What did Christ command of His Church, and what is the Church's role?
Serve God And Not Religion!
- Thread starter vengaturreino
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What did Christ command of His Church, and what is the Church's role?
We are His hands, His feet and His voice. We are to go into all the world and make disciples of every creature...and do the works of Christ.
Indeed. Would you consider baptism, receiving communion, attending Church, reading the Scriptures, etc. to be religious acts?
They are not for me. They are acts of worship.
@LysanderShapiro - I agree
@Euphemia - Can you show any scripture to back your side of the debate? It's an interesting topic, and I would be curious if there was any biblical evidence to support your stance.
I would say there is good religion, and the Bible says this:
"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." - Bible verse.
@Euphemia - Can you show any scripture to back your side of the debate? It's an interesting topic, and I would be curious if there was any biblical evidence to support your stance.
I would say there is good religion, and the Bible says this:
"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." - Bible verse.
I agree. Are they not religious acts of worship as commanded by Jesus?
I don't give them the connotation of religious acts. They are acts we do out of our own personal love and devotion to the Father, with whom we have an intimate RELATIONSHIP. Father-child. Not organizational church-God. That some of these acts are done corporately makes no difference, as we do come before the Father jointly as His family.
To begin, i do agree that these are acts that we do because of our love for Him -- because we have a relationship with him.
I wouldn't call our relationship itself religion. Rather, because we are all crippled and can easily fall, religion is a crutch that keeps us steady with Him. It is our response to Him because we love Him.
It is also what has been a service to our fellow man, from being a sanctuary for the poor to protecting the unborn.
Christ himself was a law-abiding, devoted Jew, as we're His parents. They attended temple regularly, participated in the acts as devotion to God. And it was all because of their obedience to Him.
This is religion proper -- the obedient response to God out of our love for Him.
I remember when I began hearing the trend of denouncing religion but proclaiming faith. It became extremely popular within young Christian circles. I was most definitely swept up in it. But I think I was wrong for misunderstanding the difference. Is relationship important? YES! It is THE most important part and key to our faith. But I don't think the baby should be thrown out with the bathwater, especially since Christ had no intention of abolishing religion. Is empty religion bad? Yes. Is corrupt religion bad? Yes. Is false religion bad? Yes. But, is religion animated by our relationship and love for God bad? No -- in fact, it is the ideal.
Relationship is what God calls us to---not religion, which is mankind's way of trying to reach God by doing something that he thinks will please Him. It is a roadblock to relationship with Him. We don't need a crutch!!!
Out of curiosity, what do each of these passages mean? James 1:26-27 and Matthew 5:17.
James 1:26-27 is telling us that a good system of works would be helping orphans and widows in their afflictions.
Matthew 5:17 is Jesus saying that God's law never changes, but he came to fulfill the law for us and die on our behalf.
Pretty simple
Jesus came to fulfill the law and not to perpetuate man's faulty thinking that we must DO anything to gain favour from God. He came to free us of that kind of thinking. what He considers religion is living as He did---walking in love, doing the works of Christ, which are the works He calls us to, not works that we think are expected by God and done for reward.
Being fully yielded to Jesus Christ can bring nothing but beautiful fruit---without striving for it.
It sounds like we agree, it's just you choose to not call it religion.
Absolutely. Is religion, in its purest form directing toward our worship for God, evil?
This sort of idea of “It’s only about me and my relationship with God and that’s it” appeals to the individualist sensibility. I would never argue against a personal relationship with God -- in fact, I'd argue it's the most important thing...But I’d also argue you can’t have Jesus without religion. It was only because of the institution of religion – the body of the Church – has carried Jesus over to us.
The danger, I’d argue, of sticking to this notion that this pristine concept of Jesus can only exist devoid of this messy magisterium doesn’t work because it turns Jesus into an abstraction and appeals to your individualism, but it isn’t the real Christ.
Marcionism back in the 2nd century advocated for a de-Judaism idea of Christianity, meaning divorcing Judaism from Christianity, meaning dismissing the Church altogether. It’s a form of Gnosticism. Arinaus however fought this idea and savored in the Jewish roots of Christianity and expressed not only the necessity of it, but how divorcing this would be dishonorable to Christ.
Everybody loves Jesus or even likes Him at worst. It’s not difficult. But it’s too easy to be against religion. And most of the time, it’s because a misunderstanding of what religion, maybe due to religious corruption or false religion, or because of the bad name religion has gotten from the anti-Christian rhetoric. Oddly enough, anti-religious rhetoric has increasingly crept into Christian culture.
The danger, I’d argue, of sticking to this notion that this pristine concept of Jesus can only exist devoid of this messy magisterium doesn’t work because it turns Jesus into an abstraction and appeals to your individualism, but it isn’t the real Christ.
Marcionism back in the 2nd century advocated for a de-Judaism idea of Christianity, meaning divorcing Judaism from Christianity, meaning dismissing the Church altogether. It’s a form of Gnosticism. Arinaus however fought this idea and savored in the Jewish roots of Christianity and expressed not only the necessity of it, but how divorcing this would be dishonorable to Christ.
Everybody loves Jesus or even likes Him at worst. It’s not difficult. But it’s too easy to be against religion. And most of the time, it’s because a misunderstanding of what religion, maybe due to religious corruption or false religion, or because of the bad name religion has gotten from the anti-Christian rhetoric. Oddly enough, anti-religious rhetoric has increasingly crept into Christian culture.
I haven't much fussed against the notion of one's relationship with God. I think the word "religion" is misunderstood often, even by some of the most learned Christians.
Really?