Should church tradition die?

Recently, I was engaged in a conversation about a query that a friend of mine had posed on Facebook. My friend’s daughter had asked her why only the men get to serve communion, and my friend opened the “floor” so to speak to the Facebook community to share their thoughts on how they would respond.

As is the case on many matters of understanding and opinion, the responses were diverse. But there did emerge, to me, a repetitive and majority theme – one that expressed an ideal of… Tradition.

“Some families do things a certain way because it is tradition… but, traditions change.”
“This is a church tradition that some denominations follow.”
“It is something that happened a long time ago, and we’ve never moved from it, but bend theology to support it.”
“Every family has traditions that we like and some we aren’t that fond of.”
“It is a tradition started by the church people not God.”
“Our church has traditions. We (as a family) don’t agree with all the traditions, but we support and love our church as a whole.”

So, in the midst of diversity in opinion on the matter in question, one over-arching element was plainly agreed upon, that being the fact that this matter, was indeed one of “tradition.” Some liked it. Some did not. Some understood it. Some did not. Most, if not all, pegged it as tradition.

This post is not a muse on that specific matter (women and communion). If you care for my take, please holler at me. I’ll gladly share it (some will be implied and explicit below).

This is a muse on that over-arching theme – a muse about “Tradition” – it’s place in the Kingdom, and whether or not, and when it should die.

Traditions are statements, beliefs, and customs that are handed down from one generation to the next; long-established or inherited ways of thinking or acting; a pattern of cultural beliefs and practices.

There is nothing inherently wrong with tradition. In fact, many traditions are very cool – some even bring us closer to the Lord – and those rock.

But in Kingdom matters, when tradition trumps Jesus – we have a problem. We have… an idol.

When “that’s the way we’ve always done it” is all that is said, and “Why are we doing this, really?” is never asked – and then wrestled to the ground to answer – then we are shallow.

And it is plain that this is where much of the Church lives today – shallow, naive and idolatrous – in regards to “church things.”:

The building
The Pastor or paid full-time ministers
The order of worship
The sermon
The offering
And as illustrated… Communion

Jesus?

If He’s lucky, He has a spot on the Order of Service. But too often, you can find Him buried under a pile of tradition, while He says:

And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God?…And so you cancel the word of God for the sake of your own tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote,

‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship is a farce,
for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’” – Matthew 15:3,6-9

Jesus was rebuking the worship of “the tradition of the fathers,” by the Pharisees, and reminding them that it was in fact, “tradition of men.” Tradition of men, that had gotten loftier in these men’s hearts, than the Messiah Himself. Jesus doesn’t take issue with tradition per se, but traditionalism – traditions taking His place.

And that’s when the idols must fall down and die.

Church, no matter how expressed and lived, should ever be mindful of the practices that it carries out. There must be a Supreme awareness and understanding of Why? these take place. We should know and appreciate their genesis, where they came from. Where it is discovered that a practice originated in the mind of man (as most of the list above did), or has lost it’s way from the original intent or design (as the rest of the list has) – then some serious time with Daddy is needed, with a humble heart prepared to have wrong belief corrected.

From that place of maturity, we can then stop making traditions, and simply listen to, and follow True Tradition, Jesus Himself.

Paul expressed this in his letter to the Galatians when he said that there was no one amongst all the Jews more zealous than he was for tradition; but that by God’s Grace, He was called to present the Good News of Jesus. (1:14-16)

Paul received that Jesus is simultaneously the law, the past – Tradition; and the Fulfillment the Present and Future. He is the Eternal. He is the Beginning and the End; the Alpha and Omega. There are none before Him; and none higher than Him. He is the Order. He is the Practice. He is the Liturgy. He is the Building. He is the Great Shepherd, the High Priest. He is the Sermon. He is the Offering. And He is the Communion.

He is Tradition. And He will have nothing assigned ahead of Him in His Kingdom.

He has been handed down, and asks us to Believe. He is the Inheritance, and wants to change our thinking. He is the Kingdom, and all things are by, to, through and for… Him.

Let us therefore have none other in His place.

“Experience supplies painful proof that traditions once called into being are first called useful, then they become necessary. At last they are too often made idols, and all must bow down to them or be punished.” – J.C. Ryle, Nineteenth Century English writer and minister

What do you think? Do you agree, or disagree? What would you add? What traditions posture you closer to Jesus? Is He revealing any traditions that you or your fellowship, as they are practiced, are an idol before Him?

{Image Credit: st0rm82 on deviantArt}

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