Here is a\u00a0 list of EVILS from Jesus, as found in Mark 7:20-23:<\/p>\n\n\n
“What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come – sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance, and folly. All these evils <\/i><\/b>come from inside and defile a person.”<\/p>\n\n\n
If you’re like me, you read this list and shake your head over mention of the evils of sexual immorality, theft, murder and adultery.<\/p>\n\n\n
\u00a0Shameful! Sinners! Tsk, tsk.<\/p>\n\n\n
We feel pretty righteous because we know these words do not describe us.<\/p>\n\n\n
But then Jesus gets into “greed”, “malice”, “deceit”, “lewdness”, “envy”, “slander”, “arrogance” and “folly”. And, I don’t know about you, but I hit those words later in Jesus’s list and find myself dismissing them just as quickly as “theft” or “murder”.<\/p>\n\n\n
But should I?<\/p>\n\n\n
Can I?<\/p>\n\n\n
Here’s a little expansion on each concept thanks to biblehub.com:\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Greed: covetousness, avarice, aggression, desire for advantage<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Malice: badness, depravity, wickedness<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Deceit: guile, treachery<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Lewdness: licentiousness, debauchery<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Envy: misuse of<\/i>\u00a0the eye<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Slander: abusive or scurrilous language, blasphemy<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Arrogance: pride, disdain, haughtiness<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Folly: impiety, lack of sense<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
Could any of these words apply to you or me?<\/p>\n\n\n
Before you answer, keep in mind two things:<\/p>\n\n\n
1) Jesus says these things are in our hearts. Thus, they don’t even need to be expressed out loud to be a problem for us!<\/p>\n\n\n
2) It seems that even a little envy, a little greed, or a little arrogance is just as serious as a little murder or a little theft!<\/p>\n\n\n
Jesus, make us holy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Here is a\u00a0 list of EVILS from Jesus, as found in Mark 7:20-23: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come – sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance, and folly. All these evils […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2879"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2880,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879\/revisions\/2880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}