Christianity Is Not Religion

This young man came, he said, father, father. Yes, my son. He said, father, do I have to go to church? I said, no, you don't have to.

What? No, you don't. Do I have to pray? I said, no, you don't. Do I have to read the Holy Bible? I said, no, you don't.

Who told you this? He said, my parents. I said, your parents are wrong. This guy hit the jackpot.

He said, that's it, brother. That's it. I'm gonna go back to mom and dad and say, the bishop himself said, you don't have to go to church.

You don't need to pray. You don't need to fast. You don't need to read the Holy Bible.

Mom and dad, see you later. Get off my case. I said, but before you go and talk to your parents, let me ask you this question, my son.

He said, yes, father. I said, do you love the Lord? He said, of course I do. I said, okay, well, if you love the Lord, then you have to go to church.

And if you love the Lord, you have to read the Holy Bible. And if you love the Lord, you have to pray and you have to fast. If you love the Lord, you see, going to church, reading the Bible, doing all the beautiful charitable deeds are the result, the fruits of that love.

Therefore, in Christianity, there is no such thing as I have to. Christianity is not a religion in the sense of a religion, because the moment we invoke the name religion or the word religion, we are invoking a set of rules, guidelines, laws and regulations. Religion will tell you, if you don't fast, you're in deep trouble.

If you don't pray, you're in deep trouble. If you don't do this, you're in deep trouble. You have to do.

The Lord clearly said it to all of us, his followers, John 15, 5, without me, I, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, you cannot do nothing. You cannot. It is not your doing.

It is what I did for you on the cross that will bring you to me. But then what do I need to do? Since I accepted this love and this relationship based on this love, divine love, then I have to say the following. Christianity is a belief in a person called Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

It is not a belief in a set of rules, guidelines, laws and regulations. It is not. It is a belief in a person, Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

When I fall in love with this perfect God and perfect man, this heavenly groom, this good shepherd, this King of all Kings and Lord of all Lords, my God, my father, my mother, my everything to me. When I fall in love with him, then the result of that love will make me go to church and do everything that puts a smile on the Lord's face, since I love him, since I love him. See, there's a difference now.

Lord, I came to your house because I love you, not because I am obligated to go to church. I'm not obligated. But since I love you, I want to be with the one I love.

So wherever my love is, I need to be there. I want to be there. When you are sitting with your sweetheart at a cafe, do you look at the watch all the time? You take the watch and throw it away.

You will never look at the time. Why? Because the last thing you want is the time to take you away from your sweetheart. When you are with the love of your life, you want to be there forever.

You don't want to move. You want everything to stop, including time. So when I'm with the Lord, nothing else matters.

I don't care. I've been preaching for 10 hours. Well, St. Paul beat me and the Lord preached for three days.

So he hit the world record, Jesus Christ. So don't say the bishop preaches for two hours. I'm nowhere near St. Paul nor the Lord Jesus.

He preached in the wilderness for three days. People started collapsing out of starvation. But you see, when you are so engulfed with this love, you lose yourself and everything with it.

So now Lord, I come to church naturally. I don't have to make an effort, drag myself by force. No, I just go naturally because I can't wait to meet my love.

Jesus Christ is my sweetheart. So I'm running man. I'm not walking.

I'm running. I'm running. I'm not walking.

Anything to do with the Lord. I love being there. This is the Logos that came to bring us into this love, to give us that love, teach us that love, and allow us to taste that love and share that love with the rest of the world.

It is up to a human being, either to accept Logos, to reject the Logos. And there are consequences whichever way you choose, but you will never find anyone like Jesus Christ. It's a bit cold, isn't it? It's cold, yeah? Or are you falling asleep? Like I said last week, please do forgive me.

I'm trying to be with you for as long as I can, even though maybe I'm making you tired. But this is my moment where I draw my oxygen. The moment I leave, I start suffocating till next Friday.

So please do forgive me. I'm really sorry not for keeping you for two hours. The Lord, I don't know if I can use the word weird sometimes.

It can be weird. But His love, when you trust in Him, does wonders. Even though it may sound at the beginning, looks at the beginning as weird.

An example, one day the Lord was walking. This is in the Gospel of Saint John, according to Saint John. And He saw a man blind from birth, sitting at the wayside, begging.

This guy is blind, yeah? And then the Lord said, I'm going to fix his eyes. I pray that He fixes my one. He said, I'm going to fix his eyes.

So how did He fix his eyes? He spits on the ground, makes mud and applies it to his eyes. So He fills them with mud. And He says, now go and wash in that pond over there and you'll see perfectly.

First of all, who are you? This is the blind man saying. I'm just sort of elaborating on his behalf, if the Lord allows me. This blind man is saying, who is this guy talking to me? You've got eyes, don't you? Can't you see I'm already blind? What was this mud for? Now, even if I had one percent of eyesight, thanks to you it's gone.

You just perfectly and totally blinded me now. Now I'm a complete blind man. Thanks very much.

So is this how you open my eyes? The Lord says, yes, exactly. I'll fill your eyes with mud. Perfect.

Now walk. Excuse me, I can't see. And thanks to your mud, I can't even see more now.

Expect me to walk? Yes. Well, why don't you grab my hand? No, you walk. Because my word has the power to say and do, if you believe.

When you believe in what I say and you follow in what I say, you will see the glory of God. This man walks, his face is all mud. How many people that saw him in this way ridiculed him, made fun of him and called him names.

It didn't bother him. He didn't stop. He didn't hesitate.

He didn't change his mind. He was fixated on the word of the Lord, on the logos. He said, he said it, I'll follow through with it.

And he continued walking, yet all the currents were against him. Everyone ridiculed him, laughed at him, put him down. But he continued walking because his focus was on the Lord, not on people.

And when he got to that pond and he washed his face, he had two beautiful eyes created for him. Finally, he could see. Yet from birth, he was born with no eyes.