Some say Christianity is not a religion, but I believe that it is. However it is possible to discuss the similarities and differences between Christianity and different religions, and how Christians perceive God, salvation, and the meaning of life, and how you preceive the way other religions each approach questions about God, salvation, and the meaning of life.
I understand what you are saying but must interject.
Christians are new creatures. It is not merely religion. We are essentially a different creatures in that we have a spirit within ourselves that is of God. We are children of God. Our bodies are the same, and our souls are the same, but our spirits are completely new, and completely different from those of non-Christians.
As far as religion, that is a logical, and outward manifestation of that new spirit that has been inserted. The key difference is:
- An unregenerate cannot love others or commune with God. There is no potential for any act of spiritually manifested righteousness.
- An regenerate can love others and commune with God. There is now the potential for the manifestation of spiritually manifested righteousness.
So religion for the Christian exists only because he is a new creation that can manifest the works of God.
Christians are told to "put on" the outside something that is inside themselves that does not exist in unbelievers.
Romans 13:14 KJV
14. But
put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.
Galatians 3:27 KJV
27. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ
have put on Christ.
Ephesians 4:24 KJV
24. And that ye
put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
Romans 13:12 KJV
12. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us
put on the armour of light.
Colossians 3:12 KJV
12.
Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;
So Christianity is more than just a religious observance to a set of rules and rituals. It is the outward manifestation of a new spiritual creature, that is the spirit of Christ that has been birth into us.
The putting test of all believers is the God walk test.
1 John 3:9-10 KJV
9.
Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
10. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.
We cannot sin from this new spirit that has been birthed within us. We cannot sin from our spirit any more than God can sin. Of course there is the potential to sin from the parts of our makeup that is not born of God, being our uncrucified flesh and unrenewed minds.