I’m Just Not Religious

“I’m not religious”.

“I’ve never been religious”.

I will often hear one of those sentences when I’m discussing my faith. Sometimes I’ll hear that when spending time with someone who realizes that I am behaving or thinking differently than the response they usually receive. When someone says “I’m not religious”, I usually immediately say “I’m not religious either, at least not in the way you’re thinking” but have to qualify that with two important points:

1. Everyone is religious (Acts 17:22).
2. Christ did not come to establish religion (John 8:36, 2 Cor 3:17, Gal 5:1).

Starting with the second point, I usually explain it like this: Religion is man trying to reach for God and gain His approval, being is Christian is knowing that God became flesh and reached down to man when man was powerless (Phil 2:6-8). Every religion, even those who claim to be Christian, require something for the follower in order to be acceptable to God.

True historic Christian doctrine teaches the opposite. There is nothing man can do to make himself presentable before God. God saves man because he cannot save himself. Religions take the free offer of the gospel and the precious doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone and throw it out the window (Rev 2:2).

All religions require something of the follower and all people are religious. This point is the most plainly obvious. I’ve never met anyone who wasn’t religious. It just depends what their religion is. For some people their religion is atheism (see Hawkings et al). For many it is education. A very popular religion today is environmentalism. Tim Challies recently wrote a very good article, quoting from Michael Crichton, on environmentalism as a religion. With each one of these religions you have a perfect beginning, a fall, and some sort of redemption or messiah. They have prophets and religious texts. For some their religion might be the more seemingly innocuous sports, movies, or celebrities.

I am not saying religion is bad, unless you believe it will give you a right standing with God (Matt 23:23). We cannot help but be religious, it is part of our nature. We can use this part of our nature for good, by being devoted to family, good works, or the less fortunate around us. Just as long as we realize that none of these things are what being a Christian is. There are many religious Christians, but the one isn’t related to the other.

Juice