What Is Religion?

Jesus replied, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God" (Matthew 22:29)

American lawyer and lecturer Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899) often called "the great agnostic," had this to say:
Religion has been tried, and in all countries, in all times, has failed.
Religion has never made man merciful.
Remember the Inquistion.
What effect did religion have on slavery?
What effect upon Libby, Salisbury and Andersonville? (The reference is to three notorious prison in Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia, respectively, where many prisoners died during the Civil War)
Religion has always been the enemy of science, of investigation and thought.
Religion has never made man free.
It has never made man moral, temperate, industrious and honest.
Are Christians more temperate, nearer virtuous, nearer honest than savages?

With much of Ingersoll's tirade against religion I can agree, religion of any sort over history has a poor track record. Lest we forget: Jesus did not come to earth to establish a new religion, to remove the synagogue, to begin a new sect, to establish a "church." Jesus came announcing that the "Kingdom of God" is near. Religion is anathema to God. An example of religion can be found in the winter of 1077 a.d. Pope Gregory VII had excommunicated Germany's King Henry IV. Henry IV with his family traveled to Italy to find repentance from the pope. On a cold winter day, for three days, Henry IV stood barefoot shivering, frostbitten, in the snow until Pope Gregory would allow Henry in to receive the Pope's forgiveness. Can we ever imagine Jesus doing such a thing? That is the result of religion. Religion is rebuked by Jesus read Matthew 23:1-7.

We don't have to stand barefoot in the cold, for Christ hung on Calvary that our sins, though scarlet, should be white as snow. We individually are the Church, the "ekklesia": the called out ones. We join together as a body because we believe in the same God, in the saving Grace of God, and in the sacrifice of Christ for our sins upon the cross. We come together in agape love, caring for one another, living out the command of Jesus when he succinctly instructs us to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest  commandment, and the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22: 37-38) The early church made a difference in their world because they lived out that command.

My question to myself is; does my world see me as part of a religion or do they see Christ in me? If all they see is a person involved in just another religion my witness and testimony for them, to bring to them Christ, not Christianity, but Christ, will be viewed negatively and become void. May God and Jesus be so real in my life and yours so that we stand out as having a faith that is something to be desired.

Daily Prayer:

Father, please forgive me for making You and Your Son just another religion. My practices, my complaints about my Church body, my failure to represent Jesus as you have given us instruction. I have made my own way, decided to do it my way, I forgot who and whose I am. Remove from me religion and bring back into my true faith. May my life truly represent you Jesus for all the world to see.                        Amen