The Value in Traditions!

Follow my example as I follow Christ. I praise you for remembering me in everything and for holding to the traditions just as I passed them on to you. I Corinthians 11:1,2 NIV

There are some traditions that hold intrinsic value to a functioning society in stabilizing order and peace. When we think about which traditions we follow and honor--some without realizing how they came to be or why we still do them--we should also consider the purpose or how they impact society as a whole.

If one continues to read the above-referenced passage of scripture, they would notice a tradition that was established by many churches because they misunderstood what Paul was saying. First of all, in order to understand why Paul said anything, we have to know that he was responding to questions posed to him by members of the churches. He provides us with a specific order that we should recognize and to avoid further debate about the man-superiority/authority-over-woman syndrome, understand this reference was to those who are married.

The head of every man--is Christ and if that is not true, nothing else matters. The head of the woman is the man (in Christ) and the head of Christ is God. While understanding this, we have to know that God is the head of all. This is why Paul implores the church to follow him as he follows Christ.

Okay, getting back to the tradition--women wearing hats in church services--some people missed the point that Paul said, "her hair is her covering." Anyway, here's where I catapult to other traditions.

Some traditions we should honor and some we should abandon. We should honor those traditions that were instilled in us by loving parents and a caring society.

We should speak to people in passing since it doesn't cost us anything to be polite.

 We should raise our children to be respectful of self and others; especially the elderly.

We should instill in our children the value of doing what's right and always telling the truth.

We should always instill in our children the value of earning respect and their way in life, legitimately.

Raising children right these days appears to be a challenge for many and I can only conclude that somewhere along the line--valuable traditions were dropped by the wayside.

When it comes to our contemporary society, we must encourage all to pay attention to truth, push back against the lies, and be willing to stand for justice--for all people.

One of the reasons why we have such chaos in Washington right now is someone dropped the ball. Discipline was not the rule of the day in the household of the trump family and it is evident in what we see in the Oval Office and how out of order things are.

I was thinking back to some of the traditions I was taught as I was doing my mile walk this morning and I appreciated my training in common courtesy. Everyone I saw, I spoke to and they returned the greeting. This happens on a regular basis, but it made an impact on me this morning, realizing that it was because of those traditions instilled in me that I could speak to a person and be pleasant to them whether I knew them or not. In fact, most people I pass by often smile with their greeting and I can only imagine it's because I smile when I greet them. Such a wonderful tradition!

The other traditional values instilled were about honesty and the consequences of lying. I learned early in life that the consequences were not worth a lie. That still holds true--it is so much easier to tell the truth and not worry about anyone discovering a lie.

What I often repeat to my grandson is this: If you only do the right thing, you never have to worry about doing the wrong thing. It's a premise that works and leave me in a position not to concern myself with oppositional research.

I can own truth and disregard manufactured lies. I have no control over what people manufacture and I have no reason to address such things. I do know everything I've ever done and nothing in that knowledge led me to jail or doing drugs. Therefore--all the haters can do is seek and discover truth; if there are lies presented it's because they manufactured them. Simple as that.

No matter what happens, I'm on a mission to seek support for my presidential bid in 2020 and I won't stop until it's over. I hope readers will have an opportunity to review my stances on some issues, what I think a president should know and hear me speak out about the same. Videos are less than three minutes long and will be updated periodically. I encourage all to stay tuned in to www.facebook.com/YesIAm2020.