Good Morning, Meetpastordan Readers…I suspect some of you are reading this because you saw the title of today’s message, and you thought, “oops…he mis-typed it”; then you opened it to see what I really meant to say. Well, no mis-typing is involved. This is today’s subject, and I feel drawn to state my case. I certainly thought about tackling this earlier, but today is the day.
I believe that in its purest form, Christianity is not a religion. I say that because Christ didn’t come to start a religion. Truth be told, He came to straighten out the religion He was born into. After the Israelites were set free from their four-hundred-year bondage to Egypt, they were experiencing freedom for the first-time. However, their journey through the wilderness toward the Promised Land was wrought with challenges, frustration, doubt and fear that drove them into utter chaos. God was witnessing their misery, so He called Moses to the top of Mt. Sinai and revealed His Law to the people. The intent of that presentation was threefold: First, it was civil law, a blueprint for living in peace and harmony. But it was also His moral and ethical standard; this is how He expected us to conduct our personal lives. And finally, the Law revealed to us (Mankind) our inability to honor God’s standard through our own effort.
The spiritual leaders of the Jews, the Pharisees, in their zest to help the people live in obedience to God’s Law (The Ten Commandments), instituted another six-hundred man-made laws to guide their effort. This, in my opinion, is the definition of religion. God’s Law was, and is, perfect. But when you start mixing the teachings of man with the teachings of God, it is easy to end up with a convoluted “mess” where the teachings of man rise to the top, and many times those teachings take precedence over the teachings of God.
Such was the case with the Pharisees. Their rebuttal of Jesus resulted when He was not adhering to their religious procedures, such as…asking why He and His disciples didn’t follow their laws of ceremonial washing (Luke 7:5), or why did He disrespect their religion by healing on the Sabbath? (Mark 3:1-6) This response is typical of Jesus’ response to their accusations: “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites. You have let go of the teachings of God and are holding on to human laws and traditions.” (Mark 7:6,8)
When Jesus came to earth in a human body, there were many reasons for that history-changing event. First and foremost, He came to be our sacrificial lamb, paying our sin-ransom so we could qualify for eternal life. (John 3:16) He also came to be the Word incarnate; He came to live and to demonstrate the truth of God’s Word. (John 1:14) He came to destroy the works of satan. When Jesus walked out of that tomb, satan immediately became a defeated foe. (1Peter 1:3-6) And Jesus came to proclaim Kingdom principles. His message was intended to spotlight the disparity between worldly teaching and God’s teaching.
John 8:32 points to this: “If you follow My teachings, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” He also proclaimed that He embodied the Kingdom principles when he said, “The time is fulfilled; the Kingdom is at hand.” (Mark 1:15), or “The Kingdom of God is in the midst of you.” (Luke 17:21) What Israel had long awaited, Jesus Christ was now inaugurating. But unfortunately, His message was not recognized by the people, nor by the Pharisees. (Unfortunately, the same could be said about our culture today.)
Christianity is different from all other world religions, in that other religions are about “doing to get”. By this, I mean it is about earning favor with God by what we do. For instance, we try harder to be a good person. Christianity is different in that “we already have, so we do”. We are a Christian because we accepted God’s Gift of Grace, Jesus Christ as our Savior. Therefore, we are justified with God (meaning we are worthy and acceptable in His sight because we are covered with the blood of Jesus.) Now “we do”, not to earn anything (because we already have EVERYTHING), but “we do” as our way of saying “Thank You, Jesus, for what You did for me!” Religion is about trying to make bad people good; Christianity is about giving dead people a new life. (Next week’s message will be devoted specifically to this subject.)
In the second paragraph above, I used a term that I want to clarify. I said, “In its purest form, Christianity is not a religion.” In its purest form, the message of God (Jesus) is about relationship. God created us for a relationship. In fact, He gave us free will so we could choose to enter into that all-important relationship. 2Peter, 1:3 tells us, “The more we grow in our relationship with Jesus Christ, His divine nature gives us EVERYTHING we need for living a godly life.”
Unfortunately, the purity of Jesus’ message has been tainted throughout the centuries by various attempts to turn His Kingdom message into a religion. In the New Testament, the Body of Christ, or the Church, denotes followers of Jesus Christ. Period! But instead of being one unified body of Believers today, the Body of Christ has been sliced and diced by doing exactly what the Pharisees did concerning God’s Law. The teachings of man have been mixed with the Word of God in an attempt to clarify a particular interpretation, or in some cases, to further a particular agenda. The result is a staggering number of church denominations, each with its own particular doctrine that details the parameters of its worship. In my opinion, that was never God’s intent.
So, the question now should be, “What did the purity of Jesus’ message reveal?” I referred to John 8:32 earlier, but I would like to revisit that message right here. Jesus was talking to His disciples when He told them, “If you follow My teachings, you will know the truth (Kingdom truth), and that truth will set you free.” Notice, Jesus was very specific; He said “My teachings”. So, what did Jesus teach? He taught about love, forgiveness, mercy, grace, compassion, kindness, and goodness; He taught about the Father, and He taught about being of service to our fellow man. In fact, Jesus boldly exclaimed, “Truly, truly I tell you, The Son can do nothing of His own accord. I speak exactly what the Father has told me to say.” The disparity of His teaching was also highlighted in the famous Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) when He presented the Beatitudes, the Lord’s Prayer and central tenets of Kingdom principles. Some people who heard Him that day believed Him, but many could not grasp His message because it was contrary to the worldly principles they had been taught.
There is no doubt that when most people hear the term, “Christian”, they immediately think of religion. And I must agree, that title itself can only result from accepting Jesus Christ as our Savior, and that was definitely God’s plan for our salvation. For some people, this seems to be enough. They have what I like to refer to as “fire insurance”, so they continue life as usual. But I believe there is more. I say that because of the truth found in 2 Corinthians 5:17: “We become a new creation in Christ. The old is gone (we are no longer enslaved to our sin nature), the new has come.” (the Holy Spirit) {Hum…this seems to indicate there could be a process in our future.}
When we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior, we are immediately justified (made right) in God’s eyes. At this point, we have everything we need for becoming the person God created us to be (Ref. 2 Peter 1:3). Being transformed into the image of Jesus Christ IS the continuation of God’s plan for our lives. The more we become transformed by this growth process, the more Christ becomes Lord of our lives as well as our Savior! As a result, we are on the cusp of experiencing His Kingdom right here, right now (just as it says in the Lord’s Prayer). Now we can rise above the world around us to bring honor and glory to God. This is beautifully stated in Ephesians 2:10: “For we are God’s masterpiece, created anew in Christ Jesus. We can NOW do the good works God planned for us long ago.”
To recap: God created us for a relationship with Himself. In order for that to happen, He gave us “free will” so we could choose to participate in that endeavor. But Man(kind) used free will to exalt self rather than God, so Sin entered the world. That kept Man separated from God until the coming of Jesus Christ. Jesus came “at just the right time to die for us sinners.” (Romans 5:6)
Jesus came to be our Savior so we could qualify for eternal life, to be a living example of God’s truth, to destroy the works of satan, and to proclaim Kingdom principles, which are relationship principles. When we accept Him as our Savior, we are immediately justified in God’s eyes. We now have everything we need for growing in our personal relationship with Jesus. But the more He becomes Lord of our life, the more we become the person God created us to be, and the more we can further His Kingdom here on earth.
Next week will be part 2 of this series, and will deal specifically with the supernatural realm of Christianity. This is how we receive the new life.
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May God bless you abundantly,
Dan Presgrave (a.k.a. Pastor Dan)
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