One Option Among Many?
Many Americans would affirm that religious faith is a fine thing – perhaps even a good thing. After all, organized religion can promote social ethics. It can give people a sense of purpose. It can be therapeutic for people who are struggling. Surely we can say that religious beliefs have benefited some people. But do we need religion? Is it really necessary?
When we observe non-religious people living with a strong sense of purpose, moral concern, and self-confidence, it would seem to suggest that spirituality isn’t uniquely important. Though religious belief is one vehicle that can take us down the right road, some may argue that we could just as well take a bus or bicycle and arrive at the same place.
The Unique Role of Religion
Yet this raises a key question. What is religion even for? If it simply exists to reinforce positive social norms or to make people feel better about themselves, then it seems like we could easily turn to other strategies to seek the same results. But is this really all that religion is concerned about? Is religion really just focused on human self-improvement and fulfillment? Or is religion – true religion – instead focused on God?
The answer should be self-evident. We live in a society where people misunderstand what religion is for. People assume they don’t need religion because they’re already satisfied with their happiness and moral stability. And in some regard, they’re right. They don’t need human-centered, therapeutic, moralistic, emotionally manipulative social groups that masquerade under the name of “religion.” But what we do need is true religion, revealed from God himself, which orients us away from ignorant narcissism into an apprehension of his divine majesty.
Otherwise, without true religion, how will anyone know God? How will we understand who he is, what he expects of us, or why the world is the way it is? How will we learn to relate to him? How will we know whether we’re right with God, or at odds with him? It isn’t good enough to merely speculate about the answers to these questions, or to invent answers that we wish to be true. You and I need true religion in order to really know God.
Exploring the Christian Faith
If you’ve never read the Bible before, I’d strongly encourage you to start reading the gospel of John. It gives a helpful record of Jesus Christ’s life. Rather than getting all your information secondhand, it will help you to know what Jesus really said and how he actually lived.
While you’re reading, ask yourself some questions. Was Jesus a megalomaniac trying to take advantage of the lower class? Was Jesus a charismatic salesman trying to attract crowds? Was Jesus insane? Was Jesus merely interested in teaching people about ethics and morals? Or was Jesus focused on bringing us into a true knowledge of God?
We Need to Be Pointed to God
True religion isn’t built on the whims of human beings. It doesn’t follow the latest trends or consumer preferences. It isn’t obsessed with human personalities. Instead, true religion is unashamedly and timelessly God-centered.
Unfortunately, we are too human-centered to recognize God as the greatest good. By rejecting this greatest good, we have committed the greatest evil. We have forfeited the greatest happiness. We have rebelled against the highest authority. True religion helps us to see that we’re not the good guy we thought we were. Instead, when we rightly see the perfections of God, it becomes clear that we’re wrong. We’re corrupt. We’re guilty under his law.
We need to be rescued out of our warped view of reality. We need to be freed from the cults of political idealism and commercialism. We need our idolatrous fascination with sex and popularity to be confronted. We need to be liberated out of our self-absorption and self-righteousness. And true religion uniquely points us to the only one who can save us.
This is why we need religion – not because we need a disembodied system of rules – but because we need the personal God that it reveals. Let’s be careful to set aside the dead rituals and sensationalized pyrotechnics of the modern age, so we may instead affirm the dignity and necessity of true religion that centers on the glory of God.
