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Introduction

Before I begin, let me say that this article needs to be read through the lens of knowing my deep love for the church. I am overjoyed to be part of the visible church of Christ, but it's unfortunate that too often church appears more like a type of prison than a sanctuary of freedom. Over the years I have discovered that “religion” seems to be the culprit causing this to happen.

Unfortunately religion can make people grouchy, mean, somber, angry, critical, and even neurotic. Religion can also be abusive towards Christians. I have seen and heard of so many hurt by religion it makes me sympathetic toward those who have left the church because of it.

Ironically, the worst thing about religion is that it can actually keep you from God. Religion itself can become a substitute for a relationship with God himself. There is something about institutionalized religion, as necessary and good as it can be, that will choke out your freedom if you aren't careful.

I have mixed emotions when a new Christian comes into the church. Of course I'm happy they are there, but I also cringe a bit because I'm worried they may catch the “religion virus” and that virus will destroy the joy and freedom Jesus purchased for us with his life, death and resurrection.

The Poisonous Path

Have you ever witnessed new believers wander down the poisonous path of becoming “religionalistic (new word I created)?” It starts off with an authentic discovery that there is a God, a God of love who has forgiven them of their sin and past and has accepted them and adopted them as his children. It can't help but be exciting and refreshing to witness as new believers discover the truth of Paul's words in 2 Corinthians 5:19, “In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them” (ESV) and in 1 Timothy 1:15, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of who I am foremost” (ESV).

That is, until the claws of religion grasp hold of them.

At this point the new believer starts hearing a barrage of things they need to learn and do. They have to figure out who is right and who is wrong (or who the good guys and bad guys are), which leads to the choosing of sides which most often results in a battle of sorts of us versus them. They have to learn the “acceptable” translation of the Bible or be chastised if they prefer one different than is preached from or rests in the pew, the right behavior for a “true” Christian, the right political position on an array of issues. On top of all of this as new believers they have to get discipled, learn the right way to raise their children and function as a family, learn the right way to do business, and stringently discipline their life so they will stand apart from the world. That's a lot of pressure.

Then we witness as people leave the church and respond with something along the lines of, “I don't get it. They were working so hard, doing so much. They were growing in their Christian disciplines.” Well, I have a pretty good idea of what happened. We have removed the joy and choked out the freedom from the new believer and heaped on them a burden of legalism, laws, and works (a.k.a. religion).

Did They Disappoint God?

A few things many Christian preachers and teachers repeatedly do is point out how disappointed Jesus is, or gets, with our lack of dedication, our lack of deep theological knowledge, and our caving in to the culture. Now these are legitimate areas of concern, and some of these charges are true.

However, when I look at Scripture what I find intriguing about the anger of Jesus is that he very seldom aimed it at the so called bad people, the ones who weren't strictly committed and overly religious or those whose worldview wasn't exactly godly. In fact, both Matthew and Luke call him a friend of “tax collectors and sinners.” Further, they inform us that Jesus hung around with the worst of sinners and so much so that people observing this called him a glutton and guzzler of wine (Matthew 11:19; Luke 7:34). Jesus used his most brash criticism for the religious ones who “tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people's shoulders” (Matthew 23:4, ESV).

Let's take a look at some good news. Wait, scratch that, great news. Jesus was visiting his hometown on one occasion and while there the people in his church (synagogue) asked him to read from the Scriptures. He read a specific passage and then said to the people that he himself was the one who fulfilled what he had just read. This is what he said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor” (Luke 4:18-19, ESV).

That is good news, the best news! As author, preacher, and radio show host Steve Brown wrote, “In fact, the incarnation of God in Christ was the best news the world has ever heard. It cut through the sham and pretense of spurious religious ideas. It presented the simple message that God was not what every religious person thought he was. And it offered people freedom...and with freedom, healing, meaning, immorality, and forgiveness.”(1)

How Did The Message Get So Warped?

So, we need to ask ourselves how we have taken the good news of the gospel, a message so great, so exciting, and so liberating and warped it into a religion that changes people's joy to misery and has created disciples who go out and spread that misery to others? What on earth has happened?

How did we get so religious? How did we get so warped? Where did we go wrong? How did all of these cascading layers of rules, regulations and stipulations come about? How did being forgiven cause us so much guilt? How has being unconditionally loved made us so anxious? How has being set free put us in so much bondage? How did sinners who have been forgiven of their sins become judges regarding others and their sins?

The good news of the gospel (that's what gospel means, good news) is God's gift to us - “and yet somehow, in our efforts to be more than we can be, even when our motives were right, we have lost our way. We have become obsessive, bound, angry, judgmental, and neurotic Christians.”(2)

I have a strong feeling God intended something quite different than that. He wants us to be free, as a matter of fact, he paid the ultimate price, made the ultimate sacrifice, in order for us to be free.

Jesus has freed us from the need to be obsessed with our goodness, our dedication, and our “rightness.” It is religion that has made us obsessed to the point of exhaustion. “Jesus invited us to a dance...and we've turned it into a march of soldiers, always checking to see if we're doing it right and are in step and in line with the other soldiers. We know a dance would be more fun, but we believe we must go through hell to get to heaven, so we keep marching.”(3)

If you truly believed you were completely forgiven and fully accepted by God and that he loved you with a perfect and pure unreserved love, what would you do? How would you behave? How much would you change your religion?

The thing is, people who really understand the good news about Jesus Christ, those who have really grasped and experienced his grace, don't obsess over if they are becoming “good” or “better” or more pure. Actually, they don't give themselves much thought at all. I would even say that one of the more serious sins Christians can commit is obsessively focusing on their sin. It's extremely arrogant, prideful and self-centered.

At one time Martin Luther said to his colleague Melanchthon, who was also the main figure in creating the Augsburg Confession, “why don't you just go out and sin so you will have something to repent of.” Of course Luther was not endorsing or promoting sin, he was giving counsel to his friend telling him to stop focusing on himself.

Conclusion

One of the biggest problems with what most call “cultural Christianity,” - which is the laying down of rules and regulations “discerning” how closely believers (including ourselves) are conforming to those rules and regulations – is that it gets very difficult to tell who is “good” and who isn't. I believe that our ideas of what godliness is have become so off kilter that a truly good person doesn't even realize he or she is godly. And that also leaves us not knowing who is and isn't godly.

One time Jesus said to his disciples, “For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20, ESV).

The first time I really thought about that verse it troubled me. It troubled me because if you study the topic of the scribes and Pharisees you'll find out they were actually the most obedient and committed religious people in their culture and time. Also, the Pharisees were theologically correct with almost everything they taught and believed. Trying to find an equivalent today would be difficult but they would be the most fundamental and orthodox of the bunch.

Steve Brown writes about this very topic, “If those guys aren't righteous enough and if Jesus requires me to be even more righteous, then I'm in serious trouble. I'm having trouble getting through one day without messing up so bad I can't fix it. How in the world can I be more righteous than they were? I've tried really hard, and I simply can't do it...”.(4)

The take away from all of this is simple. We can't do it. It's not our righteousness that is the issue, it's God's. His righteousness is ours through Jesus Christ's sacrifice and resurrection.

-Article adapted from A Scandalous Freedom: The Radical Nature Of The Gospel, by Steve Brown (New York: Howard Books, 2004, pp.75-92)

(1) Brown, p.78

(2) Ibid., p.81

(3) Ibid., p.83

(4) Ibid., p.92

Jeff Hagan is the President of True Grace Ministries and Theological Institute. Interested? www.preacherjeff45.wlxsite.com/truegracetheolgical