To My Facebook Brothers and Sisters in Christ….
I have written much about and against religion. And yet I think when I speak of religion a cloud of puzzlement erupts and encircles the reader. Am I correct? Do you have a good understanding of what religion is and is not?
As you read my remarks about this subject, please keep in mind that it was religion that made the “Father’s house a house of merchandise”…. and it was religion that paid thirty pieces of silver to apprehend our Lord Jesus…. and it was religion that crucified our Christ…. and it was religion that harassed Christ’s apostles…. and it was religion that hounded
Martin Luther and the etceteras of his age…. and it was religion that opposed every move of the Holy Spirit in church history. And it is religious pulpiteers who demand to be heeded and salaried.
But what exactly is religion?
Simply said, religion is a set of non-biblical traditions. And religionists are those adhering to and promoting these traditions.
Jesus confronted the religious pharisees: “You have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.” That’s what traditions of men do…. they make the “commandment[s] of God of no effect.” Traditions of men oppose God. Traditions of men spawn a vast multitude of dysfunctional religionists.
Fully understand that Jesus lived in a religious world, a spiritual world contaminated with traditions of men. And fully understand, my precious friends, that you do also.
Religion is the mean and hungry wolf menacingly salivating over the flock of sheep. Religionists are competent hijackers of hearts once enamoured with Christ alone. That man behind the pulpit? – you must know he is an ardent religionist. And all those pew-people? – they are those who once followed Christ but now follow the pulpiteer.
Religion has mutated your up-close, intimate, caring Jesus into a distant, casual, remote Jesus. Beautiful has become quite unlovely under the ministry of religionists. Time to run from and run to? To run from religion and run to Jesus?