SERMON DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. [For discussion] At the risk of talking about sensitive and even gross topics at the beginning of your Bible study, how do you feel about your body and its natural processes – personal, intimate, or even unpleasant? Does God approve of the human body?
2. READ Mark 7:1-13
3. Explanatory note: Jesus is not calling into question the authority of the Law which was given by God but religious traditions and stipulations insisted upon by men. [vv. 1-13]
a. What was wrong with the Pharisees’ view of the Law and tradition, and what did that mean in practice?
b. How had this affected their views towards the attitude of the heart and their worship?
c. How easy is it for us to be bound by traditions or customs so that they become more important than God Himself? Can you see this in ways we choose to include some things in what we do on Sundays and maybe rule out other things?
4. [vv. 14-23] Jesus addresses one of the most controversial issues of His day: what Jews could eat without defining themselves before God.
a. How does He answer the question?
b. Which of these activities is defiling and which is not: eating a ham sandwich, lying that you ate the ham sandwich, or going to the bathroom to let the digested remains of the ham sandwich pass from the body [19]?
c. Why? Explain the reasoning in these verses as you would to a child.
5. [24-37] At first sight these incidents have little to do with Jesus’ teaching in Mark 7 but Mark has put all of these things together.
a. How does the faith of the Gentile woman and the deaf man compare with the response of the Pharisees to Jesus?
b. Jesus appears insensitive to the Gentile woman. Is He acting out of character here?
c. How does He declare these Gentiles undefiled before God?
6. What makes you right with God? Is it what you can do to continue to behave well or is it what Christ has done for you?
7. READ Hebrews 10:15-18 together as you close in praise and prayer to the God of all grace.