Fear-Based Religion

Of late I have often thought of Nigel. Our only contact was Facebook. He had been at school with one of my daughters, was any army veteran and an ardent atheist. Some time in the last year or two he suicided, it seems another victim of PTSD.

I have always remembered something he said on Facebook. ‘As a kid I was dragged along to the Adventist Church on Saturday. There I heard judgement, judgement and more judgement. Then on Sunday I was dragged to the Uniting Church. There I heard hell, hell and more hellfire.’ Little wonder he was an atheist I thought. Nigel had read Dawkins and often seemed to reflect what I have read in ‘The God Delusion’. I can't recall if the statement about teaching children that they will burn in hell forever is child abuse is in that book. However it is a difficult accusation to defend.

The threat of hell has been used for centuries to get people to repent of their sins and turn to Jesus. But not by Seventh-Day Adventists. Adventists believe the idea of everlasting hellfire is alien to a true understanding of the Bible. Being deprived of this tool has not however robbed Adventist preachers and evangelists from using fear to gain conversions. The ‘Investigative Judgement’, the idea that all are judged before the return of Jesus, has been used to great effect by some to create ‘unease’. ‘Tonight, this very night, your name may be coming up in the judgement. Tonight, if you have any unconfessed sin your name may be removed forever from the Book of Life. This moment may be your last chance to be saved. If you don’t accept Jesus now you may be eternally lost.’

This is a strong appeal to the emotion, but emotions don’t last. Fortunately I heard more that was positive and found love in the Bible. Also, I was an adult and was no doubt in a better position to process what I heard than Nigel. It would be bad enough if you believed that being eternally lost meant being dead forever. But what if at the same time you still considered eternal roasting was still an option?

I cannot know what Nigel believed as a kid, but this is the stuff he heard on both Saturdays and Sundays. Hearing both he probably failed to discriminate, merging both into his picture of God. Who can blame him for wanting to block it out, to deny the possibility. 

Fear is a poor long term motivator. It may cause us to flee an immediate danger, such as a fire or a charging bull. But it is ineffective at bringing lasting change. Constant appeal to fear is known to cause people to shut out the message. Change managers recognise the need to appeal to people's desires, wants, and higher ideals.

If, as Christians believe, God is love, how can we please Him if we serve Him out of fear? Love is His ideal. He wants us to love one another, to give to Him and those we come in contact with the service of love. Fear may bring outward conformity to the rules, but legal compliance and love are not one and the same. The law may say I must not discriminate against my neighbor, but it cannot make me love me neighbor. If I love my neighbors I will not discriminate against them.

I wonder what difference it might have made if as a child Nigel had heard more about the love of God. What if he remembered the story of the prodigal son - the son who couldn't wait to get his hands on his inheritance, who brought shame on his father and ended up wallowing with the pigs. Surely nothing could have been more degrading to a Jew. But when he returns home in rags, cap in hand, Dad is over the moon with joy and throws the party to end all parties. Such, said Jesus, is the nature of God’s love. (See Luke 15:11-32)

Then there is the story of the woman caught committing adultery. According to the Law she should be stoned. When the religious leaders dragged her before Jesus He gave them permission to administer the penalty on the condition the first stone was thrown by one who was sinless. Then He stooped down and began writing in the dust. We are not told what He wrote, but it was obviously direct, for one by one the accusers retreated. Eventually Jesus stood up, looked at the woman and asked: 

‘Where are your accusers? Didn't even one of them condemn you?’
‘No, Lord,’ she said. And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I. Go and sin no more.’ (John 8:10,11).

In a conversation with the Jewish religious leader Nicodemus Jesus had earlier said:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it. "There is no judgment awaiting those who trust him. But those who do not trust him have already been judged for not believing in the only Son of God.

Let's face it, we all live with condemnation. That judgement may come from our own sense of failure to live up to our own ideals. It comes from those who all too often put us down - parents, teachers, the community. It seems there is something ingrained in our nature that makes us try and deflect attention from our own failings by pointing to those of others. 

Rather than judgement we need love. Not wishy-washy emotional stuff, but real love that accepts us as we are. Love that looks past our failures to see our potential - what we could become with the right support. Love that encourages us ‘Go and sin no more.’ Fear may drive people to Jesus, it may cause outward conformity, but fear is not worship. Love will draw and love will hold. 

I wonder how many people have been destroyed by fear based religion.

(Bible quotations from the New Living Translation)