I read an article recently, and maybe it’s because I’m hot off of writing a similar article on Tradition myself for Lutherwoman or maybe it just pushed buttons within me, but I had thoughts to share.
Below you’ll find the link to the article. Followed by my thoughts.
Did we Trade Jesus for Traditions
My thoughts in full
Bolded parts are pulled from the article found above. My thoughts flow around them.
The question at the heart of the article is “have we traded Jesus for tradition.”
In a recent article I wrote, yet to publish, I talked about tradition. The textbook definition of tradition: an inherited, established, or customary pattern of thought, action, or behavior (such as a religious practice or a social custom). In the article linked above the author used the word tradition, more along the lines of traditional worship. Regardless, a tradition tends to be something we hold dear to our hearts.
Therefore, I wouldn’t say we’ve traded Jesus for tradition.
I’d ask, what traditions do we hold in our life that are higher than we hold Jesus in our hearts?
I don’t believe that “in far too many churches today comfort and tradition have become king.” I believe it’s outside of the church. We should ask ourselves what in the other 6 days I’m not at church have become king or rule in my life? I don’t think that traditions such as the following of “old worship styles, familiar liturgies, and routines that make us feel safe” are what is hindering the people within our churches. These are things that root us in our faith. They’re meant to ground us in Christ Jesus, not to exchange Him one for the other.
“Comfort is seductive. It feels good to know what’s coming next, to be surrounded by familiar faces, and to have everything mostly predictable. But the danger of comfort is that it can lull us into complacency.”
Here again I ask, what do we hold in our life the 6 days that we aren’t at church. Can we say that Jesus is at the center of all we do? Comfort is seductive indeed. So, what “traditions” or comforts in our day to day lives can dim the Holy Spirit at work within us? These are the comforts that are most likely lulling us into complacency. Not the traditions within the church. The familiar faces of our work week are those relationships outside of church glorifying God or diminishing? Our daily actions, are they in line with Jesus or do they stand against?
On Sunday we sit in our churches and look up at the cross, and partake in the body and blood of Jesus Christ. But do we pick up our cross and carry it with us the other 6 days of the week? Or do we leave it sitting in the pew?
Matthew 16:24 reminds us: Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
Traditions/Routines/Comforts that May Cause Harm – Keep Us from picking up our cross.
Every day on my way to work I listen to the Top 40 playlist.
-have you ever truly listened to the lyrics sung, those lyrics are feeding your heart, not Christ.
Every night when I get home, I binge watch Bridgerton (insert show of choice)
– I watched about 20 minutes of that show once, it was enough to see what goes on.
– P.G. 13 gets risky these days. Do you ever feel restless after binge watching?
Thursdays are happy hour at the bar
– Do you go to have one, or many? How do you speak when out? What is your mood?
Every day the first thing I do is …
-Who said pick up your phone to check it?
-Did you say pray?
These are just a few examples of our “creature comforts” that we cling to outside of Church. These are some of the daily traditions/routines/seductive comforts that lull us into complacency.
How can we deny ourselves if we struggle or refuse to lay any of it down.
“Too often, we hold on to traditions that have long lost their purpose. We assume people are being changed simply because they show up on Sundays.”
Too often we hold onto our weekly creature comforts, so much so that they prevent the Holy Spirit to fully engage our hearts, to light that fire in our soul, to send us out with the passion we are so eager to find. The passion “that will break us out of our mold, and start changing the status quo, and be the hands and feet of Jesus to a world that is desperately in need of him.”
We’ve traded Jesus for something, but it’s not for the traditions of the Church.
“When a church chooses Jesus over tradition, everything changes. The mission comes alive, and so do the people. You start seeing new faces, hearing testimonies of transformation, and feeling the Spirit at work in ways you never imagined.”
The main point I want to drive home.
And this is the only catalyst to true change within the church.
Jesus needs to be at the center of our lives in every waking moment.
Not just on Sunday. If the traditions of the church are no longer centered around Jesus, then yes they need to change. But it’s not the traditions that aren’t working or that are “lulling us into complacency”, it’s our hearts, it’s the way we live the other 6 days of the week. When we start to clear our life of the stuff that’s creating a roadblock with Jesus, that’s when we see the “Spirit at work in ways you would never imagine.“
The people in our everyday lives, they see this change too, they see us being different then the status quo and they begin to ask questions, and it will be Jesus who gets them through that door by seeing our transformation and hearing our testimonies. Only the Lord can call us to him. And he plants those seeds and waters them in His time.
Our fire continues to burn by walking with the Holy Spirit and because we’re keeping in step with the Holy Spirit.
This fire only stays lit by being in prayer, staying in the word, soaking up the traditional foundation laid before us long ago. Too often we keep striving, reaching to find a tangible root cause as to why the church is broken. It’s not. The hearts within the church are what need mending. Mine and yours, daily. We are all, every single one of us in need of checking our hearts daily and saying, “am I putting this (insert thing) above Jesus.”
We’ve all traded Jesus for something.
We’ve put Him down so that we could pick something else up.
Most often we’ve picked up the God of More.
More money, more me time, more comfort. We keep searching for more assuming once we find it, it’ll help to patch the empty feeling in our hearts.
That empty feeling is us having put Jesus down, when we should have been putting Him first all along.
Seek today the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you. Matthew 6:33
Seek God, lay down whatever it is you’ve traded Jesus for.
Heavenly Father, draw us to you.
Draw us to you in Prayer, in your Word, to the Gospel, to the traditions of long ago that are meant to root us in You. May we come to lay down the things in our life that hold more of our heart than we currently give to you. Lord help us to live by the Spirit, so that we may keep in step with the Spirit.
We ask these things in Jesus name ~ Amen.
These thoughts are my own and are in no way affiliated with the LCMS.