What’s inside you?

Sharing with you an excerpt from today’s gospel

Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person;
but the things that come out from within are what defile."

…

Do you not realize that everything
that goes into a person from outside cannot defile,
since it enters not the heart but the stomach
and passes out into the latrine?"
(Thus he declared all foods clean.)
"But what comes out of the man, that is what defiles him.
From within the man, from his heart,
come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder,
adultery, greed, malice, deceit,
licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly.
All these evils come from within and they defile

Today is the continuation of yesterday’s gospel. This is Jesus response to the Scribes and Pharisees accusation that they were eating without following the tradition of the elders. He is saying that this tradition of purifying and washing the hands, beds, etc, does not make a person unclean. These are just superficial. What makes a person unclean is what’s inside – what is in their hearts, as what Jesus said in today’s gospel.  The elders of that time, though were following tradition, had their hearts unclean,  which made them unclean.

Today, Jesus is reminding us to check what is inside of us. It’s easy to see if the external is unclean – we easily see when our hands are dirty, when our clothes are dirty. However, when our hear is not so clean, we do not automatically see it. Other people does not necessarily see it as well – since our actions does not necessarily reflect what’s in our hearts, what the motives for those actions are.

May we take a moment and look at our hearts today. Let us pray for guidance that we may continuously seek God and do his will for his glory. May we ask God to always show us what is on our hearts, and may we always be willing to have it cleaned by God.

Be clean today!

God bless!