Good Morning Friends,
There are rules all around us, like survival of the fittest and gravity and the laws of thermodynamics that have been around since the beginning. But if we belong to any religious institution or community or live under government rule there are a lot of other rules we will have to deal with in our life. Sometimes we agree with the rules and other times we do not. Sometimes the rules make sense to us, and at times we think they are absurd. In the Bible there are not just the ten commandments but 613 Jewish laws. If you were a keeper of the law like the Pharisees, you would have studied these laws and known them very well and probably figured out ways around them. Many of the laws applied to the Temple as a Holy place but if there is no Temple are impossible to follow. The Pharisees believed that God gave Moses the knowledge of what the Jewish laws meant and how they should be applied. But the Pharisees had substituted an expanded tradition for the real intent of the law which Jesus would seal on the Cross. I think the intent of the Messiah was and is to apply the law of love to our hearts and minds turning us into a Temple for God to abide. Similarly, Jesus reminds us that we are made in the image of God and the point here is that when we have a consciousness in Christ, the law, though somewhat comforting is a bit pointless. Perhaps that will help us to answer today’s question. So, How Do Best Fight People’s Sins?
Scripture: And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.” So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day. And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind, and the cattle of every kind, and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all the work that he had done in creation. These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so.
God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Genesis 1: 20 – 2: 4a (NRSV)
what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them? Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor. You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas. O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Psalm 8: 4-9 (NRSV)
Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.” Then he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.’ But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, ‘Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban’ (that is, an offering to God)— then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother, thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this.”
Mark 7:1-13 (NRSV)
Message: Now tradition can be good but if taken it too far for the wrong reasons can end up drawing us into sin rather than fight it. Of course, the answer to today’s question is guided by the reality that we are created in the image of God so love should trump the laws we create. Still, it is not such an easy thing to live in the light of Christ. I think we all have experienced what happens in our minds when confronted with laws that control our behavior as opposed to relationships that motivate our actions through love. The mystery is how this experience of thinking both draws the community together through common interest and beliefs and creates a collective consciousness and shared relationship that brings order and an observable sense of belonging and meaning to life. On one level when we remember the law in our mind, we are encouraged to carry out moral behavior but when the law is embedded in a loving relationship the worship becomes something much more. You see being a Christian is not about keeping up with man’s traditions, being religious, or ritualistic, but being a devoted, disciple for Jesus Christ. Our minds, spirits and souls are transformed by spending time with God, praying, fasting, reading scripture, and letting the Holy Spirit lead and guide us. Friends, our relationship with Jesus grows when we spend quality time with God.
And So, the purpose of the law is summed up in our love of God and love of each other manifested in the power of a Christ relationship, so we might confront evil. The way to fight to sin in others is to first address the sin in our own behaviors. In our life God wants our love not sacrifices in an earthly Temple. And if Christ is not the cornerstone of this journey, we end up worshipping idols not God. The mystery is how a belief in Christ draws us together in community with a purpose and order and an observable sense of belonging and meaning to life. And we can place it in our hearts or in a physical place as an idol. We need to be cautious, for on one level when we remember the law in our mind, we are encouraged to carry out moral behavior but when the law is embedded in a loving relationship the worship becomes something much more. The purpose of the law is summed up in our love of God and love of each other manifested in the power of a Christ relationship remembered. So, be all in for Christ.
Pray we do not ignore God’s scripture but embrace it as a way of revealing our heart. Pray we are not controlled by obsessive rituals but freed to honor traditions that bring abundance to life. Pray we are not critiquing, criticizing, and condemning as a way of justifying our existence. Pray instead we attain a consciousness that gives us a glimpse of heaven through a relationship with Jesus. Pray we set aside time to develop a relationship with God so the sacred might spill over in our lives and the places we live. Pray we develop a Christ consciousness as a spiritual force with a sacred purpose in a movement that responds to the flow of holy history. Pray for a time when the Lion lays down with the Lamb. Pray for forgiveness, grace, and mercy but especially for love. Pray Christ rules in our hearts.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 