Unwritten

UNWRITTEN:  Not expressed in writing; oral, traditional⁹ 

My heart is broken within me;
    all my bones shake;
I am like a drunken man,
    like a man overcome by wine,
because of the Lord
    and because of his holy words.
¹⁰ For the land is full of adulterers;
    because of the curse the land mourns,
    and the pastures of the wilderness are dried up.
Their course is evil,
    and their might is not right.
¹¹ “Both prophet and priest are ungodly;
    even in my house I have found their evil,
declares the Lord.
¹² Therefore their way shall be to them
    like slippery paths in the darkness,
    into which they shall be driven and fall,
for I will bring disaster upon them
    in the year of their punishment,
declares the Lord.

Jeremiah 23:9-12 ESV

            I just wonder how many of us have unwritten rules not only for ourselves, but for others as well.  Think of these things as codes of conducts on how one should behave and how to interact with others.  You can not find said rules specifically stated in any state or local laws or religious texts, but every culture and country has them, and they are often a personal or group interpretation of stated rules and how they are implied.  Knowing these rules, we find out what someone values, like civility or not wanting to be offended  by not talking politics and or religion,   Being a baseball fan, one has to learn the unwritten rules of the game, like not stealing when having a big lead, not bunting for a hit to break up a no hitter or perfect game.  When these things happen, feelings get hurt and someone usually gets a fastball in the small of the back in the form of retaliation. 

            Over the last two months the Houston Astros and Boston Red Sox have been in the news for stealing signs electronically and then banging on trash cans to let the batter know what pitch is coming.  The Astros won the World Series in 2017, and the Red Sox won in 2018 and many in baseball thought that the teams cheated their way to a championship.  In baseball, one of the unwritten rules to my understanding is that it is ok to try and find out what the pitcher is going to throw, but when teams start using trash cans and electronics, many people in baseball say its gone to far.  People have lost jobs over this, fines have been handed out, and even the call for the teams to rescind their championships and the players rescind their bonuses and serve a lengthy suspension.  Many players have taken to social media to call the Houston Astros a bunch of cheaters. When the Atlanta Braves player Nick Markakis has the quote of

“its damaging to baseball, its anger.  I feel like every single guy over their needs a beating.”

The scary thing is that he isn’t the only player to come out and say something like this and, for everyone who has come out and said something, I am sure there are more who haven’t said anything but feel the same way.  So what can we learn about unwritten rules and the dangers of them. 

            The first thing we can learn is that unwritten rules are very subjective.  They often very from culture to culture and from generation to generation and even person to person.  Some players like to celebrate home runs by doing a bat flip or admiring it for a few seconds in the batters box to admire their moonshot.  Others players think those actions are not only showing up the other team, but it is a me before team attitude.  Its really hard to put rules to paper when they vary from person to person and situation to situation.  I think why we like our rules subjective is because when we get into questionable situations, it allows us a little bit of wiggle room to get out much damage,  When anything is subjective, especially rules, they are often based more on feelings, experience, or what we can get out of it.  When things are left to subjectivity, things can change quicker then the weather and at best truth is compromised.

            The second thing we can learn from unwritten rules is that we can become vigilantes.  When we become vigilantes, we are never wrong, its always someone else’s fault and some person or team becomes the villain.  When we become vigilantes, we see life through only one lens, and we expect others to see life through that lens and it doesn’t matter of age, skin color, where one is from, or cultural history, and there is only way to see and live life, and that’s my way. How often do we become vigilante over one from of worship, a particular Bible translation, or whether we are in the Reformed or Arminian theology camp.  There are battles worth fighting and hills worth dying on, but we have to watch out because if we are not careful, we will at least lose valuable relationships, if not become dinosaurs who wont change.  We have enough discernment to know what is personal preference and what is actual Truth.

            The third thing we can learn from unwritten rules is that it often creates a scare crow.  If we look back at our passage from Jeremiah, God is not only putting the nation of Israel on blast, but He is taking the prophet and priest out to the woodshed.  The priest and prophets were creating scarecrows by either taking Gods word and either perverting it, or completely disregarding it and creating something else to fit one’s selfish desires.  The scarecrow looks Godly but, in all reality, it is all fluff and is more concerned with looking the part than being the part.  If we spend any time in Gods presence, God will call us out on this and deals harshly with is if we don’t stop pretending.

            To wrap things up, how often do our unwritten rules turn into a slippery slope that cares more about damaging our relationships and our character instead of building both up.  In the New Testament, the Pharisees created a bunch of rules that were really impossible to meet because they thought these rules would make them more holy.  In all reality, these rules were drowning them in self-righteousness. In essence unwritten rules are designed to make us look better and is all about what we can do and control. 

Here are some questions to ponder:

   Are our unwritten rules designed to make ourselves loo better, or to handcuff others?

   How do we differentiate between personal preference and Gods truth?

   Do our unwritten rules protect or hide areas where we need to grow?