What does it mean that "these people honor me with their lips" (Matthew 15:8)?

(Vv. 6-13). In His reply to these men, the Lord exposes the emptiness of their religion that consists in mere outward forms. First, it leaves men mere hypocrites, as proved by Scripture, for Isaiah said of such, "This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me." Hypocrisy is pretending to be what we are not. By their religious acts they professed great piety before men, and by their words they professed to reverence God; actually their hearts were far from God. (Isa. 29:13: Ezek. 33:31).

This kind of thing, pushed as it was by the Pharisees to its extreme limits, stirred our Lord to a strong exposure of its evil. They were hypocrites, and He told them so plainly. They came under Isaiah's scathing denunciation, for this type of religious wickedness is always to be found with men who have hearts far from God and yet honour Him with their lips, whilst putting their own precepts and commandments in the place of His word. All such nominal worship is empty and in vain, yet it is not difficult for a true believer to get entangled in such things today.

And now the Lord thus sets the condition of the whole people before them: "Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth" (they were not sinners, in the common sense of the word, i.e. irreligious, without any profession of thought about God; quite the contrary, the thing stated of them here is, 'This people draweth nigh unto me'), "and honoureth me with their lips; BUT their heart is far from me." It was not the sincerity of conscience, and yet the Lord could use the expression, "draweth nigh." "BUT" (He adds) "in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." (vv. 8, 9.) All this religion and religiousness is at once disposed of. There might be the semblance of what was according to God in the "washing of hands;" for the Lord Himself uses water as the emblem of purity; but it was to answer their own ends, and the Lord says, that, whatever it was, it was a commandment of men - that was all. And it was in vain. There is a worship which is worshipping of God in vain.

Thus in Isaiah's day there was an outward, regard among the people of Judah for the law of Moses, and for the worship of God, but no inward reverence for Jehovah Himself. In the Lord's day it was so again with the people. Their house was swept of idols and garnished with "pious" deeds, but it was an empty shrine. Though God was on their tongues, He was not in their thoughts. Hence the Lord delivered this solemn warning to, those who were walking in a vain show. How could the lip-service of the Pharisees, and the eye-service of the men-pleasers be acceptable with Him who looks not on the outward appearance, but judges the heart?

It will be seen that two evils are indicated for condemnation in this citation — (1) Insincerity before God, — honouring Him with the lip, but not regarding Him in the heart. (2) Substitution of human authority for divine, seeking to worship Him after the commandments of men rather than according to His own will.

God is dealing with realities. He wants nothing from man. He is shewing him what he is. He is bringing into man's conscience what is already in his heart. When God's light shines in, it detects what is in the heart, and thus there is a manifestation to a man's conscience of all that comes out of his heart. That light soon teaches him the vanity of washing his hands, and such things (v. 2-8). It tells him that to draw near to God with his mouth, and honour Him with his lips, while his heart is far from Him, is all in vain. It shews him that all mere ceremonial offerings and prayers are worse than useless. "This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me." The light detects the evil of man's heart (v. 11-20): "Not that which goeth into the mouth, but that which cometh out of the mouth, defileth a man. For out of the mouth [heart] proceed evil thoughts, murders," etc. Thus God's light comes in and shews what comes out of the heart. Take the first index of what is there, when seen and expressed in the light - an idle word, perhaps (James 3). But farther, the Lord does not say, simply, You have done this or that, but He traces the evil to the root. He traces the conduct or the words of man to some source - to what? to the heart! If there are idle and corrupt words, there is an idle and corrupt heart; and out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. That is what man's nature is, what he is. So that, though men have the fairest conduct outwardly, God unmasks what is within, and shews the vanity of all their outward ceremonies as a means of eking out a righteousness of their own. He regards not the mere outward conduct of man, but measures the heart; and tracing all the evil to that, asks, Why is this? For out of the heart of man proceed evil thoughts (v. 19), and there He closes with man. His purpose, in all these dealings and ways with man, is to shew him what he is before God.

The essence of their hypocrisy lay in the profession of worship, consisting in outward ceremonials, when inwardly their hearts were utterly estranged. Nothing counts with God if the heart be not right.

Here, with the Pharisees, it was not mere following tradition, but using it to indulge hypocritical selfishness. "Ye hypocrites," says our Lord, "well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me." Those who pretended such zeal for the law were the while destroying it by their tradition, dishonouring God's own authority in the earthly relationships He had established and honoured. So He adds, "But in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men."

And now follows the righteous word of condemnation by Him who searches the hearts of men. "Hypocrites! well has Esaias prophesied about you, saying, This people honor Me with the lips, but their heart is far away from Me; but in vain do they worship Me, teaching as teachings commandments of men" (v. 8, 9).

This was plain despising of the word of God, and the Lord does not hesitate to call the Pharisees hypocrites, quoting from Isaiah 29:13 as to men's mouths and lips outwardly honoring God while their hearts were far from Him. Their warship was vain, for their doctrines were merely the commandments of men. Their insensibility to the seriousness of this condition makes this the more painful.

He did not take the defensive, however, but in turn challenged their hypochrisy, quoting the words of Isaiah as to their drawing near to God with their lips while their hearts were far distant from Him. This kind of worship was in vain, totally empty, their doctrines being the commandments of men, with God's rights ignored. Verse 8 shows that in insisting on their traditions they were setting aside God's commandments, and verse 9 emphasizes this as being the actual rejection of the commandment of God in order to enforce their own tradition