Tuesday, December 16, 2003
The Bible and Church Tradition
I have been teaching a Chruch School class on the History of Worship and the Church to 11 and 12 year olds in our Parish. It has been a wonderful experience and I have been so blessed by the kids. When I was asked to teach this class, I felt just a little unqualified. The knowledge that I have came from Catechumen class and various books that I have read. I felt, and still feel, that I have barely scratched the surface.
However, by the grace of God and the understanding that I am not imparting a wealth of knowledge to the kids, I have found a very unique place as their teacher. We, as a group, are learning Church History and Worship together, with me at the helm. I do some research during the week and then I bring what I have found to the group, and we discuss. I have been learning right along with them. It has been a wonderul experience!
One of our recent lessons was on private and public Worship, and the need that we have for each. One of the tools that we use to answer this and other questions, is what does the Church(and its 2000 years of Tradition), the Bible, the Saints, the Apostles and the Early Christians have to say about that particular question. Well, so to answer the question as to whether we need public worship and/or private worship, I pulled a few stories from the Bible and some Early Christian practices. This is the list we came up with:
1) What Jesus tells the Samaritan woman about Worship.
2) Jesus cleansing the Temple.
3) Jesus Worshiping in the Temple and teaching in the Synagogue.
4) What Paul says about "Temples made by human hands".
5) The Early Christians and their Houses of Prayer, Worshiping in the catechombs, and the
beautiful Temples that were erected after the persecution.
I made a chart that included the above for the kids to decide which events above were for or against public Worship. As we did this, it became very evident that there were contradictions in the events we were using. Not to mention that the first four are from the Bible. We began to discuss the danger in relying on oneself to determine answers to questions such as the one we were asking. As a part of this, we began to discuss the danger in using the Bible alone to do this as well. That when we rely on our own understanding, we could be forced to make distinctions that could lead us into heresy. Both the kids and myself got the point.
As usually happens during our class time together, I came away with something I did not have before: that I am blessed to be a part of this multi faceted body we call the Church. That I don't have to rely on my own understanding when difficult questions arise, but I can look to the Church and its Tradition, its Bible, its Saints and Jesus(as the living Spirit and head, present in the Church) to learn more about the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and my role in His Creation. Just like in my class where I feel extremely unqualified to teach, I also feel extremely unqualified to try to answer questions about my place in the Spiritual life and how to live it. However, this great "resource" if I dare call it such, is like I am really nestled in the shadow of His wings. If I submit myself to Christ's Bride, then I will be lead into "all truth". I am looking forward to many more opportunities like this with my class. I pray that the we all would be more humbled before Him.
8:07 AM
