The Heart of the Matter.

Inconsequential as it may sound, religion isn't a drug. All the isms and schisms are definitely linked up in what we call 'human nature'. We are a society that revolves around ritual and sacrifice and that takes delight in something transcendent, other than ourselves, beyond what we can grasp with our senses. It is not that the mind is a bad thing, but it can be a hindrance to faith at times if the reason is not healthy. The first thing that an agnostic needs to do to discover the transcendent is to look beyond his or her desires and see for the first time something other than the little self or pride, to fully see what is holding him or her back from sensing the presence of God. The first step for the ego bound man in not finding God, is not emptying their minds to discover God's will for their lives, but filling their minds with biblical truth.

All that emptying ones mind does is give room for hedonistic thoughts of how one can please himself, if he or she has not made a commitment to make Christ the Lord of their lives. Once this is done, there is room to grow no matter what age you are, and remaining faithful to ones God or ones self is to realise that the first step has already been crossed, and that is submission to God will in our lives. What brings the atheist to faith in Christ is not pounding them over and over again that they are sinners, (which they are, and is something they must realise) but showing them through their false way of seeing the world that there is a better way to live their lives other than for themselves.

Hence the cross. The cross is little value if there is no value placed on it and the more you stress the importance of the cross to the saint and the sinner, all will come to realise, one more so than the other, that their life will have meaning and the things that they will need to give up in their relationship with God were the things they were always holding onto and were trying to have victory apart from a real relationship with God. Despite this all is not lost. When a sinner repents, there is a great victory because we all see what our lives would have been like if it were not for God's grace and mercy that binds us all, not in confinement. But hold us to a new standard of truth and lets us begin seeing the world the way we were supposed to see it from the beginning. In the merciful eyes of a God who loves us and want to see us learn how to forgive and grow into what God originally created us to be. Servants.

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