Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus

 

“What if I told you Jesus came to abolish religion?

What if I told you getting you to vote Republican really wasn’t his mission?

Because Republican doesn’t automatically mean Christian,

And just because you call some people blind doesn’t automatically give you vision.

If religion is so great, why has it started so many wars?

Why does it build huge churches, but fails to feed the poor?

Tells single moms God doesn’t love them if they’ve ever been divorced

Yet God in the Old Testament actually calls the religious people whores

Religion preaches grace, but another thing they practice,

Tend to ridicule Gods people, they did it to John the Baptist,

Cant fix their problems, so they try to mask it,

Not realizing that’s just like spraying perfume on a casket

Because the problem with religion is that it never gets to the core,

It’s just behavior modification, like a long list of chores.

Let’s dress up the outside, make things look nice and neat,

Its funny that’s what they do to mummies, while the corpse rots underneath,

Now I ain’t judging, I’m just saying be careful of putting on a fake look,

Because there’s a problem if people only know that you’re a Christian by that little section on your facebook

In every other aspect of life you know that logic’s unworthy

Its like saying you play for the Lakers just because you bought a jersey

But see I played this game too; no one seemed to be on to me,

I was acting like church kid, while addicted to pornography.

I’d go to church on Sunday, but on Saturday getting faded,

Acting as if I was simply created to have sex and get wasted.

Spend my whole life putting on this façade of neatness,

But now that I know Jesus, I boast in my weakness.

If grace is water, then the church should be an ocean,

Cuz it’s not a museum for good people, it’s a hospital for the broken

I no longer have to hide my failures, I don’t have to hide my sin,

Because my salvation doesn’t depend on me, it depends on him.

Because when I was God’s enemy and certainly not a fan,

God looked down on me and said, ‘I want that man!’

Which is so different from religious people, and why Jesus called them fools

Don’t you see he’s so much better than just following some rules?

Now let me clarify, I love the church, I love the bible, and I believe in sin

But my question is if Jesus were here today, would your church let Him in?

Remember He was called a drunkard and a glutton by  ’religious men’

The Son of God not supported by self-righteousness, not now, not then.

Now back to the topic, one thing I think is vital to mention,

How Jesus and religion are on opposite spectrums,

One is the work of God, one is a man-made invention,

One is the cure and one is the infection.

Because Religion says do, Jesus says done.

Religion says slave, Jesus says son,

Religion puts you in shackles but Jesus sets you free.

Religion makes you blind, but Jesus lets you see.

This is what makes religion and Jesus two different clans,

Religion is man searching for God, but Christianity is God searching for man.

Which is why salvation is freely mine, forgiveness is my own,

Not based on my efforts, but Christ’s obedience alone.

Because he took the crown of thorns and blood that dripped down his face

He took what we all deserved, that’s why we call it grace.

While being murdered he yelled ‘Father forgive them, they know not what they do’,

Because when he was dangling on that cross, he was thinking of you

He paid for all your sin, and then buried it in the tomb,

Which is why I’m kneeling at the cross now saying come on, there’s room

So know I hate religion, in fact I literally resent it,

Because when Jesus cried ‘It is finished’, I believe He meant it.”

Next Door Savior

“Jesus was not a godlike man, nor a manlike God. He was God-man.

Midwifed by a carpenter.

Bathed by a peasant girl.

The maker of the world with a bellybutton.

The author of the Torah being taught the Torah.

Heaven’s human. And because he was, we are left with scratch-your-head, double-blink, what’s-wrong-with-this-picture? moments like these:

Bordeaux instead of H2O.

A cripple sponsoring the town dance.

A sack lunch satisfying five thousand tummies.

And, most of all, a grave: guarded by soldiers, sealed by a rock, yet vacated by a three-days-dead man.

What do we do such moments?

What do we do with such a person? We applaud men for doing good things. We enshrine God for doing great things. But when a man does God things?

One thing is certain, we can’t ignore him.

Why would we want to? If these moments are factual, if the claim of Christ is actual, then he was, at once, man and God.

… Don’t we need a God-man Savior? A just-God Jesus could make us but not understand us. A just-man Jesus could love us but never save us. But a God-man Jesus? Near enough to touch. Strong enough to trust. A next door Savior.

A Savior found by millions to be irresistible. Nothing compares to ‘the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord’ (Phil. 3:8 RSV). The reward of Christianity is Christ.”

Next Door Savior- Max Lucado

Untangle Me

I have a large mess of yarn. It’s terribly tangled and I’ve been struggling for days to restore the yarn to its previous perfectly rolled state. The more I pulled on the end, however, and weaved it around other parts of the yarn, the more tangled it became.

As I was working on this last night, I had a thought. What about the mess of yarn we sometimes call life?

Things can get so chaotic and tangled up that we often are just left helpless and exasperated. Sometimes we don’t even know how we got into this mess in the first place. It starts with an initial unraveling of the end of the yarn and then somehow it just worsens so bad we don’t know which way is up anymore.

The worst part is that the more we struggle against the tangle we are in, the easier it is for us to get even more tangled up. We think we can figure it out but we usually just find ourselves in an even bigger mess, needing even more repair.

But we can find peace.

When we give up our messes to God, He can untangle all of it for us. Some parts He may need to snip and sometimes the repair takes longer than we’d like because of the magnitude of what we’ve done, but it is possible for Him to undo the damage, bit by bit. We can be thankful that we have a loving Creator who cares for us so much that He not only takes the time to untangle our messes, but He also wants to use the end result for something great- something for His glory. Untangled yarn is not without use. And neither are we. Despite all the loops and twists and knots we’ve found ourselves in once before, God renews us and can use us, something that would not be able to happen if we decided to try to keep untangling our messes ourselves.

Whatever mess you’re in today, give it up to God. He’ll untangle it.

“Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.’”   (Matthew 11:28-29)

In Plenty Or In Need

“I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength.” Philippians 4:12-13

These two verses spoke to me this morning as I contemplated all the things that I choose to grumble and complain about on a daily basis. Oh, woe is me, my life is so hard, and I can’t ever make it through. In the grand scheme of things, these problems I face are just… life.

Yet God never meant for us to simply “get by” and accept the hardships as they knock us down again and again. 

Paul knew this full well. Beaten, imprisoned, persecuted, and forced to bear conditions worse than we will probably ever bear in our lifetime, he knew it wasn’t about simply putting on a smile and trudging through it.

This life is about contentment given by God’s strength.

Contentment, defined, is an ease of mind. That’s what God wants from us. He wants us to dismiss those worries, that stress, and the little things that hammer away at our happiness and peace of mind. He wants us to give it all up to him and in turn, He provides us with greater contentment than we could ever find ourselves. The contentment He gives us isn’t just an ease of mind; it’s a reminder that He is the only refuge our mind needs. So even when those little things that bother us so dearly poke their heads back into our lives, we can seek His peace. If we would only trust in Him, we would see how He works in our life each and every day, through both the highs and the lows.

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” John 14:27

Slates Wiped Clean

I  think many of us sometimes feel trapped, weighed down by guilt, shame, remorse, regret, or maybe all of the above. Even though we know God is forgiving and loving, and even though we know Jesus died on the cross so our slates could be wiped clean, we still find ourselves thinking that we’re undeserving, unworthy. In all reality, we really don’t deserve God’s abundant grace and mercy. But He gives it to us regardless because we are His children who He desires to have a relationship with.

The sad thing is that we sometimes feel like we’ve lost all our chances although this is far from truth.

Jesus doesn’t just forgive us our sins. He erases them. Like the cookies on your computer. You can’t undo erasing them. You can’t bring them back after all has been said and done. They’re gone for good.

Despite our depravity and sinful flesh, we are forgiven again and again when Jesus is our Lord and Savior. This doesn’t mean that he forgives but doesn’t forget. This doesn’t mean he holds things against us or keep a list of all of our wrongdoings. Because the Word says we are made clean and we are made new, that’s exactly what we are.

Satan can try to catch us in his web of lies, tricking us into thinking that we’ve messed up too many times for redemption to be possible. But at the end of the day, God is still God. He always welcomes us back with loving arms, like the father of the prodigal son.

We can’t do anything to earn or deserve His grace and love. What we can do is accept His grace and love. We can accept the truth as what it is, and stop believing these doubts filling our mind.

We are loved. We are forgiven. We are redeemed.

And now it’s time to step out of this hole into new light.

“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.  And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” (Colossians 2:13-15)

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!  All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them.” (2 Corinthians 5:17-19)

Sometimes

Empty Promises

A question we all must ask ourselves at some point or other is “Do I really mean what I say?”

Sure, we might make promises to God, and maybe for the most part, we carry them out. But there are those times when we say things with the best intentions, thinking we might just mean it, when in all actuality, we don’t. We’re all talk and no action.

Peter knows what this is like.

On the Mount of Olives before Jesus’ death, Peter tells Jesus, “Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will.” In response, Jesus predicts Peter’s denial of him, to which Peter says, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.” And all the other disciples said the same. (Matthew 26:31-35)

For the people who read this for the first time without any knowledge of what is to come, this might seem a reality. They believe that what Peter is saying is true, even if Jesus predicts it otherwise. They want to believe it is true. After all, this is a follower of Christ. How could Peter speak such a strong vow if he doesn’t have the intentions of keeping it?

For those of us who already know how the story ends, Peter does indeed disown him. Three times. And when he realized that what Jesus said was true, “he went outside and wept bitterly.” (Matthew 26:75)

Peter messed up.

Yet when Jesus is raised from the dead several days later, who does he say to announce his presence to? “…his disciples and Peter.” (Mark 16:7). Once he reached his disciples, he then gave them the authority to make disciples across the earth, what we refer to as the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20). Jesus closes with, “Surely I am with you always, to the very end of age.”

If you look again at Mark 16:7, you see that Peter was called out of the bunch. Why?

Because even when he messed up, Jesus wanted him and us to know that he loves Peter and forgives Peter all the same.

Like Peter, we too are often guilty of not giving Him the glory He deserves. We are sometimes ashamed of the Gospel, too afraid to reach out to our neighbors or claim that we are walking with Christ. We might say we’re Christian to people who ask, but the words stop there.

We might tell God on Sunday mornings in church that we will follow Him wherever He leads. We say that we’re surrendering our lives to Him and we’re going to do all we can to live for Him. Yet when we go back to our lives the following day, our routine continues and the words we spoke the day before are forgotten.

God sees our hearts. He knows we may say these things, but not really have the intentions of following through.

Yet what we learn from His Word is that He loves us and forgives us all the same. He still gives us chances to proclaim His name. He allows us the opportunities to take up our cross.

What have you been telling God lately?

Do you really mean what you say?

Come To Me

My Yorkshire terrier, Buddy, always likes to snuggle close to me. If I’m laying in bed, he’ll sneak up and carefully push the covers away from my side with his nose so he can lay against my side. If I’m reading, he’ll climb into my lap and beg for attention, most often in the form of a belly rub. He’ll whine and jump for joy when I come home from school or some other place, excited to run into my arms once I take a seat. Buddy will especially be close to me when I’m crying or in distress, as if he desires to comfort me in some way.

Something a lot of us don’t realize or we so often forget is that God wants to be that close to us too.

He wants us to recognize that He’s there. He wants the attention and He knows He deserves it. This isn’t a clingy God we’re talking about. This is a Father who cares very much for His children and desires to build a close relationship with them.

We are told in His Word that if we come near to God, He’ll come near to us. No matter how busy our day was or how hectic our life seems at the moment, He wants us to know that He’s there for us and ready to welcome us. Like the story of the prodigal son, our Father is waiting for us with open arms.

Wherever you’re at today- stressed, worried, sad, busy, distant, or hurt- just know that God longs for us to return to Him. He wants to be close to us and listen to us.

When the rest of the world seems to be running out of time, just know that God has all the time in the world for you.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Matthew 11:28-29)

“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God, and he will come near to you.” (James 4:7-8)

Rejected and Neglected

Today I was hit by a sad realization.

Some people just don’t care. Whether it’s because they were only pretending to begin with or they somehow got too wrapped up in their own lives, there are those “friends” who turn out to not be as supportive and friendly as you thought after all.

I have plenty of people like that in my life. They ask how I am, but don’t want to listen. They give false promises and say things they don’t mean. They’ll even say they’re praying for you when, in reality, you don’t cross their mind. When I pass by them, it’s as if I don’t exist. If I’m sitting alone, they’ll remain with their group of friends, turning their backs as if they don’t notice me.

And I’m sure that if I confronted these people and asked them if they “have my back”, they’d give a confident head nod and warm reassurance.

I’m sure this sounds like a rant of some sort, and in a way, it is. But it’s also more than that.

I want this to be a wake-up call.

I want this to wake up the people who know they haven’t been there for people like they should, who see the dejected and lonely ones sitting by themselves yet do nothing to put an end to it.

This is for the people who vow they want to be Christ-like and effective witnesses for His name, but can’t seem to find the time in their schedules to get to know the people around them.

This is for the people who claim to care, but don’t do anything to show it- to friends, loved ones, classmates, and neighbors.

If this is you, then listen:

There are people in this world that need a friend. And many of them need hope, the very same hope you have in your soul because of the Gospel that you might not really care to share.

I’m not bitter or angry. I’m not trying to tear you down or cause any grief.

My goal is this: to correct you in your self-consumed ways and remind you that you have a greater purpose on this earth.

If that’s not enough of an incentive, then I don’t know what is.

He Is Here