Rules We Don't Need

If you are like me, you hate driving over speed bumps. No matter how careful you try to drive over, it jars the vehicle, skips your cd, and makes you think about how far out of alignment your car has just become. We have to have speed bumps for safety, right? Well, it turns out that speed bumps are less safe than we thought. A recent study in Boulder, Colorado found that for every 1 life a speed bump saves, it kills 85 persons in the delays that they cause to emergency services. So why do have so many? Well they seem safe, so people accept them. It’s much like what Paul said of man-made commandments that people add to the word of God in Colossians 2:23.  “These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.” The religious rules humans create often seem to make for better spirituality, but in practice they cause much more harm than they do good and do nothing to actually help us be more Godly. Rules, like false teachers, are best seen in results rather than appearances.