Sunday, January 11, 2026

When the Issue Isn't Really the Issue: The Heart Behind Our Hardness

There's a moment in Mark 10 that feels deceptively simple. Religious leaders approach Jesus with what appears to be a straightforward theological question about marriage and divorce. Children are brought to Him. Disciples react poorly. On the surface, it's a passage about family values and religious debate.

But slow down. Look closer.

Like peeling an onion, this passage reveals layer after layer of deeper truth. The outer layer addresses marriage and divorce. Peel that back, and you'll find a confrontation with hardened hearts. Go deeper still, and you'll discover the core issue: how we respond when God defines truth in ways that challenge our desires.

The Design We'd Rather Redesign

The Pharisees weren't seeking wisdom—they were setting a trap. "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?" they asked, testing Jesus in a region where speaking truth about marriage had already cost John the Baptist his life.

Their question referenced an ongoing rabbinic debate about Deuteronomy 24 and the meaning of "indecency" as grounds for divorce. Some teachers held a strict view; others taught that divorce could happen for virtually any reason. The Pharisees weren't looking for God's heart on the matter—they were shopping for the interpretation that best suited their agenda.

Jesus cuts through their legal maneuvering with surgical precision. He doesn't start with Moses and Deuteronomy. He goes back further—to Genesis, to creation, to God's original design.

"From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh."

Marriage wasn't a cultural invention. It was God's design: one man, one woman, a lifelong covenant, a one-flesh union that reflects something sacred and permanent.

When the Pharisees pressed Him about Moses permitting divorce, Jesus delivered a devastating diagnosis: "Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment."

Divorce wasn't part of the original blueprint. It exists as a concession to human sinfulness, not as permission to pursue whatever—or whoever—seems more appealing.

The Loophole Mindset

Here's where the passage gets uncomfortable for all of us.

The religious leaders in this story weren't rejecting Scripture—they were reinterpreting it. They were engaged in what we might call "loophole theology," where desire-driven interpretation replaces genuine submission to God's Word.

The New Living Translation captures the heart of Deuteronomy 24 well: "Suppose a man marries a woman, but she does not please him..." This isn't about discovering adultery or enduring abuse. It's about dissatisfaction. Boredom. The belief that something—or someone—better exists.

With enough mental gymnastics and selective reading, we can make the Bible say almost anything we want it to say. We love truth when it agrees with us. We negotiate when it confronts us.

And before we congratulate ourselves for not being like those Pharisees, we need to recognize this same pattern in our own lives.

Maybe we hold firm on the "big" cultural issues—marriage, sexuality, the sanctity of life. We give hearty amens when those truths are proclaimed. But what about the commands that hit closer to home?

We have endless justifications for withholding forgiveness. We rationalize our judgmental attitudes. We excuse gossip as "concern" and slander as "just being honest." We demand grace for ourselves while denying it to others. We prioritize our own comfort over serving others, then wonder why our churches feel more like social clubs than transformative communities.

The truth is, hardened hearts don't just resist God's design for marriage—they resist His design for every area of life that confronts our selfishness.

When Learning Doesn't Lead to Living

The scene shifts. The Pharisees leave, and the disciples enter the house with questions. Jesus teaches them clearly about God's design for marriage and the seriousness of divorce.

Lesson delivered. Truth communicated. Everyone's on the same page, right?

Not quite.

Immediately after this teaching moment, people begin bringing children to Jesus. And the disciples—fresh from receiving instruction about humility and the Kingdom—rebuke them.

Why? Because in that culture, children were insignificant. They contributed nothing. They had no status, no influence, no power.

The disciples had just been taught about humility, service, and peace in Mark 9. They'd received clear instruction about God's values. But knowledge hadn't translated into transformation. They were learning without living.

Jesus responds with indignation: "Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God."

Then He says something that cuts to the heart of everything: "Whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it."

Children don't negotiate truth. They don't look for loopholes. They don't justify themselves or engage in theological gymnastics to avoid uncomfortable commands.

They simply receive.

And that posture—humble, open, trusting—is the opposite of a hardened heart.

The Danger of Biblical Fluency Without Transformation

One of the greatest dangers facing the church today isn't biblical illiteracy—it's biblical fluency without life change.

We can become experts in Scripture, well-taught and theologically articulate, while remaining spiritually unchanged. We master the content without submitting to the Author.

The Pharisees knew Scripture but twisted it to serve their purposes. The disciples heard truth but failed to live it out. And if we're honest, we often do the same.

We affirm God's truth on issues that don't challenge us personally, then replace it with "my truth" when His Word confronts our behavior, our relationships, our priorities, or our prejudices.

This passage isn't ultimately about marriage, divorce, or children—though it addresses all three. It's about how we respond when God defines truth in ways that conflict with our desires.

Do we receive it like children? Or do we search for loopholes like lawyers?

The Only Hope for Hard Hearts

The diagnosis is sobering: we all have areas where our hearts are hard toward God's truth. We all have places where we've substituted selective obedience for full surrender.

But there's hope—not in our ability to soften our own hearts, but in the One who can create clean hearts within us.

David's ancient prayer remains our most honest response: "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me."

We can't manufacture transformation. We can't force our hearts into submission. But we can come to Jesus with open hands and honest hearts, acknowledging our hardness and asking Him to do what only He can do.

God defines truth—not culture, not our feelings, not our circumstances, and certainly not our desires. And when Truth Himself stands before us, total surrender is the only appropriate response.

The question isn't whether we know what God says. The question is whether we're willing to receive it like children and live it out like disciples.

Pastor Nick