She asked once, when she was about fifteen, and got the answer everybody gets.
Așa se face. That is how it is done.
It was not said unkindly. It was said the way you would answer a question about which side of the road to drive on, by somebody in a hurry, with plates in her hands, and there was nothing behind it except that this genuinely is how it is done and always has been.
She did not ask again. Not out of resentment. She is twenty-four now and she has not missed a service in her life and she loves the people in that building, and she would be genuinely upset if anybody thought otherwise.
She just noticed, somewhere in the last year, that she could not tell you which of the things she does are because God said so and which are because that is how it is done, and that she has been doing all of them with the same seriousness for as long as she can remember.
Handing it down is commanded
Start here, because a lot of writing on this subject starts in the wrong place and ends up sounding like an attack on somebody's grandmother.
And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. (Deuteronomy 6:6-7, King James Version)
Teach them diligently unto thy children. That is a command, and it is about transmission.
And Paul uses the word tradition warmly, twice, about things he himself handed over:
Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle. (2 Thessalonians 2:15)
Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ordinances, as I delivered them to you. (1 Corinthians 11:2)
So the question is not whether tradition is good or bad. Scripture has plenty of it, commands the handing down of it, and praises people for keeping what was delivered.
The question is a different one, and it is smaller and more useful. Which is which.
You are not in rebellion for asking which is which. Deuteronomy 6:7 commands the handing down and 1 Corinthians 11:2 praises the keeping of it, and it is His Spirit who does the sorting inside somebody without making them cold toward the people who taught them.
The law expects a child to ask why, and says what to answer
Here is the part almost nobody has been shown, and it changes the whole feeling of the question.
Three separate times, the law itself anticipates a child asking why, and provides the answer.
At the Passover:
And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service? That ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the LORD's passover. (Exodus 12:26-27)
At the stones by the river:
That this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones? Then ye shall answer them. (Joshua 4:6-7)
And in Deuteronomy, in the middle of the passage about teaching children diligently:
And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God hath commanded you? Then thou shalt say unto thy son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. (Deuteronomy 6:20-21)
Read what is happening there.
God builds the question into the system. He does not treat a child asking why as a crack in the wall. He assumes it will happen, He plans for it, and He supplies the answer in advance, and the answer He supplies is a story about what He did rather than a sentence about how it is done.
The question you have been holding is one God wrote into the design. Exodus 12, Joshua 4 and Deuteronomy 6 all anticipate it, and it is His Spirit rather than anybody's permission who makes a person able to ask it without guilt.
What He requires is stated and it is short
And there is the other half. Scripture does not leave the requirement vague.
He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? (Micah 6:8)
He hath shewed thee. It is not hidden and it is not long.
And Moses says something about the difference between what is revealed and what is not:
The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law. (Deuteronomy 29:29)
Those things which are revealed belong unto us. The revealed part is described as belonging to ordinary people, and specifically to their children.
You have been shown what He requires, and it was never hidden from you. Micah 6:8 says He hath shewed thee and Deuteronomy 29:29 says the revealed things belong to us and to our children, and it is the Holy Spirit who makes a short requirement land as ground rather than as a loophole.
And Jesus made the distinction Himself
He did, plainly, and it is worth having in one paragraph rather than five.
Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. (Mark 7:9)
That is the sharp end and He aimed it at people who were substituting one for the other.
But notice the fault He names. Not having traditions. Rejecting the commandment in order to keep them. The failure is a swap, and a swap is a specific thing, and most of what any family does is not a swap.
Which means the honest work here is not tearing anything down. It is knowing which shelf a thing sits on, and continuing to keep plenty of things that sit on the lower shelf because they are good and because they belong to people you love.
You are allowed to keep something and know exactly why you keep it. Mark 7 names a swap and not an inventory, and it is His Spirit who makes that distinction clean rather than cutting.
Nobody here is going to do the sorting for you
And this is the point where an article about rules would normally hand you a list, and this one is not going to.
There is nothing in here about clothing, about music, about what a service should look like, or about anything else a family argues over. That is not modesty. It is that a stranger with a keyboard has no business ruling on the practices of a house he has never sat in, and doing it would only be swapping one this is how it is done for another.
What you have is better than a ruling. You have a text you can read, a question the law itself expects you to ask, and a requirement stated plainly enough to fit in one verse.
You are trusted with this, and you are not alone in it. Deuteronomy 29 says the revealed things belong to us and to our children, and Christ is in you now by the Spirit who is described as guiding a person into truth.
So write one down and ask about it out loud.
What God requires of you is not hidden, and asking which is which is not rebellion. He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good, and the law itself plans three separate times for a child to ask what these things mean.
And do not let this turn into distance from your own people. You are not being handed a case against anybody. God commanded the teaching of it in the first place, and Paul praised a church for keeping what was delivered to them, and Christ is in you now by a Spirit who sorts this in a person without making them cold.
You have been trusted with the revealed things, and so have your children. Deuteronomy 29:29 says they belong unto us and to our children for ever, and it is His Spirit rather than anybody's permission who makes the sorting possible inside a person.
Nothing here promises the question is comfortable or that the answers arrive quickly. She waited nine years to ask again and then took a week to ask a person. What is promised is that obedience taking itself seriously was never rebellion (Deuteronomy 29:29, Micah 6:8), and it is His Spirit rather than anybody's permission who makes asking out loud a receiving.
Declare this over yourself
Say it out loud. You are in Christ and Christ is in you, so the authority to speak over what you were handed is genuinely yours, given to you and never invented. The law itself anticipates a child asking what these things mean and supplies the answer, so speak to the question you have been carrying quietly: you have standing to address it because God wrote it into the design. An ambassador carries the King's word and never his own opinion, so say what God has said and leave the outcome to Him. Every line below is Deuteronomy 6:20 and Micah 6:8 handed back in your own voice, and it is His Spirit, not how loud you say it, that makes saying it a receiving.
- Answer that this is how we do it, you are not the whole of what I was given and you were never meant to be the end of the conversation. The Word of God says when thy son asketh thee in time to come, what mean the testimonies, then thou shalt say unto thy son, and He built the question in Himself.
- Fear that asking is disloyal, you are finished in the name of Jesus. I am honest and I am at home here, because Deuteronomy 29:29 says those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, and His Spirit does the sorting.
- Abba, You have shewed me what is good, and Micah 6:8 says You did not hide what You require of me. I receive Your clarity today, and I am asking You about it out loud before I ask anybody else.
Deuteronomy 6:20
This message is free, and always will be. There is nothing to unlock, nothing to subscribe to, and nothing you owe for having received it.