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We conclude this topic of self-exams in this series on Encountering the Religious Spirit with more tools to help you see if this spirit is hindering your progress in walking closer with the Lord. Again, your answers to the following questions are between you and the Lord. Be honest with yourself—the Lord already knows your heart.
Has your relationship with the Lord and your spiritual activities/disciplines changed compared to a few years ago?
If you attend church, read and pray regularly, yet you do not know Him more intimately than you did years ago, you need to be set free from the religious spirit. Many sincere Christians unknowingly develop a routine of spiritual activities and rely on their performance of that routine. When the things you do in your relationship with the Lord become traditions, you’ve lost your intimacy with the Lord.
He might have told you years ago to leave your current, stale, old church and attend a different church where His Holy Spirit—not the religious spirit—is welcome. He might have told you to spend only ten minutes in prayer each day instead of your two hours, because you see the amount of time as the indication of your spiritual growth. The religious spirit wants you to rely on tradition and works. The Lord wants you to grow and flow with the wind of the Holy Spirit.
Do you hold to particular doctrines that are either not in the Bible or that contradict scripture?
You might believe something as seemingly harmless as: “Money is the root of all evil” or “Spare the rod, spoil the child” or “The Lord helps those that help themselves”. But those concepts are no where in the Bible. The Pharisees had created over six hundred extra-scriptural laws and guidelines—all of which did nothing but place over six hundred chains of bondage on the people.
Know what is and what is not in the Bible. Test and prove all things. Hold fast to that which is good and godly.
Do you often tear down whatever you believe is wrong?
The religious spirit thrives on fault-finding because it only destroys and it creates division. Father has called you to build up the Body of Christ and create eternal fruit.
Do you believe that because God speaks directly to you, that you don’t need to listen to people?
After learning how to hear God’s voice, there is often a strong temptation to give less consideration to what other people say. After all, you’ve established a direct contact with Father, so why should you listen to His kids, right?
God’s wisdom, kingdom principles, and His voice can be found everywhere, including birds of the air, lilies of the field, and in animals. Balaam discovered that his own donkey was more spiritually keen than he was and learned a valuable lesson (Numbers
Do you often feel that you do not measure up to the Lord’s standards?
The religious spirit would have you believe that what you say and do determines the intimacy in your relationship with the Lord. But, the performance-based relationship is the direct opposite of the grace-based relationship. Jesus paid the price so that you could be fully accepted by the Father without having to do any works.
Do you feel the need to correct everyone who shows a weakness or who does not have your spiritual understanding?
It’s okay to recognize weaknesses or spiritual immaturity in other people. It’s not okay to feel that you are God’s anointed “Corrector”. Believing that you can correct everyone is a sign that you are actually weaker and less spiritually mature than those who you want to correct. There is a difference between being an example of godliness and being a sheriff or dictator.
Do you get a sense of satisfaction when others notice your spiritual good works?
Doing things for man’s approval does not earn God’s approval.
Lastly, you can see if the religious spirit is in your life by watching your reaction to correction.
Do you get bristly and think, “Who does he think he is?”, and then blurt out a bunch of words to defend yourself? Then, after the exchange, you go away angry and critical of that person? That’s the religious spirit.
The religious spirit makes you unteachable in the things that help you grow in your relationship with God.
You should gladly accept correction. Are you like the man in Proverbs 5:8, “…Rebuke a wise man, and he will love you.”? It’s the wise and humble person who accepts correction and makes his Father glad (Proverbs 10:1).
Conclusion of Self-exam
All of us are susceptible to the cunning and deceptive seductions of the religious spirit. If you have discovered some of the characteristics of the religious spirit in your own life, repent, expel it from your life, and remain free.
In Matthew 7:21–23, Jesus described those that expect to enter into the kingdom of heaven, but have followed the religious spirit:
Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
In Jesus’ response to those many people, He tells us two very important things: we must know Him (have a personal, intimate relationship with Him) and performing spiritual works to gain God’s acceptance is a form of lawlessness.
After reading this and the previous study on the religious spirit (The Spirit of Sheep’s Clothing) your answer to the following question will reveal any remaining presence of the religious spirit in your life:
What is your greatest desire—what do you want most—regarding your spiritual life?
Give that question some serious thought.
If your answer is something like, “To have a more effective ministry” or “To have the gifts of the Spirit operating in my life” or “To win more people to Christ” or “To give more to those in need” or anything similar, then the religious spirit is alive and well in your life.
1 Corinthians 13:1–3 says it this way:
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.
Our greatest desire should be to fulfill the first commandment:
Jesus said to him, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.” (Matthew 22:37–38)
When you love the Lord as He has commanded you, there will be no room for the religious spirit to operate in your life.
Jesus is our example and the following two passages reveal the intimacy of His love relationship with the Father:
Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel. (John 5:19–20)
And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him.” (John 8:29)
We should love our God so that our greatest desire is to do only those things that He shows us and only those things that please Him.
The next issue concludes this study, Encountering the Religious Spirit, by explaining how to react when you discern the presence of the religious spirit in someone else and in a church.
It is my prayer for you that Father will continue to help you to hear His voice, and more and more frequently.
With God’s grace and in His peace,
Gary
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