In the TV Game Show I'll Take Relationship for $200

I have been noticing that there is a totally different flavor to people who are religious - very different from the flavor of a person free to have relationship with Jesus. Whether people are in or out of the institutional church is irrelevant. Religion always stinks. It smells because is becomes a cheap imitation of relationship, and it binds up religious people. A spirit of fear replaces a spirit of grace and freedom, and they are so afraid that at every corner there is a way that they could mess up whatever thing they have going. Like the plate spinner on the old Ed Sullivan show that used to see how many plates he could get spinning on the top of these dumb poles. There was always a number at which he lost control. When one would start flopping like it was going to fall down, he would frantically try to get it going again. The problem would be that there were too many of them. Deeper yet was the problem of thinking he could ever 'master' the poles or the gravity that worked for and against them.

When religion replaces relationship, people end up so afraid that they will do something wrong or not do enough good things to keep the plates spinning. They end up fearful that around every corner there is another thing they will mess up. Worse yet is the rigid or strict adherence to the pattern of behavior that is all about them feeling like they have accomplished something grand, and very little about God. Ritual becomes the end, not loving relationship with an unpredictable God. There is no room to create or trust or explore or discover. After all, if they don't do it right, God will thump them. Evidently the God they worship isn't love, unless you define love (as many do) as someone caring enough about you to hit you along side of the head with a 2x4. I'm sorry, but I love my kids, and haven't had to use a piece of wood yet to communicate that to them.

When religion replaces relationship, people seem to be victimized by their own works system. The works they try so hard to be perfect at leave them never perfect, but always striving. The norms they can't attain become norms others should maintain - as if relationship with God was about keeping rules. Relationship/Rules - both begin with the same letter, but the letters after the "R" are very different. How do we get them mixed up?

It seems to me that it would be a lot harder to do a relationship. There is no one to tell you what to do, how to behave, or how to avoid blowing it. In relationship I would have to trust. In religion I just do what I am supposed to do and not do the things I am not supposed to. Oh yeah, and I am supposed to do it all with a joyful heart. Religion is much easier. I don't have to choose or think or be really responsible - my only responsibility is to do whatever I do perfectly. When I can master doing everything right, then I can become truly religious. When I can spin the plates perfectly, I will be "There". I wonder sometimes what the rest of that line of thinking would be. If I could arrive at the place where I did everything right, then I wouldn't need the blood of Christ, because I would have it all together. Something seems very wrong with that picture.

I'll take relationship for $200 on that game show.

I don't want to be told what to do and what not to do. I want to walk with Papa, regardless of where the road takes me. I want Him more than I want easy answers. I want to know the Spirit of God more than I want every step dictated to me. I want to wrestle with Him rather than do 10 legalistic steps that are supposed to make me right with God. I choose messy relationship, with its confusion and maddening uncertainty. I choose the unknown over the known. I want the mystery of the journey together before I want to know I am doing it right.

I know, I'm pretty scary sometimes.