The Script

⁵ I was circumcised when I was eight days old. I am a pure-blooded citizen of Israel and a member of the tribe of Benjamin, a real Hebrew if there ever was one! I was a member of the Pharisees, who demand the strictest obedience to the Jewish law. ⁶ I was so zealous that I harshly persecuted the church. And as for righteousness, I obeyed the law without fault. _{Philippians 3:5-6}

The Plot

The 19th-century Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard identified two kinds of religions - Religion A and Religion B. The first is “faith” in name only _{(2 Tim. 3:5)}. It’s the practice of attending church without genuine faith in the living Lord.

Religion B, on the other hand, is a life-transforming, destiny-changing experience. It’s a definite commitment to the crucified and risen Savior, which establishes an ongoing personal relationship between a forgiven sinner and a gracious God.

This difference explains why for many years British author C. S. Lewis had such great difficulty in becoming a Christian. Religion A had blinded him to Religion B. According to his brother Warren, his conversion was “no sudden plunge into a new life, but rather a slow, steady convalescence from a deep-seated spiritual illness - an illness that had its origins in our childhood, in the dry husks of religion offered by the semi-political churchgoing of Ulster, and the similar dull emptiness of compulsory church during our school days.”

Sometimes, we can get so caught up in doing church that we forget why we are doing church. There are many people around us, sometimes even us, that have this same deep-seated spiritual illness. An illness that denies the grace that is ours through Jesus Christ in favor of a religion full of rules and regulations.

The Walk Through

1. If you know these facts about Paul, how can it help you?
2. In what ways was Paul very good at the Jewish religion?
3. Are there area’s in your life that you favor Religion A instead of Religion B?

Ad Lib

In the book “Gaily The Troubadour,” published in 1936, Arthur Guiterman wrote the following poem. Reading this, you might think that he wrote it about today.

First dentistry was painless;
Then bicycles were chainless
And carriages were horseless
And many laws, enforceless.

Next, cookery was fireless,
Telegraphy was wireless,
Cigars were nicotineless
And coffee, caffeinless.

Soon oranges were seedless,
The putting green was weedless,
The college boy hatless,
The proper diet, fatless.

Now motor roads are dustless,
The latest steel is rustless,
Our tennis courts are sodless,
Our new religions, godless.