Jesus said, “Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition. Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying: ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honour Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me. And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”” Matthew 15:6-9(NKJV)
Whatever is not in the Bible let us not follow. We are neither Jew nor Gentile to follow their traditions. We are One New man in Christ Jesus to reconcile us back to God. And we should have one Spirit also. So we should not follow Jewish traditions and definitely not follow Gentiles’ pagan traditions too. What the apostles laid as foundation, as Jesus Christ Himself being chief cornerstone, is for us and nothing else. We got to be holy, in the sense, live a set apart life to have God’s presence to stay in our dwellings.
One New Man
“For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.” Ephesians 2:14-22(NKJV)
You cannot live as you feel like and do things as the worldly people do and can expect God to bless you anyway; as if He is obligated to do because you are a Christian in name sake. Our God is God of order and He can bless you, only if you are following what He has instructed to do. Otherwise if God wants to bless also, which He does, He cannot do; because you have tied His hands by living unruly. From the time God created men He got to deal with such behaviours from men. Let us be wise, separate ourselves and be holy to please God. Do not be man pleasers.
We celebrate the Lord Jesus Christ and His Finished Work; whenever we come together, it is a celebration to worship the Lord with spirit and truth. We remember the day of His birth, His death on the Cross and His resurrection from dead. Because it is all about Jesus and none of anybody or anything. Let us make it clear that the focus is on the Lord Jesus.