My faith, or my "religion" wont get you into heaven.
I feel the need to clarify something. Religion... my interpretation of this word is as follows. Religion... a dead boring church or other service where one pays lip service to the thing or things being "worshipped"! A day in, day out ritual with all the heart and soul sucked out of it, until it has become meaningless and pointless. The very thing that God says He detests. In His word He says that He would prefer obedience over sacrifice. And this obedience is not from coercion, its because you want to. And religion is full of sacrifice. Not to mention rules! You can't do this. You can't do that. You MUST do this. And doing that will cause you to loose your salvation. Eh, who needs it!?
A friend of mine hit the nail on the head one night when he said, we preach too much Paul to the "nonbelievers", or "unsaved". We hit them with rules and regulations, tell em to shape up, and change themselves, to be better presented to God! And what he said is true. But if we stopped and looked, Pauls writings were meant for who? Ephesians was written to the church at Ephesus. The key word there is CHURCH! The book of Romans was written to who? The church at Rome. Again the key word there is the CHURCH!
There is a world of hurting people out there and they don't need a list of things they need to fix or change! They most likely already know what they need to fix or change. What they need to know is while they were living in that crap and pain, Christ died for their lives. For them. Just as they are, covered in crap, hurting like no tomorrow. His death for their life. Thats what they need to know. Leave Paul for those of us who are already committed to God, committed to living our lives the way He created us to.
To the hurting you share the stories of the healings and the miracles and the countless times it says Jesus had compassion for them... They don't need a set of bloody rules, they need to be loved, to be mended, to be healed, to be picked up and put back together! They need hugs. Don't tell them that God loves them then slap them with "you sinner, you will go to hell because you smoke"! That's rude and uncalled for.
I remember in a church we went to. We had a "lady of the night" come in. Sweet thing she was. But, a couple of people said she couldn't come to church dressed like that. Ok, so it might make some people squeemish, and it might cause some to have a burst of lust. (Those people might have some hidden issues...) But the fact was, she was in church. Obviously she wanted to know if Gods people actually care.
If God is a loving and merciful God, shouldn't His people also be loving and merciful? If a lady like the above mentioned, came into your church, would you turn her away? You say you wouldn't. Why don't I believe you? Maybe because I've seen too many hurting people turned away. We say welcome with our lips. Hurting people don't read our lips. We say go away by our behaviour. That is what hurting people see and take note of.
Have you talked to anyone who has been hurt by the church? I have. They almost always say that the church doesn't care. The church is meant to be the hands and feet of Christ. That doesn't mean we are to kick and punch people. That means that we are to walk with them in their journey. We are to hug them, support them, care for them. We are to show Gods love to them.
Ok. A little example to help you.
You are sitting on a park bench, in the middle of winter. You've just realise that you have no money, you are far away from home and absolutely starving hungry. What do you do? If its a Sunday, it shouldn't be too hard to find a church with someone in it who might be able to help! But are they willing to help? Say you haven't had a bath for 3 days. You're a little on the smelly side. Would they help you? There have been people from different churches try being a beggar, then they turn up to their church (where people apparently know them) and what happens? Sometimes someone offers to help them. But all too often, they are turned away! "God bless you and have a nice day" isn't going to help someone who is starving and homeless. What about the family who is living in a house, they have a car, the husband has a job, the wife is a stay at home mum, they have a mortgage, their bills are ever increasing. Then the bank springs a nasty one on them. Because of the financial stretches their small amount of money has to do, they have accidentally fallen behind on the mortgage. And even though they have tried and struggled, they just cant get ahead, and now they will be homeless because the bank wants their money last month... you get the picture. Are you going to step up and help them? Are you going to be Christ for them?
I've recently began acquiring horse poop from a friend. I told her that I would swap her horse poop for some vegies (when they start producing). Why? Because I can see that lifes struggles are tough on them too. And we are growing food to try and save some money ourselves, so why not share, ease the load for someone else? If I cant help someone carry their burdens, and support them through their struggles, what good am I? A few vegies probably wont do much. Feed them a night here, and a night there. But its attempting to be kind and generous. Jesus was kind and generous to me. I want to pass that kindness and generosity on to someone else. I cant feed anywhere near as many as I would like, but I can help ease the strain for one family.
If each of Gods people helped one other family (and one another) in some way, how much better would this world be? And don't you think that people would start saying "I like those christians - they helped us". Instead of saying, "the church is full of mean people, they never helped us when we needed it."
One other thing. (Actually its probably two). 1. Christian is meant to be Christ like. Go study His behaviour and learn how it is best to behave. 2. Church is community. Notice at the end of the word there is a smaller word - UNITY. Community is a group of people who work together in what? Yeah, you guessed it - in UNITY. They don't all need to think alike. If we did, we be a bunch of boring drones and that sounds too much like religion! We have been commanded to what? Tell people how much of a sinner they are? NO!! We have been commanded to LOVE ONE ANOTHER, as I (Jesus) have loved you. I dare you to go ask Jesus to show you how much He loves you. Then wait expectantly on Him for His answer. Once you have that answer, go and do likewise to whomever you meet! You may just change the world.
May Gods blessings shower down upon you. And may you be coated in the dust of your Rabbi!
Australian Watcher On The Wall
http://australianwatcheronthewall.blogspot.com.au
