Religion Exposed

Therefore many of the Jews who came to Mary, and saw what He had done, believed in Him.

"If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." (John 11:45, 48)

Miracles do not produce belief; miracles produce judgment. Judgment exposes what we already believe at the deeper levels of our being. Whether they are true or counterfeit miracles they still have a similar effect. Miracles tend to harden people or accelerate them toward the direction they are already leaning.

It is important to keep in mind the true definition of judgment. The concept of judgment as the Bible uses it is an arrangement of circumstances that forces into the open the secret things of the heart. Interestingly the secret things of the heart are also directly connected with true belief.

Jesus is always more interested in the heart belief rather than just our head beliefs. The Jews had spent so many years focusing on head beliefs that they had largely lost their ability to even be aware of their real beliefs at the heart level. Like many of us today caught up in the externals of religion, more concerned with keeping up appearances than with the true condition of our hearts, the Jews assumed that doctrines and behavior were the most important things to keep pure while they ignored the inner condition of their spirit.

This has been one of the most effective schemes of Satan to keep people caught in a trap of professional religion while denying the power of it. God spoke of this in the Old Testament when He pointed out the real center of strength. 'Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,' says the LORD of hosts. (Zechariah 4:6) But the spirit manifested by these stubbornly unbelieving Jews was not the Spirit identified in this verse. Their spirit was focused on clinging to their political power and their prestige derived from their ability to control the people of their nation along with the advantages they had been able to gain by compromise with the Romans.

Rome was the ruling power of the world in that day. Rome more than any other empire up to that time relied heavily on raw power and cruel suppression to accomplish and maintain their control over the world. Because of Rome's success in forcing so many countries under submission to their control, the leaders of Israel had also become addicted to their desires to rely on similar methods. Instead of turning to the God of their fathers who taught a very different approach to life, these Jews had adopted the ways and tactics and spirit of the enemy of God and thus indulged in a governing style incompatible with the ways and methods of God.

When Jesus showed up in their midst acting and relating to people like the true God rather than the false ideas about God that were so popular, the very men who claimed to know God most found themselves totally at odds with Him and out of harmony with His spirit and ways. They were constantly irritated and even enraged at His methods, His attitudes, His way of relating to sinners because it made them look bad by contrast. They refused to believe that God had grace and love like that displayed by this meek and gentle Jesus. They refused to accept that God was not a harsh, demanding, condemning deity waiting to severely punish all who strayed from His strict rules.

He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. (John 3:18-19)

It at first seems very strange that religious, pious 'men of God' would rely on such arguments as what are expressed here. But the very nature of judgment is to expose the true nature of the underlying motives lurking deep in the heart. By this incredible display of love and divine power over death, Jesus brought intense light to bear on all those who witnessed this amazing miracle and that light of the real truth about God could not help but to expose the things hidden in darkness up to that point. The hidden motives of selfishness and pride and greed began to come out into the open as these men coalesced into a united front of evil bent on terminating the witness of Jesus about the truth about God.

The same is always true. When people today begin to catch a glimpse of the real God of heaven and discover that His agenda and His Spirit and His methods are in stark contrast to what we are accustomed to using, then judgment and polarization begins to take place. The true motives of selfishness and pride in our hearts began to be seen in all their ugliness and we are faced with a choice of either repenting and seeking God's grace to be transformed into a new person or we dig in our heels and try harder to resist and resort to Satan's methods to silence all those who make us feel so uncomfortable.

The sad thing about this is that the greatest resistance usually emerges from those who have been the most prominent leaders in religion, those who claim the most to represent God and to know His ways. This creates a real dilemma for all those who have followed them and trusted them to lead them to a saving knowledge of God. This is why it is so vital that each one of us pursues a personal experience and a person education in the things of God rather than relying so much on religious teachers to do our thinking for us.

While it can be very beneficial to learn many important things from teachers and preachers, it is extremely dangerous to rely on them too much to do our thinking and reasoning in our place. The world teaches that we should rely on experts who have spent years training in a particular field of thought and not to question their conclusions. After all, they are the experts and we should not argue with them for they know far more than we might ever come to know their subject of expertise. But therein lies a very subtle danger, for when it comes to our salvation there is no substitute for personal investigation and a personal encounter with the primary Source of life and truth. Only an individual education in the things of God and a personal tutoring by the Spirit of God can bring us into a saving knowledge of the truth. Others may be able to assist us in that direction, but only a personal accountability to our Creator will give us an authentic education in the things of heaven.

In raising Lazarus from the dead and confounding the insinuations of those who were seeking to spread unbelief and doubts about Jesus, God flooded them with greater light that exposed the evil and selfish motives of the religious leaders and threatened their credibility with the people. Strangely their reasons for wanting to silence the witness of Jesus seem at first bizarre and almost irrelevant. But upon closer examination they can begin to look uncomfortably familiar.

Our deepest drives at the heart level are to feel valued and important. However, the directions that we choose to look to from which to derive our sense of value and importance will determine ultimately where we will spend eternity. If we choose the accept the world's paradigms about how to achieve peace and happiness and a sense of value, we will turn to any number of false sources upon which we will depend to gain our sense of worth. We will rely on the counterfeit principles of Satan to seek worth but in the end will come to realize that every false method only ends in emptiness and death.

On the other hand, if we accept the testimony of Jesus Christ who came to reveal the real truth about how God feels toward us, our value in His eyes and accept His prognosis of our condition, we can turn to Him for hope, for grace, for redemption and forgiveness and come to see that God is far better than any have ever dared to dream. We will come to discover that God's reputation has been terribly maligned and lied about and misrepresented by Christians and unbelievers alike. As the Spirit draws us closer and closer to the light we will begin to catch a glimpse of the true glory of God that is in stark contrast with the dark pictures of God we previously believed and we will be challenged to lay aside all our preconceived opinions and fears and shallow religious pettiness and embrace the grand truth that God truly is one who can be trusted in every way. The deepest longings of our hearts will resonate with the emerging truths about Him as the Spirit leads us closer and deeper into His glory.

Only by denying our previous opinions and fears and perceptions of God and allowing Him to reveal Himself to our hearts will we ever be able to avoid the tragic mistakes of these religious people who ended up killing the very Son of God. Religion is not safe enough to rely on to come to know God. Only a personal pursuit of Him through the testimony of His Word and especially in the testimony of Jesus His Son can we ever hope to come to enjoy the real destiny for which we were created.

Father, keep teaching me and expanding my capacity to know the real truth about you. Keep me from the subtle deceptions and blindness that obscured your beauty from the hearts of these religious people. Put your Spirit in my heart and breath life into all the dead places deep inside of me as you continue to transform me from dark views about you into transcendent joy and peace in your presence.