First Reading: Isaiah 29:11-19
11The vision of all this has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed. When men give it to one who can read, saying, “Read this,” he says, “I cannot, for it is sealed.” 12And when they give the book to one who cannot read, saying, “Read this,” he says, “I cannot read.” 13And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men, 14therefore, behold, I will again do wonderful things with this people, with wonder upon wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden.” 15Ah, you who hide deep from the Lord your counsel, whose deeds are in the dark, and who say, “Who sees us? Who knows us?” 16You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be regarded as the clay, that the thing made should say of its maker, “He did not make me”; or the thing formed say of him who formed it, “He has no understanding”? 17Is it not yet a very little while until Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field, and the fruitful field shall be regarded as a forest? 18In that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see. 19The meek shall obtain fresh joy in the Lord, and the poor among mankind shall exult in the Holy One of Israel.
Psalm 14
1The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” All are corrupt and commit abominable acts; there is none who does any good. 2The Lord looks down from heaven upon us all, to see if there is any who is wise, if there is one who seeks after God. 3Everyone has proved faithless; all alike have turned bad; there is none who does good; no, not one. 4Have they no knowledge, all those evildoers who eat up my people like bread and do not call upon the Lord? 5See how they tremble with fear, because God is in the company of the righteous. 6Their aim is to confound the plans of the afflicted, but the Lord is their refuge. 7Oh, that Israel’s deliverance would come out of Zion! when the Lord restores the fortunes of his people, Jacob will rejoice and Israel be glad.
Second Reading: Ephesians 5:22-33
22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body. 31“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Gospel: Mark 7:1-13
1When the Pharisees gathered to {Jesus}, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, 2they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. 3(For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly, holding to the tradition of the elders, 4and when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.) 5And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” 6And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; 7in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ 8You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.” 9And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! 10For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 11But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God) — 12then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, 13thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”
How many of us does it take to change a light bulb?
Someone once asked, “How many Lutherans does it take to change a light bulb?” The correct answer is, of course, “none. Someone’s beloved grandmother donated that light bulb!” We laugh but we also must admit that a great many people, Lutherans included, have difficulty with change. Anytime a change takes place in any institution, particularly the church, there is resistance.
Another pastor shared the story of a small-town church in upstate New York. They’d had a much-loved pastor in that church for over thirty-five years. After he retired, he was replaced by a much younger minister. This was his first call, and the new pastor was trying hard to serve them well. He had been at the church for several weeks when he began to perceive that the people were upset at him. Naturally, he was troubled and wanted to know the reason for the problem.
The next Sunday he called aside one of the lay leaders of the church and said, “I don’t know what’s wrong, but I have a feeling that something isn’t right.” The man said, “Well, pastor, that’s true. I hate to say it, but it’s the way you do the Communion service.” What do you mean?” asked the pastor. “I follow the communion liturgy and service rites according to the manual for worship.” “Well, it’s not so much what you do as what you leave out,” said the layman. Puzzled, the young pastor insists, I can’t think of anything I leave out.”
Yes, you do,” the layman replied. “Just before our previous pastor administered the chalice and wine to the people, he’d always go over and touch the radiator. “Touch the radiator?” questioned the young pastor, “I’ve never heard of that liturgical tradition.” So the younger man called the former pastor. He said, “I haven’t even been here but a month, and I’m in trouble.” “In trouble? Why?” asked the older man.
“Well, it has something to do with communion and something to do with touching the radiator. Did you do that?” “Oh yes, I did,” said his predecessor. “Before I administered the chalice to the people, I touched the radiator to discharge the static electricity so I wouldn’t shock them.” For over thirty-five years, the people of this congregation had thought that touching the radiator was a part of the service Rite. That church has now gained the name, “The Church of the Holy Radiator.”
The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus one day and saw some of His disciples eating food without washing their hands. Now in all fairness to the disciples, this wasn’t a question of hygiene, but one of tradition. The Jews had a ritual for washing hands as well as for the washing of cups, pitchers, and kettles. Today, with our hyper-consciousness on germs, bacteria and viruses, the need to cleanse hands and eating surfaces is a matter of common sense. This is how we keep from getting sick. However, the religious leaders over the years had forgotten the real reason behind the command to wash and had instead focused on the tradition itself. They had made an idol of the command to wash.
So, the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?” To this Jesus is admittedly harsh in His reply. Jesus said, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.’ You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.” Jesus was a practicing Jew, but He didn’t want His disciples to be mere slaves to Jewish tradition. He wasn’t advocating the bashing and abolishing of tradition; Jesus wanted His disciples, and us, to understand the why.
With that in mind, we first must recognize that tradition is a powerful force in our lives. This is not only true in our families, but also in the church, and in all of society. One woman tells about a banana loaf she was making. The loaf was in the oven when her 16‑year old son came into the kitchen where the family had gathered. “That bread smells about done, don’t you think, Mom?” he asked. His mother told him that she had set the timer and it was fine. A little later he passed through the kitchen again. He said, “Mom, I really think that loaf is done. I think you should check it.” Always quick to her mom’s defense, the woman’s 13‑year old daughter said, “Eddie, Mom’s been burning that banana bread for 20 years, now. I think she knows when to take it out.”
Mom’s burned banana bread had apparently become a tradition. We have traditions in our families, some of which are wholesome and some, perhaps not. But tradition shows up in everything we do. You may have seen on the Internet a little item about how tradition played a role in the design of our transportation system, specifically in determining how far apart rails are for our trains. The official distance between rails in this country is four feet, eight and one-half inches. Why? Because that’s the way they built them in England. Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built tramways. Why did the builders of tramways space them like that, because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons.
Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on old rural roads, because that’s the spacing of the wheel ruts. The first long-distance roads in England were built by the Romans for their imperial legions. Roman chariots made the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagons and wheels. Since the chariots were made by the Roman Empire, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.
Thus, we have the answer to our original question. The distance of four feet, eight and one-half inches derives from the original specification for an imperial Roman war chariot. And why did the Romans use that spacing? Their chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the backsides of two war-horses. That’s the ultimate answer to the question of how it was determined how far apart train rails should be spaced, the size of the behinds of two war horses. But wait . . . there’s more.
When we see a space vehicle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big boosters attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters. These Solid Rocket Boosters are manufactured in Utah. The engineers who designed the boosters might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the boosters had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The boosters had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track. So, the major design feature of what is arguably the world’s most advanced transportation system is still determined by the width of two horse’s rear ends. That’s hilarious to me, but tradition does affect us.
Second, tradition has an impact on our daily lives. Traditions give us our identity and, to a certain extent, set borders on our behaviors. We have traditions according to our cultural heritage. We even have traditions according to the region of the county we live in and which sports team we follow or what hobby we may have. Of course, traditions play a bigger role in some communities more than others.
The Rev. Dr. G. Carswell Hughs says that people in Charleston, SC pay more attention to tradition than any place he’s ever been. He says they pay particular attention to how long a family has lived in their city. The general assumption is that a family cannot claim to be native Charlestonians until they have lived in Charleston for at least three generations. That means being born in Charleston and remaining in Charleston until “death do you part” is important if you want to be known as a true Charlestonian. He says that at a dinner party, he met a man whose accent was definitely that of someone from Charleston.
Never having met him before, he casually asked the man if he were a native of Charleston. With a sad expression on his face, the man said, “No, I am not a native Charlestonian. I’ve lived in Charleston all my life. My father and mother were both born and lived in Charleston all their lives. The same is true of both sets of my grandparents, and their parents and grandparents. But I will never be a native Charlestonian.” As the man spoke, Hughes was counting. It certainly sounded like more than three generations to him!
The man explained why he was still not a native Charlestonian: “I was born during the Second World War. My father was overseas. My mother visited relatives in Greenwood, South Carolina, and, by chance, I was prematurely born there.” So, he could never be a real Charlestonian, even though his family had been there for generations because, due to a quirk of fate, he was born elsewhere. He said all of this as if he were confessing his greatest sin. When he finished, Hughs said he was tempted to say, “God be with you. Go, and sin no more.”
This may sound silly to us, but traditions give us a sense of our identity. For the Jews this has always been important. They understood themselves as a holy people, as set apart by God, and their traditions helped them maintain their identity and set borders on their behaviors. The problem was, over time they added to God’s statutes and spent more time teach them, then the laws as handed down through Moses. They had become so focused on their rules, they forgot the why and the One who gave the law in the first place.
You may remember that wonderful line that Tevye speaks in Fiddler on the Roof about tradition. Tevye said, “You may ask, why do we practice these traditions, Well, I’ll tell you . . . I don’t know. But they’re traditions!” Tevye is the head of his family living in a small village in Russia. He continually struggles with traditions and values. In his small village, there were traditions for everything, how to eat, how to sleep, how to wear clothes. For instance, they always kept their heads covered and always wore a little prayer shawl to show their constant devotion to God. Because of their traditions, everyone knew who they were and what God expected them to do.
Tevye was molded by his adherence to tradition, but he wasn’t a rigid man. He had the capacity to compromise. That is until his last daughter asks his approval to marry an atheist. This he cannot compromise. He loudly declares, “Some things I will not, I cannot allow, tradition!” In many ways traditions are a good thing. This was certainly true for the Jews. And considering the persecution the Jewish community has endured throughout its history, it’s doubtful that it would have survived without help from its traditions. However, traditions can get out of hand.
In the eyes of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, to eat with unclean hands was worse than how one treated one’s neighbor or even their own parents. The traditions had taken over the religion. And this is the greatest danger of traditions. Traditions can become a substitute for God. Traditions may tell us what was appropriate for our ancestors, but they may not be reliable indicators for how we should live today.
Jesus was continually saying to His disciples, “You have heard it said . . . , but I say unto you . . .” Tradition is one guide for our behavior, but only one. Times change. Situations change and even traditions can change. Far more important is the why and living Spirit of God moving in our midst and guiding us in our present situation. We must understand the why we do what we do. We simply cannot blindly go through the motions simply because we’ve always done it that way.
Today we have the privilege of being witnesses to God’s grace in action. Shortly, Tyler and Amber will be obeying God’s command as Beckett will be washed of sin by God’s promise in the waters of Baptism. He will be anointed with the Holy Spirit, welcomed into the body of Christ, and become a member of our congregation. Some may see this as merely a tradition, but this view is incorrect. Baptism isn’t something that humans do in observance of some ancient ritual. Baptism is God’s work through us.
Baptism is a command of God: Jesus said, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” (in Mark 16:15-16). But our obedience to Jesus’ command to baptize isn’t over when we leave the font, rather, it’s just the beginning.
As I will remind you during the Baptism Rite, Baptism is the beginning of a commitment we make to teach, to train, and to bring Becket to church. As Luther explained to the people after writing the Small Catechism, Luther wanted the home to be the primary place for communicating the faith, and that the parents, through the church, be given the tools and training they need to properly teach the faith. This is of course why church attendance in both worship and study classes are so important.
The Church makes use of the Small and Large Catechisms to help individuals and families grow in their understanding, in their faith, and to help preserve them in unity with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. But again, the primary responsibility lies with the parents and the family. This is why I’ve included a copy of the Small Catechism with the Bible and other gifts that will be presented this morning.
This morning, we will all make a covenant, a promise to “faithfully bring [Beckett] to the services of God’s house, and teach him the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments. As he grows in years, [we promise] to place into his hands the Holy Scriptures and to provide for his instruction in the Christian faith, that, living in the covenant of his Baptism and in communion with the Church, hemay lead a godly life until the day of Jesus Christ.” It’s a big responsibility, a duty we must take seriously.
One final thought in closing this morning, I’ve heard repeatedly over the years parents question why their children seem to drift away from the church as they leave home and head away to a career or to college. Solomon instructed us to “Train up a child in the way [they] should go; even when [they are] old [they] will not depart from it (Prov. 22:6). Could the answer be that we as parents, grandparents and sponsors have failed in our promise we made at the baptism to our children?
Have we shifted the responsibility for instructing our children in the faith away from the dinner table and onto the church? These are hard questions and a sobering thought, but ones we must take seriously. Solomon’s words to parents, to bring up a child properly, on the surface may seem like a command, an obligation, and they are. But they can also be seen as a promise. Remember Jesus’ statement, “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved.” As parents, grandparents, and sponsors of the baptized, we have made a promise, and the pledge we make is one that has eternal consequences.
Amen
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.