By: Phil Hopkins
Over the years many of us develop various traditions in our lives. Many of these are family related. I remember growing up that my father’s family had a tradition of having family reunions on January 1 and on Father’s Day, The second date was due to the fact that my grandfather’s birthday was close to Father’s Day. Since my father had 11 bothers and sisters the reunions were quite large. My grandfather had a dairy farm in the country which was located in southern Michigan in the area where the lake effect snow would sometimes cause large snowfalls on his farm. The choice of January 1 for a family reunion might not have been a wise choice. I remember one year when I was small, going, but due to the large amount of snow we could only drive to about 1 mile from the farm. We had to walk the remaining distance because the road by his farm was unpassable. You can imagine the five of us, I was about 5, my sister about 11 years, my brother about 1, and my parents all traveling the last mile through deep snow to get to the reunion. We were cold! The June reunions were nice, it was usually warm out and there was plenty of places for us kids to explore or even watch the various dairy farm chores being performed. I was a city kid and I knew nothing about a dairy farm and all that had to be done, so I watched and learned. Likewise the Jews had accumulate many traditions over the years. Unfortunately, they had moved the traditions taught by their religious lawyers above God’s word. They were holding that which was taught by their scribes to overrule what was clearly taught in the Law of Moses. We find Christ teaching them their error; Mark 7:9 “And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. 10 For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: 11 But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free.” The Jews were using the false teachings of their Rabbis to get them out of taking care of their parents in their old age. Something that the Law of Moses (God’s word) clearly required. Jesus Christ pointed out their error and condemned it. Tradition can never overrule God. In the church we also develop traditions, areas in which God has given us the choice on how to do things, as opposed to the items that God has specifically defined what or how we are to do something. For example, in worship, we find 5 items authorized: praying, singing, giving of our means, communion and being taught from the word of God. What God did not tell us was the order of the items or even how many songs that we should sing or how many prayers should be given and especially how long the lesson should be. We use the scriptural name “church of Christ”, which is used in Rom. 16:16 to refer to the body of the saved. While this is correct, I hear that name used from time to time in a way that is very sectarian. Remember that this name is more of a descriptive phrase telling everyone that the church is “of Christ”, either proceeding from or belonging to Christ as opposed to just a name. We must understand that the word translated church is the Greek word, ekklesia, which means a calling out. a popular meeting, especially a religious congregation (Jewish synagogue, or Christian community of members on earth or saints in heaven or both). In the Bible it never refers to the building. However, wrongly, many of us call the building the church. We must also realize that there are many other names which are used to refer to the church in the Bible such as: 1 Cor. 1:2; 10:32; 11:16 church of God, 1 Cor, 14:33 churches of the saints, 1 Tim. 3:15 church of the living God and Heb. 12:23 church of the firstborn. Each of these are scriptural names for the church, There are even other names or descriptive terms that can be used but for many reasons we do not use them. For example , using the name church of God might confuse people, since there is a denominational group that uses that name. We want others to correctly know who we are. Unfortunately; there are those who think that the only name that can be used for the body of saints is that of “church of Christ”. We would find some that might even try to make the name, a test of fellowship, if we used a different scriptural name for the church. We must never react emotionally to changes in traditions but examine them to ensue that what we do is in alignment with God’s requirements. We must remember the plea from I Peter 4:11 “if any man speaketh, speaking as it were oracles of God”; and not go off reacting instead of thinking and following God’s word. It is important that we learn how God authorizes, so that in trying to keep the church pure, we don’t start adding to or taking away from God’s word in our zeal, Rev. 22:18 “I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any man shall add unto them, God shall add unto him the plagues which are written in this book: 19 and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life, and out of the holy city, which are written in this book”. It can be very easy to fall into holding traditions equal to God’s word, for example, since the preacher is down front in the assembly, when someone responds to the invitation, the preacher will usually take the confession for the person and then perform the baptism. After weeks, months and years of this happening, members can and will start to think that the only one who can perform a baptism is the preacher, since that is the only person that they have seen perform one. Those that have begun think in this way will find scriptures that they think prove their position, which has happened. In the 1940’s, 1950’s and 1960’s, we had a group that because of their improper understanding of the Bible and how God authorizes and their zeal, split the church. Many a congregation was destroyed due to their misguided efforts in binding items that God never bound on Christians. There are religious organizations today that hold that tradition on an equal level to God’s word. We must be very careful to not fall into that trap. We must not have a knee jerk reaction to questions about why we do something in a certain way, we must be certain that we follow God’s word and not vary to the right or to the left. It is OK to have traditions, but we must realize that they are just that, traditions and can be changed. That they not violate what God has commanded, but that they are just traditions.