Customs, Traditions, Commandments

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Building Blocks Bible Study Week 13-

Customs, Traditions, and Commandments Alright, so today we're going to look at customs, traditions, and commandments.

And just a forewarning, like it is absolutely impossible for me to get through every specific custom.

So if there is a specific custom or a tradition or a question you might have in regards to those, there will be a time at the end where if you want to ask my thoughts on that, I will do my best to answer that and/or tell you what I think the scripture kind of says about that.

But today, I think it's important as we close out building blocks for this year, and then we enter into the fall feast time, and then we enter into what HFF has on their seasonal calendar as a season of rest, which is November and December.

Yes, it's okay to rest.

As we enter into that time, this will kind of be the final element of laying more of a theological basis for the church.

For those of you who are newer, which we have some in the room, we are almost a nine-year-old church, but I like to say we're really about a year and a half, almost two years, just massive shifts in the last two years by the grace of God.

And so we never really had any theological or doctrine basis in this church.

We kind of were almost in an opposite.

We just said, "Hey, look, you know, in full biblical Christianity, there's like four or five topics that everybody divides over, and we're just not going to divide.

We're going to be a place where you have the right to practice in the way you feel like that."

And after a while, I just felt fairly convicted that you can't have an identity being something that you're not.

And so we need to find our identity as a body.

That being said, as long as things aren't divisive, I do love the diversity of thought processes.

And so, you know, we've got people who've come from the Seventh-day Adventist.

We've got people who come from the Messianic Hebrew Roots movement.

We've got people who've come from the Pentecostal Church and the Baptist Church and all of the above.

And they're all at different places in the journey.

And one of the beautiful things about the scripture is that God is present in all of the stops on the journey.

So let's first start off by defining terms.

A custom.

A custom is a specific behavior or a way of doing something.

Traditions are the transmission of the customs or the beliefs from generation to generation.

So when we talk about custom, it's a specific thing that we're doing.

It's either a way we do it or how we do it.

The transmission is actually then how do we transmit that to other people and our family, generation to generation, our children, all of that.

And so it's important to define what those are.

And then obviously a commandment is a divine rule, especially in regard to the Bible.

Customs and traditions aren't exclusive to anyone's set of cultures or religious beliefs.

So if you studied history, if you study even the different denominations of Christianity and church history alone, obviously you have the Catholic and then you have the Protestant Reformation.

And in that, that's come with, well, we dress this way or we believe this way or we do this or liturgy is different.

And so like just the whole concept of those things would be considered to be more of a custom and then a tradition that's passed down throughout generations from generation.

We obviously live in a day and age where traditions aren't necessarily as big with the younger generation.

You know, I know when I talk to my mom and talk to my grandparents when they were older, and unfortunately, as I get older, you know, you look at those traditions and it was really, really big.

If I did not go back to Wisconsin with my family for Christmas like we did my entire childhood, my mom was devastated because this was something she was passing down as this is what we do and this is how we're going to do it as a family.

We have one nowadays where the family gets together for Thanksgiving.

Since our family doesn't currently celebrate Christmas and so like Thanksgiving was the time when we started doing our sabbatical in the month of November.

Every other year, we don't go back.

And so even that is hard for her.

It's like, oh, well, you know, we're not passing down this tradition and it is a custom that we do.

And so we as a family like to have our own.

Obviously, taking the sabbatical and going to Florida is something that we're trying to establish as this is a custom we do.

This is a tradition we would like to pass down to our kids.

I don't know that they necessarily understand it.

You know, when we go to the donut hole in Destin and I'm like, oh, well, your grandpa took me there when I was your age and they're like, shut up that.

So, yeah, my kids are human too.

So he's smiling because you know it's true.

And so customs aren't just tied to religion.

They're not just tied to Christianity.

They're not just tied to Judaism.

Customs and traditions are things that we have all over the place.

And history is something all of us have, obviously, when you go through and you look at that.

However, in our little corner of Christianity, where you have the feast and the festivals and you have the roots of the Christian faith, whatever title you want to call those.

When you get into that, sometimes we lack in scholarship of historical facts.

And so there's been lots of books that have been published out there that says, oh, this historical thing tied into this religious belief in this and this and this.

This is why it's important when doing your research to make sure that you have solid, credible historical facts on customs, traditions, origin stories, things like that.

I, for one, have had to repent on social media many, many years ago because I would share incorrect historical facts because I was given a book when I started to keep that.

When I started to keep the feast and they said, oh, you need to understand the origins of all these things.

And then I would teach people in the ministries I was a part of like, oh, hey, according to this author.

And then all of a sudden I started to realize, well, that author recounted on his deathbed and basically said he made up a lot of the facts that were in there.

And so but still those those those literatures and things like that, they're still out there.

The Internet, on one hand, has been very, very good because you can get a lot of things, but also can be bad because you can get a lot of things that maybe aren't necessarily vetted.

And so today I want to specifically look at how customs and traditions interact with the commandments given to us from God.

Customs and traditions only become a problem when they cause us to be against the commandments.

So, for example, is there anything wrong with me creating a custom of Sunday morning is donut morning for my family?

No, not not at all.

Is there anything wrong with me wanting to make that a tradition that I engage my kids to try to pass that down?

Absolutely not.

Now, if I make donut morning more important than getting up and going to church on Saturday or going to those things, OK, now we have a problem.

I've placed I've placed a custom or a tradition above the commandment, which is we're commanded to assemble whether you assemble on Saturday or Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, all the days.

There is a command to assemble as a community.

So today I want to look at from the Messianic Hebrew root side, a chapter of Jeremiah that has been used completely out of context for a long period of time.

And while today I'm not really going to dive into the topic of Christmas as much, I already did that in a sermon many years ago.

And on the website there is an extensive two years, two and a half years worth of study and peer review, an article with the bibliography and all those types of things on actual origins of these things.

So I'm not going to I'm not going to use this passage in that context today, but I do want to look at that passage in regards to customs and traditions.

So Jeremiah 10 says, Hear the word of the Lord speaks to you, O house of Israel.

Thus says the Lord, Learn not the ways of the nations, nor be dismayed at the signs of the heavens, because the nations are dismayed at them.

For the customs of the people are vanity.

A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of craftsmen.

They decorate it with silver and gold.

They fasten it with hammers and nails so that it cannot move.

Their idols are like scarecrows and cucumber fields, and they cannot speak.

They have to be carried for they cannot walk.

Do not be afraid of them, for they can do no evil.

Neither is it in them to do good.

So in this passage, we see a couple of instructions that Jeremiah is giving us.

One, or not to learn the ways of the nations.

Two, do not be dismayed by the signs in the heavens.

Three, do not cut a tree down and make them into, at that time the terminology was Marduk.

The term Marduk was a typical carved idol.

Now there's two main components in that historical timeframe of Marduk.

One, and I do recommend you go look these up because it's actually kind of interesting, but it's a little doll like made out of wood.

And those little dolls would be idols and they would consider them to be gods and they could ward off evil spirits and all the other things.

The other is they would take kind of similar to a totem pole and they would take a trunk of a tree and they would carve into it faces and symbols and things like that of their gods.

And so nowadays we have subdivisions or we have apartment communities in America.

And so at that time they had tribal groupings and so they would have like kind of an encampment of people and they would be all over the place.

And so a lot of these were just out in the wilderness.

It's not like they had some big LED sign that was like, oh, welcome to the icon or whatever.

Or, oh, hey, welcome to the tribe of the chrysites or whatever it is.

And so they would take these totem pole-esque things that also fall under Marduk and they would implant them at the front of their gathering place.

And that was kind of a way for them to say that other gods of other tribes and other spirits, this was ground that was covered by their god and it couldn't go forward.

I think that's kind of ironic because the god of all the universe, that Holy Spirit that was hovering over the void in Genesis, somehow he's like, oh, no, you've got a tree.

I can't come here.

But in their mind it was.

And honestly, when we think about things like we do things to and we're like, oh, no, you can't come here.

Like when we lock the dead bolts, it's not like you can't come here.

And it's like, well, if I want in your house, I'll come in your house.

Like it doesn't stop evil.

Evil does what it does.

It also can't stop the Lord.

So that is don't cut a tree down.

Just making sure we understand.

And then number four, do not be afraid of worldly idols.

A lot of people will use Jeremiah 10 and they'll say like all these types of things, but they always stop and don't remind you you're not to be afraid of it.

And so especially when we get into talks or social media, social media is a real big place where a lot of people are interacting with all these people.

And it's like, oh, well, you know, I can't go here because there's a bunny or I can't go here because.

This or that, like I've heard some crazy things and it's like, OK, well, then like you're giving it power and you're saying, well, I can't go here.

Is there fear there?

And a lot of people say no, I've especially guys after nothing.

And it's like, oh, well, I mean, I think you do fear that it might have some power.

And so Jeremiah 10 also tells us that we are not to fear.

And so don't fear the idols.

Don't fear.

Don't fear the the reaper as as it was recorded.

You know, don't fear.

The Bible tells us over and over again, if we're going to fear, we're to fear the Lord.

So when when we take our fear and we put it on to anything that's created and we're like, oh, I'm scared of this chair.

Oh, I'm scared of.

Thai food or whatever it is like, then we're misplacing our fear and we're putting what's supposed to be fear and reverence for the Lord.

We're placing it on otherworldly created things.

So let's unpack this a little bit.

Is it is it wrong for us to learn from the nations?

No, no, it isn't.

The nations love football.

The nations wear pants.

The nations love fireworks.

The nations love pizza.

Is there anything wrong with us getting together for pizza?

Absolutely not.

Is there anything wrong with us going outside and watching fireworks?

No, they're very pretty.

They make loud noises.

But those who aren't scared of the loud noises, it's really pretty to watch.

There's nothing wrong with watching football in and of itself.

Pizza is not an idol and in and of itself, pizza is not an idol worship and in and of itself, football is not an idol and in and of itself, football is not idol worship.

By itself, it is just what it is.

Now, you can make football an idol.

You can make pizza an idol.

You can make fireworks an idol.

You can literally make almost anything an idol.

It's by placing it in a higher importance in your life than it should be.

Just a real practical thing.

I've been married for almost 21 years.

If I put football over my wife, I'm not even talking about Christ.

I'm just talking about my wife.

Do you think that I would have a healthy marriage after 21 years?

No.

Do you think that my wife might think that I idolize football more than I idolize her?

Absolutely.

What's going to happen?

We're going to have conflict.

Also, using the same analogy, I love my wife.

I think my wife is very hot.

But in the end, I'm not going to lie, I've amended all of our blessings to have the most important thing.

And so in that, if I place my wife above God, I've made my wife an idol above God.

And in doing so, I am out of line with what the Creator has instructed us to do.

So it is healthy to love your spouse.

It is healthy to love your children.

It's healthy to love these things.

But you have to understand where you place them and what importance is there.

So is Jeremiah telling us that pizza is bad?

That I can't like pizza?

Is Jeremiah telling me that I can't eat Chinese food?

Is Jeremiah telling me that I can't love to wear pants?

Shocker, these jeans were not around in the biblical days.

Matthew was not sitting there writing in some sort of bell bottoms.

Like it wasn't a thing.

And so no, there's nothing wrong with that.

All of those things in and of themselves are not bad.

But it's all about what you make something.

So can you make the Torah an idol?

You absolutely can if you place the Torah and the words of Moses above Jesus and God himself, because the lawgiver gives the law.

Now, at the same point in time, you know, we have people who will throw away the Torah and they'll say, oh, well, the words of Moses aren't relevant or whatever.

That's not healthy either.

But the reality is, is you can make idols of almost anything you want.

Michael, I can make you my idol if I want.

And I can say, man, when I grow older, I hope I have a really cool arm tattoo sleeve and the Wyatt Earp.

And like I hope I just walk around with the hat on and like I just don't care.

I just look cool wherever I go.

I can make you an idol just like you could make me an idol.

Brent talked on this on Saturday specifically talking about narcissism and preachers or ministry leaders.

A lot of people will sit under people who they absolutely do have some form of idol worship.

And so this is why I'm constantly as the senior pastor telling you, like, I don't want you to be like me.

If I'm trying to make you like me, you should run.

I'm trying to make you like Christ.

And so, like, I don't ever want that to be an issue in the church.

I want you to find the greatest version of who you can be in Christ, not in Chris.

The moment that we place that higher importance on these things, that is a commandment.

We're commanded to love Jesus.

We're commanded if we love him, we'll obey his commandments.

So we're commanded to walk out our faith and our salvation and fear and trembling by understanding his word and trying to apply that to our lives.

But the moment that we place anything above Jesus, we've gone into some sort of idol worship.

And so the nations in and of themselves, some of their practices are not bad.

When we have pizza, you know, for all the people when we do the Passover Seder before and we do the Passover Seder weeks before Passover, so it was like, oh, yeah, pizza, there ain't no bread.

Like, no, no, we don't.

But when we bring pizza in, we're not engaging in idol worship.

It's just a simple, easy thing that we can bring in for the volunteers that we also don't have to spend twenty something dollars a plate on.

So moving on to number two, do not be dismayed by the signs in the heavens.

Well, God gave us recently a really, really cool example of this.

We had a solar eclipse.

Anybody get a chance to see the solar eclipse?

OK, awesome.

It was kind of cool for a little bit, but it was definitely cooler to watch on YouTube with people who had way more expensive equipment than us.

We just had like a little piece of paper on the ground and watching it.

Home school, hashtag home school.

That is correct.

Yet many people in the United States of America, they traveled all over the country.

They looked at the trajectories of where it was going to be, where was going to be the best visual place, and they made vacations out of it.

And they went and they they went all out.

And while not every person who went on a trip to see the solar eclipse was in idol worship, some people, absolutely.

That's what they do.

They see signs in the heavens and there's a pink moon and there's a blood moon and all these types of things.

Obviously, prophecy, if you if you look at YouTube on any prophecy thing, every time there's a change in some sort of star or moon, everybody's like, well, this ties into Daniel and this ties into Ezekiel and this ties into OK.

OK, back up a second.

Why are we dismayed by the signs in the heavens?

The old ancient Mayans with their calendar.

Oh, we're all going to die on this date with this thing like there's nothing new under the sun.

We replicate all those types of things.

So the moment we see people prophesying the end of day or the pending judgment or or we're speculating about stockpiling food or stuff like that, we are giving more power to the event that's happening than we're giving to the one who allowed the event to happen.

Remember, the sun and the moon were created by God.

And so we shouldn't be dismayed by those things.

We should find it beautiful that that God's creation is beautiful.

We also have throughout history, entire cultures, religious groups like the sun and the moon become become an absolute form of idol worship and everything that's there.

There were sacrifices.

There were special offerings and there was different types of religious activities that took place when they saw the signs in the heavens.

Poor dinosaurs got it wrong.

Like they did not know the end times were near and like God took them out.

Maybe they should have paid more attention to the signs.

When we start to do that, that crosses the line.

Like, again, there's nothing wrong with being prepared.

We live in Oklahoma.

You should have some food.

You should have some water.

You should have, you know, something other than Netflix.

If you got to like be all locked up in your house on a laptop with your kids or whatever, there's nothing wrong with that.

But when we worship elements of creation, we forget that the countless times in scripture that God warns us about being dismayed or worshiping them over the one who created them.

Romans 1, 18, 25 also talks about this.

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.

For his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world, in these things that have been made.

So there are without excuse.

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him.

But they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened."

Nobody wants their hearts to be darkened and nobody wants God to reference their hearts as being foolish.

"Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creepy things.

Therefore God gave them up to the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator.

Who is blessed forever.

Amen."

The idolatry that we see with the sun and the moon and some of those things, this is actually the source of the revelation of wrath that's talked about in the Bible.

The revelation of wrath is the degrading of mankind's ability to think and reason logically.

Truth becomes hidden to them.

Nobody wants, I mean we're all in this room right now because we're trying to understand the truth of God and experience God and learn more like God.

The last thing we want is God to bring a revelation of wrath upon us and shut off our understanding or shut off our ability to understand truth.

The revelation is not witnessed in the heavens, it's witnessed in the corruption of humanity's ability to perceive the truth.

Number three, "Do not cut a tree down and make marduk."

This one has been used throughout a really, really long period of time to specifically reference, "Don't cut down an evergreen tree and bring it in your home."

Just another reason that people will say, "Well, you can't keep Christmas because Christmas has pagan origins."

And this is the scripture verse that they use for that.

Yet no place in the Bible have I found where God says, "Hey, don't cut a tree down and have a campfire."

"Don't cut a tree down."

I don't mean to step on anybody's toes.

I do that sometimes.

Forgive me, it's a size 15 shoe.

But nowhere in the Bible does it say, "Do not cut down a tree and build a sukkah."

If it did, we'd be in trouble on the second day of Tabernacles because we're going to cut down some trees and build a sukkah.

And so, yeah, you're going to help us?

Awesome.

All about it.

Yeah, you can do that little dance thing you're doing there too.

You have to teach me how to do that so I don't look so like I'm in my 40s.

Trees in and of themselves were created by the Creator.

And so once again, we see Jeremiah specifically referencing how a group of people would use the trees for a specific purpose that they were not intended to fulfill.

And so sometimes we read the scripture and we want to imply things to it.

We want to project things into it and we want to misappropriate it.

And I'm not saying if you have a personal conviction over, "Hey, look, this is kind of a boundary I want to set up right now because I'm unsure."

Nothing wrong with that.

We do that too.

Where it's like, "Oh, I'm not exactly sure what the Lord wants me to do with this scripture or how I'm supposed to apply it."

And so we'll kind of step back and kind of say, "All right, let's just be patient and see what the Lord wants to do."

But you can't take a scripture and you can't then turn around and make scriptures into something that they don't say.

I've heard people go so far as to say, "Well, this is why you can't have any trees anywhere near the temple of the Lord."

And it's like, "Well, then I guess the Jews were doing it wrong who were the ones who were the upholders of the Torah until Jesus came."

And so, again, we live in a time where we can go and we can find history, we can find archaeology, we can find things that tell us about how cultures and customs did things in the past.

And so, yes, let me tell you, Jeremiah tells you, "Don't cut a tree down and carve an idol.

I don't care if it looks like you."

You're like, "Oh, I'm creating this cute little version of myself in a wood doll."

And then you're going to walk around and you're like, "Hi, babe, talk to little Chris or talk to little Russ."

Like, "Oh, what does little Russ want to say?"

Like, "Okay, we're borderline in some weirdness."

Like, weirdness alone should cause you to step back from what potentially will turn into idol worship.

Sweetie, can you set an extra plate at the table for little wooden Chris here?

Like, "No, it's just weird.

Jesus wasn't creepy.

Don't be creepy."

So we also have to understand that while wood is not something that has any power, it also doesn't give you any protection.

And so, like, yes, you could say, "Okay, well, if you build a log cabin and you put a door on it and you go inside, there's a certain level of protection from the rain."

That's true.

But if you just say, "This piece of wood right here offers me no protection."

The only way it offers me protection is if I get into a fight and I swing it.

So you have to do something with the wood.

The wood is an inanimate object the moment you cut it down or the moment it falls in the forest or whatever.

So we cannot give it power it doesn't have, nor should we be afraid of it.

The world is absolutely beautiful because of trees.

I mean, not most of Oklahoma, but the rest of the world.

So when you think about it, you're driving through the Arbuckle Mountains, which will be down there by here for the Feast of Tabernacles.

It's beautiful to see the rolling hills and the trees that are there and those really awesome trees that the government put up that have the spinning wheel on them, the solar powered bird killers.

And so that's going to be on YouTube, too.

I'm going to be on some sort of FBI list just because just because the solar power things.

It's OK.

It's OK.

OK.

I've got legal counsel.

Awesome.

But the world is beautiful because of trees.

And so when you think about it, the occasional time that we don't get ice, but we get snow, when you go outside and you look and there's snow on the trees, it's beautiful.

So God uses trees as a decoration, and he's done that throughout the entire world.

So trees in and of themselves is not a problem.

Trees in and of themselves are not an idol.

You could say, oh, well, pagan cultures have done that.

OK, well, that's awesome.

But the reality is, is that I'm not a first century Viking.

I'm not a fourth century pagan in the hills of Europe.

Like I'm I'm a white middle age American man who didn't camp up until like 17 years ago.

And that's that's almost all in RV.

So like, again, full transparency.

Like it's glamping on a whole nother level.

And so think in your life like, you know.

What time have you given power to trees?

Also, I said I wasn't going to go there, but I think it is relevant because I've heard it.

And it's it's it's asinine how we would take a custom or tradition and that we would somehow immediately tie idol worship in it, which is against a commandment.

So, again, customs and traditions and commandments when they're opposed to each other, we have an issue when they're not.

We don't.

But if somebody has a Christmas tree in their house and there is gifts underneath the tree and they bend down to get it or you have a toddler in the house and the toddler is crawling around under the Christmas tree, that does not mean they're worshiping the tree.

You don't accidentally fall into worshiping.

It's not just like I woke up today and I was like, oh, I found myself at Sonic.

So I just fell into Sonic worship.

Like, no, worship is an intentional act.

It's something you intentionally do.

And so whether you like it or not, we've talked about discipleship and you're being discipled or discipling somebody all the time of your life in every relationship.

So the reality is, is that you can fall prey to an atmosphere, but you don't just immediately wake up today and you're like, oh, OK, well, you know, I'm a devil worshiper.

Like.

You might do horrible things, but like it's different than when you say, oh, I'm going to give my life over to this or I'm going to give my life over to that.

That's why you can't just fall into Jesus.

It's not just like, oh, I've just been walking around for the last 10 years and guess what?

I didn't shank anybody.

I didn't steal it from anybody and I didn't do anything else.

So I'm a Jesus lover.

No, no, no, no.

Worship is intentional.

And so so when I bow down to pick up a tree because I'm six foot seven, there's no other way for me to do that.

It's an army crawl.

And once again, Jesus wasn't creepy.

So why am I army crawling to get gifts and a family gathering?

That's creepy.

Jesus wasn't creepy.

I'm not worshiping a tree.

Now, if you walk up and you bow down and you say, oh, beautiful are the tree with your power and your richness.

OK, we might have a problem there.

But I ventured to believe that even the people who celebrate a Christmas or do these types of things, nobody walked up to their Christmas tree and was like, oh, the beautiful tree with all my wisdom and my power.

Speak to me through the gifts that you bring forth that my mom and dad put while I was sleeping and claim to fat man did it.

No, it doesn't work that way.

No different than when I bow down to tie my child's shoe.

I'm not bowing down and worshiping my child.

I'm helping my child.

So you don't just fall into idol worship.

It doesn't just happen.

The other side of that for my my Hebrew passionate Christians, as Brent liked them on.

I want to go make sure that's like copyright trademark.

When you're lighting a Hanukkah or you're lighting a menorah, you're not worshiping the Hanukkah or the menorah.

Now, if you walk up and you say, oh, just like in the ancient temple period, Lord, speak to me through this ancient artifact that would your presence would have been OK.

Yeah, now we might have a problem.

I might be leaving.

But if you're just there saying, oh, Hanukkah, I'm lighting the Hanukkah or a menorah or candelabra.

No, you're not you're not calling it a God.

You're not making it a God.

It is it's a creation.

So like just got to be careful about implying.

And I've seen that said many, many times over 17 years was like, whoa, because you bent down.

It's like, well, every time I let the Hanukki, am I am I now an idol worship to?

No, it doesn't work that way.

A tree as a decoration is not idolatry.

And so I need us to understand that because if that's what we're going to say, when you cut down a tree, if it's for Christmas, it's an idol.

But when we cut down a tree and build a sukkah next week, it's not like the Bible also tells us equal way to measures.

That doesn't seem like we're using equal way to measures.

It sounds like we're using favoritism to one practice versus the other.

Also, humanity loves fear.

Moving on.

Do not be afraid.

If you think the Christmas tree is an idol, if you think a sukkah is an idol, anything that's fashioned of wood outside of the Marduk, I think that definitely was used for pagan worship.

Like you bring a Marduk here and you're getting the axe like literally we're going to take an axe to that piece of wood.

So if you believe that, if that's where you fall, which is your right, you have the right to do that.

If that's what you believe, stop fearing it.

Well, I don't fear it.

Well, I can't go to their house because they have a Christmas tree set up.

Well, you're down to me like you're kind of giving it some power.

Like you can't you can't be present in somebody's home.

How many people stop at the door of the Chinese restaurant with a little cat that's got like a dollar thirty five in there?

It's like, well, I can't eat at this Chinese buffet.

You ain't eating no Chinese food unless your door dashing then.

And even then, like it's a great line, you know what you're doing.

So so we have to apply it the same way.

Indian restaurants, Ethiopian restaurants, all these things like they all have their little things.

And so except for the Indian buffet up off of I think it's Santa Fe and 23rd up there.

Like they're always just playing elevation worship.

And I'm always like, man, this is really just a little weird little like always like worship nights.

And I'm like, oh, should I come up here for worship nights?

So so I haven't seen anything at that one.

But but either way, how we approach these things matters.

Don't fear them.

Don't give them power.

In and of themselves, Jeremiah tells us that they have no power.

The moment you say you fear them or the moment you adjust something because you're like, oh, I'm not going to go to my parents' house for Christmas anymore.

I'm not going to go to their house because they they light Sabbath candles or whatever it is.

Like literally, I'm not going to go to their house because they watch football or they like LeBron James.

Like, OK, like whatever it is, like the moment you do that, you're actually giving a far more power than it ever actually had in and of itself.

And so if that's where you're at, then I don't mean to be disrespectful.

But but the reality is, is that like you are giving it more power than what it actually has in and of itself.

That that water cup is has no power on its own.

It has power when you pick it up and drink it.

So inanimate objects are just that they're inanimate objects.

Trees are alive until you cut it down.

So it would seem like you're not giving a Christmas tree life.

Seems like you're giving a death, especially when you turn right around and you throw it out on them on the on the curb the day after Christmas.

So just be be careful in how you approach those.

Proverbs three seven tells us, Be not wise in your own eyes.

Fear the Lord and turn away from evil.

It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones.

We're to fear the Lord and turn away from evil.

If your customs and your traditions cause you to fear anything other than God.

You should turn away.

Misplaced fear.

If customs and traditions cause you to transgress the commandments of God, you should also turn away from them.

I like a pastor friend of mine calls it this.

There's closed handed issues and there's open handed issues.

And the closed handed issues are the commandments of God.

Obviously, we would not say if these are our two options, thou shalt not kill.

I sure hope nobody in this room is like, oh, that's an open handed issue.

Thou shalt not steal.

Open handed issue.

No, those are all closed handed.

Like you shouldn't do it.

If you do, you're calling Michael to be represented by an attorney as you're going to jail.

And so they're closed handed issues.

Open handed issues are parables, other things in the Bible where we're looking at with history and we're saying how do we apply that to our daily life?

That's things that we can disagree on.

Not new.

If you've been a Protestant for any portion of your life, you know that there is literally like 3 billion of them in the world and all of them disagree on something when it comes to theology, doctrine, practice or whatever.

So this is not new.

And then when we look at Judaism, one of the common things with Judaism that I like to hear, especially from our Messianic Jewish brothers and sisters, is well, Judaism doesn't have near the divisions that Christianity does.

Bogwash.

Like they absolutely do.

Judaism in and of itself has disagreements.

And if you look historically, even the Orthodox had disagreements.

And so obviously during the first century in the whole entire Gospels, you see that the Pharisees and the Sadducees weren't in agreement.

And so like just using the Bible, like we don't even have to go into historical facts.

We have disagreements and practices and stuff.

And some of that I think, again, it's just the Holy Spirit leads us into all understanding, wisdom and knowledge.

We're at different spots on the journey.

This is why older to help teach younger and younger also help teach the younger younger because you learn things as you go through life.

I've been doing this for 17 years.

Brent's been doing this since 1995.

Somewhere in there right around in there.

I've been in the Independent Christian Church before that, but he's also been talking to Hebrew passionate people since 1995.

I don't keep the Sabbath today the way I kept the Sabbath before.

Next year, I might not keep the Sabbath the same way.

I don't approach the feast the same way.

And so sometimes you'll come to my house and we've got the little wine thing you pour the wine in grape juice for when the kiddos around grape juice in.

And there's like all these little tiny shot glasses.

You can call them whatever you want their shot glasses for the grape juice.

And so very, very more historically looks more Jewish.

Sometimes you'll come and we're holding up a beer because that's what we're having.

And we're saying, hey, you know, thank you, Lord, for for the fruit of the vine and.

Amozi at the same time like the monks lived off that that was their liquid bread.

You know, things look different at different stages.

Part of the journey doesn't make one right.

Doesn't make one wrong.

One of the things I absolutely loved about traveling the country all those years as a worship leader was that we got to spend a lot of Sabbath and a lot of people's homes.

We saw a lot of different ways to do it.

And we didn't go into it and I was like, oh, Monique, well, you're going to do it this way.

Well, I don't do it that way.

So I don't like the way.

No, we found beauty in the diversity of how people approach those times.

We find beauty when we go into tabernacles here in a week.

You have people who who decorate different and you have people who who do different things for Sukkot.

I find beauty in that doesn't mean that I'll necessarily apply that to my family, but I find beauty in it.

Sometimes we've actually said, do you remember so and so did this and then will apply it to our life at some point in time.

So like things come and go.

Customs come.

Traditions come even in regards to the Sabbath and other things.

And so there's a beauty in the diversity, but it doesn't mean that unity doesn't mean uniformity.

And so Judaism, Christianity, Catholic, Protestant, all those things, they all have had disagreements and have different customs and traditions.

And they've argued over, well, how does this fit with the commandments for a long time?

Yet Christianity is not the only religion that has sometimes elevated customs and traditions over commandments.

Judaism was doing it, too.

Obviously, the Gospels, Brent talked about this on Saturday, the Gospels did this.

And so so a lot of times.

When people come to the more Hebrew passionate side of Christianity, it's like, oh, well, the church lied to me and Constantine, man, Constantine.

That dude is responsible.

You would think, honestly, the way they've talked about Constantine, I'm not surprised that he's not alive because I thought he was the Antichrist.

And so like, but like we take shots at Christianity and then somehow we're just like.

Judaism is awesome.

And then when you start to actually read, you start to actually look at where and why some of these things came up.

Some of the customs, some of the traditions.

And again, I love Judaism.

I love the Jews.

I'm not I'm not throwing punches at anybody here.

I'm just trying to help us understand how to be balanced in our approach to our walk with God.

You can't just say, well, because Christianity didn't uphold the law of Moses that that we're just going to go over to Judaism.

And then all of a sudden you start to read history and you're like, oh, well, this was like an anti-Yisrael thing that they started in the fourth century or the fifth century or the sixth century.

Well, Christmas is pagan, but we're going to do the anti-Yisrael thing instead.

Like, no, be balanced people.

Be balanced.

Be balanced.

Mark seven nine.

And he said to them, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandments of God in order to establish your traditions.

We love customs and traditions.

We just do.

Humanity does like, you know, we love saying every Sunday morning is our doughnut day or every Wednesday night is is is dad night with the kids or we love customs and traditions.

It's something that we can hold on to.

It's something that we can find value in.

But again, you can't just say Christian customs are bad.

Jewish customs are good.

You can't just say Jewish customs are bad.

Christian traditions and customs are good.

Like have to be a little bit more balanced in that.

So customs and traditions in the Bible for the sake of time, I'm only going to look at three tonight and then we'll open it up if anybody wants to talk about anything specifically in the QA time.

The reality is, is if we were to go back through history and all these things, the amount of customs or traditions we could talk about just on the topic of Christmas alone is overrated.

The amount of people who came to me is like, OK, well, you went you talked about the origins of like five things, but you didn't talk about this one.

I was like, OK, so ten years ago in Ethiopia, they started this tradition for Christmas and I didn't reference that one.

OK, sorry.

Like it's not possible like traditions pop up and customs pop up all the time.

So it's not possible to get through all of them.

So I want to look at some that are more prevalent to the entire body of our group at HFF.

Sabbath candles.

According to Tobiah Ben Eliezer, the Sabbath candles were adopted by Israel during the time of Moses.

Case closed, right?

However, when you start to research that, this utilizes what is commonly known as oral law.

Oral law is very hard to pin down.

Some will say oral law goes all the way back to the garden.

I've heard oral law is hard to pin down.

No doubt.

Anytime you have a father and a mother and children, there is some element of an oral law or oral custom or oral traditions because you're talking about them and you're doing them.

So there's some form of that.

But oral law is kind of a blanket overview that they use where it's like, well, if we don't know exactly when it starts, it all came from the oral law.

Problem is you can't prove it.

So maybe it is.

Maybe it isn't.

I don't know.

I can't prove it with any type of actual fact.

So this is something that we have to wade into carefully because you can't prove it.

I can't say in this book on this page, go to here and they can tell you this.

I can't tell you that because it has its roots, according to Tobiah, in the oral law.

However, we do know that the Mishnah outlines that this tradition was recorded in the second century CE.

So we do know one of the very first actual written recordings of this is in the Jewish writings of the Mishnah.

Lighting the Sabbath candles alone does not break a single commandment in the Bible.

There's not a commandment in the Bible that says do not light candles on the Sabbath.

It just doesn't say that.

It also doesn't say you must light candles on the Sabbath.

Now obviously before OG&E and all these things, candlelight was how many, many cultures had light.

If the sun went down four or five o'clock like we're getting ready to be in the winter, if we didn't have the ability to just flip a light switch, you would light a lantern or a lamp or candles.

You'd light something to have light in your house.

And so I think just honestly some of that was naturally happening just due to the fact that they didn't have OG&E at that time.

But the Bible does not have an issue with candlelighting for the Sabbath, nor candlelighting at any other point in time.

But this raises an important question regarding the blessing over the candles.

So not everybody does this, but this is the traditional blessing over the candles.

And I'm not going to read it in Hebrew today because my wife was the one who used to do that.

And so it's just like I'm going to read it in English.

Blessed are you Lord our God, King of the universe, who has sanctified us with his commandments and commanded us to light the Sabbath candles.

I just told you I can't find a single commandment in the entire canon of the Bible that tells us that we're commanded to light the Sabbath candles.

So in and of itself, the traditional Hebrew blessing for the lighting of the candles actually contradicts the commandment.

We're not commanded to light the Sabbath candles.

So is the traditional blessing of lighting the candles wrong in that capacity?

Yeah, because now what we're talking about is we're adding to the word of God.

We're saying that he commanded us to do this.

So does that mean you throw it all out?

Because some have done that.

It's like, oh, see, this is what Judaism...

Not necessarily, no.

No, because in a blessing, you can create your own blessing.

So let me just recommend this to you.

I like to give a solution to the problems when I can.

Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who is sanctified us by his commandments and has commanded us to be a light to the world.

Just an option.

There's many other ways you could do that.

You could take the liturgy of the Hebrew blessing and you could make it more theologically correct with what we see in the scripture.

At that point, we're not making a statement that contradicts the commandment of the Bible.

I think that's important.

Does that mean that you cannot light the candles?

Absolutely not.

If you find value in that, you can.

If you don't find value in it, you don't.

But there's no commandment.

So, Russ, I can't come to you and say I came to your house for Friday night dinner, for Erev Shabbat dinner, and you didn't light the candles.

You're not observing the Sabbath.

Wrong.

If you do it, then you find beauty in it.

If you do it and you say, well, if Crystal says you've commanded us to do it, well, maybe he commanded you, but he didn't put it in the Bible.

So let's be careful what we say in that type of place.

It's kind of not a Jewish one in any way, shape or form.

And I've been guilty of this too, especially when I go to lunch with Bram.

Praying before a meal.

I come from a mutt background of Christianity.

I grew up in the Presbyterian Church before it went all wonky.

My dad was a Methodist before it went all wonky.

Theopatronyre.

And what was it?

Bless us, O Lord, for these gifts that we're about to receive from the bounty of Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Oh, my gosh.

The things you remember.

Promise cycles.

And honestly, if his family gets together now, I'm sure they probably say that blessing.

That is what they pray before they eat.

And not throwing my mom under the bus.

I love my mom very, very dear.

I am who I am today because of my mom.

And so I love her very much.

But like when my mom comes into town and we sit down to eat and like get ready to pick up my street talk or whatever, she's like, aren't you going to bless the food?

Like, actually, no, I was planning on eating the taco.

But then it's like, you know, that guilt, shame and condemnation that the mom eyes give you is like, bless the food.

And so then everybody stops like a kid stop and they're like, we don't bless the food before we eat.

And it's like, so again, is there anything wrong with blessing the food?

Is there anywhere in the scripture where God says, do not pray before you eat?

Has anybody found that in the Book of Doesn't Exist, Chapter three?

OK, there's a lot of things from the Messianic Hebrew Roots movement that is in the book that doesn't exist, chapters one, two, three, four, five through thirty five.

There's nothing wrong with expressing a thankful and grateful heart to the Lord for the food that he's given or anything really in that manner, even if you're not eating just just the table fellowship.

We see in the Book of Acts that breaking bread together is a covenant.

And so there's nothing wrong with giving thanks or thanking the Lord for for the opportunity that's there or the hands that have prepared it.

When my mom watches back, make sure I cover all my bases.

There's nothing wrong with that.

However, we do see in Deuteronomy eight in the words to Moses, and you shall eat and be full and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.

So we actually do see an instruction in the scripture in the biblical canon that says.

When you're full, you should bless the Lord.

Now, I will be fully transparent because I don't know how to do anything else.

This is a struggle for me because I grew up with a custom and a tradition that you better not eat or you're going to get indigestion unless you bless the food ahead of time.

So a lot of times like, well, I'm not going to do that.

I eat and then it's like, oh, well, we've got another meeting we need to go to.

And you get up and you run out the door and you forget to thank the Lord for a full belly.

But the reality is, is there is no commandment in the Bible instruction from the Lord that says bless the food before you eat.

There's certainly not a caveat in there that if you don't, you're going to get indigestion.

There is a commandment that says don't add to the word or take away from the word.

So I'm just saying, you know, I'm just saying not not saying that to my mom when she watches this on YouTube, but I'm just saying in general, like be careful.

However, I would recommend living a thankful and grateful lifestyle.

So if you struggle to bless the food afterwards, make yourself a little reminder.

Set it on your iPhone.

Do whatever.

Nothing wrong with doing it before and after.

That's something I would like to do in our home because we always forget afterwards is do it before and after.

But I also have to be the one who kind of leads that, you know, I can't just walk in like getting off the counseling call.

It's like, all right, thank you.

They're like halfway through their food and it's like, all right, I got to get back on another counseling call.

Like it's something we have to practice on a regular basis to engage that.

Talit or Talit or prayer shawls.

You can throw tassels in on this too, because not everybody who wears tassels wear them on a Talit or a Talit katan.

Some of them will just wear them on the corner of their garments.

Numbers 15, 38 through 41.

Speak to the sons of Israel and tell them to make tassels on the corner of their garments throughout their generation and to put a cord of blue on the tassel on each corner.

And it shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the Lord, to do them not to follow after your own heart or your own eyes, which you are inclined to whore after.

That was important.

So you shall remember and do all my commandments and be holy to your God.

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God.

I am the Lord your God.

He made sure he said that multiple times to understand we're not the Lord the God.

He's the Lord God.

So the history of the Talit and the tassel is commonly known as tzitzit or tzitzit.

I've heard it called tzitzit, even though that's not accurate at all.

Tzitzit is also one that is not really defined in history.

It's one of those things that we can't just say, OK, in the first century we have this.

And so utilizing the different Jewish writings, we actually see different information on how and when these were these were put into place.

So in the Talmud, we see that a Talit was worn by scholarly Jewish men.

At that point, we would say that that was more commonly what's known as a Talit gedol, which would be basically a rectangular white garment that would be an undergarment that on the corner of them would have the tassels sewn in.

Some people like to wear that now because that is kind of more of the historically accurate way they do.

A lot of the Orthodox do still wear that, correct?

My understanding is they still wear that under their garments as well.

But according to John Lupia, an author on the ancient Jewish shroud, that's the name of the book, it was closer to the second half of the first century.

I was about to say second half of the second century.

The second half of the first century where the Talit as a prayer shawl like we see today was actually introduced during the first to third centuries.

The concept of what we see as a modern Talit actually evolved.

And by the third century, we actually see a plethora of references specifically in Jewish paintings.

So by the third century is when you'll see a lot of the Jews at the Wailing Wall or you'll see that kind of that prayer shawl covering.

But this was an evolution from the Talit Gadol, which was referenced back even before that.

Philippians 2, 12 through 13.

We're all at different spots on the journey.

We're absolutely all at different spots on the journey.

Some people would argue and say no female is allowed to wear zits or prayer shawl because historically that's accurate.

And the masculine terminology is used in the scripture.

Some would say you're not allowed to wear zits at all because that's not how it was worn.

It was worn on the fringes of a garment.

I think Philippians in the writing in Philippians, it tells us that, hey, look, you're to walk out your own fear of your own salvation with trembling before the Lord.

And so I know people who wear zits, they wear them on the corner of their garment.

I know people who wear Talit.

I know people who have prayer shawls that they only bring into service.

I think that there's a lot of beauty in those areas.

I think like anything else, it can become an idol, just like your meal can become an idol, just like anything else can become an idol.

And so doesn't mean that because somebody wears tassels or because somebody wears a Talit or a Talik idol that they're making an idol out of the garment that they have.

In fact, I very rarely have ever seen that personally where somebody has made an idol out of it.

But we are to walk out our own salvation.

And so that means that my job isn't to walk around looking for a reason to take issue with how you're practicing your walk with the Lord.

I know people who've worn them early on.

I know people who don't wear them.

I know people who wear them under their clothes.

One of the most awkward things I ever had is I walked up to a man who was a pretty popular teacher at a conference that I was leading worship at.

And I was talking to him.

I had seen him before we had done conferences and roaring lion of a man walks up and goes, so you preach the whole Bible?

Yeah, right.

Where's your tassels?

And he was like, do you want to see him?

And he was like, you're not wearing him.

He's like, oh, I am.

I don't think you want to see him.

And the guy was like, oh, you're not where I was like, stop, please stop.

None of us want to see the tassels.

OK.

And sure enough, he wore the tassels on the inside of his garment.

You would have never known.

I didn't know.

I mean, I was doing events with the guy.

I had no idea.

I would have never known.

But he did.

And I think that's the personal thing he felt like he wanted to do with the Lord.

And he felt like the Lord commanded him to do.

And he did.

I find beauty in that.

I personally don't do that.

But like I find beauty in it.

And so not to be judgmental of those, not to take issue with people, just like people shouldn't be walking around taking issues like, oh, well, you don't wear him.

Like we got enough problems inside of ourselves.

We don't need to be taking issues with other people.

When you do start saying like, oh, well, I'm wearing my zitzi and I'm more holy than another person, we have an issue with actual commandments.

Why?

Because you're supposed to walk out your own salvation.

Not anybody else.

So there is just simply too many customs and traditions for me to go all the way through it.

Yet the gospel writers were Jewish.

Messiah was Jewish.

They grew up in that culture.

They grew up trained.

They grew up fully understanding the cultural elements.

And then as they get to the time where Jesus called them as apprentices and disciples, they absolutely knew the differences between the Sadducees thought process and the Pharisees.

They knew that.

And then they were in shock, to say the least, when all of a sudden here comes Yeshua, Jesus, and he's starting to say, oh, you've heard it said this.

Now we're introducing three common teachings at this point, yolks, if we like to call them, into this time.

So the Jewishness of who they are culturally and politically, because, yes, they were under the Roman occupation, but the Sadducees had a political element that were there.

You can't immediately strip away the Jewishness of who they are or the Jewishness of who our king is.

However, we also can't then say, well, seventh century Judaism is first century Judaism.

It's simply not.

It just isn't.

Just like we can't say the Catholic.

Here's the doozy.

The Catholic Church is the overseer of all Christianity.

If you are a Christian, then you are under the Catholic reign.

Martin Luther has something to say about that and the most entry level.

He had issues with the Catholic Church.

He had issue with this.

Most people, especially in the Western Church, we don't have a whole lot of influence from any of those.

I mean, like the most Catholic thing we do is also probably the most Jewish thing we do, which is when we do liturgy inside of our service and the Jews had it first.

So like, you know, it just it just is like you can't strip away the Jewishness of the Gospels and you can't strip away the Jewishness.

So if Jesus and the apostles are talking about doing certain things and how they did them.

They knew they were making a choice, which is why the gospel is so revolutionary because they had the Pharisees and they had the Sadducees.

And here comes Yeshua and they made a choice.

They weren't uneducated.

People say, oh, they're fishermen.

They were Jews.

Anybody who studied the history of Judaism in the Jewish culture, they have only survived because they have stuck together.

They have taught their children.

They have done these things together because the world has been trying to kill them since the inception of them.

They've been trying to take them away from God and the garden.

And I know it's not when the tribe of Judah and Benjamin existed, but the reality is the same bloodline sooner or later.

So at the same point, you can't immediately just say that because something is Christian or something that's Protestant or something is Presbyterian, you can't just immediately say that all of a sudden that custom or that tradition is bad.

Customs and traditions happen.

They're important to a certain degree to keep a community and a family together.

And so as a church, by and large, have a great evening.

As a church, thank you.

As a church, we're a family.

We're made up of families.

We have the Parker family here.

We've got the Perez family here.

We've got the Robinson Walker, Walker Robinson, interchangable.

We've got all kinds of people.

We're your household.

Your family makes up our family.

In doing so, there's diversity.

We're not a cult, which means there's not uniformity.

However, we're a commandment-loving church.

We do our best to pursue the commandments of the Lord.

In doing so, we cannot place a higher importance on customs or traditions over the commandments.

We also can't then expect that because as a church we choose to base ourselves like this, that people can't have different customs and traditions in their home.

The problem becomes when the customs or the traditions cause you to transgress the commandments.

Now you could say, "Okay, well, I'm transgressing the commandments in my home."

Okay, that's fine.

You're not going to hear from me until it becomes a problem in the church.

I'm not like the police over here like, "Every move you make, I'll be watching you."

No, no, but when it comes into the church, we have a problem.

It doesn't matter whether it's a Jewish tradition of custom.

It doesn't matter whether it's a custom or tradition of the nations like eating pizza on Friday nights.

It doesn't matter whether it's a Christian-based custom or tradition.

When that becomes more important than following the commandments of the Lord, we're out of line.

How can we ask for Jesus to be the head of the church and the Holy Spirit to lead and guide us as a church, including me, including Brent and all the other elders?

How can we ask the Holy Spirit to be the leader of this body if then we turn around and say, "Well, you can only be the leader of the body as long as you don't touch my Friday night pizzas, as long as you don't touch my Saturday morning Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," whatever it is.

If our custom and traditions take away from the commandments of the Lord, that's a problem.

I want you to practice the customs and the traditions of your home that you find beauty in.

But it shouldn't be divisive until it takes away from the commandments of the Lord.

So as a general rule of thumb, if a custom or tradition causes you to transgress a commandment, then we should look to adjust the custom and tradition, not look to find a loophole for the commandment.

Brent talked on Saturday the narcissism and the arrogance of the religious leadership in the presence of Almighty God in the flesh to say, "Who are you?"

I think there's a reel that I cut up of Brent where he's like, "I know, boom!"

And he's basically talking about like, so Almighty God is standing there who knows the commandments.

He authored them.

He gave them.

He knows the full intent of them.

And they're like, "You don't follow our traditions of washing your hands before the meal."

And he's like, "Really?

You're coming at me with traditions when you don't even keep the commandments?

Like, come at me, bro.

It's a mic drop moment."

Only they didn't have microphones at that time.

Historically, they came along a lot later.

And so it's important for us as a church to understand customs and traditions are only a problem when they cause a transgression of a commandment.

And you need to afford people the opportunity to walk out there with salvation with fear and trembling.

We're going to become a healthy church, which we weren't necessarily a healthy church for seven years.

You have to have people at different spots of the journey so you can help them along the journey.

And they can help you remember where you were at on the journey.

So as we continue to grow that way, you're going to see people on all different spots.

You're going to see people with prayer shawls, no prayer shawls.

You're going to see people dancing in the aisle with a Pentecostal style.

You're going to see people doing what they call "Devitic dance," which isn't Davidic dance.

We're never doing actual Davidic dance in this church.

That's just a showstopper for me.

But like, a messianic Davidic style of dance that was pretty much introduced from the Mediterranean Jewish influence that's there.

But like, there has to be a diversity of us.

Remember, God didn't save you from who you were so that you wouldn't have to go back to those people.

Part of the goal is for you to be able to go back to the people who you were and tell them about the life-altering power of Christ and the Holy Spirit in your life.

You can't really do that when all you do is stick up your nose at some people and you're like all mean girls, Lindsay Lohan, like on them.

Like, that's not cool.

And so, fidelity to the commandments over fidelity to the customs and the traditions.

But not all customs and traditions cause us to transgress the commandments.

So, let's stop acting like they all do.

So, I'm going to close in prayer.

And if there's any questions or anybody wants to dialogue through any specific customs or traditions or questions about something like that, we'll do our best to kind of dialogue through that.

So, dear Father, we thank you for this day.

We thank you for the opportunity to get together to study your Word, to have a little bit of fellowship with each other.

Be with us, lead guide and direct us.

Continue to mold us and make us into the image of your Son by the power of your Spirit.

In the name of Jesus.

Amen.