This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. And in vain they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.Repent, and believe in the gospel.
Mark 7:6.7; 1:15

True faith or mere credulity?
Must we, in order to approach God, abandon our personality and be moulded in a religion or even a sect?

Jesus vigorously opposed forms and traditions. He reproved the religious leaders of His day who prevented people from approaching God. On the other hand, how could God, who created people with a variety of feelings, characters and views, despise such diversity? On the contrary, He uses it to form those who serve Him with a view to their particular function in His work on earth.

Everyone can come to God just as he is to find not a religion but a living relationship with Himself. Christianity is not a compilation of dogma, but the revelation of God, His righteousness and love through established facts, especially the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Religious forms may go along with spiritual death, whereas faith in Jesus Christ means freedom, true life offered freely to all.

Faith is not being naïve or credulous. It receives the Bible message because it recognises it as God’s Word. True faith has nothing to do with superstition, imagination or infatuation.

It comes from a spirit of reflection. Faith is an act of obedience, a response to God’s appeal. It does not mean accepting anything, but acknowledging with full conviction that God is always right.

Today’s reading: Joshua 17:1-18 · 1 Corinthians 14:1-12