Contents:
• Traditions of men
• The heart is evil
• Who not to take spiritual advice from
• Make your prayers persistent
• Jesus feeds four thousand

Before reading this commentary, I encourage you to first read the text of Matthew chapter fifteen.

Verses 1-9

Why do Your disciples break the traditions of the elders?

Simple question: who do we worship? The elders or Jesus? Anytime anyone adds something to the word of God, they are creating something God didn’t want there. A friend of mine told me a story about how he was kicked out of a church because he didn’t want to do what the elders had suggested. He had gone to them for a counseling session and the elders gave him some advice. It wasn’t a particularly biblical issue; the elders merely offered their opinions on a practical matter. He prayed about it and decided he wasn’t going to follow their advice. He later told them why he had rejected their advice and they subsequently kicked him out of the church. They claimed that when they spoke it was the same as God speaking. When he told me this story I was appalled at their audacity and I told my friend that he was very fortunate to have been kicked out of that church. I questioned if those elders were even saved because they certainly conducted themselves with an overabundance of pride.

Regarding the Pharisees, Jesus said ‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. They worship Me in vain; they teach as doctrine the precepts of men.”

Verses 10-11 & 16-20

A man is not defiled by what enters his mouth, but by what comes out of it. whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then is eliminated? But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these things defile a man. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, and slander. These are what defile a man, but eating with unwashed hands does not defile him.

Verses 12-15

Then the disciples came to Him and said, “Are You aware that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?” But Jesus replied, “Every plant that My heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by its roots. Disregard them! They are blind guides. If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”

When I read that verse, the phrase that stands out to me is “disregard them”. It was immediately preceded by “Every plant that My heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by its roots.”

Do not take spiritual advice from anyone (or anything) that is not filled with the Holy Spirit. I knew a man who advised his children to never tithe. He said they needed the money more than the church did. He wasn’t filled with the Holy Spirit. His advice was terrible. I also knew a woman who advised a young lady that she should be willing to sleep with her boyfriend if it meant being able to hang on to him and keep him around. That advice was coming from a woman who wasn’t filled with the Holy Spirit. It was terrible advice. It was 100% the wrong advice. Do not take spiritual advice from anyone that doesn’t have the Holy Spirit. As Jesus said “disregard them”.

I do think it’s okay to take practical advice from anyone who has experience in such matters, however, you should always weigh it carefully with prayer. For example, someone who is an expert at building houses is certainly qualified to give you advice about remodeling your bathroom. But we have to be careful about those areas where practical advice begins to seep into spiritual advice. This is especially true when it comes to money. People who are wealthy are qualified to offer financial advice, however, a wealthy man who lacks the Holy Spirit, may be inclined to give advice that would put you in a position of prioritizing money over Jesus, making financial decisions without prayer and of relying upon your money rather than Jesus. All of which would be terrible advice.

At the start of the previous paragraph I said, do not take spiritual advice from “anything” not filled with the Holy Spirit. That is specifically referring to AI. I’m writing this in 2025, and what I’m seeing is that the younger generations coming up behind me rely heavily upon AI programs such as ChatGPT. I would advise you to never, ever, ever, turn to ChatGPT for spiritual advice, because it is a machine that lacks the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, in writing this commentary, I have noticed that on every occasion in which I performed an internet search in order to do some research for this commentary, Google’s AI often displays its answer at the top of every search result page. Even if its answer were technically correct, I disregard it. My advice is to only take spiritual advice and guidance from a person filled with the Holy Spirit.

Verses 21-28

Why does Jesus initially reject her pleas? He says he was sent only to the Israelites. First and foremost, Jesus is the Jewish Messiah. We know that after his ascension, he’s going to send both Paul and Peter to the Gentiles.

We also should recall that in Matthew chapter ten, Jesus sent out the twelve disciples with the following instructions: “Do not go onto the road of the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel.”

Jesus is not ardently opposed to the gentiles coming to faith because he does eventually heal this woman’s daughter and we also know that he healed the Roman centurion’s son in Matthew chapter eight and he also spoke to the woman at the well who was not an Israelite. So, clearly Jesus is not opposed to the gentiles.

I’ve concluded that there must be a sequential order in which Jesus the Messiah is presented to the world; a sequential order in which the gospel is proclaimed to the nations starting at Jerusalem.

Why that is, I don’t really know, however, we do know that the Jewish people, the Israelites, are God’s chosen people and that they were supposed to represent God to all the other nations, yet they failed to do so because of their disbelief. However, it appears that the intent remains that this faith is supposed to start at Jerusalem first and then spread outward from there.

It appears in these verses that Jesus is wanting to retain that sequential order but relents when the woman will not take “No” for an answer, which leads me to ask the reader to recall the story of the man who comes to his friend at midnight asking for bread.

Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose one of you goes to his friend at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, because a friend of mine has come to me on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him.’ And suppose the one inside answers, ‘Do not bother me. My door is already shut, and my children and I are in bed. I cannot get up to give you anything.’ I tell you, even though he will not get up to provide for him because of his friendship, yet because of the man’s persistence, he will get up and give him as much as he needs. So I tell you: Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? So if you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” (Luke 11:5-13)

This Canaanite woman kept asking and pleading. Jesus eventually gave her the blessing she sought. Likewise, we should be consistent and persistent in our prayers, particularly when asking for the Holy Spirit and when asking that our loved ones be saved. Ask, ask again, and then ask some more.

I don’t want anyone to operate their faith as one who constantly doubts. That would be very bad. However, I pray every day for my own salvation and the salvation of my wife, children, family and friends. Not because I doubt, but because Jesus gave these examples of asking repeatedly. So my prayers for salvation look like this: “Lord save me….Lord I give you praise for my salvation.” “Lord fill me with your Holy Spirit…..Lord thank you for giving me your Holy Spirit.”

Let’s contrast that to a man who, 37 years ago, raised his hand during a Sunday morning alter call, and followed along when the pastor said, “Repeat after me….”, but since that day has never again met with the Lord in prayer for anything. Can he go confidently to his death bed with an assurance of salvation? God judges the heart, but He also says we can judge a fruit by its tree and still further he says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness!’ (Matthew 7:21-23)

But he must ask in faith, without doubting, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. (James 1:6-8)

So we should ask persistently, but not as one who doubts.

Verses 29-39

Jesus once again, provides for the people by creating something out of nothing. There were only seven loaves of bread and a few small fish. So then where did the seven basketfuls of broken pieces come from, not to mention the fact that all 4,000 men plus women and children ate their fill and were satisfied? God, created all the additional food out of nothing. Despite the fact that God rested from his work at the end of the creation week, he is still able to create things from nothing. This should be for us, a great encouragement in that nothing is impossible for God. If God can create something out of nothing, then there is no limit to his abilities. Our whole entire lives can be boiled down to merely the gathering and utilizing of resources (I need food, I need shelter, I need clothing, I need transportation, I need communication). If God is able to provide for people in such miraculous ways, there is no reason why we can not depend upon Him for everything.

Some will say, God doesn’t work in such miraculous ways today. To which I would respond, “God may not have worked in such miraculous ways in your life, but you are not omnipresent. Don’t make assumptions for the rest of us.” Besides that, if you woke up today breathing, is that not God providing for you? The person who doubts that God does miracles today, will not see a miracle. The rest of us, however, are seeing miracles daily.