TRADITION Its merits and limitations
As part of her yearly tradition, the Christian faith world -wide observes Lent period, which commenced on Ash Wednesday through Easter Sunday. Its a forty-day period of deep reflection on the life, sufferings, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ while on earth. One of the greatest tenets of Lent and Christian fellowship is prayer. Its whole essence is inner penitence, renewal and reconciliation with God, to obtain Gods mercy, forgiveness and inner healing by the power of the Holy Spirit. Even though denominations observe this tradition differently according to their doctrines, the crux of Lent is self denial marked by fasting and prayers. This tradition appears as old as Christianity and commemorated with the celebration of the Lords Supper [also known as Holy Communion]. Some Christians do not observe Lent; I have no problem with that, since Christianity is not so much of observing laws and ceremonies, but of Gods kindness inviting mankind to His grace in Christ Jesus. God allows man this choice; He forces no man to accept and worship Him. This is the root of the New Testament covenant where God writes His laws in our heart. Jesus Christ and His early disciples spent a lot of time teaching this doctrine – from laws to grace, yet it was complex and difficult to understand, talk less of doing, except one is helped by the Holy Spirit. Funny enough even in this era, the situation seems not to have improved much, if at all, since a great number of Christians are still legalistic and judgmental; they love corrective roles where they make rules, exert influence and put up pretense in a dip and skip disposition, and reject the low position of grace.
Its also common knowledge that Muslims celebrated EL al ADHA [EL Fitri] to round up the month of Ramadan [DHu al QAdaH] thirty days of fasting and prayers. It is a yearly tradition similar to Christian Lent. Islam source informs that this tradition is in memorial of the revelation of the Koran to Prophet Mohammed while he was fasting and praying. Its preceded by another tradition called El Kadhi [ID al AdHA] where Muslim faithful make pilgrimage [Hajj] to Mecca for a universal corporate prayers in preparation for the fast and to show the oneness in the brotherhood of Islam. These two are examples of religious tradition.
Another interesting aspect of tradition concerns a group of Russian Americans. The story is contained on page 51ff, in a book titled Expecting the unexpected [or you wont find it by Roger Von Oech and it goes like this: I once read about a group of Russian immigrants in Los Angeles who had the tradition of celebrating New Years Eve on the afternoon of December 30th. A Newspaper reported asked them: why are you celebrating the arrival of New Year thirty six hours before every one else? One of them, a man in his late sixties replied, when we were growing up in the Soviet Union forty years ago, we were very poor and we found that it was a lot cheaper to get a band on the afternoon of the thirtieth. Thats how the tradition began. The curious thing is that these people had prospered in America and they could easily have afforded lavish entertainment on New Years Eve, yet they continued to celebrate it on the previous afternoon. Also the Chinese are known to celebrate their new year on the first of February. The lgbos [Nigeria] associate their cultural New Year with the first new yams harvest known as lkeji. Each town within this tribe celebrates theirs at different calendar date between April and September each year. Like other traditions, the early New Years celebrant sticked to their newfound culture even when conditions had changed and it no longer made sense.
Its important to uphold and preserve our tradition and culture but we should reason with time and eliminate obsolete ones or perhaps update them to suite the time and age we are in, less our offsprings see them as irrelevant and reject them. In our society today, some traditions appear obsolete and should be discarded, instead its adherence is enforced for some unknown myth and reason or to maintain status quo. Some of these traditions involve rituals, burnt offerings, and pouring of libation of wine and kola nuts to the gods of the land. They are obsolete and belong to the old covenant and generation; worked for our ancestors because of the time in which they lived. The Scripture says: it was not possible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away the sins of the world [Hebrew 10:4]. God, the Creator of the universe replaced it with a better covenant-the blood of His only begotten Son Jesus Christ who entered once for all into the holy place and obtained eternal redemption for us. It therefore makes no sense going back to what had been put away about two thousand years ago.
Yet, at every ceremony and festival, we witnessed these reincarnation of idolatry performed with no regard to those they stand against their faith. These contribute to why some people even though appreciate their tradition but abstained from cultural events. Little wonder Jesus rebuked the religious leaders of His time who allowed tradition to supersede the word of God. God in old times had dismissed their worship because their hearts were not aligned with their lips. [Matthew 15:1-9; Isaiah 29:13]. Apostle Paul also warned Titus against this group of leaders. [Titus1:10-16]. Today in our Churches and society some leaders still hold tradition as equal to or even higher than the scriptures. This group believes that, just as there are many ways to kill a rat, so also is reaching God and making heaven. But my bible teaches that Jesus is the only way to God and salvation [Acts 4:12; John 14:6]. They are quick to ask: if Jesus is the only way to God, what happens to worshippers of other religion.
Some persons, among whom are Christians are so traditional minded, for some myth neither touch, buy nor eat new yams and new crops like melon etc until new yam festival is held and sacrifices made to the gods of the land. But thank God for His grace, for whatever yield the God of creation brings forth should be received in thanksgiving and in the name of Jesus; such is good for eating. Thats our tradition as bible believing Christians. This tradition not only reminds us who we are, but also Gods intervention in our affairs and unmerited grace in our lives as well as the sufficiency of His mercies. It is therefore expedient that we do not forget Gods manifold goodness in our lives; for if we do, our offsprings will forget Him too. By adhering to the disciplines of tradition, we can remind our children of the things they may not have personally experienced but still need to know and honor.
Reach: Evangelist Ogbonnaya, Godswill @weefreeministries.org or P. O. Box 720035, Houston, Texas, 77272. Tel: 832-881-3929.