Pray the word with David Platt is a resource from Radical.net.

Mark chapter 7 verse 8, you leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.

This is a stinging indictment from Jesus and Mark chapter 7 as he's speaking to Pharisees and

scribes who've come to Jerusalem and those Pharisees and scribes. These religious leaders were known

for watch this strict adherence to traditions that they and those who had gone before them had

developed and right before this verse when Jesus says you leave the commandment of God and hold

to the tradition of men. Jesus says to them, Isaiah talked about you hypocrites when he said

this people honors me with their lips but their heart is far from me and they worship me in vain

because they teach as doctrines the commandments of men. I just want to encourage us to think in

our lives today. What traditions do we hold to? What commandments do we follow that don't actually

come from God but they're just things we do because we and those who have gone before us have

decided we should do these things. It's a helpful and humbling exercise to ask and answer that

question. Maybe even right after this podcast episode is over, just continue in prayer for a moment

and ask God to open your eyes and for me to do the same in my eyes, what are we holding to

that's tradition or commandments of men that is not a commandment from God and it's not that all

traditions are bad or things that we do that don't come directly from God are bad but there is

a sinful tendency that Jesus is pointing out here where we exalt our traditions and things we

say we should do over the clear things God has commanded. So God, we pray that it would help us.

We don't want it to be said of us that we leave your commandments and hold to our traditions.

So please keep us from doing that. Please open our eyes to ways we are doing that in our lives

and our families and our churches. God, we don't want it to be said of us that we honor you with our

lips but our hearts are far from you that we worship you in vain as we teach as doctrines things

...