“Every scribe who has been instructed in the Kingdom of heaven is like the head of a household who brings from his storeroom both the new and the old.” While Jesus was giving a fresh understanding of our relationship with God (we do call it the New Testament, after all) his way must always be understood in continuity with the traditions he inherited. The temptation we face is either to throw the “old” completely away or to enshrine the “old” as somehow holier or more sacred than current reality. Nostalgia for a previous era contradicts Jesus’ method of teaching the presence of the kingdom of God in current, everyday experience. Ignoring traditional values causes one to become un-anchored. We need the new and the old.






