Matthew 15
You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophecy of you, saying,
This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.
Isaiah 29
This people draw near with their words and honor me with their lip-service, but they remove their hearts far from me and their reverence for me consists of tradition learned by rote.
We generally blank the slate in our rebirth with God. Then we start to grow hedges, organic-like, as we embrace His teachings:
This is right This is wrong
This honors God This dishonors Him
This is the truth This is falsehood
The hedges grow, and we find comfort in their presence, for their perceived protection.
In our wisdom,
we dig up the organic hedges and replace with stone walls,
from farmers to masons,
trading nature for precision,
from working in the dirt to finishing concrete.
As God-followers, we would do well to be in the habit of purging the precepts we take comfort in and expose ourselves to the direct influence of God.