I used to subscribe to this religion, believing that if everyone on the planet were as nice and as well-educated as me, this world would be a wonderful place, free of wars and famine and bigotry.
However, years ago I discovered by encountering the pure holiness of Jesus of Nazareth, that others in the world are indeed just like me, and that is in fact what is wrong with the world. I had only a thin layer of nicety, a surface coating of goodness. Like my first lemon-car once I came to US, a rusted out Peugeot that I tried to put a coat of paint on, the rust just kept showing through. And all it would take for me to show my true colors is to put me in a morally challenging or stressful situation.
The Bible tells in Acts 10 the curious story of how God brought two men together, Cornelius and Peter. It describes Cornelius as a devout man, one who feared God, a generous giver to charity, and one who prayed continually. At first it sounds like Cornelius had it all together, and was in need of nothing, a "good person" by the world's standards. Then why did God have to go to all that trouble to orchestrate a meeting between Cornelius and Peter? Obviously this "good person" was missing something extremely fundamental that God wants all of us to have if we will genuinely seek Him and cooperate with His plan.
The first point to notice is this: a person can be devout, believing in the existence of God, a generous giver to charity and a good deed doer, even pious, and still lack the most fundamental thing. Jesus said "unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God", that "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourself." John's first letter says that "he who has the Son has life, he who does not have the Son does not have life."
It's something very interesting here: God couldn't directly bring salvation to Cornelius without the agency of the Word preached by a spiritually reborn person. Why didn't God directly minister to Cornelius in his bedroom? Why didn't He simply come down and get him filled with the Holy Spirit right there? Why didn't the angel?
That's what people want to believe. We say, "Well if God is really real, why doesn't He just appear to me?". We want a personally customized do-it-yourself religion on our own terms. That way we don't have to fool with these church folks, preachers, religious people, etc. I'll just sit in my dorm room, maybe light a candle, watch TV-religion and wait to receive enlightenment. That's human pride talking.
There is a definite humility required in bowing to receive the word of truth being transmitted to us by a peer. Certainly God is present everywhere as Spirit, but at some point the ministry of God's human agent is needed for people to receive salvation and filled with the Spirit.
I believe there are many of us today, even attending church, who are nice people, devout, givers to charity, well-meaning, who have never actually received this life-transforming experience. Could this be because we have not understood the Word, being busy to pick and choose what we thing it may look like a gospel?
Perhaps we have only heard polished moral essays, human wisdom, popular psychology, philosophy, tradition, and good advice. Or perhaps we have indeed heard the Word but have denied the power of it. The life-transforming encounter with God through the Word and through His Holy Spirit is an objective reality that no one should want to miss.
This is the real deal.
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