| RELIGION | THE GOSPEL |
| Controlling | Liberating |
| Hierarchical | Egalitarian |
| Antidisestablishmentarianism | Autonomy & self-direction |
| Counter-reformation | Reformation (of society) |
| Conservative/judgemental | Liberal/magnanimous |
| Elitist/supremacist | All humans are equal |
| Enforced conformity | Celebration of variety |
| Robotic, disempowering | Freedom without chaos, empowering |
| Imposed/cult identity/self | Authentic identity/self |
| Contrived unity, conditional love | Genuine family kinship, unconditional love |
| Territorial - boundary disputes with Science | No boundary disputes Faith, Spirituality and Science |
| Salvation & forgiveness are works & merit based | Salvation & forgiveness are "free gifts" by Grace |
| Focus on the group, organisation, institution | Focus on the individual and relationship |
| Apostate Legalism (a "morass of inconsistencies") | A renewed heart and spirit (organic/natural) |
What differences have you noticed between RELIGION and the GOSPEL?
by Fernando 30 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Fernando
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Fernando
In his book "Waking the dead", John Eldredge observes:
"Religion and its defenders have always been the most insidious enemy of the true faith precisely because they are not glaring opponents; they are impostors."
Religion hides its theft and destruction of faith by redefining faith to mean religious belief or religion. Hence the unscriptural term faithS. This word (the plural) does not appear once in scripture - but does appear 215 times in the 2012 Watchtower library.
On the other hand Watchman Nee explained (the "free gift" of) faith as "knowing what God knows" (a wide opening of our spiritual eyes).
Scripture only refers to faith, or "one faith".
Unlike the Watchtower, scripture does not speak of "the true faith".
In Watchtower speak "the true faith" means the "true religion" - a heretofore foreign concept (to JWs, and) only invented in the early 1950's by Watchtower attorney Hayden C. Covington. This was done with the view to swindling the legal system - a very successful fraud and racket not uncovered by authorities to this day.
(Why do followers of the Watchtower religion call themselves “publishers of the Good News” whilst unfamiliar with the “Good News” according to Paul, Moses, Isaiah and Psalms?)
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Band on the Run
I understand your sentiments, particularly the antireligion part b/c of the Witnesses. For my part, I no longer see religion as evil. Religion is neutral. It can be a force for good or evil. I don't know how to work the gospel but through other humans. The need for a community is present.
I also don't see the Gospel as God approaching man. There is a term for a theology that embraces both views: God to humans and humans to God. It is a two way street. Perhaps humans have their responsibiliites. God does not dictate all. There is interaction.
Religion has achieved many noble things. Of course, when I view it through the prism of a high control religion such as the Witnesses, I have trouble finding good in it.
It is hard for me to articulate my beliefs. Words are inadequate. Christianity teaches a fully human,fully God Christ. The Christian mystics langauge approaches it. I find it in masterpieces of art or music. A soaring beyond the ordinary. The peace which passeth all understanding.
It makes sense that we approach faith and religion through our life experiences. Everyone's God will be different from another's God. Perhaps there is a biological component or a collective unconscious with archetypes. I doubt I would be Christian if I were raised in a different tradition. After I left the Witnesses, I saw no great good in Christ. It took many years to embrace Christ. I don't find Christianity unique.
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mP
BoR
For my part, I no longer see religion as evil. Religion is neutral. It can be a force for good or evil.
mP:
How can you say that if there are no good religions ? The more religious a group or person the more dangerous they become. Just look at Islam or chrsitians who believe they must defend israel. Both want war, how can that be good ?
There are also other christian religions which basically destry families. I cant think of a single good religion. The salvos are good, but they are hardly religious, but rather people who are devote to a humane cause. Religions is not a part of their devotion.
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Fernando
Hey Band on the Run!
Thank you for a considered and alternative perspective.
Personally I believe there are many good people doing good things despite their religion.
My only regret is that they could be so much more without the hidden weight of religion holding them back.
I do not believe it to be an accident that the fullness and richness of the gospel message is obscured by religion.
Possibly you could see some of this demonstrated by asking a Christian, a Jew and a Muslim to each explain the gospel, bissar and injeel from their hearts. You will note that huge chunks of the gospel/bissar/injeel are missing. Not an accident.
Blessings
Fernando
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Ding
The NT uses the term "religion" in reference to Christianity (1 Timo thy 5:4; James 1:26-27), so I don't think the Bible supports the view that the terms "religion" and "gospel" are necessarily opposite s . That said, as far as I can tell, all religions except Christianity are about human beings trying to attain something by the ir own efforts (heaven, paradise earth, Nirvana, whatever...)
The gosepl is about what God has done for us that we could never attain by own our efforts. As Vanderhove n 7 said , put in two words, it's the difference between "DO" and "DONE." The c ults often use Christian lingo , but those religions are all about us trying to make ourselves acceptable to God by our works. The WT talks about faith, for exa m ple , but we all know the emphasis is on works. I f you have a "faith + works" system of salvation, works always dominate. You can never do enough. The treadmill never ends. You are never sure of your salvation in those systems because in the end, it dep ends on you, and you are never good enough.
By contrast, the gospel emphasizes the work of God's Spi rit . Romans 8:8 - 9 says, " ... those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him." (NASB). The contrast in these verses is between p eople who are indwelt / empowered by God's Spirit and those w ithout His Spirit whose only choice is to cop e with life solely out of their o wn natural resources. I believe t his is why Jesus said that we need to be reborn spiritually (= born again ; John 3:3). Without that transforming experience (which happens the moment a per son repents of his or her sins and trusts Christ alone for salvation), we are just religio us sinners who are fruitlessly trying to make ourselves acceptable to God in our own strength (OUR loyalty, OUR witnessing, OUR attempts to live moral lives, etc.).
The WT has no concept of these t eachings . The "great crowd" are busy trying to please Jehovah by theocratic activity without being indwelt by God's Spirit. They don't even believe that such a thing is p ossible. T he WT considers the "anointed" to have God's spirit, but even this isn't the life-transforming experience the Bible describes. It's just people having a feeling that they will go to heaven when they die instead of the paradise earth. Even they are re lyi ng on themselves because they think they have to prove themselves worthy by field service, meeting attendance, and all the rest. They are relying on themselves rather than on Christ and the Holy Spirit.What sort of "gos pel" ( "good news") does the WT have? That if you prove worthy enough for 1,000 years you will be approved by Jehovah ? And even after all that you can still be rejected if you sin at the end of the millennium. That isn't good news; it's ter rible news because Isaish 64:4 s ays, "all our righteousness is like filthy rags in his sight." I believe that the Bible teaches that it is o nly by rec e iving the righteousness of Christ cre dit ed to o ur account that we can be forgiven . Since that is a free gift, that message is genuinely good news.
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mP
Fernando:
How cna you claim the gospels are "liberating" when jesus tells slaves to be obedient to their masters and the poor to pay taxes ? He never tells the masters to free their slaves and you claim this is "liberating". If he cant hold any moral integrity in this life forget the next.
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Terry
Religion is superstition, plain and simple.
All the rules pious men can think up for other pious men to follow.
Religion is a power structure that sucks all the equality out of relationships.
Somebody gets to tell somebody else what to do........or else.
Religion is people who don't really know something factually who get together and reinforce each other's confidence.
Religion is a head trip. It is a time waster. It is a mob. It creates "good guys" and bad guys.
Religion makes it okay to hurt "certain" people for "good reasons."
Religion wastes your mind and your life scratching off a Lottery ticket that pays nothing in the end.
The Gospel consists of uneducated, superstitious, Bronze Age men telling each other stories and others listening, believing and repeating them
Somebody, years later, writes down what they heard and passes it around. Others make copies. Eventually, enough naive souls become convinced
of the truth of those stories they start thinking it wasn't just men telling them--it simply MUST BE God! Like an old baseball card somebody's grandfather
bought with a stick of bubble gum way back when---the word-of-mouth story that was written down gradually becomes very valuable. Why? People
can look at old things and make them seem valuable, that's all.
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Fernando
Hey mP!
The way I understand "the message or plan of liberation" from all forms of bondage, captivity and control, is that it is a story which has been unfolding from back when these two opposing ideologies first were unveiled in Eden.
We the children are born into a captive situation as part of the protracted and ugly legal custody battle between our heavenly father and our evil step father. At any point we could choose to read, pursue, embrace, yield to and obey our heavenly father's detailed and ultimate alternative as fully articulated in the "unabridged gospel" message hidden in plain sight throughout scripture.
I personally have experienced a rather rapid liberation from spiritual bondage to the self-centred, self-congratulatory, self-absorbed and self-righteous "ruling religious clergy class", and from my addiction to numerous aberrant thought patterns.
It was the "unabridged gospel" and not the "truncated gospel" that accomplished this:
"The spirit of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah is upon me [Jesus], for the reason that Jehovah has anointed me [Jesus] to tell [the] good news to the meek ones [sheep or wheat]. He has sent me [Jesus] to bind up the brokenhearted [spiritually deprived and unregenerated], to proclaim [spiritual] liberty to those taken [spiritually] captive [by religion/ists] and the wide opening [of the spiritual eyes] even to the [spiritual] prisoners [of religion/ists]" (Isaiah 61:1, paraphrased).
I do yearn for total liberation from all dysfunction (sin) in myself, others and society. I understand this is what the "recreation of all things" is about (Rev 21:5).
It seems that this will only begin to happen when we the children all start paying attention to our heavenly father's message, and ultimate solution" the "unabridged gospel".
The stages of this difficult journey has been explained by others as: "We (as simple followers of Jesus) have been delivered from the authority of Satan, sin, sickness, suffering and death. We are being delivered from the power of Satan, sin, sickness, suffering and death. We will be delivered from the presence of Satan, sin, sickness, suffering and death."
Greetings, blessings, peace and love to you and yours
Fernando
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mP
@Fernando
The way I understand "the message or plan of liberation" from all forms of bondage, captivity and control, is that it is a story which has been unfolding from back when these two opposing ideologies first were unveiled in Eden.
mP:
Well i just showed your liberation claim to be total bullshit. YOu can tell me about other ideas, but for the slaves and poor in Jesus homeland back then and all that followed there is no freedom.
Your reply is total nonsense that only exists in words, and is no where near practical for those that lived in fear and servititude.