WHAT, IF ANY, are your most cherished (or possibly not so cherished) family traditions? Perhaps they center on the holidays: traditions regarding how you celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, or even birthdays. The members of our extended family who lived locally, for example, used to gather every Thanksgiving for a feast. I would bring the roast turkey, and you could count on holiday staples like sweet potatoes and green beans, and of course, cranberry sauce of one kind or another.

We haven’t done this in years, because our family has dwindled. People have moved away or, unfortunately, passed away. Thanksgiving is now down to my wife, our daughter, and myself. But we’ve started a new tradition. On Thanksgiving Day, each of us will cook one meal that centers on a theme we’ve decided in advance. One year, it was only foods that were rolled up (such as crepes or cabbage rolls); the following year, it was foods from the cuisines of different countries. Each time, we spent the day cooking, eating, playing games, and enjoying each other’s company.

Traditions like these can be tied to our sense of identity as a family; they’re part of what makes our family different or special. One of my favorite examples is of a musically gifted family that used to sing carols when they gathered at Christmas. Perhaps that doesn’t sound particularly unique — but they sang them while standing together in the bathtub (fully clothed).

Why? They liked the acoustics.

At least, that’s what I was told.

And we can feel compelled to keep the traditions going, almost for their own sake. I know families who insist on having turkey every Thanksgiving even though most of them don’t actually like turkey all that much. Others insist that only cranberry sauce from a can counts as the real thing. The spoken or unspoken rule is, This is the way we’ve always done it, so that’s the way we have to keep doing it.

Thus, traditions can take on a life of their own, and for some, insisting that things be done a particular way can feel nonsensical or even oppressive. But that shouldn’t give tradition itself a bad name. There can be both security and meaning in being part of something that has a rich and storied history, even when we don’t understand why things are done a certain way. We don’t simply create our own meanings as individuals; we participate in meanings and practices that may have been handed down for generations in our families and communities.

And something similar can be said about the spiritual life and the life of the church.

. . .

HERE AGAIN ARE the words of the apostle Paul, as he begins the main argument of his letter to the Colossians:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. (Col 2:6-7, NIV)

Paul isn’t speaking to the Colossians solely as individual believers, each of whom has “received Jesus into their hearts.” He’s speaking to people who have heard and believed the gospel preached to them by Epaphras, who in turn most likely heard the gospel from Paul. And while the gospel tradition they’ve received is relatively new, it’s an outgrowth of an ancient story that stretches back to the time of Genesis.

Imagine what would happen to the life and vitality of this evangelistic movement among the Gentiles if in its very first generation people began freely importing spiritual and philosophical ideas that were contrary to the gospel. As recent converts, the Colossians were like spiritual children. Kids don’t know what they don’t know; they don’t understand the world well enough to know wise behavior from the foolish or dangerous. Eventually they will, but they first need caring adults who will set protective boundaries for them.

This, I think, is Paul’s role with regard to the Colossians. Their understanding of the gospel hasn’t yet matured to the point where they can reliably sort out right belief from wrong, orthodoxy from heresy. Paul has to set those boundaries for the Colossians by emphasizing the importance of what they’ve already been taught.

Thus, as he begins the main section of the letter, Paul paints a picture of what he would like to see in the Colossians. They’ve already received the gospel; they are in Christ, and Christ is in them. They must therefore “live their lives in him”; the word is literally “walk,” an ancient Hebrew way of referring to one’s life and conduct. They must also sink deep roots into Christ and the apostolic tradition. Indeed, in the second century, a theologian and bishop named Irenaeus would use this metaphor of being rooted in orthodox belief to combat the spread of — you guessed it — Gnosticism.

Paul then switches from an agricultural metaphor to an architectural one, from a well-rooted plant to a well-constructed building. He uses a similar metaphor in 1 Corinthians 3 to describe the church as a building whose foundation is Christ. Together, the metaphors of a plant and a house under construction suggest the growth that was already happening among the Colossians — and the growth that still needed to happen.

That growth entailed getting stronger in their understanding of the gospel as it had been taught to them, in fact, as Paul was teaching it to them in the letter itself. He will, of course, try to persuade them away from some of the dangerous ideas they were toying with. But first, he emphasizes the importance of deepening their roots and strengthening their foundations. It’s a bit like how treasury agents are taught to spot counterfeit currency: don’t study the fakes, study the real thing until you know it so well that the fakes stand out by contrast.

The final note he strikes here is one of gratitude. With everything that Paul has said about the cosmic nature of the work of Christ, he wants the Colossians to be amazed. But he also wants them to be grateful, to know that what they already have is a treasure worth protecting.

In our individualistic culture, we’re tempted to think of tradition as an imposition on our freedom instead of as a treasure to be preserved and protected. That’s not to say that traditions can’t change and grow. But it’s only in a spirit of gratitude that we can have the wisdom to know what part of a tradition is most valuable and where we need to sink our roots the deepest.