Without serious question people accept and are often delighted by the many man-made elaborations that are appendages to the Kingdom of God.
These take expression in the churches, which themselves at their very cores are foreign appendages to the Kingdom of God.
There are many reasons why people unite with churches. Sometimes, it’s because of heritage. Sometimes, it’s because of tradition(s). And sometimes, it’s because of the pageantry or the pomp demonstrated in the churches. While certain groups of the Catholic persuasion, both eastern and western, are the extreme examples, ceremony or formalism has not escaped many different groups. People have a sense that this is right and the way things should be done. They think that because we are dealing with God, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, that this type of posture toward God is the only proper way to honor and respect Him. After all, they have reasoned, if earthly kings have this kind of honor and deference, how much more should the heavenly King be so respected.
This type of ceremony actually brings dishonor to God. It sets those who are held in esteem and who perform the ceremonies above their brethren. It wastes monetary resources on extravagant luxuries instead of using them in all wise applications.
God desires no man-made honor. The honor of God is loving and obeying His Son, Jesus. Jesus is the wealth, the holy array, and the full honor and glory of God. In Him gold, silver, and precious stones are all fulfilled. He is the shinning Light of Heaven and Earth. All of the riches to be brought to God are summed up in Him. He is the Beginning and Goal of everything. It is in Jesus alone that God’s wealth is demonstrated and experienced. This is the wealth of fellowship with the Father and one another through the Son. God’s eternal purpose from the beginning was that (according to Paul) “in the ages to come He might show the boundless riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus”. Jesus said to a Samaritan women at Jacob’s well, “An hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father seeks such who worship Him. God is Spirit, and those worshiping Him must worship in spirit and truth.” The worship was purely in the Spirit then, as it is now. It had no accouterments then. It has none now. The only difference between then and now was that then the worship was in partial functionality, and now it is without measure. All of the trappings, the ornamentations, the paraphernalia are of human flesh. They are man-made additions that detract from God and dishonor God. They make mundane and crass the true spiritual worship of the Father.
“A highway will be there, a roadway,
And it will be called the Highway of Holiness.
The unclean will not travel on it,
But it will be for the one who walks in that way,
And fools will not wander on it.
No lion will be there,
Nor will any vicious animal go up on it;
They will not be found there.
But the redeemed will walk there,
And the redeemed of the Lord will return
And come to Zion with joyful shouting,
And everlasting joy will be on their heads.
They will obtain gladness and joy,
And sorrow and sighing will flee away.”
Isaiah on the Kingdom of God
“And the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass.”
The Revelation of Jesus Christ – Heavenly Jerusalem descended and revealed
“I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through Me.”
Jesus to Thomas according to John