Setting God Aside

Mark 7:9 - "He was also saying to them, 'You are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition.'"

To point the finger at the Pharisees is often to have three pointed back at ourselves. While we may not have a written form of the Talmud that we use to dissect the Law of God, we invariably do this in other ways. Compromise comes through forcing our own way rather than God's. It can often come in the most subtle ways also. Have we desired something we should not have? Then, we can sometimes justify our position by doing a little more for God in another area. We add to the law by trying to love someone a bit more so we can act a bit more rude to another through our self-justification. Or, we might fall into the trap of doing for God rather than being for God. To clarify, how often do we do for God because we are afraid not to? We have become so accustomed to giving to a certain charity or helping out a person in a certain way, yet we have lost our love in the midst of it.

If we will allow the love of God to be our great motivator in whatever we do, then we will never fall short of His expectation. Jesus Himself stated that if we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, and mind and our neighbor likewise, then we have fulfilled the Law (Luke 10:27). However, this takes sitting before the Lord and seeking His will everyday rather than assuming we know it from past experience.