Is it religion or relationship? Four questions to help you diagnose your commitment to Jesus

A few days ago I was at the hospital for a church member who was having a minor procedure done.  Is any procedure really minor?  Never having gone under the knife myself, they are all major to me!  Anyway, while I was in the waiting room I overheard the conversation of some people nearby that peeked my interested.  After a lot of discussion about sports and politics, the dialog had moved into the area of religion, my specialty!  One gentleman, who had just described his feelings about the OKC Thunder with much language that I can't repeat, began discussing different churches and his experiences with them.  He said that he didn't regularly attend church, but when he did go, he went to one of those "holy-roller" churches.  "You can just feel the Spirit in there!  They're not like those Baptist churches around here.  They get with it!  Those Baptist churches are so dead!"

Now I take a particular offense to that. Not only because I'm the pastor of a Baptist church, but because outward emotion and sincerity are not true indicators of spiritual transformation.  You can be sincere about something and be sincerely wrong.  While I do agree that we, as Baptists, often times need to display more life in our worship, the depth of our emotion doesn't give us a real picture of our relationship with Christ.  It was that conversation that brought this question to my mind: how can a person truly know they have a relationship with Christ or whether they are just following the requirements of religion?

Before you bust out your Gospel tracts on me, let me explain.  Scripture is very clear about how a person begins a relationship with Christ.  It all originates with the understanding that God created the universe and everything in it, including man.  And that sometime after God breathed the breath of life into Adam, he chose to deliberately disobey the commands of God; bringing the curse of sin upon himself and upon his descendants- ruining his once perfect relationship with God.  This separation from God was so complete that He could not even hear us (Isaiah 59:2).  Even though mankind gave their best attempts in restoring this relationship, it didn't work; there was no way to work our way back to God.  So, God does the unthinkable.  He humbles Himself and takes on the form of lowly mankind as the God-man Jesus.  Being born of the Spirit and not from a man, through the virgin Mary, Christ comes to redeem those under the curse.  He pays the penalty of our sin with His perfect life.  And to give evidence of His finished work of redemption, He rises from the dead on the third day proving Christ to be the Victorious King!  Christ's salvation comes as a free gift to all (Ephesians 2:8-9) but, as a gift, it must be received by us.  Those who long for Christ's gift of forgiveness must agree with God about their sin, turn away from their sinful lifestyle, and trust In His sacrifice for their sins by believing in Jesus.

I know that was kind of long, but it's definitely shorter than all I could have written.  And the reason I took the time to state all of that was because of the confusion about faith in Christ.  Many people spend their whole lives in church and miss Christ.  Large numbers of church-goers have walked an aisle and said a prayer and thought they were, "good to go".  A vast majority of people are even trusting in all their goodness or their religious experience to get into heaven.

All of these ways "fall short of the glory of God"!  They give us just enough information to keep Christ at a distance without ever developing a relationship with Him and receiving His gift of salvation!  With so much confusion, I came up with four questions that you should ask yourself to determine whether you have a relationship with Christ or whether you are just hanging on to a religion.

1. Do you pray, read your Bible, or attend church out of joy or obligation?
                This is big telltale sign!  If partaking of the basic tenants of the Christian faith bore you or they are just some ritual that makes you feel like you’ve done your part, then you might just be holding on to religion.
                The true follower of Christ will have a desire to do these things.  Not so that they can check them off of the list, but so that they can develop their relationship with God.  They will long to discover the will of God, hear His heart, and find His compassion for their lives.

2. Do you see those around you as people or inconveniences?
                Those who follow religion are typically sticklers for the rules and they expect others to do so as well.  When someone else breaks those rules or goes outside those boundaries, they snap back with vengeance!  They tend to see people, not as souls in need of a Savior, but as interruptions to their day.  It is more important to them that people know how wrong they are rather than helping them understand their need for Christ.
                The follower of Christ tends to look upon people with compassion because they understand both the power of sin, which they were once held by, and the depth of Christ’s forgiveness, which they have experienced.  They love because they have been loved, and they forgive because they’ve been forgiven.

3. Are keeping things the way they are more important to you than reaching people for Jesus?

                Some of you are going to read this and think that I’m referring only to music.  Well, in a very small way, it does deal somewhat with music.  But changing the style or tempo of our worship services is the very least of my concerns.  Very few of us like change; unless it benefits us in some way.  But if there was something that you were doing that was keeping people from Christ, would you be willing to change it or give it up?  What if there was something that you could do in order to encourage your children or grandchildren to follow the Lord?  Would you be willing to make that change? 

                Unfortunately the religion of some will not allow them to budge, even if it means that those they love will be turned off from the Gospel.  They keep the same negative attitude toward everyone and everything that doesn’t agree with them.  They will fight tooth and nail over the color of the carpet and how many people are able to drive the church van.  They will make sure that they “keep those youth in line” by ripping the hats off the boys that come into a worship service with them on (instead of asking them to remove it and lovingly explaining why).

                Those who have come to Christ by faith should be open to doing what it takes for others to hear the life-changing message of the Gospel.  I’m not saying that we should change everything.  The truth of the Gospel will never change!  But carpet, paint, pews, and music should not be hill on which the faith of others die.  True faith requires putting our personal preferences aside for the glory of Christ’s Kingdom.

4. Are you saddened at the fact that some will reject Christ?

                Stagnant religion only feigns affection for the souls of others.  It may point to true faith, but it fails to cry out for mercy.  Those caught in the grasp of religion tend to focus on the steps of faith without partaking in them for themselves nor encouraging others to do so.  The “wide gate” of destruction is simply a fact that they have accepted and it still leaves them unmoved.

                For those who have a true relationship with Jesus, the fact of eternal separation from God for those who refuse to come to Him by faith breaks their heart!  They understand that each person, friend and foe, is created in the image of God and that the Father longs for them to come to Him by faith through the redemptive gift of Christ.  They also understand their role that Christ has called them to play in His Kingdom through the Great Commission.  Their passion for those around them to come to Christ is like that of Charles Spurgeon when he wrote, “If sinners will be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our bodies.  And if they will perish, let them perish with our arms about their knees, imploring them to stay.  If hell must be filled, at least let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go there unwarned and unprayed for.”

                So, which is it for you?  Are trapped in the emptiness of religion or have you found a true relationship with the One who faced all of hell to bring you into His family?  If religion has previously been your motto, there’s still hope!  You can find freedom from the shackles of religion by trusting in the saving grace of Christ!