Mark 7:9-13 And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)— then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. Thus, you nullify the Word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.
The comedian W.C. Fields was a lifetime confessed agnostic. He was very outspoken of anything that had to do with religion in general and once said that the Bible "was a pack of wild lies." So, you can imagine the surprise to his friend Thomas Mitchell when he came into his hospital room shortly before his death and found Mr. Fields reading the Bible. When Mr. Mitchell asked the dying actor why he was reading the Bible since he thought it was all lies, Fields said he was looking for loopholes. A loophole is an ambiguity in any network that one may use to circumvent or even avoid the network's implied or explicitly stated wording.
There was bad news in store for Fields or for anyone else that believes that they can circumvent the Bible. Unfortunately, there are no loopholes in the Bible; it contains the very straightforward truth as the Word of God (Hebrews 6:18). Consequently, many people down through the ages have been like W.C. Fields and many even today looking for these "Non-Existent" Bible Loopholes. This elusive search happens most often to support a lifestyle that is contrary to God's Holy Word. Loopholes are very alluring and are searched for when we want to make an excuse for not obeying a commandment of Jesus.
In our text today, the Religious Leaders of the time when Jesus was living among us thought they had found a loophole in Moses' Law about honoring your Father and Mother. Instead of helping their parents with financial or material support, they allotted all their worldly goods to God to not have to give to their parents. Jesus told them that they abrogated the Word of God by their traditions (Mark 7:13). This revocation made it look like they were obedient to God, but Jesus let them know in no uncertain terms that what they were doing did not escape His notice. There were more of these incidences where they tried to circumvent the law because Jesus said: "and you do many more things like that."
When we search for one of these "Non- Existent Loopholes" in the Bible to show that we are obedient to God, all we are doing is making an excuse for not following what the Bible says is the truth. Even if we think we have found a reason for not obeying the Lord, just like the Pharisees could not get it by Jesus, we will not escape the notice of our Savior. He will still call it disobedience. You will find no loopholes in the Bible and looking for them is a waste of the valuable time that we could spend serving God. The Bible is our "Roadmap," or today we might call it our "GPS" to lead us down the narrow path to the straight gate that leads to eternal life, spent with our Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus.
In the Bible, we will find the perfect, pure truth of God. We must open, read and study it, and we must let God write it on the pages of our hearts.
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