I’ve heard many Christians say, “I’m not religious. I am in a relationship with Jesus.”
Unfortunately, when the majority of people hear a Christian say, “I’m not religious, but in a relationship,” an uncivil banter of words that condemn and judge said Christian usually follows. People are quick to judge the Christian as prideful, arrogant, or just flat out stupid for saying such a thing.
Please listen though, I really want you to consider the possibility that the teachings of Jesus are actually on to something revolutionary. That maybe Jesus revealed and ultimately did something that is far greater than any other religion.
Please keep reading, I don’t want you to think I am being dogmatic or condemning any other religion, but instead keep an open mind about this idea of moving beyond religion and into a relationship.
You see, in Matthew 6 we find the Lord’s prayer. If you grew up in the south like me, aka the Bible Belt, you have probably heard this prayer several times regardless of your religious affiliations.
As many of you know the prayer starts off with, “Our Father …”
Let’s end it right there, because right there is the key! The thing that separates Christianity from every other religion in the world is found within those two simple words, “Our Father.”
Before we get there though let me tell you what Jesus said before he spoke this prayer. He more or less said, “Don’t pray like the pagans who think they will be heard for their many elaborate words.”
Don’t pray like the pagans…
Whenever I hear the word pagan I think, “An unethical, immoral, and irreligious person consumed with anger and lust.” However, Christ is calling the religious elites of the day Pagans. Not the tax collector or the prostitute, but those who are considered to be the closest to God because of their hell bent desire on obeying the law. Yet they are pagans in the eyes of Christ.
Why?
To do that I must first explain something.
Ultimately, when it gets down to it, we as people can only live in a home, apartment, condo, etc. as a tenant or as a family member. (Yes, I understand there are gradations, you don’t have to tell me, but at the core this it!)
In one you have a business relationship and with the other you have a family relationship.
When a tenant you have a Land Lord who lets you stay where you are as long as you pay the rent and keep up with the property. It’s a very business like relationship. Basically, “I do my part, you do yours. I have something you need, and you have something I want.” It’s a very give and take relationship that is completely based upon performance and can never move beyond conditional love.
For the moment you slip up in one of these areas the land lord has zero conviction in keeping you around! He has every right to kick you out. You have failed to uphold your end of the deal, so why should he?
When a child, however, you have a father who lets you stay simply because of who you are, and not because of what you do or bring to the table. This way of living is radically different, for no matter what you might do a true and loving Father would never kick out their child. The love is completely unconditional.
One relationship has to do with your doing while the other has to do with your being.
And that’s the point Christ is so passionately advocating for in Matthew 6! That all these religious elites and other religions go before their God and perform. That wither or not their prayers are heard is based upon their actions being good enough and what they can give to God. For if they can be good enough then God owes them something in return, but if they fail then God has zero reason to answer their prayers or even love them due to the business like structure of their relationship. In a sense, at the core of their heart they are trying to put the Lord of the universe in their debt.
These religious elites, or better yet pagans, pray and pray and pray, all the while hoping that their prayers will be answered due to their many words and good works. Yet they only view God as a land lord, they never actually get to know Him! There is zero relationship or intimacy with God. It’s all about what they can do and what He can give. They approach Him on the basses of their good works; thus, they approach as pagans.
But a child gets to know their Father without feeling the pressure to perform or the fear of being kicked out of the home. They fall radically in love with Him and have such a zealous desire to obey His will. They obey his will not because they fear losing his love, but rather they are so in love with their father that they desire nothing more than to honor and respect him just as anybody would with the one they love.
They trust that a good loving Father will give them exactly what they ask for, or at least what they should have asked for if they knew everything He knew. They simply trust him to be good, regardless of how they may act or what they understand. For they know this to be truth.
Don’t you see! Through the death and resurrection of Christ, the son of God, we have been adopted into the kingdom of heaven. All those who believe in Jesus are now covered by his blood and receive the same spirit that declared over Christ, “You are my beloved son, with you I am well pleased.” (Luke3:22) We have moved beyond religious performance and legalism and into a relationship with a loving Father who is absolutely crazy for His children!
So Christians who say, “I am in a relationship,” are not being prideful, but instead they understand EXACTLY what Christ came to do and did. They understand the life of Christ and what he taught. They understand the freedom that comes through Christ. They realize they no longer have to perform to be accepted, but instead are accepted and are therefore able to love freely without the fear of messing up or being condemned or judged by any human or even themselves (1 Corinthians 4:3-4). They have already been judged good, and nothing can take that from them because they did nothing to earn it!
Galatians 4:4-7
But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.
