The difference between the gospel and religion.

[hislastwalk]

RELIGION: I obey, therefore I’m accepted.

THE GOSPEL: I’ m accepted, therefore I obey.

RELIGION: Motivation is based on fear and insecurity.

THE GOSPEL: Motivation is based on grateful joy.

RELIGION: I obey God in order to get things from God.

THE GOSPEL: I obey God to get to God, to delight and resemble him.

RELIGION: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I am angry at God or myself, since I believe, like Job’s friends that anyone who is good deserves a comfortable life.

THE GOSPEL: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I struggle but I know all my punishment fell on Jesus and that while he may allow this for my training, he will exercise his fatherly love within my trial.

RELIGION: When I am criticized, I am furious or devastated because it is critical that I think of myself as a "good person." Threats to that self-image must be destroyed at all costs.

THE GOSPEL: When I am criticized, I can take it. I struggle, but it is not critical for me to think of myself as a "good person." My identity is not built on my record or my performance, but on God’s love for me in Christ.

RELIGION: My prayer life consists largely of petition and only heats up when I am in a time of need. My main purpose in prayer is control of my environment.

THE GOSPEL: My prayer life consists of generous stretches of praise and adoration. My main purpose is fellowship with God.

RELIGION: My self- view swings between two poles: If and when I am living up to my standards, I feel confident, but then I am prone to be proud and unsympathetic to failing people. If and when I am not living up to standards, I feel insecure, inadequate, and not confident. I feel like a failure.

THE GOSPEL: My self- view is not based on a view of myself as a moral achiever. In Christ I am “simul iustus et peccator”—simultaneously sinful and yet accepted in Christ. I am so bad he had to die for me and I am so loved he was glad to die for me. This leads me to deeper and deeper humility and confidence at the same time, neither swaggering nor sniveling.

RELIGION: My identity and self-worth are based mainly on how hard I work or how moral I am, and so I must look down on those I perceive as lazy or immoral. I disdain and feel superior to "the other."

THE GOSPEL: My identity and self-worth are
centered on the one who died for his enemies and who was excluded from the city for me. I am saved by sheer grace, so I can’t look down on those who believe or practice something different from me. It
is only by grace that I am what I am. I have no inner need to win arguments.

RELIGION: Since I look to my own pedigree or performance for my spiritual acceptability, my heart manufactures idols. It may be my talents, my moral record, my personal discipline, my social status, etc. I absolutely have to have them so they serve as my
main hope, meaning, happiness, security, and significance, regardless of what I say I believe about God.

THE GOSPEL: I have many good things in my life: family, work, spiritual disciplines, etc. But none of these good things is an ultimate end for me. None of them is something I absolutely have to have, so there is a limit to how much anxiety, bitterness, and despondency such things can inflict on me when they are threatened and lost.

I found this online, thought I'd share

 

[Crimeny]

i think that religion requires gospel, otherwise its not really a true faith, really if its just that its more of a doctrine of men, whereas true religion preaches gospel.

 

[hislastwalk]

i think that religion requires gospel, otherwise its not really a true faith, really if its just that its more of a doctrine of men, whereas true religion preaches gospel.

Religion contradicts the gospel.. If you'll actually read the original post...lol. Theres a big difference.

 

[tribesman]

There's nothing in these examples listed that gives any foundation for the word/term religion being bad or evil. The word religion has clearly gotten a bad name among many men however. That doesn't mean that either the word or term religion is evil in and by itself. The objective meaning of the word and term religion is not evil.

 

[hislastwalk]

There's nothing in these examples listed that gives any foundation for the word/term religion being bad or evil. The word religion has clearly gotten a bad name among many men however. That doesn't mean that either the word or term religion is evil in and by itself. The objective meaning of the word and term religion is not evil.

1: this is the teens forums.

2: Religion will not save you. People always overlook that point when reading stuff like this. Slow down, and actually read.lol

 

[tribesman]

1: this is the teens forums.

2: Religion will not save you. People always overlook that point when reading stuff like this. Slow down, and actually read.lol

1. Teens should listen to the elderly.

2. Religion by itself will not save you. True. Also faith or spirituality will not save you. Also true. There's a content and implication in these words/terms, of course, that makes it true as contrasted to what is false.

What's the point with just singling out the word/term religion? You don't like the word/term religion, therefore you go on condemning it like it is some evil, wicked thing? Where's your scripture that supports your view? Just follow the flock of disliking something?

Big risk to condemn christians who say that their religion is christianity. That's the problem with it.

Let the law of God alone be the measure for what is sin and not sin. OK?

 

[hislastwalk]

1. Teens should listen to the elderly.

2. Religion by itself will not save you. True. Also faith or spirituality will not save you. Also true. There's a content and implication in these words/terms, of course, that makes it true as contrasted to what is false.

What's the point with just singling out the word/term religion? You don't like the word/term religion, therefore you go on condemning it like it is some evil, wicked thing? Where's your scripture that supports your view? Just follow the flock of disliking something?

Big risk to condemn christians who say that their religion is christianity. That's the problem with it.

Let the law of God alone be the measure for what is sin and not sin. OK?

I have plenty of verses against religion..
And, no, elders aren't always right.. I respect you, but that doesn't mean to come on my post in the teens room..lol

 

[hislastwalk]

"Big risk to condemn christians who say that.their religion is christianity. That's the problem with it."

I'm not using religion in that context either. -.-

People keep assuming that.. No if you will actually read the post you'd know..lol

 

[tribesman]

I have plenty of verses against religion..
And, no, elders aren't always right.. I respect you, but that doesn't mean to come on my post in the teens room..lol

I suppose you show some of these "plenty of verses" then. You do not only make very drastic claims, you also want to set up rules who should reply to your posts. Age focused are we?

One has to tolerate criticism of one's beliefs and claims. That's how we can prove them to be true or not. Those who are in the wrong usually want no critique or discussion at all, they just want people to accept what their saying (because they are saying it) without checking anything. Avoid such.

And welcome back with Bible verses that emphatically states that the use of the word/term religion is sin.

I'd go with this scriptural principle and will let no person of any age attack or condemn brothers and sisters in Christ for them using the word/term religion (see Jam.1:26-27, KJV), as little as if they use the words/terms faith or spirituality. Yes, there are false religions/faiths and spirituality, it doesn't mean that these words/terms denotes evil. Christians are under the law of liberty, free from the commandments of men and their feelings/preferences and likes/dislikes.

1John.3

[4] ...sin is the transgression of the law.

Rom.4


[15] ... for where no law is, there is no transgression.

Rom.14

[14] I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean.

 

[lil_christian]

I actually like it pretty cool to me! Btw, the reason it does the Gospel vs. Religion, it's not giving religion a bad name, it's comparing the GOSPEL to OTHER religions.

 

[tribesman]

"Big risk to condemn christians who say that.their religion is christianity. That's the problem with it."

I'm not using religion in that context either. -.-

People keep assuming that.. No if you will actually read the post you'd know..lol

In another thread you created the title is "Why I hate religion".

And, yes, I read the original post in this thread. It clearly uses "religion" in an indiscriminately negatively way. They could have written "false religion", then it would have made sense, but to state only "religion" will give the impression that religion, generally speaking, is something bad, something which is against the gospel.

The translators of the KJV had another view on "religion".

Jas.1

[26] If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain.
[27] Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

 

[tribesman]

I actually like it pretty cool to me! Btw, the reason it does the Gospel vs. Religion, it's not giving religion a bad name, it's comparing the GOSPEL to OTHER religions.

That should be spelled out then. Other or false religion. However, it is not. I've seen this silly "radical" rant against "religion" before. There are many people who do not know what forces that pioneered in this diatribe against religion, so popular among many today, they are just following the disliking crowd, mostly run by worldlings and atheists. Very unwise.

 

[lil_christian]

That should be spelled out then. Other or false religion. However, it is not. I've seen this silly "radical" rant against "religion" before. There are many people who do not know what forces that pioneered in this diatribe against religion, so popular among many today, they are just following the disliking crowd, mostly run by worldlings and atheists. Very unwise.

Well, let's ask this: what is the original definition of religion? I'm assuming it's a Latin word because the root "re" is Latin (I took an Etymology class last year. Word origins and the definition of roots and suffixes)...so I'm going to go look for the origin of it...

 

[lil_christian]

Found something.

Webster's Collegiate Dictionary traces the word back to an old Latin word religio meaning "taboo, restraint." A deeper study discovers the word comes from the two words re and ligare. Re is a prefix meaning "return," and ligare means "to bind;" in other words, "return to bondage." Do you still want some of that "old-time religion"?

"O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you! Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?"

Those words are not mine, they are the site's. Yeah it bashes religion. But that's the origin. I took an Etymology class and I was an A student in it. (I always got a 97% or above on it because I'm extremely good at spelling and I found it interesting to know the origins of the words we speak.)

 

[tribesman]

Found something.

Those words are not mine, they are the site's. Yeah it bashes religion. But that's the origin. I took an Etymology class and I was an A student in it. (I always got a 97% or above on it because I'm extremely good at spelling and I found it interesting to know the origins of the words we speak.)

You google around and "found something", seemingly so great that you cannot even share what site it was found on. I saw this same thingy on sites like tentmakers *sighs*. Ever heard of source criticism?

If we are into etymology then there a lot of issues we can analyze into pieces with different methods. How about names of pagan deities in the english language, even including words like god and holy? If we want to go that road then many things can be claimed. But that's another topic altogether.

As an example, the translators of the KJV translated a greek word as "religion", in a positive sense. I find it odd that some people think they know better than them about the usage for same.

 

[lil_christian]

You google around and "found something", seemingly so great that you cannot even share what site it was found on. I saw this same thingy on sites like tentmakers *sighs*. Ever heard of source criticism?

If we are into etymology then there a lot of issues we can analyze into pieces with different methods. How about names of pagan deities in the english language, even including words like god and holy? If we want to go that road then many things can be claimed. But that's another topic altogether.

As an example, the translators of the KJV translated a greek word as "religion", in a positive sense. I find it odd that some people think they know better than them about the usage for same.

I'll give you the site if you want. And I never said I was smarter or better than KJV translators. I just know what I know. Yeesh.

EDIT: somehow it omitted some of your quote. And yes it was tentmakers. But the Latin origin was correct.

 

[lil_christian]

But regardless, the way we mean religion probably isn't the way the Latins meant it.

 

[tribesman]

But the Latin origin was correct.

Which changes nothing on the meaning and uses of the root words, which indeed can be said and claimed to mean a lot of things, with different connotations to different crowds listening to them. We are to use words in their objective sense, otherwise communication will be havoc. But good that you don't think yourself to be smarter than the KJV translators.

 

[tribesman]

But regardless, the way we mean religion probably isn't the way the Latins meant it.

That is actually debated among scholars. However, there's still a proof of burden upon all those who claims that the word in question must by mere necessity, in and by itself, mean something evil, bad, sinful, carnal, dark, repressive, backwards etc.

 

[hislastwalk]

I thought you would have assumed I Meant false religion. (false religion IS evil) you should choose to obey, simply because you love God. That's the point. >>