From the Pastor’s Study
Keeping Some Traditions Alive Oct 20, 2021
A family rented a cottage in February and on Sunday attended the local church. The worship service proceeded normally until just before the sermon. At that point, after singing the song right before the sermon, people got up from their seats and started moving to other seats. A pattern emerged: the people against the window moved toward the centre aisle while the ones by the aisle moved toward the window. They did this without fuss and within about 20 seconds everyone was sitting in a new place. This puzzled the family, and they talked about it after church over coffee. Later in the year, in July, the family visited the same cottage and attended the church again and were fully expecting everyone to move. That Sunday, however, everyone remained in their seats for the entire service. This puzzled the family and they decided to ask someone from the congregation why this had happened.
A member of the congregation had a simple explanation: we only change seats in the wintertime, but when it is warm, we stay where we are. They wanted to know why, but the member of the congregation really didn’t know. “That’s how we do things here,” he said. An elderly woman was listening in, and she joined in the conversation. “We used to have a woodstove which heated the sanctuary,” she said, “and in the winter, those seated by the windows would get quite cold while those by the stove would get uncomfortably warm. We found that by trading places about halfway through the service, everyone would be more comfortable. For some reason, when we got rid of the woodstove and installed central heat, we didn’t stop the practice. That is why we trade places in the winter but not in the summer.”
Traditions become embedded in our lives, and it is hard to break with tradition. Sometimes we do things because we have always been doing them, and we don’t really even know why. There usually is a good explanation, but we may have forgotten the reason for the practice, yet we continue doing what we have already been doing. Consider the congregation which traded places in the winter. They began this practice because they cared about each other’s physical needs and trading places was a way to ensure that all members of the congregation felt loved and cared for. I think we can all agree that it is time for that congregation to stop trading places and find some other way to express their care and love for each other. They can abandon the tradition, but we would not want to see them abandon the reason for the tradition.
Sometimes, however, when we discover the reason behind a tradition, we may make a decision to hold on to it even more strongly. For example, it is a tradition in many of our families to have devotions after our meals. I grew up with this tradition, and my father read the Bible after the noon meal and my mother the children’s Bible after the evening meal. Never a day went by when we didn’t hear the Bible read at least once a day, most often twice. I have discovered that this tradition of having family devotions after a meal is somewhat unique to people of a Dutch heritage. I was quite surprised, in my childhood years, that my devout Mennonite neighbours didn’t even pray after their meal. They did pray before, but never afterward, and they never read the Bible or a devotional. This seemed almost sacrilegious to me.
Now, as we well know, Scripture does not command us to read the Bible after our meals. In fact, the Bible never tells us to pray before and after our meals either. So, where does this tradition come from? Although I cannot verify it, it seems that the tradition of having devotions after the meal was first introduced about 150 years ago by a man named Abraham Kuyper. He was a pastor, teacher, and, eventually, prime minister of the Netherlands. He reasoned, from Jesus’ quotation of Deuteronomy 8:3, that because “We do not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God,” if we spend time reading God’s Word every time we eat, we would be strengthened spiritually just as we are strengthened physically with meat and potatoes. Thus, he advocated that families develop the tradition of having devotions at every meal.
Many of us continue in this tradition, even if we aren’t aware of its roots. I do note that the idea of family devotions at mealtimes is slipping, for a variety of reasons. Some families, because of work and recreation, no longer gather, as a whole, around the kitchen table. Other families, because of limited time, have made the decision to eat quickly, skip the Bible reading, and get to those pressing activities. Other families have just stopped the habit because they don’t see the point.
It may well be that the tradition is impossible to maintain, but we should never forget the reason behind the tradition. If it is indeed true that we will grow in our relationship with our God and in our faithfulness to him as we read his Word, then we need to find time to do just that. It is always better to do this with others, for then we can hold each other accountable, but it is not essential that we do so. What is important is that we continually and regularly read God’s Word so that we can strengthen ourselves spiritually.
I do like the tradition. I am one who needs to eat regularly (and I sometimes eat too much), and if I don’t eat regular meals, I feel myself failing physically. I find that I food energizes me, pushing back the tiredness and weakness that a lack of food leaves me with. Most of us are the same, and we carve time out of our days to eat regular meals. It is more difficult to feel the effect of not engaging with God’s Word, but I suspect that when we don’t, we weaken spiritually and may become weary of serving the Lord. I wonder how weak we become if we only engage with Scripture on Sunday morning. We would die if we had one meal per week, or, at least, become so emaciated from starvation. It is possible to become spiritually emaciated, and when we are, we become unable to fulfill the calling God has placed on our lives.
The tradition of engaging with God’s Word has important roots, but if we don’t understand those roots, we may stop the practice. Some traditions should die even if the reason behind them is good. Other traditions should never die because the reason for them is good. Regular family devotions is one of those.
Pastor Gary
