But That's the Way We Have Always Done It
Shari L. Davis, Ph.D., Class of 2004
Senior Sermon on September 4, 2003
Lessons for Pentecost 12 (Proper 17) Year B: Deuteronomy 4:1-9; Psalm 15; Ephesians 6:10-20; Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

May the Words of My Mouth and the Meditations of Our Hearts be Always Acceptable to You God, Our Rock, and Our Redeemer. AMEN

WOW! It is hard to believe that two years ago I sat in those chairs listening to the first senior sermon of the year wondering what I had gotten myself into by coming to seminary. I was in awe of the skill and ease with which that first sermon was delivered and the courage and confidence that it must have taken to go first.

As my time in seminary has flown by, I have changed my outlook some. Rather than courage and confidence I think the first sermon of the year is about intelligence and brilliance, it is over and the bar has yet to be set. There is no standard that has to be met.

Tradition has it that the senior class representatives have the honor and privilege of preaching first each semester. So if getting it over with early is important to you, think about getting yourself elected. I am certain there are other perks and responsibilities, but I let you know about them later.

Knowing I would be preaching first in the fall or spring semester, I started investigating what texts I might be working with several months ago. When I first encountered the texts assigned for today I thought the gospel was a bit pointed and difficult to digest, so I looked at the epistle. The whole armor of God sounded very familiar suggesting to me many preachers before had elected this route and what more could I say on the topic. I moved then to the Old Testament lesson and found no comfort in Moses telling Israel to follow the statues and ordinances given by God so that they might enter and occupy the Promised Land. The Psalm, what about the Psalm. Realizing Michael's class on the Psalms was not until next the semester and it looked much like the Old Testament and gospel text. I found myself in a dilemma.

Maybe, just maybe Titus would change the lectionary pattern and we would use the following Sunday rather than the previous Sunday's lessons for Thursday worship.
Or maybe clinging to hope there would be no senior sermon the first week since there were radical changes in the calendar and schedule.

Admitting and finally accepting that none of these scenarios was likely to occur, I set out to explore the texts more thoroughly. I found some comfort in the General Convention hysteria as it seemed to provide a direction for how to proceed. After completing CPE and a week of recuperation, I went on vacation fully armed with materials to tackle the foreboding task in the unlikely event I would have nothing else to do. But as you can probably imagine on a cruise there is always something to see, do, or eat, thus leaving little time to sit down and write. When I returned to civilization, I discovered the topic of the day was to be Embracing Diversity, thus it seems that procrastination has paid off.

In today's gospel lesson, Mark describes an interaction between Jesus and the Pharisees. The specific incident is related to the fact that the disciples are not washing their hands before eating. SO what is the big deal, the disciples have not been out all day grooming horses, digging ditches, greasing axles, or mixing pesticides. How dirty could their hands be?

Dirt was not the issue; rather holiness and purity were the big concerns. The Pharisees had adopted the ritual hand washing as a way for ordinary people to show their devotion to God. It also served as a way for Jews to proclaim their identity as distinct from their pagan neighbors.

The Pharisees believed God was holy and the people were to be holy, thus laws were developed to create and maintain a nation of holy people through prescribed moral behavior. Pharisaic law or "law of the elders" were oral laws designed to protect God's commandments. These laws were intended to provide a layer of protection so that one could avoid breaking God's laws, being found guilty and consequently punished by God.

The real problem for the Pharisee arose when the people became more familiar and ultimately rigid with the protective laws and God's laws were neglected. Pharisaic law was equated with the authority of scripture. This type of power served the Pharisees well as they were afforded many of the rights and privileges held by their Roman counterparts. They wielded political, economic, and religious power. Power they believed to be authorized by God.

Jesus has little patience for this type of behavior and criticizes the Pharisees to illustrate that people cling to human traditions as if they were divinely revealed. Jesus is more concerned about taking care of people, all people, than to the rigid adherence of rules. Jesus tells us that observing rules is for the benefit of those serving God, not for the sake of the rules themselves. How many of us blindly adhere to stated rules to only later discover that there was no rule just a tightly held tradition, you know because that is the way we have always done it.

Because this is the way we have always done, it was OK with the Pharisees. Actually, they encouraged and reinforced this way of thinking as it allowed them power and control that served them well. Why would they want to put people before the law, as it would undermine their power? The primary reason for clinging to power was and remains fear - fear of losing one's position in society.

Jesus makes it very clear that God is not honored by our rote adherence to rules and regulations but from an obedience that flows from our hearts. When we defer to traditions or rituals, the basic virtues of love, reconciliation and the good news that God has come among us is lost.

Jesus goes into great detail to explain that it is not, that which goes into the body that defiles, but the things that come out of the body from the heart. The heart represented a person's innermost core or spiritual center rather than the organ that pumps blood throughout the body. This distinction is necessary when we acknowledge that God sees tests and searches the hidden depths of our hearts.

When considering the condition of our hearts we encounter polar opposites with the majority of people falling somewhere along the continuum. At one end, we find the pure hearted person who lives a life directed and devoted totally and unreservedly to God. At the other end is the hard-hearted person who is self-centered, impervious to spiritual things, resistant or closed off to God and to what God wants to do in that person's life.

Living a life totally and completely devoted to God is very difficult in our 21st century society. Our society places significance and importance upon identifying and honoring our feelings rather than developing ways to control them. We celebrate freedom and personal choice and become fiercely resistant to any constraints that Christ or common sense might place on our behavior. The result is that we live in a world characterized by the evil intentions outlined by Jesus: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, and folly.

So how do we counteract these societal influences? We must become critical of all the traditions of our time otherwise, we will miss the mark of holy living, and continue to worship the false gods set forth and reinforced by our society. These are major issues that the church struggles with in its attempt to discern God's will.

Jesus does not condemn all tradition, only the improper elevation of human tradition to sacred status. The church has a responsibility to preserve tradition, but must take care to distinguish between scriptural teachings and other tradition.

Jesus provides direction when he tells us it is a true inner observance that brings one closer to God not an external display of piety and righteousness. Our inner observance of God's will can be observed in our attitude and ethical behavior or honoring God by our right actions in relationships with to others; rather than through our piety or honoring God by devout fulfillment of religious duties.

The challenge Christians face is to follow practices that transform our hearts and allow us to accept and honor those people who are different from ourselves. This is accomplished only when we examine each custom and tradition in light of a tradition of worship that proceeds from our heart to the heart of God.

Over the centuries, religious people have codified customs into church laws that in turn make the law an instrument of oppression. God tells us repeatedly that people matter most and Jesus reinforces this command by demonstrating that biblical laws never take precedence over what is compassionate and caring.

We must examine our traditions to determine their appropriateness as vehicles to carry us along faithfully in the life of faith.

We must ask ourselves and respond honestly, do we allow rules, traditions, and rituals to exist for their common sense and applicability to daily lives, or to enslave us needlessly?
AMEN