{"id":7123,"date":"2024-12-21T16:47:36","date_gmt":"2024-12-21T22:47:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/?p=7123"},"modified":"2024-12-21T16:53:50","modified_gmt":"2024-12-21T22:53:50","slug":"1-religion-or-nothing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/?p=7123","title":{"rendered":"(1) RELIGION ? – OR – NOTHING ?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

<\/span>Part One—The Tablecloth\/The Crash<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your religion was gone . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your ‘name brand’ religion was gone . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your religion crashed today . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your religion already crashed on the rocks in the storms of your life . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If your church denomination crashed . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the perfectly designed tablecloth (symbolic theology), with all the complex, perfectly arranged table settings (of theology) of your church denomination—if that tablecloth and everything it held securely–if that was yanked off the table and gone, . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the tablecloth of your non-denomination with its avoidance of the complex theological table settings of denominations—if all that was yanked off the table and gone, . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the PERFECTLY EMBROIDERED TABLECLOTH (literal and otherwise) with all the powerful, complex, PERFECTLY ARRANGED TABLE SETTINGS (literal and ritual) of your Catholicism—if all that, held so securely and worshiped so sincerely—if all that was yanked off the table and gone, . . .
– – –
If all that religion (on the table) you have depended on gets gone, . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THEN,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just the table is left.
The table is solid.
It is the Bible.
Just the Bible is left.
NOW that the Bible is all you have—
You read it.
The Bible is all you need.
The Bible tells you all you need to know.
The Bible tells you all you need to understand.
The Bible tells you all you need—to tell someone else all they need.
The Bible tells you all you need—to tell someone else that they need Jesus.
– – –
The religion way to heaven ?
X – Fine church ‘dining’ ?
X – Immaculate theology ?
X – Beautiful religious arrangement ?
X – Perfect spread ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RELIGION – – – NOTHING !<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE BIBLE – – – EVERYTHING !<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part One—The Tablecloth\/The Crash If your religion was gone . . . If your ‘name brand’ religion was gone . . . If your religion crashed today . . . If your religion already crashed on the rocks in the storms of your life . . . If your church denomination crashed . . . […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2,4,7,9,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-educational","category-faith_based","category-financial","category-inspire_lifter","category-political-cultural","category-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7123"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7123"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7127,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7123\/revisions\/7127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}