How you view a thing becomes how you relate with it. What’s my point? God created Adam and Eve for His pleasure, for a relationship. Adam and Eve were deceived and were separated from God. it is because of this Man since the fall has tried to get back to God. So the effort you put in pleasing God to get in good terms with Him is religion. This is my summary of what religion is.
Man tries to please God in everything, this has caused the emergence of several religion today due to the way they feel God could be impressed. But the point here is to know if Christianity falls under the term “religion” because many people today see Christianity as a religion, some claim it is not a religion, but have no indebt knowledge in defending their claim. Let’s take a look at the stand Christianity has taken.
Religion is about man trying to reach up to God, but Christianity is about God reaching down to man through Grace. God showed this by sending His Son Jesus to become the sacrifice; that is to die in our place, so that we could be free [ref. John 3:16, Romans 5:7-8]. It was God and not Man who made the effort. This is a sign of love and a relationship.
Again, religion has a set of rules and regulations or moral codes which must not be broken but Christianity want you to believe in what Jesus and what He did cross by accepting Him as Lord and saviour. This is a choice you would have to make yourself and you accept Jesus because you discovered the love He has for you and the Grace He has endowed us with. Some might say “but the law is in the bible, what about that?” Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 3:7-8 that the law is the ministry of death and it brought condemnation but the new life in Spirit is more glorious [ref. 2 Corinthians 3:7-8, Romans 7:7]. Many of us don’t know that the law was meant for ONLY the Jews, so the Jews are expected to move from sin to law to Christ; while non Jew are to move from sin to Christ! The law came through Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus [ref. John1:17]
Religion condemns, Christianity doesn’t; religion is one sided, that is it requires your effort; on the other hand Christianity is “symbiotic” in nature that is we commune freely with God, calling Him Father and He communicates back to us as Sons, thus making it a relationship. This you can NEVER find in any religion, if you do then that is not a religion.
Religion is acting the script; Christianity is being the script. A typical example were the Jews (the children of Israel), they acted the law which wasn’t their life, so it became a struggle for them. But now we live the script because our new nature in Christ has God’s way of life engraved in our heart therefore making it our way of life [Hebrews 8:10-11]
Jesus didn’t come to establish another philosophy, rather He came to bring the whole world back to God, He did that, but we being free moral agents, this had to be a choice we had to make by ourselves. So, it happened that those who believed what Jesus did and accepted Him into their lives naturally started acted just like Christ. This made others call them Christians [ref. Acts 11:26]. There is freedom in relating with God which you can’t find in any religion.
So, we could say, Christians are the Sons of God who is their Father and being their Father implies they carry His genes and possess His Spirit. This is achieved when we are adopted as His Sons under the first born Son Jesus (who really is God). It’s all because of His love for us and this is the gospel truth.
Why not accept Jesus today if you haven’t. Pray out loud, “Jesus, I confess that You are my Lord and Saviour. I believe in my heart that God raised You from the dead. By faith in Your Word, I receive salvation now. Thank You for saving me!” Congratulations, you’re born again, you are now brand new!
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GOD BLESS YOU.
Unless otherwise stated, the following scriptures are gotten from King James Version (KJV)
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