Chsitianity is not a Religion but a Demonstration of Character

 Hi Esteemed readers and viewers of my blog, today is another sunday and as usual, i am here again to share the word with the world.Happy reading.

The way to be right with God in every religion is by earning your way.  It is based on works, not grace.  Christianity is different from every religion in this aspect: all other religions (including Mormonism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism) state that you must earn the right to be reconciled with God.  It is by what you do in this life (good deeds or bad deeds) that determines your eternal destiny.  Christianity is completely different from this.  It is not religion.

Religion (almost universally) is enforced by those in power in an attempt to maintain, increase, or abuse their power over others.  Religion is the creation of man and is not the intention or design of God.  A modern day example (taken from the movie “Footloose”, starring Kevin Bacon) is a preacher who believes that dancing leads to promiscuity and destructive behavior (the Bible does not speak against dancing). 

 He uses (abuses) his influence and his position of authority to convince his congregation that dancing is evil and forbids it.  He sets up rules that are not in the Bible and adds additional beliefs that Jesus never endorsed.  He is trying to control the people, using their trust of his authority to force them to believe his version of the truth.  He adds rules that don’t exist in the Bible.  In this example, he even has good motives, but he is still being religious and this “religion” is not from God.  This is so very common.  People have used Jesus to justify adding so many “requirements” to being a Christian.  Here are just a few of the countless examples:

• Not drinking alcohol
• Not listening to certain types of music
• Insisting that church meet on certain days
• Only certain forms of music can be used in church
• You can’t be saved unless you are circumcised
• Reciting ritualistic prayers
• Saying you aren’t saved unless you get baptized
• You can’t eat certain foods
• Requiring you to perform rituals
• Being saved is conditional upon attending church or church membership
• Saying that you have to earn your salvation by doing good deeds
• Women opening their hair in church or wearing trousers are sinners

I could go on and on.  When Jesus was on the earth, religion was very rampant, as it is today.  There was a group of corrupt religious leaders called the Pharisees who had taken the word of God, passed down from Moses and the prophets (the Torah), and written a commentary on it interpreting what the scriptures said (called the Talmud).  Then they wrote another commentary on that commentary called the “Mishnah”.  The Mishnah was a list of hundreds rules to meet in order to insure that you were obeying the word of God.  These were created by man and had little basis in the actual scripture.

For example, one of the 10 Commandments (from the Torah) was, “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy”.  The Pharisees had made literally hundreds of rules in the Mishnah that detailed to the n-th degree what you had to do in order to keep that commandment.  There was a rule that you couldn’t walk through a field on the Sabbath because your sandal might clip a grain of wheat, and if it did you would be harvesting grain.  If you were harvesting, you had worked on the Sabbath and sinned.  Another example is that you could not spit on the ground on the Sabbath because your spit would create mud and this was making mortar.  If you created mortar you were working on the Sabbath and therefore sinning. 

Jesus hated this!  He hated the way the Pharisees used the people’s love for God (or fear of God) to control them, limit their freedom, and empty them of the relationship with God that was intended.  When you practice religion, your relationship with God is degraded to a mathematical formula.  Do this, then do this, don’t do that, and presto. . . you are right in the eyes of God.  This is TOTALLY missing the point!  God wants so much more.  He wants to have a real relationship with you.  He wants to show his love to you and He wants you to love Him.  That was the point of the original commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy”.  The Sabbath day was supposed to be a day for us to take a little break from working, refocus on what’s important, spend time with our family, and spend time with God.  You can’t build a deep relationship without spending quality time together. 

If you read the 10 Commandments you will notice that they are all about relationships.  They are either about improving our relationship with God or with other people.  As Jesus Himself said:

  “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment.  A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.  The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.” ~ Matt 22:37-40.

Do you remain in a church simply because you cannot meet up with the fashion of other churches, you are limiting yourself.