What Is Religion?
James 1:27 NIV
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
To say a person is religious could mean all sorts of things - you can be religious about your exercise program, religious about keeping your house clean, religious about your daily schedule, religious about changing the oil in your car every 3,000 miles. but what is religion in God's eyes?
Religion - the kind God wants us to have - has nothing to do with an organization or denomination or anything whatsoever to do with what is written over the door to the place where you worship. Religion, in God's eyes, is a relationship... a relationship with Jesus. If you are deeply involved in that relationship, you will meet the two conditions our Father places on pure and faultless religion; to be concerned about others and to be concerned about yourself. Concern for others goes back to love, the love our Lord taught us to have for others. James mentions widows and orphans, and I truly believe this should include divorcees and their children. But our concern for others should not be limited. Our concern should be directed at all our brothers and sisters and what we can do to help them, both in good times and in times of distress.
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When a new person comes into your church, how sensitive are you to him or her? Is she newly widowed? Is he going through a divorce? Do her children need to be around a Christian man once in a while? Would his daughters benefit from the influence of a woman of God?
And what about your activities outside of church? What kinds of magazines and books are lying around your house? What kind of movies and TV shows do you watch? Whether we want to admit it or not, everything we read, see, and hear affects the way we think. Our minds are so malleable that it has been proven that anyone (and yes, this means you!) can be brainwashed! We're subjected to minor "brainwashing" every time we watch an ad on TV or listen to a radio jingle. The writers and producers of those ads have one thought in mind when creating them - to influence your mind enough so that you will buy that product. And what about television programming? Sometime - especially if you have cable or satellite television - get a notebook and scan through the channels, making a tally sheet of programs that you would allow your children to watch and those that you would not. Don't just check late night programming - look at what's on at 4:00 or 6:00 or 7:00. You'll be amazed at how large the tally of "unaccepta ble" programs is. And the only reason the list has grown that large is because people are watching those programs. people whose minds have been slowly anesthetized to the point that things which would have shocked and repulsed them ten years ago seem okay today. That's brainwashing.
The Bible warns us over and over again to be careful not to be corrupted by the world. Has your mind been anesthetized? What kind of input will your mind have today?
Start today to practice pure and faultless religion. make sure you care for others, and care for yourself.
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