Rituals
We, as individuals, each have our own procedures that we go through each day, our own set of measures that we routinely do, starting as we awaken most every morning. This is mostly human habit, and have, through time, figured out it works for us. Man seems to be programmed to do certain things at certain times, in a certain way, and we become predictable; but God is not that way. He said; “My ways are not your ways, and My thoughts are not your thoughts.” But man falls into this category of being ritualistic very easily I’ve always thought of God as a backdoor God. Let me explain. When I’d pray, expecting an answer, looking for Him to show His answer through a means that I expected, He’d always seem to show up at the opposite place I was looking toward. After years of this, I became ‘wise’, so-to-speak, and began looking for Him through the back door, what I thought was the opposite direction. But lo-and-behold, He’d reveal Himself through a window, or at the front door, or any other place that I wasn’t peculiarly looking; meaning, the mystery of God cannot be apprehended, nor comprehended by the mind of man. We are flesh, full of ourselves, carnal, and like definite things our way, but God is Spirit, and His ways are seldom ours, and how, or when he reveals himself, or His answer, has always been a mystery; this IS the way it ought to be, but we haven’t, as yet, understood it.
In Luke 12 Jesus said; “I came to send fire on earth…”, and it continues; “Do you suppose that I came to bring peace on earth, not at all, but rather division.” Now the term earth is used to mean the carnal fleshly ways of man. It is liken to the scripture in the same chapter, “that the father shall be against son, the son against the father…” He is pointing out that His ways, His Spirit, will always be at odds with the fleshly earthly man, and his self-serving ways of thinking.
Again Jesus said; “Think not that I came to bring peace, but rather a sword.” The sword brings a division between mans’ flesh, and Gods’ Spirit, for “He is Spirit, and we must worship Him in Spirit”. Therefore our religious ways, which were invented out of the flesh, continually get in the way of our intimate relationship with the Father and His son Jesus, and if it weren’t for the Father’s Love for us we might have lost it completely; but God endures to Love us, in spite of ourselves. So it seems that if the Spirit were to bring peace on this earth, then the Spirit would have to compromise with the flesh, and that will never happen; therefore all true peace will only come from God through the spirit, and the spirit doesn’t abide on earth, but in the heart.
Even though man resists Him in just about every way, God’s mercy and Love remains, for He is Faithful and Just; He is the God of mystery, our God, and we are His children. But a deeper and more intimate relationship is being missed by man because of our own inventions, our religious ways, our rituals that man created more to please himself than to please God; and I’m not talking about our morning routines. The way we carry-on with these foolish rites on Sunday mornings; singing a song, then go to prayer, make all the announcements, sing another song, take up that coveted money, sing another song, and then engage in what’s mislabeled as the worship service; it not hard to understanding why God is unmasking this man-made institution.
The event of doing, or not doing, does not deter us from Gods’ Love, He just simply Loves us; for God is Love, but it does deter from an intimate relationship with Him. Not that He gives up on us, God forbid, but our doings does nothing, and many become frustrated and then give up on Him. God’s Love for us is always enduring, and never fails.
Now, let me stop a few moments and explain myself. All of us, to some degree, have a relationship with our Creator, many say that they believe in Him, many speak of His existence in a kind way, many even study His word and actively proclaim His message as they understand Him; but what I’m speaking of is far deeper than that. We can walk with God in His presence, and understand Him as our real and permanent Father, we can participate with Him by the act of ‘being’.
We no longer have to perform for our Father’s Love; when we fall short, He is always merciful and full of Love. In 1 John: 3, John is writing to them as a people with many failures, as little children. These folks were already stuck on what they thought was ‘pleasing God’, but needed this understanding by Him. “Now we are the children of God, and it is not revealed what we shall be…”, and this is not necessarily speaking of the life beyond, but the Life now. Now let me paraphrase; But when He is revealed, when we see Him, then our life will be changed, and the change will come by that Light of His illumination, we will then be like Him; that is like his character, demeanor, and so-on, for it will be God changing us from within, rather than we attempting to change our own life. We will then be transformed, not reformed. This is standing and believing that God is able, and at this time, if we are willing; then we become in the state of ‘being’. When we allow Him to do with us, and to do for us, as He sees fit; this is now the beginning of a relationship that God too longs for; intimacy. He spoke that if we as parents know how to give good gifts to our children, how much greater can our Heavenly Father give to us; this statement is true, and when we believe it, only then can we position our self, and get out of His way and let God have his way; and that is an intercoursing, intimate relationship with Him and His creation of man, for we all came from the same family.
Why is this ‘getting out of God’s way’ so difficult? Religion. Religion has taught us, and our fore-parents, that we must act, or do something, and show our selves approved before Him, do our weekly rituals, and therefore the place of ‘being’ His child, already with His approval, is no longer making sense to the fleshly mind, and we know nothing else but to follow their lead. Is this not the blind of their fore fathers leading the blind of ours’, and we accept it? We already are the children of God, and there is nothing that we need to do to accept that, but if we don’t know it to be true, we won’t. It is no less true that we are His children, but our lack of acknowledgement of it does.
If we do all that is required of us from the ‘structured church’, and then hope our deeds, (which are their deeds), will win God’s approval by these works; we will then imitate them, by believing this is also our standard for Godly living; but it is not. Either we earn our way to His graces, or, (and this is a big ‘or’), we allow His Grace to sustain us; but we can’t have both. Our works of the flesh, our rituals, our deeds, our way of thinking has been what has kept us from the relationship he has already made available for us, but most are too blind to see. Too many rites and rituals, these old habits, have gotten in our way, and since God doesn’t push Himself on people, we have stolen from Him His desire for Creation; a relationship with each of us is sometimes lost.
In the times that Jesus walked on this earth, and still prevalent today, the Pharisees and elders enforced the ritual of the washing of hands before eating. Strictly imposed upon all their people, a rule that wasn’t from God, but their belief said it was. Have you ever noticed that Jesus never did wash His hands?
When I was a teen, and that was many years ago, when thinking of joining a ‘church’, I chose one that had tens of millions of members. My thought was that there was so many of them, whether they are right or wrong, that surely God would honor their religion, therefore with all that unity, I would be safe. How silly, but many today have thought that same thought, and have joined themselves with the masses, that already established institution, and ride that bus that takes them wherever it takes them. Now if Jesus came to bring division, and we are to follow Him, then why can’t we stand up, buck the orthodox system, and please our Father with the unorthodox but true ‘stand’?
Understanding that in scripture, many of the old terms are now being used in a somewhat different way. The word synagogue also represents our structured ‘church’ of today; not the Church, but the institution of ‘church’. Also Israel is, of course, still a country, but the word is used as God’s chosen people; which reinvents itself as ‘us’, those that are called by His name. And to the Israelites, which are also us, Jerusalem is that point of contact, also known as, along with several other meanings, the place of assembly, the place of ritual sacrifice. Can we, with this not-so-well defined terminology, see that we also are Israel coming together at Jerusalem? If so then this passage will make sense to us in these contemporary times.
Matt.: 23: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wing, but you are not willing. See! Your house is left to you desolate.” Why? Understanding this, why do we continue to play church? This Life that He has given us is far more than a play thing, it’s forever, and it doesn’t start after we die, it starts now. This Life is not a toy, nor should it been toyed with, but man, with his ego, seems to have to put his hand on everything, including the things of God.
Why do we seem to think that God needs our help? I know that most won’t admit to enhancing His word, or reaching our hand out to help someone before God tells us too, and it’s always the other guy that does it; but God is able, even without our help. If fact, He moved on Saul on his way to Damascus, as Saul, later surnamed Paul, didn’t ask, nor want, nor was he looking for the hand of God, but in spite of all that, God had a plan. Saul’s life was changed, along with his identifying name, and God was able to use him in many and in mighty ways, in the forwarding of His Kingdom. When asked by God; do it. But when we just want God to move on them; wait. We, as a people, have toyed and pretended with the things of God long enough, and, to some degree, have lost our compass of direction when it comes to knowing Him personally; mostly because of the many perversions. Our rituals have never in the past, nor will they in the future bring us to a closer contact with the Lord; they were set in place from men that didn’t have an intimate relationship with the Father, but wanted to pretend they did. It was their formulas, their rituals, sometimes call it chants, their inventions, that helped them feel powerful when others would follow their lead; but none of it worked, and it still doesn’t.
When a people, be it christians, or muslims, or any other religious sect, invents a program to call upon God because some in the past have done it, then it begins to take on a normalcy, but it still doesn’t make it right. To prove my point: Look at other religions from anywhere in the world, watch what and how they do it, some shaking their heads back and forth, some bent over in a knot when praying, some with their wild ritual dancing, and some not really knowing which god to pray to at that particular moment; and then tell me you don’t sort of snicker inside. Well, that’s probably what they do when they’re watching christians. It’s all formulas, programs, rituals and such that man invented because he doesn’t know what to do, but feels he must do something, even if it’s wrong. It’s all for image. The old silly saying says; if you can’t get it right, make it look good; and now all that’s falling apart. Centuries of wrong practice doesn’t make perfect, it just make it seem right.
Paul wrote to Timothy; “…having a form of godliness but denying its power, and from such people turn away. For of this sort are those that who creep into households and make captives… loaded down with sins, and led away by various lusts, always learning, but never able to come to the knowledge of Truth.” There is a way that seems right, but they deny the power therein. God knew man, and what was to come, and that is the perversions that the flesh of man would do to the revelations that His Church was to be built upon. Of course this was happening even in the days of writing these epistles, but has, through these many generations, taken a life of-its-own, and has grown continually with their non-scripture rituals and doctrines. Be it that we were warned, should be enough to open the eyes of many, but I’m afraid that is not the case, but God has kept a remnant through every generation that has held to the Truth; and now it’s our turn to hold fast.
If you know what you’re doing; you do it. If you don’t; they make a leader out of you. Even in this funny statement, there still is a hidden truth. Rituals, programs, man-made doctrines, and sometimes a circus act is what many have turned too to capture an audience, which helps make their leaders get their weekly dose of ego-boost.
If God, during a worship service, wanted to skip the music of a particular week, would we be receptive to that? If He wanted to go straight into prayer, would we be willing to forego with the spoken message? Since none has the complete Ways, nor the thoughts of our living God, and not knowing what He has stored for us that day, couldn’t we keep silent until God’s Spirit began moving? This works, if one wants to seek God’s lead, but if we want to seek the masses, and entertain a crowd of would-be believers; it won’t work at all.
Again, it is written: “If my people that are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I shall hear from Heaven, and will forgive their sins and heal their land.” How long is our God of Grace and mercy going to continue watching man pervert, destroy, and consume His people with their unadulterated antics of silliness before His intervention?
Sit down and try to remember any, and all, of the rituals that Jesus abided by, and what form or pattern He took in His daily walk with the Father, and then compare what you see, or that matter don’t see, with the patterns that man uses in these ‘things’ and then has the audacity to call it a worship service.
A person doesn’t go to Church, we are the Church. The word Church is not a noun, it’s a pronoun; it is a people, not a place. Ministry is not an occupation; it is a privileged opportunity to reveal Christ. Rituals were shown to us by the old stories that they didn’t work, for if they could have, they would’ve, but now that we accept Grace, all works are dead, for Love covers a multitude of failures.
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