Religious Leaven Inflates God’s Word With Human Traditions

In recent weeks, a big Christian Instagram account in Brazil posted about the increasing trend of people who are “unchurched.” Many people in the comments condemned the “unchurched” harshly. Some believed that Christians having fellowship outside of Sunday morning services in the “temple” are unchurched and “desviados” meaning “backslidden.” Others were debating and commenting “I have fellowship outside of the church services and I’m following Jesus. You’re judging me wrongly!”

I commented, pointing out that by their criteria for what “churched” means, the early church and much of the persecuted church in countries like Iran, India, and China are also “backslidden.“

Hebrews 10:25 (NKJV) …not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

This exhortation of scripture is simple, but as the Pharisees did, many people inflate God’s word with their religious leaven so that their interpretation of it involves much more than what it says. In doing so, they violate God’s word by going beyond what is written and thus become puffed up and full of religious judgmentalism.

1 Corinthians 4:6 (NIV) Now, brothers and sisters, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, “Do not go beyond what is written.” Then you will not be puffed up in being a follower of one of us over against the other.

There is still so much of this religious leaven in the English-speaking world, and probably much more in Brazil! Let’s start highlighting some of those issues that are leaven: mere human traditions but treated by modern Pharisees as if they were commands of God.

Matthew 16:6 (NIV) “Be careful,” Jesus said to them. “Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

We’ll continue by answering the many accusations of the religious and pointing out how far many of them have fallen from Christ and the gospel.

Matthew 23:24 (NIV) You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

Hebrews 10:25 is an important exhortation, and we should make it a priority to stay in Christian fellowship. Many of those called “unchurched” actually are in fellowship, just not in the institutional way. But even regarding those who are not in Christian fellowship, those who judge them so harshly are usually straining out a gnat but swallowing a camel.

Matthew 7:1-5 (NIV) “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

It’s important to deal with this issue of religiosity so that the church can be restored to unity and to God’s purposes. There is much need for repentance. Instead of judging those who are unchurched, why don’t we offer them our fellowship without the heavy burdens of religion?

You Load People With Heavy Burdens

Matthew 23:4-8, 13-16 (NIV) They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them. “Everything they do is done for people to see: They make their phylacteries wide and the tassels on their garments long; they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats in the synagogues; they love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and to be called ‘Rabbi’ by others…

Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are. “Woe to you, blind guides!

Brian Hogan is a church planter and YWAM church planting coach. He did this skit in which a missionary team wanted to bring the gospel to an unreached man, but instead gave him a heavy burden or religious add-ons so that he got hurt and became angry and resistant to receiving Christ. The church-planting team realized the need to “lighten the load” and filter out everything not explicitly in scripture for people to be able to receive Christ instead of getting hurt by religion.

Brian’s skit and teaching are in the context of church planting, especially in foreign cultures. However, so many people today even in our Western cultures of religion find that they are no longer able to deal with all the baggage of religion. Some are trying to stay connected in churches as they are, but they are suffering. Some have found fellowship without all the add-ons of religion. Others have gotten burned out trying to carry the heavy burden imposed by religion, were unable to find fellowship without it, and are now isolated. Rather than condemning them, the church must repent!

Weights, Burdens, And Human Commands

Hebrews 12:1 (Darby) Let us also therefore, having so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, laying aside every weight, and sin which so easily entangles us, run with endurance the race that lies before us…

Weights in Hebrews 12 are distinct from sins. For example, reading the news every day may be a weight in your life. It is not wrong, but it may hinder you from using your time to do something more productive. What is a burden or weight for you may not be a burden for another. Mark Hemans shared that drinking coffee was a burden for him due to how it affected his energy. He felt better when he gave it up. However, I feel fine drinking coffee!

Some things, such as buildings and budgets, may not be wrong for everybody but are a burden for some Christians that God is not calling them to carry. It is not a sin to have them. However, it is a sin to impose heavy burdens of religious expectations on others. We see this in Acts chapter 15, in which the Jewish Christians wanted to put the burden of their regulations on the gentiles who were turning to Christ.

Acts 15: 10, 19 (KJV) Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?…Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God…And they wrote letters by them after this manner; The apostles and elders and brethren send greeting unto the brethren which are of the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia. Forasmuch as we have heard, that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law: to whom we gave no such commandment: It seemed good unto us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, Men that have hazarded their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have sent therefore Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same things by mouth. For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things; That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.

Weighing people down with religious burdens is the sin of testing the Lord and putting stumbling blocks in the way of those who are turning to Christ.

Matthew 18:6 (NIV) “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

Having a building or budget, or doing church in a certain way, doesn’t necessarily make a person religious in the sense of being caught up in human traditions. But imposing these burdens on others and judging other people’s faith by them IS religiosity. Teaching human commands as doctrine is also sin.

Mark 7:7-8 (KJV) Therefore, in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold to the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups, and many other like things ye do.

Titus 1:10-11, 13-14 (KJV) For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially those of the Circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not for the sake of filthy lucre…This witness is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, not giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men who turn from the truth.

In the next posts, we’ll look at some of these weights, burdens, and commands of men. I’ll also answer the objections of those who insist we need these things to follow Jesus.