The compound in Ibadan was full by four o’clock. Canopies had been hired, plastic chairs arranged in rows, and the smell of jollof rice and fried meat drifted from the back where the caterers were working. Temiloluwa’s family sat on one side, the women in matching aso-ebi of deep green, the men in agbada. On the other side sat Izuchukwu’s people, who had travelled from Nnewi that morning: his uncle, two aunties, and four of his friends from university, all in their best.
This was the introduction, the first formal meeting of the two families. Izu had been warned about the protocol. Temi had explained it to him twice over the phone. When the groom’s party was presented to her parents and elders, the young men would lie flat on the ground in greeting. It was the Yoruba dobale, the full prostration of a son-in-law before the family he hoped to join.
The moment came. The woman acting as the family’s master of ceremonies called the groom’s friends forward, and all four went down at once, chests to the floor, to cheers and laughter. Then she turned to Izu.
He did not move.
He had grown up in a church in Onitsha where the pastor preached, often and with great force, that a Christian bows to no man. He could still hear the sermon. Kneeling before a human being was idolatry. Prostrating was worship. A believer kneels before God alone. Izu had believed it for twenty years, and standing there in his new kaftan, with three hundred eyes on him, he could not make his body go down.
He bent at the waist, a stiff half-bow, and straightened up. The cheering stopped. Temi’s mother’s face changed. Somewhere behind him an auntie from her side said, not quite quietly enough, “So this one has no home training.”
Izu felt his face burn. He was certain he had been faithful. He was less certain, as the silence stretched out, that he understood what faithfulness required of him in that compound.
Faith or familiarity?
Every believer carries two things that are easily confused: the convictions that come from the Word of God, and the habits that come from the place we were raised. Both feel sacred, because both were given to us young by people we trusted. And when we meet someone whose habits are different, it is very easy to feel that our faith is being challenged when only our familiarity is.
The history of the church in Africa has examples on both sides. Some early missionaries came with genuine devotion, and their courage and sacrifice brought the gospel to many of our grandparents. Yet some also treated African names, African dress and African music as though they were heathen in themselves, while wearing their own European customs as though those were Christian. Converts were sometimes told to take foreign names at baptism and to abandon drums in worship, as though God preferred the harmonium. Much of that has since been recognised and corrected. But the instinct behind it did not belong only to foreigners. Nigerian Christians do the same thing to one another. Southerners misjudge northern customs; Pentecostals misjudge Anglicans; city believers misjudge village ones; and every group is sure it represents simple, biblical Christianity.
The gospel reaches people whose customs differ from ours. It always has. And the question for the believer is how to love those people truly, receive them as brothers and sisters where they belong to Christ, and hold fast to what God has actually said, without mistaking our own preferences for His commands.
What Peter learned in Caesarea
Few people in the New Testament had to face this more painfully than Peter. He was a faithful Jew who had kept the dietary laws all his life. When God gave him a vision of unclean animals and told him to eat, his answer was instant: “Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean” (Acts 10:14). The voice replied, “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common” (Acts 10:15).
Then messengers arrived from a Roman centurion named Cornelius, and Peter went with them to Caesarea and walked into a Gentile house. His first words there show how much the vision had taught him:
And he said unto them, Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another nation; but God hath shewed me that I should not call any man common or unclean.
“Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing.” Peter’s prejudice had come wrapped in religion. Separation from Gentiles felt like holiness to him. It had been taught by people he respected and reinforced by long tradition. And God had to show him that his practice of calling people common or unclean was no longer pleasing to Him. Then, as Cornelius described his own vision, Peter spoke one of the great sentences of the book of Acts:
Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him.
“God is no respecter of persons.” The phrase translates a Greek word meaning, literally, one who receives a face: one who judges by outward appearance, by nationality or by status. God does not do that. “In every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him.” Peter goes on immediately to preach Christ, and the Holy Spirit falls on those who hear, so he plainly does not mean that people are saved without Christ. His point is that no nation is shut out from God’s welcome. Ethnicity is not a barrier to grace.
It is worth noticing what happened next. When Peter returned to Jerusalem, believers there “contended with him, Saying, Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with them” (Acts 11:2-3). Peter explained, and they glorified God. And yet, years later in Antioch, the same Peter withdrew from eating with Gentile believers when certain men arrived from Jerusalem, “fearing them which were of the circumcision” (Galatians 2:12). Paul had to confront him publicly. Even an apostle who had received a vision from heaven could slip back into old prejudice under social pressure. If it could happen to Peter, we should not assume we are beyond it.
Telling commandment from tradition
So how do we tell the difference between conviction and culture? Jesus gives us a starting point. When the Pharisees criticised His disciples for eating without the ritual handwashing their elders required, He answered:
He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do.
“Teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” Every community has traditions, and many are wise and good. The Pharisees’ fault lay in raising their traditions to the level of God’s commandments, and then using them to judge others. In the verses that follow, Jesus shows that their traditions had even become a way of avoiding what God actually commanded.
That is the danger we face. When a custom becomes a doctrine, the person who does not share it becomes a sinner in our eyes. And the most serious result is that the gospel itself is obscured, because the message heard by others is no longer “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ” but “Become like us.”
Here are some questions that can help sort the matter.
Does Scripture actually command or forbid this? Not “Did my pastor say so?” or “Is this how we do it at home?” but “Where does the Bible say it, and what did it mean in its context?”
Does the practice involve worship directed to someone other than God, or a claim that contradicts the gospel? Bowing to greet an elder and bowing to an idol may look similar from a distance, but they mean entirely different things.
PunchlineDoes the practice harm people? Love for our neighbour is itself a biblical conviction, so any custom that abuses, exploits or endangers someone cannot be defended as “just culture.”
Or is it simply a different way of doing something God leaves free: a different way of greeting, eating, dressing, celebrating or showing respect?
Izu’s pastor had answered the first question without looking carefully at Scripture. The Bible forbids bowing down to idols to serve them (Exodus 20:5). It also records, without any rebuke, Abraham who “bowed himself to the people of the land, even to the children of Heth” (Genesis 23:7) when he was negotiating to buy a burial place, and Moses who went out to meet Jethro, “and did obeisance, and kissed him” (Exodus 18:7). In the ancient Near East, as in much of Nigeria today, a bow or prostration before a human being was a greeting of honour. Its meaning was respect, not worship. Scripture itself tells us to “rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face of the old man” (Leviticus 19:32). Different cultures have different ways of rising up.
Receiving one another without doubtful disputations
The church in Rome was a mixture of Jewish and Gentile believers, and they disagreed about food and holy days. Some kept the Jewish calendar and avoided certain meats. Others felt free to eat anything and treat every day alike. Paul did not settle every question for them. He told them how to live together while they disagreed:
Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs. Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand. One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike . Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it . He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
“Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations.” Welcome the other believer, and do not turn the welcome into an occasion for arguing him out of his scruples. “Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth.” Paul warns both sides. The free believer is tempted to despise the cautious one as backward. The cautious believer is tempted to judge the free one as worldly. Both attitudes are wrong, “for God hath received him.”
“Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant?” Every believer answers to his own Master. “Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” And then the central point: “He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord.” A believer who keeps a custom and a believer who does not can both be acting out of devotion to Christ.
This passage is not about clear sin. Paul is not telling us that adultery or idolatry are matters of private conviction. Romans 14 concerns things God has left open, where sincere believers come to different conclusions. But a great many cultural differences fall into exactly that category, and our churches would be healthier if we treated them that way.
Consider how this applies in Nigeria. Many Christians in the north receive meat from Muslim neighbours at Sallah, and many Muslims receive rice and chicken from Christian neighbours at Christmas. Some believers eat it with thanksgiving as a gift of friendship. Others feel uneasy and decline politely. Romans 14 says both may be acting unto the Lord, and neither should despise the other.
Greetings, dress, food and festivals
Let us look at some ordinary areas where cultures differ, with charity.
Greetings. A Yoruba young man prostrates and a young woman kneels to greet elders. In many Igbo families a younger person greets with a particular word and a slight bow. In much of the north, a younger person may lower himself, avoid direct eye contact and speak softly before an elder. In Britain or America, a young person may look an older person directly in the eye, shake hands firmly and even use a first name, and mean it respectfully. None of these is more Christian than the others. Each is a way of honouring, and “Honour all men” (1 Peter 2:17) can be obeyed in any of them.
Dress. Modesty is a biblical value, but what counts as modest varies from place to place. A wrapper and blouse, a kaftan, a long gown with a head covering, a suit and tie: each can be modest, and each can be worn proudly. Some churches have strong traditions on trousers, head coverings or jewellery. A believer may keep those traditions as personal conviction, but should hesitate before treating them as the measure of another believer’s holiness.
Food. A Calabar soup that delights one person may seem strange to another. A Lagos believer may find a northern meal unfamiliar, and a missionary from abroad may struggle with pepper. Where food is not offered in worship to another god, it is simply food, received with thanks.
Festivals. Some community festivals have roots in traditional religion: certain New Yam festivals, masquerades, the rites of particular deities. Others have long since become civic celebrations of harvest and homecoming. Many communities now hold Christian thanksgiving services for the new yam. Believers will need wisdom here, and they may not all reach the same conclusion. Ask what actually happens at the event, and what participation would mean to those around you.
Family rites. Naming ceremonies in many Yoruba homes use symbolic items such as honey, salt and water, each linked to a prayer for the child’s life. Many Christian families keep the custom, read Scripture over each item and pray to God through Christ. Others prefer a simpler dedication. Both can be acts of faith. Where a rite involves invoking the spirits of ancestors or seeking power from another source, the question changes, and we must look at it carefully.
Where conviction must stand
None of this means that anything cultural is automatically acceptable. Some practices do involve worship directed elsewhere, and Paul is clear about them:
But I say , that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils.
“Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils.” A believer cannot take part in acts of worship directed to other spiritual powers, whether that is pouring libation to call on ancestral spirits, swearing an oath at a shrine, or participating in a sacrifice. The issue here is allegiance.
Other practices must be refused because they harm people. Widowhood rites that force a grieving woman to drink the water used to wash her husband’s body, shave her head, sit on the floor for months or be stripped of property; customs that deny daughters any inheritance; female genital cutting; the branding of children as witches. These are not neutral customs. They wound people made in God’s image, and “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction” (James 1:27). The believer stands with the widow, the daughter and the child.
But notice how conviction can be held graciously. Daniel and his friends were taken to Babylon, given Babylonian names, educated in “the learning and the tongue of the Chaldeans” (Daniel 1:4), and trained for royal service. They accepted a great deal of the foreign culture. Yet “Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s meat” (Daniel 1:8). He drew a line. And then he did something wise: “therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs.” He asked respectfully. He proposed an alternative, a ten-day test. He did not insult the official or mock his customs. He held his conviction and kept his relationships.
NuggetThat is the pattern for us. Refuse what you must, honour the people, and offer another way wherever you can.
A believer can bow low to greet an elder and still refuse to bow to an idol. Learning the difference is part of loving people well without abandoning what God has said.
All things to all men
In 1 Corinthians 9, Paul describes how he approached people from different cultures. “For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more” (1 Corinthians 9:19). To Jews he became as a Jew; to those without the law, as without the law, “being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ” (1 Corinthians 9:21). And he sums it up: “I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some” (1 Corinthians 9:22).
Notice the brackets in verse 21: he remained under the law to Christ throughout. He adapted his customs, his food, his manner and his starting point, so that nothing unnecessary would stand between people and the gospel. He did this “for the gospel’s sake” (1 Corinthians 9:23).
We can see the principle at work in two decisions that look contradictory. Paul had Timothy circumcised “because of the Jews which were in those quarters” (Acts 16:3), so that Timothy’s ministry among them would not be hindered. Yet he refused to have Titus circumcised when false brethren demanded it, and would not give way to them “no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you” (Galatians 2:5). What was the difference? In Timothy’s case, a cultural accommodation served the gospel. In Titus’s case, the same act was being demanded as a condition of acceptance with God, and yielding would have denied the gospel. Paul could flex on culture precisely because he would not flex on grace.
This takes patient listening. “He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, it is folly and shame unto him” (Proverbs 18:13). Before you judge a custom, ask the people who practise it what it means to them. You may find that a practice you assumed was idolatrous is simply a greeting. You may find that a practice you assumed was harmless carries spiritual meanings you had not understood. Either way, love listens first. And listening often exposes prejudices we did not know we had, prejudices we had dressed up as faithfulness.
Every nation before the throne
Look at the final picture of the church in Scripture:
After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.
“Of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues.” In the new creation, the redeemed are still recognisable as coming from many nations. Their languages are mentioned. Their peoples are named. They wear the same white robes and cry the same praise, but the diversity has not been erased. It has been gathered around the Lamb.
That should shape how we see one another now. God “hath made of one blood all nations of men” (Acts 17:26). At Pentecost, the crowd heard the apostles “speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God” (Acts 2:11). Each person heard in the language of home. And in Christ, “there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all” (Colossians 3:11). Our cultural differences do not divide us in Christ, because He is the centre. But they still exist, and they can enrich the church.
A Yoruba believer, an Igbo believer, a Hausa believer, a Tiv believer, a believer from London and a believer from Seoul can worship together with genuine joy. Each will bring something the others lack. The task is to receive one another, “as Christ also received us to the glory of God” (Romans 15:7).
That evening, after the guests had left, Izu asked Temi’s father if he could speak with him. They sat on the veranda, and Izu explained. He told him about the church in Onitsha, about the sermons, about what he had believed. He said he had not meant disrespect. And then he said something that surprised them both: “Sir, I am not sure any more that my pastor was right.”
Temi’s father, a church elder of many years, listened without interrupting. Then he took out his Bible and showed Izu Genesis 23 and Exodus 18. “When I prostrate before my father,” he said, “I am not worshipping him. I am thanking him. God is the one I worship.”
Izu spent the next three months reading and asking questions. By the time of the traditional engagement, he had made up his mind. When the moment came, he went down flat on the ground before Temi’s parents and elders, and the compound erupted. Her mother laughed and clapped her hands. The auntie who had spoken about home training was first to come and lift him up.
But there was another part of the engagement that he and Temi had discussed with her father beforehand. An elderly great-uncle, who did not share the family’s faith, usually opened such ceremonies by pouring a little drink on the ground for the departed. Temi’s father had gone to him in advance, with respect and a gift, and asked whether the family pastor might pray instead. The old man had grumbled a little. On the day, he was given the first greeting, the seat of honour and the first portion of the kola, and the pastor prayed in Jesus’ name.
A few months later, at the wine-carrying in Nnewi, it was Temi’s turn. Following Igbo custom, she carried a cup of palm wine through the crowd while guests tried to distract her, searching for the man she would marry. She found Izu, knelt before him and offered the cup, and he drank it to cheers. Her own aunties, who had travelled from Ibadan, were among the loudest.
PunchlineIzu still believes that a Christian bows to no idol. He has simply learned what an idol is, and what an elder is, and how to love both his own people and hers.
Teaching Companion
For Reflection
- Which of your strongest religious habits might be cultural rather than biblical? How could you check?
- When you meet a believer from a different background, which way are you more tempted: to despise or to judge (Romans 14:3)?
- Can you think of a time, like Peter at Antioch, when social pressure pulled you back into prejudice you thought you had left behind?
- Where in your family or community is there a custom you must lovingly refuse? How could you, like Daniel, refuse it respectfully and propose another way?
- What could you learn from believers of another culture that would enrich your own walk with God?
This Week
This week, find a believer from a culture different from your own, whether another ethnic group, another region or another country, and ask them to explain one custom from their background that you have not understood: a greeting, a celebration, a family rite. Listen without correcting. Ask what it means to them and how their faith relates to it. Afterwards, write down one assumption of your own that the conversation challenged, and one thing you admired.
A Prayer
Father, You are no respecter of persons, and in every nation You have received those who come to You through Christ. Forgive me for the times I have treated my own customs as Your commandments, or looked down on others because their ways were different from mine. Give me a listening heart. Teach me to tell the difference between what You have said and what I am merely used to. Where I must refuse something, give me Daniel’s wisdom and courtesy. Where I am free, help me to become all things to all people for the gospel’s sake. Prepare me for the day when every nation, kindred, people and tongue will stand before the Lamb. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Truth received brings freedom. Truth believed establishes the heart.
Scripture quotations are from the King James Version. · Illustrations using first names only are composites unless stated otherwise.