Thursday, February 18, 2010

Traditions

Traditions...good, bad, indifferent? They can be!

Tradition- customs, beliefs, etc. handed down from generations to generations.

Three things come to mind: Fiddler On the Roof, The Roast Story, and Mark 7:13.

Sometimes we just do things because that's the way it has always been done.
Sometimes that's good and sometimes it isn't.

Know you are just chomping at the bits to hear the roast story and no, it didn't originate with me, and no, I never did it...I only cooked canned hams in the can...well only once, mind you,
and I would not recommend it! Explosions in your oven is NEVER a good thing!

Okay...the roast story in a nutshell...
A daughter watches her mother get ready to cook a roast and she cuts off each end first, throwing the ends aside and puts the roast in the pot. Daughter asks why and she says because her mother always did it...because the grandmother always did it, etc. Come to find out, the Grandmother only did it because most times the roast wouldn't fit her pot!

It is a good thing to find out why we do the things we do! (God is never "afraid" of our questions!)

We are entering the season of Lent. As far as I know Lent is a man- made traditon.
I don't recall it being mentioned in the Bible.
Now, I'm not saying that it's bad but why do we do it?

In college some of my friends and I would "give up something for Lent". According to tradition,
the season of Lent is a time of fasting and doing penance.
I never really thought about it as doing penance. Penance is "self-punishment"...we give up something we really like to punish ourselves, why? to be more accepted by God???
(Hey...been there and done that...even now I have to make sure I don't read and study the Word to impress God. I read and study for myself..to grow my faith, my love...)

Wrong! If we have accepted Jesus then we are accepted!

I do understand that the season is supposed to make us think about Christ more..what He did for us....but-
we should think about this every day.

It's supposed to be a time to set aside things, activities to spend more time with Him when
we should already be doing that, too.
(If we really have a viable, intimate realtionship we will want to be with Him, spend time with Him, just talk to Him as our dearest Friend-all out of our love for Him. I do understand that we can get busy and then we need to discipline ourselves to stop and be still before Him, but still that's out of love...loving Him, showing Him how grateful we are....)

Sometimes we do things and never really think about what and why we're doing it.

Look up Mark 7. Pay close attention to verses 6-13.
God always looks at our motives....our hearts.
The traditons of man can make the Word of God of no effect.
Think about it.

Proverbs 4:22 tells us that the Word is "life to those who find them and health(medicine) to all their flesh".

I want His Word to be very effective in me and in you too! :)

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Outstanding.
I was in NYC this week and people couldn't understand why I wasn't "giving up" something and eating meat last night, etc.
I was also thinking about people not understanding that we are to have a relationship with the Lord. I explained to someone on Monday that the reason I discovered peace is because I learned who Jesus is and found I could trust His Word. I could talk to Him and KNOW that He is and wants to have a relationship with me.