It is easy to take credit for other's achievements and imagine you've hit a triple when you've only been born on third. But it doesn't have to be like that. We can honor our fathers and mothers, but we won't do it by accident.
Tradition is honor incarnate. It is reaping what others have sown and having gratitude for what others applied grit to.
Ecclesiastes 1:11
There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.
The normal course of events is to ignore the past to focus on the present and pass down a heritage of hindsight blindness. But we do not have to be caught in this current. We can run in the other direction.
"A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it." — G.K. Chesterton
We can break the cycle and honor our ancestors because in Christ we live.
Mark 12:27
He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living.
The traditions of our forefathers do not die with them because we, as their children, keep them alive; and they are not dead. Not just in a sense, but in actuality. Before Him they live and to us their faith has been received and will by us be delivered to those yet to come.
1 Corinthians 11:2
Now I praise you, brethren, that you remember me in all things and keep the traditions just as I delivered them to you.
The traditions of men kept as the law of the Lord is legalism, but the habits of the holy ones are our heritage.
“Tradition means giving a vote to most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead.” — G.K. Chesterton
So, don't sleep on the dead, but build tree houses where they planted trees, and give thanks where others throw shade.
1 Corinthians 4:7
For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?
No comments:
Post a Comment