My Religion Meets the Master
In the morning session on day 3, South African Mark Tittley, a big voice in the global youth ministry discussion, shared a powerful message with us about Jesus' response to religion. You can listen to this message here. For those who won't take the time to listen, the following are some of the key thoughts I gleaned from him, as well as a few thoughts of my own:
1. Jesus confronts our beliefs.
-Jesus was constantly challenging the beliefs of the people, especially his disciples. Consider the "antitheses" passage in Matt. 5:21-48 in which Jesus continually says, "You have heard that it was said...but I tell you...." Jesus saw through the disciples' faulty belief systems and cut to the heart of the issue. This is still true for us today (if we are willing to listen).
2. Jesus confronts the world around us.
-Jesus' teaching was always in direct opposition to the predominant culture in his day.
3. Jesus confronts the world we live in today.
-This includes the "religious cultures" we find ourselves in.
-We reflect our religious culture and the broader culture in which we live.
-Jesus introduced a "Kingdom of God" that was at odds with both of these cultures.
Mark's concluding message was that we have created a false dichotomy as Evangelical Christians in saying that we choose "relationship" over "religion." Was it not God who created the Jewish religion in the first place? It is not religion and relationship, then, that are diametrically opposed to one another but rather true religion and false religion. True religion has at the very root of it a relationship. False religion has its root in "the law of sin and death" (Rom. 8:2).
Sometimes we buy into this false religion...Jesus confronts this even today.
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