Ever go to dinner with the experts? Please…don’t go off thinking about them, stay with me. This is about you and me. Focus on these words-Jesus was invited to dinner with a “religious expert.” When we read the text, we find Jesus used words like “cleanse the outside of the cup,” and “inside you are full of greed and wickedness.”

The Pharisees were religious experts. But sadly, experts in rules only. They made faith in God a set of rules to follow. All the while, their hearts were filthy with sin. They looked religious on the outside. It was Jesus who told them-and today, us, to- “clean your hearts.”

“As Jesus was speaking, one of the Pharisees invited him home for a meal. So, he went in and took his place at the table. His host was amazed to see that he sat down to eat without first performing the hand-washing ceremony required by Jewish custom. Then the Lord said to him, “You Pharisees are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and wickedness! Fools! Didn’t God make the inside as well as the outside? So, clean the inside by giving gifts to the poor, and you will be clean all over.”

Luke 11:37-41

When we seek to be “right” with God the first step is not following a set of rules.

Step ONE is to clean our hearts. We are to wash off our blackened hearts with the blood of Jesus. The Bible uses the word repent. To repent is to feel regret for the “greed and wickedness” in our hearts.

Only Jesus can see the sin blackness of our hearts. People look at us from the outside. We look OK. What counts is our hearts-the inside of who we are. And Jesus sees the inside of every human heart.

It is a waste of our time and effort for us to say, “I’ll be better. I’ll forgive. I’ll stop my anger, I’ll CLEAN up my act.” We can’t.

Only Jesus can clean our hearts. Jesus is the true, living, eternal EXPERT. He is the way to a clean heart. Guess what, He delights in cleaning the blackness of sin from the inside of a human heart.

We may think of Him as the “Eternal Cleansing Agent.” (His blood washes away the blackness of human hearts. It’s why He died on the cross.)