Christianity, while far from perfect, currently offers the best opportunity for mankind to establish and maintain a meaningful relationship with God.
Praying to God in accordance with the teachings of Jesus Christ opens up the most efficient channel for human communication with our Almighty Father in Heaven And, as more and more messengers arrive to augment this communication, man’s fear-based reverence for God will continue to evolve into a relationship inspired by love.
In order to ensure spiritual advancement, however, Christians must re-evaluate certain deeply ingrained beliefs and practices that are detrimental to the efforts of mortals seeking to gain admittance into Heaven.
Praying to departed mortals, for instance, such as the mother of Jesus and an assortment of saints, is, like prayers offered to idols, a total waste of spiritual energy, and a serious breach of loyalty to the One True God of All Creation. To understand why people still kneel before the images of human beings, one must turn back the hands of time to the birth of Christianity.
The belief in the existence of specialized deities is a direct result of the merging of Christian teachings and Greco-Roman mythology. As Christianity spread across the Roman Empire, the concept of a god for every activity and occasion was replaced by a belief in an order of patron saints, each reputed to be capable of responding to requests for assistance in his or her specific area of expertise.
This pagan-based practice is counter-productive to maintaining a healthy relationship with God in that it fosters a misguided belief in the ability of ascending mortals to answer prayers, and it undermines God’s authority over human affairs.
Jesus instructed his followers to pray only to our Father in Heaven, through him. And he never referred to his mother, Mary, as any more than a woman.
Another ill-advised practice in modern Christianity is the use of unintelligible utterances in devotional prayers. Originally, being able to “speak in tongues” (the ability to converse in more than one language) meant that a speaker could deliver his message to people of various ethnic and racial backgrounds.
In today’s religious services, “speaking in tongues” means just the opposite. Babbling incoherently, the speaker fails to communicate his thoughts, leaving many in attendance feeling spiritually inadequate over not being able to understand the message, and/or discouraged from making further attempts to get closer to God.
In assessing the merits of this confusing, distracting practice, the sincere seeker of truth should remember that Jesus delivered his messages with simplified parables, plain enough for a child to understand. And it is an absolute certainty that if God had a message for His children that was so important He had to deliver it through a human being, He would not have to speak to them in a foreign tongue. He knows every language.
Remember this: God does not confuse, He enlightens. Whatever the source of the strange words may be, it is not Our Heavenly Father.
Modern Christians should, therefore, disassociate themselves from beliefs and practices that hinder the development of a more enlightened Christian religion. When you encounter teachings that portray God as violent, jealous, vengeful, destructive, or negative in any way, stand up for Him just as you would if your human father was being falsely accused.
Proclaim the truth: God is love. God is the most intelligent Being in the whole Universe. He has too many options at His disposal to ever have to consider using violence to further His will. If you are uncertain about any aspect of your involvement with a religious organization, pray for God’s guidance. Ask, and it shall be given. Seek the truth, and you shall find it.
© Paul Howard Nicholas
(This NLN Presentation is an excerpt from Extinguishing the Flames of Hell)