Dear Friends,
We hope this week's devotional will encourage you in your spiritual walk. We give thanks to Rev. Dr Joseph Wood, Principal and Senior Lecturer in Theology and Church History, for writing this devotional.
You are welcome to share this and include it in your church newsletters if you wish; we just ask that you please give credit to NTC and the author. Thank you!
Mark 7: 1-8, 14-15, 21-23 (NLT)
One day some Pharisees and teachers of religious law arrived from Jerusalem to see Jesus. 2 They noticed that some of his disciples failed to follow the Jewish ritual of hand washing before eating. 3 (The Jews, especially the Pharisees, do not eat until they have poured water over their cupped hands, as required by their ancient traditions. 4 Similarly, they don’t eat anything from the market until they immerse their hands in water. This is but one of many traditions they have clung to—such as their ceremonial washing of cups, pitchers, and kettles.)
5 So the Pharisees and teachers of religious law asked him, “Why don’t your disciples follow our age-old tradition? They eat without first performing the hand-washing ceremony.”
6 Jesus replied, “You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote,
‘These people honour me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
7 Their worship is a farce,
for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’
8 For you ignore God’s law and substitute your own tradition.”
14 Then Jesus called to the crowd to come and hear. “All of you listen,” he said, “and try to understand. 15 It’s not what goes into your body that defiles you; you are defiled by what comes from your heart.
21 For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, 22 adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. 23 All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.”
Devotional Thought
I am a Church Historian. The bulk of my research and writing for the past 15 years has been on topics in Church history. From the first century to the twentieth, I find the birth, growth and development of the Christian religion absolutely fascinating. One aspect of this history that has captured much of my attention is worship practices. Although the Bible includes some descriptions of various worship practices in the first century (baptism, communion, prayer, confession, etc.), it includes very little prescription for how these things are to take place.
For example, Paul instructs the church in Corinth to ensure there is order in worship. He says that no one should speak over someone else and if someone speaks in an unknown tongue an interpretation must also be provided. This is an explicit instruction that can be understood and followed. There are other descriptions of worship in the New Testament, however, that are not explicit. Acts 2 describes worship in general terms: “They devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” This is a very broad description of worship that can be interpreted in different ways.
As the Church grew and spread across the ancient world, worship practices developed in different ways for different cultures and peoples. One example of different practices may be observed in the type of bread used for Communion. In the Eastern half of the Roman Empire, bread baked with yeast was used. In the Western half of the Roman Empire, bread baked without yeast was used. In terms of what the Bible prescribed, there is no definite recipe for bread mandated for worship. The Eastern tradition included bread with yeast to point to Jesus’ death and resurrection as bringing about new life and growth. The Western tradition used bread without yeast as a reminder of the Last Supper, which was in the context of a Passover meal. In both traditions the element is the same. Both use bread, but the method of baking the bread was different.
Why am I telling this story? Ultimately, the Church in the West and the Church in the East separated from one another over traditions like this. The type of bread used in Communion was one of the issues that eventually led to division.
As I read the passage from Mark 7, I was drawn to various times in Christian history where the Church has focused more on “following age-old traditions” than worshipping God in spirit and in truth. It is a challenging word from Jesus, not only to the Pharisees, but to the Church throughout time. We all agree that worship is integral to the life of the disciple, but what is the most important aspect of worship? Is it the type of bread we use? Is it the way we sing or pray? It seems to me that Jesus’ instruction here indicates that the most important aspect is not our traditions, but our hearts.
Prayer
Father of all, we give you thanks for this reminder, as challenging as it may be, to consider our hearts in worship. May our traditions always lead us in the paths of righteousness. When they become a barrier to true worship, may we be willing to change for the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ and the ministry of reconciliation in the world. Amen.
Grace and peace,
Rev. Joseph Wood, PhD (Principal and Senior Lecturer in Theology and Church History)