I have no right or authority to bind your conscience.

Anybody's conscience in this room, absolutely.

You may not like the traditions that I like.

You're not going to be judged for that.

But there is an apostolic tradition that is passed down from God himself.

Every time we add to the law of God, beloved, it is inevitably a subtraction.

Because instead of putting our attention on those things that God is concerned about

to regulate our behavior, we then lose sight of what concerns God, and we begin to major in minors.

We begin to give our devotion to our own traditions, to our own human regulations.

You've seen it in the Christian community.

You've seen it where Christian piety is defined by whether people wear lipstick, whether they

dance, whether they go to movies, as if these things had anything to do with the kingdom of God.

But not only in some Christian environments are they elevated to regulations and law, they become

the test of real piety.

And in one sense, when that happens, authentic righteousness is not simply obscured, it's discounted, which is easier to refrain

from lipstick or to refrain from pride, to stop going to movies or to start loving your enemies.

I mean, I have all I can do to try to seek the righteousness that God's law shows us to

do without worrying about petty issues.

And that's what happens here.

The Pharisees began to major and minors.

The Pharisees turned the supreme law of God into petty regulations, which obscured the majesty of the law of God.

Beloved, I have no right or authority to bind your conscience.

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