By Zachary Teasley
During the 4th Quarter of the Year 2022, during our Adult AM Bible Class and during our Adult Wednesday Night Bible Class, we listened to and we hopefully learned from these series of lessons on worldly (man-made) behaviors, superstitions, traditions, holidays, festivals, and sayings that could very easily be tied into or blended into the church and our daily lives as Christians and sojourners on this earth, 1 Pet 2:11-12, “Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against soul, having your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation.” As sojourners, we must be the positive influence for Christ and righteousness setting the example to those that we come in contact with out in the world instead of them influencing us to go away from God and His will for us. The dangers in this blending or influence from activities of secular origin is that these things can cloud and erode our perception of what is acceptable and not acceptable according to God’s divine will (The Bible). Consequently, before we realize it, we start to question the unchanging commands given by God, and we want to change right to wrong and wrong to right all based upon what the majority of society is doing. This is a grave danger to the future and final destination of our souls. God through the Prophet Isaiah warned the Jews of the Old Testament under the Law of Moses to beware of people with this dangerous mindset in Isaiah 5:20-24, “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! Woe to men mighty at drinking wine, Woe to men valiant for mixing intoxicating drink, who justify the wicked for a bribe, and take away justice from the righteous man! Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble, and the flame consumes the chaff, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom will ascend like dust, because they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.” This dangerous pattern of apostasy (a falling away) described by Isaiah was prevalent throughout the span of time that the Bible was written and has increased at a rapid rate as selfishness and a complete disregard for what Jehovah God has commanded is being practiced and exhibited by society today. There are many examples of this destructive behavior in the Bible and for emphasis we will cite a few examples: In Gen 4:1-15, Cain goes against God’s command and offers an unacceptable sacrifice to the Lord, and in a violent rage he goes and kills his Brother. Second example, In Exodus 32:1-35, the Israelite’s, after seeing, hearing, and feeling God’s presence at Mount Sinai decides to build a golden calf as their new God while Moses is away on the mountain receiving the commandments from God and they are punished for this, Third example, 1 Cor 10:1-13 summarizes, the Israelite Nation left Sinai on their way to the Promised Land wandered about in the wilderness for 40 years because of their selfish disobedience to God and the original group of people who left Egypt and crossed the Red Sea all died off except for Joshua and Caleb, and our Fourth example, In Luke 23:13-25, that angry mob of Jews outside of Pilate’s court who did not believe prophecy about the Messiah coming nor did they believe the signs and miracles that Jesus performed because of the hardness of their heart; they all angrily and very forcefully yelled out that Jesus Christ be crucified. Going back to Isaiah 5 again, these examples is just a sampling of the ways that mankind will purposely reject and go against God believing what they prefer to believe. Because of the tendency that we as human beings possess to be influenced by and follow after the norms and behaviors of what society is doing at any given moment, we need to be aware of what we are saying and what festivals and holidays that we are participating in and their origins (because many of them are from pagan or false origins, i.e., Easter, Halloween, Christmas) and why we are participating them. We need to ensure that our participation in these activities does not violate God’s word and is not drawing us away from walking in the light. 1 John 1:5-7 says “This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.” Light is God, truth, and righteousness and the darkness is evil, sin and the world. We cannot take darkness and try and mix it or blend it in with light; God will not accept this premise even if our intentions are genuine and the event or act is fun or if we try to tie religious connections to it. God is not the origin of evil or darkness nor is He the author of confusion, see 1 Cor 14:33, so we must not associate or fellowship with anyone or thing that is promoting darkness or evil. We should not follow the pattern or the influence of this world due to peer pressure (because everyone or the majority is doing it, it must be OK) or because of an old tradition that has been followed for years. We must be aware of what and why we are participating in a tradition, festival, event or activity and ask ourselves the question is this to the benefit and glory of God? Col 3:17 reminds us “And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” Now, if we are walking in the Light this means that our love and faith are at a high level and we are keeping His commandments, see 1 John 2:3-5. In closing, there are few events like Christmas and Thanksgiving that originated from man-made origins but we extract the common good from it like the family fellowship, generosity, and the display, but we do not bring it in the church. What we mean by not bringing it to the church because we as Christians are the church is that we should not do anything that is going to prevent us from walking in the light. If there is something secular that does interfere with us walking in the light, we need to abandon it or cast it aside so we may continue our walk with God. One last passage that summarizes this article: Eph 5:7-11, “Therefore do not be partakers with them. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness but rather expose them.”