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Did You Choose Your Religion Wisely?

 

Did You Choose Your Religion Wisely?

Have you given any thought to your spiritual well-being? General religious practices are not uncommon in the world, and an individual would have had to grow up in a frosted bubble to deny that the world’s populations worship: something, somebody, or some entity.

With this thought in mind, “How do you view religion in general and your spiritual well-being specifically?” There are many ways a person may view their spiritual condition: (1) Individuals may deny that man has a spirit, such as did the Sadducees (Acts 23:8). (2) They may “profess themselves to be wise” and make for themselves all manner of images of man, birds, four-footed beasts, and creeping things, as was the case presented by the Apostle Paul in Romans 1:22-23. (3) An individual may think that the Lord dwells “in temples made with hands” and is “served by men’s hands” as the Apostle Paul stated in Acts 17:24-25. (4) They may think, as did the Ephesians, that an image of Diana “fell down from Jupiter,” Acts 19:35. (5) They may think, as did Naaman, that God will work through some prophet who “will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of Jehovah his God, and wave his hand over the place, and recover the leper” (2 Kings 5:11). (6) Some even think that man is pure mortal, with no spiritual life now, or in the future, but has gods and goddesses to worship (I haven’t quite figured that one out). (7) Some people, over the ages, have claimed to have had a spiritual experience: God appeared to them, spoke to them, or touched them in some miraculous fashion, and revealed his will to them turning their sinful lives around, and now they have a message for the world! What is your view of religion?

Whatever your view of religion, ask yourself whether or not your conclusion comes from an emotional, or a rationally educated source. Jehovah, speaking through the Prophet Hosea, said of Israel, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I also will forget thy children” (Hosea 4:6). You see, emotions are unpredictable and based upon the baser nature of man. The Apostle Paul once said, “For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God” (Romans 10:2-3). In this text, righteousness is a standard. Though their zeal was evident, they refused to subject themselves to God’s standard, which is what the Apostle Paul said about the Gentiles who, knowing God “glorified him not as God, neither gave thanks; but became vain in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened” (Romans 1:21).

What we would like for you to do is to examine the source of your religion. Upon what is your religion based? From whence did it come? And can it be validated by an external source? You see, when God sent his Son, He ultimately validated his person, and his teaching when Jesus “was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead” (Romans 1:4), and as the Apostle Peter “answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life” (John 6:68).

When Jesus came into the world, he did so “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10): that includes every soul on the planet today. He came to a world of darkness and gave it light. As the medium and substance of all the revelations God made known to man, he brought true grace, and explained the Father to mankind, and thus, God showed that He loved us when He “sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

This Jesus said, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30). Ross Triplett, Sr.