Religion vs. belief and some videos

There are some videos floating around the web that are stirring up Christians on the subject of religion vs. Jesus. I wanted to think this out on my blog...mostly to make sense of this for myself, in as much of an objective and balanced approach as possible. We'll see what happens.

Here is a link to video 1. Here is a link to video 2. I'll let you watch them for youself.

Here are a couple of my thoughts about these videos.

1. Scripture is interpreted differently for everyone who ever reads it (granted, some are in error) but, because each of us has a different life story we all have our own lens that we interpret through. It doesn't matter what it is we are interpreting, we all have a lens it goes through. So, each of these videos have some points that I would say are Biblically accurate. However, because of the lens each one of these men have to look through, they arrive at different conclusions. Anywhere you have two different people you will have two different opinions on these issues. We shouldn't be shocked by this.

2. There are many other people who will jump on one of the two of these bandwagons: The Catholics/mainline denominations on one and the evangelical/pentacostal/charimatic on the other. The problem with this is that it widens the gap between believers in the Church. Yes, the capital "C" Church. All we're doing with videos like these is creating dissension and division. This is not at all helpful, nor does the church need more battles to fight--especially from within.

3. There are admittedly problems in evangelical and mainline churches as far as retaining young people. Usually, statistics say, if a kid goes off to college and leaves the church, they probably aren't coming back. Evangelicals need to take a hard look at that stat and ask if we are really doing a better job than mainline churches. The problem for both groups is that when kids leave, then tend not to come back. That isn't what Jesus or religion has in mind. Before one group starts picking on the other for valuing traditions too highly or not valuing them enough, we should probably figure out why most of our kids leave home and leave church at the same time, never to return. I think the guy in the first video should have used the word tradition more than he used the word church. His video would have made more sense to me - because he doesn't hate church, he hates tradition.

So, there are the thoughts that are going through my mind. And, depending on your knowledge of church history, your background, your "lens", you may agree or disagree with me. But here is my main thought on this issue:
Christianity is a religion where we need two things: a strong personal conversion which leads to personal faith AND a community of faith that nurtures disciples (not believers - disciples follow and do, believers just believe) and trains them up to make more disciples. When one of those things is missing, we get results like what we have now.

Finally, the two, religion and (belief in) Jesus are not mutually exclusive; they are bound to each other. We were ever supposed to have Church without Jesus and we are definitely not meant to have Jesus without Church. Jesus will return for one (singular) bride. Only he can say who is inside our outside of that. We need to stop these petty arguments about who is right and wrong (they haven't been solved in 2000 years so I am pretty sure it isn't going to happen anytime soon) and learn how to have faith that includes loving Jesus and the Church - wherever you regularly attend. Major on the majors, minor on the minors. Leave the backbiting to politicians.

Thanks for reading!

First Post: The King Jesus Gospel

I have always been curious about the issue of once saved always saved vs. the possibility of losing your salvation and I have always had a hard time with the issue. On the one hand, how does God possibly lose someone who he has called to himself, who has made a decision to place him as their Lord and Savior? On the other hand, if you make the decision to accept Jesus's sacrifice and commit your life to him, doesn't that give you the right to deny it just the same as you accepted it?

There are many people who claim to have an answer to this question, this dilemma, but I just am not sure I can buy one answer or the other. But there has been a book released that is dealing with this issue...in a way. The King Jesus Gospel by Scot McKnight is a book that I have recently begun to read. The bigger issue, behind once saved always saved, is the issue of the Gospel. What exactly is the Gospel, and is our method of conversion doing the Gospel justice?

The questions are what I want to look at over the next few weeks. I want to present my take on what Scot McKnight is writing about, and my thoughts definitely do not represent McKnight's thoughts or anyone elses; my thoughts are my own. This is basically an exercise for me to read and think "out loud" on theology. If you want to read, have at it.