Transactional Christianity

 

Transactional Christianity

Transactions happen every day in our lives. We have transactions with people in terms of exchanging ideas, feelings, thoughts, and moments. We have transactions in the business sense. If I want a candy bar I go to the store and pick it up from the candy aisle and then proceed to pay for it with my cash or debit card. There was an exchange that has taken place. As such, transactions can be good or bad depending upon the outcome. But, in a world of transactions can our faith, salvation, and/or relationship with God become the same? Can it develop a nature that is "transactional"? 

The Great Exchange

Truly in the Scripture there is a transaction that has taken place for our sake. The moment when first man and first woman fell in sin and were separated from God by their sin, there was needed an exchange of sin for grace. God was the first to do this when He made clothing of animal skins for the man and woman. A life for the spiritual death that had taken place. Eventually, God would establish an entire system of sacrifice for His people that would be their way to "exchange" their guilt for innocence and God's grace. Leviticus chapters 1-7 detail the nature of the system and the transaction that takes place as a result. 

However, the book of Hebrews relates to us that this system was not able to complete or fulfill the fullness of the transaction needed between God and man. 

For when every command had been proclaimed by Moses to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, along with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled the scroll itself and all the people, saying, This is the blood of the covenant that God has ordained for you. In the same way, he sprinkled the tabernacle and all the articles of worship with blood. According to the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. (Hebrews 9:19-22)

Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the reality itself of those things, it can never perfect the worshipers by the same sacrifices they continually offer year after year. Otherwise, wouldn’t they have stopped being offered, since the worshipers, purified once and for all, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in the sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year after year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (Hebrews 10:1-4)

He takes away the first to establish the second. By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time. Every priest stands day after day ministering and offering the same sacrifices time after time, which can never take away sins. But this man, after offering one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God. (Hebrews 10:9-14)

There is only one transaction that was able to completely pay the debt we owed to God, the sacrifice of Jesus who was fully God and fully man. He alone was capable to fulfill our debt. As the apostle Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians, "He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." Jesus is the transaction of our sin for God's grace, mercy, love, and salvation. The theological terms we use are substitutionary atonement and propitiation to describe this. Instead of our debt leading us to knowing the full wrath of God, Jesus took it upon Himself in our place. This is a wonderful piece of the news of the gospel of Jesus!

Transactional Christianity

 The transaction of the gospel is only a piece of the gospel. The Lord desires relationship with mankind. In Genesis He walked with Adam and Eve. In eternity He will dwell with His people as Revelation tells us. The love of God and His salvation is not just a transaction. It is not a simple, cold, calculated business deal between Him and Satan or us. It is something deeper and more. It is about community, relationship, and connection to our Creator, Sustainer, and Life. The outflow of the salvation with God through Jesus is relationship, but relationship that is intimate, not transactional. Often, though, I fear we take the transaction of salvation and we apply to the relationship. Meaning we take our good deeds, our godliness, our righteousness, our church attendance, our service, our prayer, our Scripture reading and we simply make it a transaction in the bank of God. The purpose of this transaction? To accrue favor and God's blessing in our lives. We hope some interest on account builds into our benefit with God, never realizing that these outflows of salvation are actually meant to lead us into a deeper walk and intimacy with Jesus.

The Impact of Transactional Christianity

Stale and Cold Religion

Transactional Christianity is where the things of church and God become stale and cold for us. Just as a deposit of funds in the bank becomes a somewhat trite task or becomes an autopilot with direct deposit; so can the works of our salvation. They lose meaning, intent, purpose, and lifeless. Church life becomes a steady deposit every other week where we cash in our time with God to add to the savings account of eternity. Yet, it was never meant to be that way.

Jesus told His disciples and us, "Abide in me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the Vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without me." (John 15:4-5)

Abide or remain denotes fellowship, closeness, intimacy in mind, heart, and soul. Life comes from abiding and deposits of religiosity were never the way to abide. Expressions of religion- worship, fellowship, serving, giving, Scripture reading, prayer, etc were meant to be the avenues in which we abide. Also, this verse teaches that fruit- righteousness, godliness, love, mercy, peace, patience; or desire for worship, prayer, Scripture, fellowship, etc. does not even come from within. It comes from Him in our abiding. If the expressions of religion have become a stale, cold, deposit for us; perhaps it's because we are no longer abiding.

Attempts to Manipulate God

Transactional Christianity where the relationship becomes a way to manipulate God. The expressions of religion or better, of the relationship with God, become tools of the carnal heart to manipulate God. Granted we cannot actually manipulate our Creator. There is an account in the book of Acts that attests to this. A man names Simon who once practiced a form of sorcery and magic becomes a believer. In a unique moment described the Holy Spirit had not come on the Simon or the people who were saved in Samaria. When Peter comes he prays for the Holy Spirit to come upon them and it happens. Simon sees this and tries to offer money to have this same power of Peter. Peter's response? "May your silver be destroyed with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money! You have no part or share in this matter, because your heart is not right before God." 

In essence, Simon is attempting to buy or manipulate God to gain the benefit of God. If our relationship with God is simply transactional we can be vulnerable to use our expressions of religion to manipulate Him too. If I simply pray, God will grant this thing. If I serve on this team it will make up for the sin I committed the past few months. If I read this much of the Bible I will feel better about myself or immediately see God change my life. The issue is not doing, but being. The heart is like Simon's and is not right before God. It misses the point of the expressions of religion to become tools of manipulation to gain favor when instead they are avenues of depth with God.

A User of God

Transactional Christianity is where the relationship becomes only useful to our benefit. Similar to the manipulation of God, the user of God only has need for benefits. Like a user of drugs seeks to get their fix from their drug of choice; they can go about many ways to achieve that drug. Transactional Christianity seeks to use the expressions of religion like good luck charms that will bring about all the "goodness" of life. Does the Lord seek to bring about our good? Yes! But our good and His good can have completely different looks. Before Paul was an apostle, he was a persecutor of the Jesus and the Church. He was Saul, a ruthless man who hated all things Christian. Saul has an encounter with Jesus, is blinded, and in need of a believer to reveal the truth to him. Ananias is sent by Jesus to speak to Paul and this what Jesus says of Saul- "Go, for this man is my chosen instrument to take my name to Gentiles, kings, and Israelites. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name." (Acts 9:15-16)

Did you catch that? Saul is called out to suffer for Jesus. There is great benefit in salvation with eternal life and the presence of God in our lives, but the call was not to have everything Saul deemed as good or of benefit to be given to him. He would actually suffer greatly for the sake of Jesus. Often, when our Christianity becomes transactional we simply want to use God for the good things only. When the suffering comes, we find another fix. This is also when we can often blame God or the church for the wrong/hurt in our lives and eventually walk away.

Our Response

The book of Hebrews provides us with our answer to respond. Transactional Christianity can creep in on us. It can lead us to drift its way without even realizing it. Our response is to remain vigilant to keep a pulse on our spiritual walk. If we notice the affects of Transactional Christianity in our lives, take assessment and steps to combat it. Here are some suggestions from the book of Hebrews:

1. Seek to rest or abide in Him- "Let us make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience." (Hebrews 4:11)

2. Hold fast to our confession of Jesus- "let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:14-15)

3. Approach God in your need- "Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need." (Hebrews 4:16)

4. Allow other believers(the church) to speak into your life- "And let us watch out for one another to provoke love and good works, not neglecting to gather together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching." (Hebrews 10:24-25)

5. Confess and lay down what hinders you- "...Let us lay aside every hinderance and the sin that so easily ensnares us . Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith.