, or even in thought.
So temptations come to us from without. We cannot stop them from coming; we are not responsible for them; there is no sin in merely having these suggestions. But the sin begins the moment we open the door to one of these sinful solicitations.
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