2.21.09
Why is Religion Boring?
We
begin today a series on some of the most common questions that non-Christians
and particularly young people ask, when it comes to the Christian faith and the
church. Now, you may consider yourself
to have been a believer for a long time; maybe you grew up in the church and
you’ve been around the church for a while.
But this doesn’t mean that you never have questions
about faith, religion, life, and such.
Perhaps you too have thought at times, “Man, religion is sure boring! There’s nothing in it for me, and sometimes I
feel like I’m wasting my time going to church.”
We’ll be looking more closely at some of the most
common questions that people are asking these days. Today we look directly at a most puzzling and
potentially destructive question: Why is religion boring?
I say destructive, because this question, and
really the thought that is behind it, has the potential to absolutely KILL the
church! If more and more of our young
adults and teens and children—worldwide—are losing touch with spiritual things,
and they are thinking that religion and the church just are not very attractive
to them, then “church” as we know it will one day soon be a thing of the
past. The church will have become
extinct, as it were. And that is not a
good thing.
Nor is it likely to happen, because Jesus, the
Leader and Chief Overseer of the church, has said very openly that basically,
His church is going to go through till the end!
He said the even the gates of hell will not prevail against the church!
(Matthew 16:18)
So it must be that God’s people figure out how to
present spiritual things in a more attractive light, and it must be that people
in general get tuned into and turned on to God and His ways!
The
Approach
So let’s begin by looking at something that is very
basic and very important. That is, how we approach religion and God.
Theory. Some people
approach religion and God as if God were basically a subject—something to be examined, studied, theorized, compiled,
etc.
This is a very common approach. And I must say that after a good period—maybe
several weeks, or months or even a few years of studying—and you have yourself
a well-thought-out theory! Sure enough.
In fact, colleges, universities, and seminaries are
FULL of individuals who have dedicated themselves to full-time studying and
theorizing! They have become—some of
them—experts in their chosen fields.
This can be good.
After all, we need people who are willing to pour their lives into a
particular subject. We reap the benefits
when they do so. That’s why we have such
amazing advances in medicine and engineering.
But this approach doesn’t really translate well to
spiritual life and God. In fact, it’s
quite possible to spend years studying about
God—the various areas of theology—and end up being quite versed in historical
and systematic theology—but not really
that close to God. This is a
problem.
Club.
Another approach to God and spiritual things would be the club approach. You know—relating to church as if it were
simply a social gathering, or a fashion show, or a mating/dating service, or
the easiest way to keep on what’s happening with so-and-so—a busybody club.
Attending church for primarily social reasons. Attending church so that you can say you’re spiritual,
or that you are into spiritual things.
Kind of like giving to charity—it
feels good.
Now, clubs serve a good purpose. Clubs are basically groups that have a stated
mission or outlook or interest, and people who are interested in what the club is
about join the club.
There are fishing clubs, hunting clubs, aerobic
exercise clubs, dating clubs, German clubs, Spanish clubs, ham radio operators’
clubs, knitting clubs, you name it—the list goes on and on.
Clubs help to group together people with like
interests and common goals. That’s a
good and useful thing.
But the problem comes when we relate to God,
religion, and the church with a “club” outlook.
While it is true that believers do have common interests and
goals—growing in grace, heaven, etc.—there is so much more to God than this.
Approaching God or the church with a club mentality
creates shallow Christians who do not progress in spiritual maturity, because
they bypass the spiritual disciplines of prayer, consecration, obedience,
trust, and personal evangelism.
Escape. Some people
flee to religion, the church, and God in order to escape whatever nightmare,
confusion, pain or loneliness they are experiencing. Surely we have all been there at one point or
another. And I should mention that
probably most of us can relate to these different approaches, at least at some
point in our lives.
But if the only reason we seek God or attend church
is for escape, we are setting ourselves up for great disappointment when a
misunderstanding takes place among members, or when the Bible challenges our
way of life, or when it becomes unpopular to be “spiritual” or to attend a
particular church.
We won’t be able to continue with God or with church
at that point, because the challenge/disappointment/misunderstanding is overshadowing and outweighing the “escape” capacity of God and the church.
Image. Another
approach to God and religion is image. This is closely related to the “club”
approach, only more specific. Some
people want to portray to potential mates, business connections, parents, or
even to important friends an image of
faithful church goer/God lover.
After all—it can make a big difference with how we
are perceived! There’s something
attractive about a person who seems to be well-balanced enough to include the
spiritual component in his/her life. For
a potential mate, it makes you a bit more trustworthy and “safe.” For a colleague, it makes you appear more
honest and gives the impression that you have a moral base to what you do.
But the problem is, God cannot be
compartmentalized, and “spirituality” is not merely an aspect of who you
are. When you have an “image” approach,
you run the risk of deceiving yourself that you are a complete person, simply
because you attend church and talk about God once a week.
And self-deception can be deadly.
Make no mistake about it—God wants ALL OF YOU—EVERY
PART OF YOU! His Son perished for all of
you—100% of you. And, it the truth be
told, GOD HAS A PLAN TO HELP YOU BECOME A COMPLETE, WELL-ROUNDED PERSON WHO IS
RESPECTED AND TRUSTED—BUT NOT BY MERELY ADDING TO YOUR IMAGE—BUT RATHER BY
GIVING YOU A NEW HEART AND LIFE.
Entertainment. It seems
more and more people are attending church because the church is becoming a
state-of-the-art high-tech entertainment event!
There’s no doubt about it—big churches with all the
bells and whistles are attracting lots of people. As long as they keep up with the live bands,
colorful lights, movies, donuts, assortment of classes, and they don’t make you
feel uncomfortable or guilty—people will keep on attending every week.
But you know—if you look at the most popular TV
shows in the past few decades, they all eventually run out of steam. Interest dies off, or it’s replaced with some
other show. Then you’re left with a
whole bunch of re-runs.
The same could be said for rock bands. They come and go. Usually they go after they have raked in millions of our dollars! Then they retire early.
People get tired with something after a while. The same could be said for churches. People who attend church for entertainment
value go to several different churches—kind of like choosing which
drive-through you’ll go to in order to eat.
Just because something is entertaining doesn’t mean
it’s good for your spiritual development.
In fact, it could be getting in the way of your spiritual
development!
All of these approaches have two things in common:
1. They miss the mark when it comes to promoting
true Christian growth.
2. They all lead to boredom in the end.
So, what’s the difference between these
counter-productive approaches and a way of approaching God that leads to peace,
to security, to happiness, and to life?
The Distinction
Religion vs. Relationship You can come at God as though He were a
theory or a subject, and you will still be empty inside, and outside of the
If we do this, we will grow. This is why Paul told us how very important
it is to continue on with Christ, in Colossians 2:6, 7:
As you
therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built
up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in
it with thanksgiving. Colossians 2:6, 7
As we continue to walk with the Lord through daily
prayer and Bible reading, we get established,
Paul says, in the faith. Religion and
God will never be boring when you are established in the faith. When you are established in something, it’s
part of you. When you live in a place, a
community, for a long time you get established there. The people and the places are part of your
life, and you don’t want to wander too far because you won’t feel connected if
you stray.
That’s how it is with God. As we grow with Him, our love for Him
increases, and we dare not stray. He is
more to us than a mere subject or theory.
He is our life.
Protocol vs. Person. A
protocol is a way of doing something.
Believers, and particularly Adventists, can get awfully used to doing
things a certain way. I mean, we have a
protocol for just about everything.
There’s a protocol for how you act in mixed company. There’s a protocol of modesty that comes into
play. There’s a protocol for how you act
in the sanctuary. There’s a protocol for
how you spend the remainder of the Sabbath hours, so as to preserve the
sacredness of the day. There’s a protocol
for how and what you eat and drink.
And yet, as important as all of these protocols
might be, they are not the same thing as Jesus Christ. Jesus is a Person, and a person needs to be
related to. A protocol is carried out,
performed. A person is loved. A protocol is adhered to. A person is followed. A protocol is a guideline. A person is a guide.
It is easy to think that just because we are going
through all the right motions pretty much—doing the right, expected things at
the right time—that we are somehow good with God, and in a saving relationship
with Him. But this is not the case. Jesus directly addressed people who had the
protocols down when He said this:
“Not everyone
who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who
does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord,
Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and
done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew
you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’” Matthew 7:21-23
The thing about the church of Laodicea is that they
are self-deceived into thinking that since they are doing pretty much all the
right things at the right time, they must be saved. Remember—the things we do and the belief
system we embrace will never be substitutes for our relationship with the
Person of Jesus Christ. We must have a
love relationship with Jesus, and let our obedience flow naturally out of that
love. Let the protocol follow the
Person.
“I thank my God
always concerning you for the grace of God which was given to you by Christ
Jesus, that you were enriched in everything by Him in all utterance and all
knowledge, even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you,” 1 Corinthians 1:4-6
Here we can see that Christ enriches us as we spend time with Him, and that out of this
connection come some good things—protocol.
He helps us to speak right and He helps us to have knowledge. Again, the protocol follows the Person.
Passivity vs. Activity. There is nothing that will foster boredom in
Christianity more than passivity—doing nothing.
We were made to move and to act as the Spirit leads us. In that sense, it could be said that we, just
like the prophets of God, are really to be moved and literally carried by the
Spirit of God.
If you don’t want to be bored, DO SOMETHING! Do something for God, and His kingdom. Attempt something, start something, envision
something, act on something, get something going, and bring as many with you as
possible!
Let your plans flow out of your love for God and
your knowledge of His plans. Let your activity not be self-centered and
self-serving, but people-centered and people-serving. Let your energy be spent not soaking up
resources and time and attention, but rather let your energy be channeled into
something worthwhile—something lasting—something that pleases God.
If you can’t think of anything, ask some of God’s
people what they think. The Spirit will
confirm the will of God usually through the Word of truth and through the
church.
Remember Ephesians 2:10—
“For we are His
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand that we should walk in them.”
Ephesians 2:10
We were meant to live for so much more… God designed us with specific tasks,
missions, assignments, appointments in mind.
We need to be about these things—and if we do not know what they are—we
need to have a talk with Jesus about it, because THESE THINGS AND THESE PEOPLE
ARE WAITING FOR US!
Sleep Aid vs. Adventure. Another distinction in approaching God is
relating to church and the Christian life as a sleep aid versus going at it
like it’s an adventure.
It’s true sometimes church and religion can put us
to sleep. How do we keep from falling
into that trap? Well, first of all, make
sure you get proper rest on Friday night—that will help tremendously.
Secondly, it’s how we can at it that matters. If you go to church just to see someone
special, or to maintain your membership in the club, or to maintain a certain
image, or to make yourself fell better, you will probably be disappointed. You will probably be bored.
But if you come at church with an expectation that
“I’m gonna round up all the truth, all the gems, all the nourishment, all the
spiritual fuel I can find!”—you will do just that. You will not be disappointed, and you will
not be bored at all. Because your walk
with God is a LIFELONG ADVENTURE that never stops.
The approach is very important. Ask any professional tennis player about
their approach, and how important it is to be prepared and poised for the
match, and for each and every serve.
It’s all in the approach.
If you want to grow with God and enjoy God, you
will. You will soak up every little drop
of holy rain you can find. It’s there. It’s everywhere. It’s an adventure.
The Person
We talked about the approach, the distinction, and
now we will talk about the person—you and
me; the individual who is coming to God, spirituality, the church.
Conversion is Key.
This is perhaps the most important aspect that we will look at
today. If you have not personally
accepted Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of your life, and you have not been
born again of the Holy Spirit of God, you
cannot help but be confused and bored around anything that has to do with God
and religion.
“But the
natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are
foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually
discerned.”
1 Corinthians 2:14
Only a person who is born of the Spirit can
understand spiritual truth. Nicodemus
had to learn this. The story of his
interchange with Jesus on this subject is found in John 3:
There was a man
of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and
said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one
can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”
3 Jesus answered and said to him, “Most
assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the
4 Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man
be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and
be born?”
5 Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say
to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the
9 Nicodemus answered and said to Him,
“How can these things be?”
10 Jesus answered and said to him, “Are
you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things? 11 Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak
what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness.
12 If I have told you earthly things and
you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? 13 No one has ascended to heaven but He
who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.[a] 14
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of
Man be lifted up, 15
that whoever believes in Him should not perish but[b] have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the
world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 “He who believes in Him is not
condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not
believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the
light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light,
because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not
come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the
light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” John 3:1-21
Let’s summarize:
* We
must be born of water and the Spirit
* If we
believe and trust Jesus Christ, we enter into life
* We
are only condemned if we reject the light (Jesus)
We are restless, we are lost, we are never
satisfied, we are full of ourselves, we are forever bored with spiritual things . . . until we come in faith to the cross, and receive the new life that
Jesus offers us.
For the person who has entered into life with
Jesus, and been born again, there is
spiritual food in every meeting of the church!
Every
Never a dull moment, when we know the Lord. But until that time, misery, boredom,
discontent, dissatisfaction.
Customized
Orthodoxy
When we come to the Lord as Jesus advised, we begin
the adventure of a lifetime. Indeed, it
stretches past our earthly lives and into eternity. It’s a continuing adventure with God, always
exploring new realities and enjoying new glimpses of the Lord, and always
gaining a new appreciation for His kindness, love, and wisdom as time goes by.
I describe the blessedness of the Christian
experience customized orthodoxy, and
by that I simply mean that we must take the age-old truths of the Bible, and
apply them to our specific situations in life.
Truth is truth.
It is unchanging, because God never changes. But the truth must be personalized. We must apply the truth of God to our habits,
our customs, our practices, our behavior, our thought processes.
This is something that believers have had to do all
through the years, since the beginning of time.
God’s people have always had to apply godly teaching to current issues
and circumstances. This is good, and
this is necessary.
The way life looks changes a lot through the years,
even in our own lifetimes. But the
timeless, changeless doctrines and principles of God are as enduring as He
is. And so we have the challenge and the
opportunity of creating, as it were, a contemporary application of God’s
Word. We do that every single day of our
lives, without realizing it.
We apply and misapply the things of God all the
time. And yes, we impact those around us
as well, because they watch how we apply God’s principles and truth.
So the adventure continues, and the experience deepens for God’s people. To the degree that we are willing to surrender to God’s ways, we will be happy. It’s always been that way. The people of the Bible could tell you that the way of peace is the way of loving obedience.