Religion

For people not yet called by God; their religion is to pursue their own ideals and attempt to define their existence within their present environment, evidenced only by their own understanding.

"The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.'" (Psalm 53:1)

"For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse." (Romans 1:19,20)

For people already called by God; their religion can be an exercise of conveniently incorporating God's word to conform to their own ideals and societal comfort.

"The Lord says: 'These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men.'" (Isaiah 29:13)

"...having a form of godliness but denying its power."
(2 Timothy 3:5)

God states that His religion is helping the elderly and visiting the orphans. Unless one receives payment for such services, this requires self denial, which without the Holy Spirit, is impossible for man to achieve. Charles Spurgeon writes, "Ungodly persons and mere professors never look upon religion as a joyful thing; to them it is service, duty, or necessity, but never pleasure or delight. If they attend to religion at all, it is either that they may gain thereby, or else because they dare not do otherwise."

God's religion is finalized by keeping ones self from becoming stained by the world. When worldliness is more the norm in long-time professing Christians, it is certain that truth has been rejected and the sanctifying work of the work of the Holy Spirit has been neglected.

Whether called by God or not, people everywhere witness more of man's own idea of religion than God's.

Who then is interested in truth? Just what is truth?

Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."

Again, he says, "If you abide in me and my word abides in you, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free."

When we are consistently about the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit upon the words Jesus spoke, it will enable us to know and live in truth rather than in religion.

PJR

"About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil." (Hebrews 5:11-14)