Judging Traditions

Every group of people on earth has a culture or collection of traditions that help that group be bound together as a unit. Traditions are unavoidable, and in fact, serve a useful function. When we talk about traditions, we are not talking about a concept that is evil. However, not all traditions are equally acceptable to God and we need to have a framework for judging the traditions of our own culture first, then the traditions we see among others also.

Here are some traditions from the culture I grew up in:

• Say “sir” to older men and “ma’am” to older women to show them respect
• Wait until your child is a year old before you give them a haircut
• Get drunk when you turn 21 (the legal drinking age there)
• Be mostly naked in public when you go to the beach or a water park

You can see that traditions may be good, bad, or indifferent (neither good or bad). In other cultures, we have traditions like:

• Honoring the elderly
• Marrying more than one woman
• Young women dancing mostly naked in front of men to celebrate their virginity
• Women sitting separately from men
• Feeding your child a pancake when they get their first tooth

How can we evaluate our cultural traditions to know if they are acceptable to God or not? It is the same way we determine if anything we do is acceptable to God or not. Something being a tradition does not make it wrong but it also does not make it right. Those who want to justify sinful behavior based on it being tradition must consider Jesus’ statement to the Pharisees.

Matthew 15:3-9 (NKJV)

3 He answered and said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition? 4 For God commanded, saying, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’ 5 But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is a gift to God”— 6 then he need not honor his father or mother.’ Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition. 7 Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying: 8 ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me. 9 And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”

If we say that because something is tradition, it is right to do, we are teaching as doctrines the commandments of men and are transgressing the commandment of God because of our tradition. Being tradition will never make anything right to do. Let’s look at some basic principles we should use to evaluate our traditions.

Basic Principles

Is It a Violation of God’s Law?

Some things are always wrong. God has spoken against them directly or they fit into a category of things that God has spoken against.

Drunkenness is always wrong. It doesn’t matter if it is a tradition to get drunk when you turn 21, someone who follows Christ will follow Him rather than tradition.

Ephesians 5:18 (NKJV)

And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit,

Fornication is always wrong. In many cultures, whether they state it or not, fornication is expected in certain situations. It is part of the culture. It is tradition. A Christian will refuse to take part in that tradition in order to please Christ.

1 Corinthians 6:18-20 (NKJV)

18 Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. 19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? 20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

Worshiping anyone but God is always wrong. Any tradition that requires us to offer any form of worship to anyone but the true God must be rejected by the children of God. This applies to idols, ancestors, and anyone or anything else.

Matthew 4:10 (NKJV)

Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’ ”

Some traditions do not require us to directly commit sin, but have us assisting or encouraging others to sin. This may be buying alcohol for someone else. You are then encouraging or assisting them to get drunk. You might attend the wedding for someone who is marrying a second wife (or someone marrying someone who is unscripturally divorced, which is culturally acceptable in many cultures). You are then encouraging them in that sin. You might help prepare a feast to the ancestors or for an idolatrous ceremony. You are encouraging them in their worship of something other than God.

Encouraging others to sin is always wrong.

Numbers 31:8, 16 (NKJV)

8 They killed the kings of Midian with the rest of those who were killed—Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian. Balaam the son of Beor they also killed with the sword.

16 Look, these women caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to trespass against the Lord in the incident of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of the Lord.

Balaam counseled the Midianites to sin and get Israel to sin with them. He was killed for encouraging and counseling others to sin. This concept is referred to in the New Testament as well.

Revelation 2:14 (NKJV)

But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality.

Just because Balaam did not eat things sacrificed to idols or commit sexual immorality did not excuse him from the sin. He taught Balak to place this stumbling block before the children of Israel and if we encourage others to sin through words or actions, we are placing a stumbling block before them as well. God will judge us for that.

Does It Glorify God?

1 Corinthians 6:20 (NKJV)

For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

Everything we do with our bodies should glorify God. We should think about our traditions and ask if it glorifies God. Does dancing mostly naked glorify God? In fact, it falls under the category of lewdness, which is directly condemned and always wrong (Galatians 5:19). This same principle applies to school dances and things like that which are traditional for many.

1 Corinthians 10:31 (NKJV)

Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Even regarding food, we need to consider if it glorifies God. If we eat to the glory of the ancestors, that does not glorify God. If we eat blood, when God has directly condemned it (Acts 15:29), we do not glorify God. Tradition cannot change whether this is right or wrong. It is always going to be wrong.

But other cases that are not specifically condemned may need to be considered. If you have a cultural tradition about eating pork but you are with someone for whom their conscience is bothered by that, you should consider that person’s conscience more important than your tradition.

Romans 14:13-18 (NKJV)

13 Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother’s way. 14 I know and am convinced by the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself; but to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. 15 Yet if your brother is grieved because of your food, you are no longer walking in love. Do not destroy with your food the one for whom Christ died. 16 Therefore do not let your good be spoken of as evil; 17 for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 18 For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men.

If your tradition requires you to go into debt to keep your tradition (giving gifts at a certain time of year, feeding everyone who comes to a funeral, etc.), it likely is not something that glorifies God. God does not want us to go into debt if we can help it.

Romans 13:8 (NKJV)

Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.

Does it show wisdom to others?

Colossians 4:5 (NKJV)

Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time.

James 3:17 (NKJV)

But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.

What if your traditions involve taking a drink of alcohol, but not enough to get drunk? Does that display the wisdom of God in a culture where drunkenness is so common?

There are some cultural traditions that are connected with religion. It can be difficult to separate culture and religion in many cases. Some things that are simply culture are viewed as religion. Sometimes there are things that have a religious idea behind them but we only think of them in a cultural context and do not think of the religious connections. We need to apply the thinking of wisdom to these also.

What About Traditions That Have a Religious Background?

What you if tie a skin bracelet on your daughter’s wrist even if you claim it has nothing to do with ancestor worship? Does everyone else know that it has nothing to do with ancestor worship, even among those in your culture? What signal does it send to others who may not think about it the same as you?

What about participating in a Halloween party? I grew up celebrating Halloween. We never thought of it as celebrating wickedness or anything like that. But in South Africa, that is a common view of it. I don’t celebrate Halloween now because my culture is not a justification for doing something that others see as participating in deeds of darkness.

If someone wishes another person “Merry Christmas,” how is that viewed? I’m not saying it is wrong, but we need to understand how it is viewed by others. If we wish someone “Happy Diwali,” is that viewed as support of the Hindu religion? We need to be careful about how traditional things are viewed in connection with false religion because we never want our cultural traditions to be of higher priority to us than the traditions given to us by Christ.

Conclusion

We all have cultural traditions and live around those of other cultures as well. We need to understand clearly that something being part of our culture does not make it good or bad. We must evaluate it according to the word of Christ to know if it is something we should participate in or not.

Some good tools for evaluating these things are to first see if God has spoken directly about it. If it fits within something we are commanded to do anyway (like showing respect for the elderly), we should certainly do it. If it is something God has condemned, we should certainly not do it. We need to see if it is something that glorifies God because everything we do in this life should be for that purpose. Part of glorifying God is using wisdom as best we can to demonstrate God’s wisdom to others. Let us be careful not to blindly follow our cultural traditions but rather to live our lives for the Lord.