My wife wrote 2 amazing blogs. You all should become aquainted with her blog. her blog can be found HERE.
Here are the posts.
Christianity - Religion = "what" exactly?
Today's Christians seem to pride themselves on taking the eternal gospel of God and changing the verbiage from classic terminology to something more relevant or palatable. Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for speaking in the common tongue of this age, but not at the expense of shaming, reviling or flat-out dismissing the message of salvation in Christ alone.
Here's an example of what I mean:
"Christianity isn't a religion- it's a relationship with God."
"... isn't a religion..." The dictionary says religion is the devote practice of one's beliefs. If the word religion is removed from Christianity all that remains is God's love without a responsible and measurable human response. Or, more commonly called, universalism (a heresy to Christianity); which means God saves all people everywhere, eventually.
It's true that God's love is unearned and unmerited, however we must respond in one of two ways- faithful obedience or further rebellion. Jesus said, "if you love me then keep my commands." What is the evidence God measures proving we love Him? Our devote practice of His commands- religion! "The proof is in the pudding!" Someone's grandmother had to have said. So, if Christians are not religious (devotedly practice their belief in God and His gospel according to the scripture) then they are 1) Unbelievers at heart because according to God practice/work/obedience is a strong evidence of one's conversion or 2) Silly, hip-relevant Christians because they are demonizing a good word to mean something it does not (e.g. religion means: legalism, rigid, spirit-quench, etc.) for the sake of... ya know, I'm not sure what! Bottom-line, Christianity is religion- true religion.
"... it's a relationship with God." Now, that doesn't define anything! Even the demons have a relationship with God- God is judge and they are condemned. Also, the unbeliever has a relationship with God- God is judge and they are condemned. Finally, the believer has a relationship with God, too- God is judge and we are redeemed by Christ. Being a Christian is not a relationship with God which allows us to continue living the same selfish, idolatrous, adulterous lives with new warm and fuzzy feelings of peace and joy accompanied by sensual worship music and an occasional ecstatic experience of His presence. We must turn from our sinful ways and follow God's commands if we say that we love Him! Christ Jesus is the apple of His eye and clothes us with His righteousness. The difference in our relationship to God as believers is that when we do sin, we can now boldly approach God asking Him to forgive us for the sake of Christ's work on the cross and turn from practicing what is sinful to practicing what is righteous. Whereas before, we loved our sin and had no desire to change- the pride, the self-seeking ambitions, the hidden lusts in our hearts, the jealousies, the covetousness, etc.
Christianity is true religion and all others are false. False, because they don't save us from the eternal penalty of our sin. False, because they are all legalistic telling us if we do this or do that we can save ourselves. True religion in Christ is NOT legalism (a bunch of do's and don'ts), but rather the freedom to love and serve Him whereas before we were bound to love and serve ourselves. Bottom-line, Christianity is religion, because without the persistent evidence of faith (works/deeds) we must ask ourselves, "are we saved at all?"
here is the Second
"Free From Religion"- why?
*Warning, content contains strong sarcasm- be sure to take an aspirin if you're prone to stroke.
Someone thought it'd be cool to slap this slogan on a t-shirt and balderdash some mock definition demonizing things like "organized institution" and "traditions" then finalizing their hypocrisy, I mean creativity with this line, "substituting spiritual realities with carnal rituals."
What do they consider a carnal ritual, I wonder? Regular communion, baptism by immersion, preaching of God's word for more than 17.5 minutes on a subject that is actually about God? All commanded by Jesus I thought... Oh, but carnal is surely not referring to secular concert-style worship with lyrics so hip you can hardly tell who or what they're about. And carnal rituals are definitely not referring to those hip sermon series talking illicitly about sex (justified perversion?), personal gain (greed?), or the latest sporting event (idolatry?), instead of Jesus Christ. Certainly those traditions of men don't mean carnal rituals. Surely the seeker-sensitive model of church is not an institution based on the traditions of men... traditions like ego, "just believe in yourself because God believes in you" or greed, "if you sow the best you can God will give you that miracle; our ministry takes check, cash, credit card..." Surely freedom from devote practice of one's belief (religion) must mean I can believe in God and practice whatever sinful lust I please. By Joe, that must be freedom from religion!
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