"Useless Laws"
If you're planning a visit to Rhode Island, there are some laws you need to be familiar with. One is that there is a limit to the amount of seaweed you can remove from public beaches for the purpose of fertilizing your garden. Also, if you plan to feed your pigs (always a good idea if you own pigs), you need a permit if you are going to feed them garbage (or, as we called it in Southeastern Kentucky, "slop").
A story carried by the Associated Press on February 3 pointed to the two ordinances above as laws currently being targeted by Rhode Island legislators as "antiquated" and in need of removal. There may have been good reasons at one time for enacting such laws, but those days are in the past.
Rhode Island isn't alone; virtually every state has statutes passed long ago but which fail to make sense today. In Georgia, for example, a state law makes it mandatory to eat fried chicken with your fingers. Also on the books in that state is a law making it illegal to sell children, 12 years old or younger, to the circus. (Does that mean teenagers may be offered up to Ringling Brothers?)
There is another repository of old laws, all of which are thousands of years old. We have in mind, of course, the Bible. Some of those laws applied specifically to the Jewish people during the time of God's covenant with Israel; no claim is made for those being in effect today. But other commandments, especially those of the New Testament, are still in force. Many claim we should just ignore them, even if they can't be repealed.
Some have always rebelled against laws God has given. Moses, however, gave a perspective that is timeless and that will help us accept counsel that we might not understand or agree with: "And the Lord commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that He might preserve us alive, as it is this day" (Deuteronomy 6:24). Note that phrase, "for our good". That has always been God's motive in dispensing laws and commandments. He has our good in mind.
Jesus affirmed this principle at the end of His Sermon on the Mount: "Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock" (Matthew 7:24,25). The one who hears but "does not do them", Jesus went on to say, would see his house fall when the storms came (Matthew 7:26,27).
Man's laws are sometimes foolish, and they may grow outdated. God's laws, however, are based on His everlasting wisdom, and His care for you and me.
Come to the light God offers! Study His word, the Bible. Worship Him in spirit and truth (John 4:24). Get in touch with us if you'd like to discuss these ideas further.
Timothy D. Hall
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