Religion Ain't Bad, It's Just Misunderstood.

In keeping with my previous trend, I am going to talk about the misconception that seems to surround the word religion. I would be lying to you if I said that sometimes I cringe at the word. That kind of upsets me. Because religion is not the problem. It really never has been. If we look at the definition of religion, we will see that simply put it just means, the service and worship of God.

There, that's not so bad.

So why does society (and Christians specifically it would seem) flee from calling ourselves "religious"?

Because it has such a negative connotation.

A lot of "crazy" people have also been "religious", and Biblically speaking, the Pharisees were considered the "most religious", and look how that turned out for them.

I do not believe that religion gets you to heaven.

Serving God doesn't get you to Heaven. Worshiping God doesn't get you there either. Rather, they are products of your relationship with God.

Biblically speaking, the term religion only appears a scanty five times (in the English Standard Version), twice in Acts (25:19, 26:5), twice in James (1:26-27) and once in Colossians (2:23).

Really the only one of the five that speaks to what religion is, is found in James, which states:

"Religion that God the 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" (ESV)

So by James' definition, religion is not so much about what you believe, but how you believe it.

In other words, James' definition of religion, undoubtedly supplied by the Holy Spirit, leans more towards religion being a term to describe the action of the relationship between Christ and His followers. So while no, Christianity is not soley a religion, there seems to be a balance between our relationship with Christ and how we act on it religiously.

So instead of getting bent out of shape because someone calls you "religious", take it as a compliment. And ratify the term by claiming "religion" and  honoring God through it.