Question posted on Yahoo! Answers: Okay so I am 16 and I am a ‘christian’. But recently I decided that I didn’t like the christian religion nor did I believe in HELL. I feel Hell is just something to make people scared and believe in religion so they don’t go to hell. I just believe in god (and love god) and believe that jesus is my savior. I don’t really go to church unless it is christmas or easter and sometimes I will read my teen bible. am I a bad person for changing to this or what? I mean I would NEVER tell my family because they raised me a christian and they would just assume I was an atheist (which I am NOT) So I decided to take the name tag off of me and just let myself be a believer in god and jesus. Because personally I think it is RIDICULOUS what mankind has done to religion. There are hundreds of different religions which believes in the SAME thing but they just interpret it differently. SO no more name tag- does this mean I am ‘GOING TO GO HELL’ or what? I am just really confused
You may understand some of what your church teaches or even what the Bible says, but knowing God through Jesus is something totally different. It’s not a matter of believing the right thing. It’s a matter of living a life of faith, which requires action. If you want to know Him and the abundant life He offers, set your heart to seek Him and find Him through prayer and the Bible.
Religion has perverted the truth big time and revolves it around us and what we have to do. Christianity is not about that. It is about God and what He did for us. So I don’t really consider Christianity a religion. Saying that you believe in God and Jesus rather than calling yourself a Christian will not send you in hell. I would like to point to you that to draw closer to God and strengthen your faith you must read your Bible, and be active in a good Biblical church. If you don’t know of a good church around you, I would love to help you out in your search. Send me an e-mail to kingsbro27@gmail.com and I will definitely help you out.
“I am the way and the truth and the life, NO ONE comes to the Father, except through me.”
According to this post, it doesn’t seem like you have a full grasp on what it means to believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. To have a sincere understanding of the gospel means that you cannot pick and chose what parts to agree with and which ones to throw away. With that reasoning, you can’t really know anything for sure. If you chose to believe in parts of the bible and not others, why believe in it at all? To believe only pieces means you’re understanding yourself to be wise enough to discern the wisdom of God. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your thoughts my thoughts. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my thoughts above your thoughts.” Taking this lax interpretation of scripture teeters on heresy and exudes unjustified pride.
Both Christian culture and secular culture have given “being a Christian” a bad connotation. The secular culture is ignorant about something they cannot know apart from the Holy Spirit. “For the gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing.” This world can put assumptions on ideas of following Jesus, or how they understand Christianity to work, but they’re not true. Don’t let this blur your view of the gospel. Christian culture has put a different negative spin on “being a Christian” in making it into its own culture, totally apart from this world. Don’t let this elitist idea deter you for fear of being labeled a “Jesus Freak”. Neither are scriptural.
Hell is very real. The idea of hell is extremely difficult to wrestle with, especially in applying the idea to people you know, but this difficulty doesn’t make it any less true. We’ve offended a all-powerful, holy God. Not only once, but over and over and over and over. His wrath is justly deserved and we are unable to earn our way out of it, no matter how hard our efforts. Jesus’s death on the cross as God becoming man and taking our sin and overcoming our sin in his resurrection, is our only promise for hope.
“Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who acts and wills according to his GOOD purpose.” Seek scriptural truths and biblical leadership, this is a very real concern.