Religion Is Not Working

  
I am convinced that religion without relationship is what is turning people away from God. I grew up in the church, but what I had was religion without relationship. I had many amazing experiences, including receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost at the age of just 4. But a few childhood encounters were not enough to keep me through my teenage years. I needed grounding. As a result of  lacking real relationship with God, I began to fall away from church around the age of 11.

   By the age of 13 I was totally lost from God and the church, or so I felt. I had made a few attempts at coming back, but each time was the same. I would stay in for a while, something would happen, I would be hurt and then I was gone again. I went through a long period of my life without church, and without God. I hadn't had the best experience with religion. However, on the rare occasion that I would visit church with my mother and sisters, I remember literally having to fight to keep from weeping at the presence of God I felt.

   I had to make myself numb to his presence. I didn't want to give anyone hope of me returning, because honestly, I never wanted to. I had been hurt so badly by people in the church that I didn't want anything to do with religion or God. I had ventured out into some dark things to try to fill the void I felt. Eventually though, I began to attend church with my boyfriend (now husband) around the age of 19-20, and I made it up in my mind that I was going to try this again for myself, not for anyone else. 

   Pretty soon I began to develop a real relationship with God. Something I had never done before. My past attempts in returning to God had failed, partly because the changes I would make weren't coming from my heart or done with understanding. So this time I didn't just automatically give up a lot of the things I knew the church wasn't in agreement with, and no one had even asked me to, but I always felt like it was something that was expected. As my relationship grew stronger I began to give those things up on my own, because of the revelations  I had received through prayer, reading the Word, and a real hunger for truth. I wanted to please God this time, not people.

   I truly feel that when people abandon the faith it's most likely because they had religion without relationship; once you have true relationship with Jesus you won't ever want to leave. I grew up in a church, never really knowing who Jesus was. I wonder how many others share this same story, and how many today would still be here had they truly known Him. Religion by itself is not enough, and is easily lost without relationship; we must teach people relationship.