Evangelicals need to observe Lent, in part, because our troubling lack of tradition leaves us untethered from the past. A church without the great traditions of the faith is like a church with amnesia. Rejecting tradition means submitting ourselves and our churches to the tyranny of the relevant, the oligarchy of the innovative, and the arrogance of the avant-garde. More than ever before, the church needs to rediscover our tradition.
When I say tradition, I donâ??t mean pews and organs and choir robes and classical music. Those things are once exalted pop-cultural markers, like todayâ??s video projectors and podcasts. Tradition goes to the heart of the faith. The best way I know to explain what tradition is (and what it is not), is to borrow the words of Jaroslav Pelikan, who said:
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