Matthew 15:2: The Pharisees asked, Why do your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread?

Matthew 15 and the first part of chapter 16 return again and again to the subject of food. The Pharisees ask Jesus about washing before a meal. When Jesus responds to the Canaanite woman, He says that He cannot take the children’s bread and give it to the dogs. He feeds four thousand, and when the disciples go to the other side of the sea, they forget to take bread. All of these incidents have something to teach us about this table, this meal.

Our sermon text, as we’ve seen, focuses on proper preparations for food. Failing to wash hands before meals, Jesus says, doesn’t defile. The Pharisees have annulled the law of God for their tradition. Though they are, or will be, guilty of every evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, slanders, and false witness, they think they are pure if they wash their hands before they eat.

Jesus did not, as we’ve seen, annul concern with purity. He simply redefined it, defined in in light of the weightier matters of the law – justice, mercy, and truth. He doesn’t say that we don’t have to worry about preparing for this meal. He says we need to be pure if we want to eat. But He has a different notion of what kind of purity is required than the Pharisees.

If we want to receive this meal rightly, it is true that you must be among the pure ones. If you want to take this meal rightly, you need to guard your hearts, avoid the defilements of the world, seek God’s cleansing by confessing your sins and believing His word of forgiveness.

This is a holy meal, and as the ancient invitation puts it, these holy things are for the holy.