High Standards

Some of the standards preached among extreme separatist movements today are: no cowboy boots, lipstick, wire-rimmed glasses, tassel shoes, slacks on women, hollow figurines (demons inhabit them), high heels, television, walking shorts, and on and on it goes. We laugh, but we should be crying. I’m ashamed to admit that in my ignorance, I was a part of one of these movement years ago.

The sad thing is that this unending list is taught to be biblically based. The truth is, few, if any of them have any semblance of a Scriptural basis. Is it any wonder then, the people who occupy the pews, and the youth in our homes, after coming to this startling realization, rebel against legitimate Biblical standards? They have been taught, “Thus saith the Lord,” when there is no Lord in these taboos.

To God’s limited but complete list of laws on how His people were to live, the Jews added something like six hundred and thirteen of their own. I think sometimes the separatists have out-done their Jewish brethren. I personally would like to hear some preaching on the thirteen sins Jesus mentioned in Mark chapter seven, verses eighteen through twenty-three.

Far too many of us, I’m afraid, are like the woman my son Andrew tells of. She was upset at his teaching on a certain thing that was acceptable, with limits; something her group believed to be sin. Her reply to him was, “Yes, I realize this, but don’t you think God holds His children to a higher standard?” I refer to this sort as, “mindless mystics.”

by an Aged Saint

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