Living in the Shadow of Religion

Religion is a powerful motivator. Religion can motivate a child to become a monster who will strap on explosives and become a mass-murderer. Religion will devalue certain people groups based on ethnicity or for not holding the same religious views that are taught by their religious dogma.

The more people become exposed and educated about not just the religious teachings but the ones who are pushing religion as well, the greater the rejection of not the religion but the rejection of God takes place.

Lost and wondering in a desert of indifference is where many people find themselves as the result of religion. A life of defiance, fear, loneliness and self-loathing is the lifestyle of people who have rejected or who are living out their lives in the shadow of religious experience.

The positioning of God as an angry superpower that requires personal sacrifice or religious activities is the power that religious institutions use to control the masses of people.The “angry God” theology is a powerful tool that has been used to control entire people groups.

The “stick and carrot” philosophy of religion uses the threat of punishment or the promise of rewards for the one who will follow their religious teachings. The power of religion over people is not new but is as old as the failure in God’s garden.

Religion is a man-made power base used to empower a select group to hold the power to breach the separation that death creates. When anyone rejects their teachings they are condemned to a life that is exiled from God and is condemned to a promise of eternal suffering.

To question their religious teachings will cause you to be shunned or rejected by God and condemned to a life of wandering in darkness and judgment of personal sin. To accept the religious teachings is to live your life enslaved to a religious lifestyle that gives a false sense of security that your actions have brought the favor of God to you. Addressing the purveyors of religious bondage Jesus said, “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” (John 8:36)

The Bible teaches:

“For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.” (Tit 3:3-5)

The words “Not by works of righteousness” effectively removes the power of any religious group to endow or exclude you from God’s love and grace. There is not one religious activity that any religious discipline or teaching has that will bring God’s approval on your life.

To escape the shadow of religion and be saved from your sinful life you must be “born-again” by the Spirit of God. In God’s mercy and grace, He will save you. You will be washed of the darkness of sin and will be a new creature. The Bible teaches:

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” (2Co 5:17)

Following the teachings and disciplines of a religious group are not enough to do this. The Holy Spirit is the power of God that sets you free from the darkness of sin and religion’s answers for the separation that exists between God and you.

If you have walked away from a religious approach to your life; be careful you do not find yourself out of the shadow of religion and in the darkness of living a life that is void of God’s love and protection. Reject not God but the religious systems that are designed to enslave you to a religious group. Believe in Jesus and you will experience “The kindness and love of God our Saviour.”