The Christian Tradition

A conversation I shared with a brother from church started me thinking about the impact of tradition in our expressions of faith and obedience.  Traditions in themselves are not necessarily good or bad but because of our bent towards formula, routine, and self-righteousness they can divorced from the original purpose or reasoning behind them.  We can adopt a legalistic view of what should be done when and how things must be to be done right--typically with our own experience setting the gold standard.

Take water baptism for example:  depending on your culture and Christian denomination beyond the theology there is great variety in the view of baptism, who is qualified to perform a baptism, how it is practically done, and the reasons behind it.  It may be we rely upon our own experience (which was likely impacted by tradition to some extent) rather than the scripture to form our ideas of why baptism in water is important.  Some imagine a person cannot be saved without it, and others downplay it altogether because it is not a "salvation issue."  The Bible is clear salvation occurs by faith in Jesus before baptism in water and not dependent on it (Acts 8:37, Acts 16:30-31) but was practiced in obedience to Christ (Matt. 28:18-20) and identification with Him (Acts 10:44-48).

One of the buildings our church moved into had a baptismal on the stage I believe we only utilised once:  our "tradition" was to go to the beach for a picnic.  We made a day of it and headed down to a nice spot in Mission Bay.  After lunch people made their way to the beach with guitars and sang worship songs.  A pastor addressed the people who gathered from the church and curious onlookers to explain we were having a baptism and why.  People stepped forward to be baptised and queued up to be baptised by a pastor or elder who prayed with them before immersing them in water and lifting them up to applause from the crowd.  I realise this experience would be considered strange or even bizarre by some because their traditions are different.  It is important I do not look back upon my experiences as free from tradition because the ceremony was relaxed and did not involve donning white robes.

No matter what church you attend, it is likely (to some degree) tradition has impacted what things are done and how.  It is the scripture--not tradition--which is to dictate why things are done and we can hold to God's unchanging truth with freedom to honour Him as He directs.  If the reason for us doing something are not supported in scripture, we are under no obligation to continue in it.  Growing up we often held a "sunrise service" early on Easter morning, yet there is no biblical mandate for this.  There is certainly nothing amiss with rising before dawn on Easter to remember with awe and praise our risen Saviour Jesus Christ.  One might say if Mary was willing to go to the tomb before it was day out of reverence for Jesus who she expected to find dead, how much earlier should we rise in honour of our risen King!  Tradition can be justified and staunchly defended as better and right, but that does not make those who keep it spiritually superior over anyone else.

Let us have our traditions but in identifying them as such let us not attach any moral or spiritual obligation to keep them beyond the scripture.  Doing things causes tradition to become an obstacle that hinders people from following Jesus in truth.  The Pharisees were masters of this, straining at gnats but swallowing camels.  Let us follow the scripture in step with the Body of Christ according to the leading of the Holy Spirit, giving grace to others whether they hold to a tradition or not.  Our call is to be convinced in our own minds and not give place to the devil through self-righteous judgments of others.  The Christian tradition Jesus established is one of freedom to worship and honour God according to the Bible and the leading of the Holy Spirit, not to follow tradition as the end in itself.