Losing My Religion

Do you remember REM's song Losing My Religion? I remember the tune being incredibly catchy but the lyrics bothered me at first. In part, it was due to my misunderstanding of what the song was about and I suppose what religion is all about. I guess at first I thought it was about actually walking away from a faith in God. It turns out the expression of "losing my religion" is from the southern states and refers to losing one's cool or simply cursing. Hmm - when's the last time you lost your religion? Was it when that guy cut you off the other day?

The phrase "losing my religion" for me personally means something very different than swearing. No - it's not about walking away from God but rather walking away from the constructs or "box" we put on our faith in God. It's not that those religious trappings are inherently bad, in fact ritual & a focus on holiness can be a good thing. But when we depend on religion to save us or make us appear righteous we are walking down the wrong road. Religion does not bring us righteousness but rather self-righteousness.

Let's face it - the culture we now live in does not particularly like people called Christians (definitely not fundamentalists) but they seem to have no problem with Jesus. If only the people that actually call themselves Christians would live out a faith that honestly followed Jesus. It's not about going to church (not that it's bad to go to church), about wearing the right clothes (definitely not about WWJD bracelets), about posting the 10 commandments on our school wall (but maybe the beattitudes?), or blowing up abortion clinics (definitely not!). But it is about being honest to others and to God about who we are. All of us need to lose our dependency on religion and focus in on Christ.

This past Sunday, Pastor Terry Kaufman entitled his challenge to our church 'The Refuse of "Religion" on the Road to Righteousness.' It was a gutsy message based on Paul's letter to the Philippians (see Phil. 3:1-11). Let's face it we all desire to be right with God and look right to everyone else. But being a follower of Christ is not about appearing righteous to others. It is being dependent on Jesus - the attention is not on us but on Him. Before we can be called holy - we need to be broken! Pastor Terry talked about how Man's religion is all about status and accomplishment; about following rules and looking good! Paul called this refuse - in the original Greek it is closer to dung or you can fill in the less-sanitized more current four letter expletives if you wish.

It seems to me that Jesus broke a lot of these so-called rules - he hung out with all the wrong people: prostitutes, taxmen, shepherds, the lepers, etc. It seem he not only was the life of the party - he also was their bartender! Jesus was most critical and condemning to the religious. The most militant Jesus we see is when he starts overturning tables in the local synagogue. He was more liberals than the liberals in reaching out to the poor & sick on the Sabbath and more conservative than the conservatives when it came to acknowledging God.