Home-Grown Encyclopedia

of

Religious Words and Terminology

in

Useful, More-Understandable English

This list is being compiled from words that in my growing process have confused and baffled me most of my life. I have been blessed over recent years by insights from various sources that have greatly enlightened my understanding on many of these terms. These insights and revelations have helped to clarify the beauty and congruity of the truths behind these words. As my understanding has progressed my appreciation and affection for God has also grown, many of the subtle but pious sounding lies embedded in many of these terms has been exposed. As I have learned and applied the more accurate and consistent definitions back into passages containing these terms I am amazed at how different and exciting and fresh the Bible has become for me. This is a flexible list of terms and phrases that will grow and change with further understanding. If you have suggestions of clearer explanations or want to see other words included, feel free to leave your comments and ideas.

Salvation	This is a word that has a lot of excess baggage attached to it along with a lack of its true meaning. (see the notes under the label Salvation) From both its root term and its usage throughout the New Testament, salvation is best understood primarily as the idea of salvage or restoration. It is both the plan and the process whereby God is restoring humans to the original function and design that He first created them to be. This involves primarily restoring the proper function and role of the heart in the way we live, think and relate. When mankind entered the experience of sin their heart was dis-enthroned from its proper place in the life and intellectual head knowledge became dominant in artificial religion. The balance of the brain and humanity's relationship to God was thrown all out of whack and something called a “sinful nature” or “lower passions” became an overwhelming driving force of selfishness that infects every human born since that time. With the heart largely disconnected from the mind and also perverted by lower passions that were not originally intended to rule the life, men came under the control of Satan and were helpless to extricate themselves from his abusive tyranny. Salvation is God's amazing arrangement to bring back any humans willing to cooperate with His provisions into proper alignment both internally and externally so they can once again experience wholeness (holiness), perfect peace, joy and perfect synchronization with the rest of God's perfect creation. Many religious people have gotten the notion that salvation is primarily about getting ourselves into heaven so we don't have to live in pain or be bothered by people we don't like. The idea of salvation has become very ego-centric and selfish and totally human focused. They have largely lost sight of the real issue in the great controversy taking place – namely, God has been charged with cruelty and heinous crimes against humanity and the universe and His reputation is on trial before all creation. In this context, salvation is not only about restoring humanity to its original design but also restoring God's place in the hearts and affections of all His created beings. Salvation is closely linked from its root to the word salvage and means very much the same. It conveys the added nuance of rescuing from loss and destruction. It means to restore something or someone to its original design and function and purpose. Salvation for humans means God's plans and methods for restoring us to the purpose and function for which we were originally created. But in Revelation we are also told that salvation belongs to our God. God's reputation has also been terribly damaged and it too needs to be restored. God is so incredibly wise and loving that He is carefully guiding everything to eventually restore all of creation back to not only its original design but to something even better that it ever was before. When the terrible experiment with sin is finally resolved and spent, salvation will be complete in restoring the humans who cooperate with God's plans to a condition and relationship with Him far more intimate and thrilling than would have happened otherwise. And through the process of redemption God's reputation will also be restored to a condition more beautiful and awe-inspiring than it was before the creation of the earth.
Guilt	At the most basic level of explanation, guilt is a dis-congruity between the intellectual, information-based left brain and the experience, emotion, spirit-based right brain. The real problem can be on either side. If the heart simply knows something has to be true but the intellectual belief system has something contradictory on file that is not really true, the mind will experience some level of discomfort and uneasiness that we know as guilt. Similar feelings will result when our emotions or experience does not align with what in our mind we know to be true. There are two kinds of guilt commonly known as real guilt and false guilt. Real guilt occurs when we are not aligned or synchronized with what is really true, with the unchangeable principles the govern the universe. This guilt can prompt us to accept conviction from the Holy Spirit and be reconciled or realigned with reality. False guilt usually occurs when our habits of thinking, feeling or emotions are so ingrained by culture and conditioning that they refuse to release us into peace when we choose to believe what is real and true in spite of them. John referred to this problem between our heart and mind in this passage. We will know by this that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart before Him in whatever our heart condemns us; for God is greater than our heart and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God. (1 John 3:19-21 NAS95) see condemnation
Conviction	True conviction from God is when you are impressed with what really is, what is true about your condition. It is often countered by excuses and diversions but it will still persist to impress us with God's view of ourselves, our surroundings or what is true about God. We can be convicted about something that is wrong, about sin or lies or dysfunctional behavior. We can also be convicted about what is true and beautiful, what is beyond us and transcendent. Conviction of sin comes by contrasting truth with what we are thinking or believing. Conviction is strictly the work of the Spirit of God and not something humans should attempt to do to someone else. There is a lot of confusion on this point. But since humans cannot see what is in another's heart they can never correctly create redeeming conviction in another person. The closest we can come to convicting another is by living fully under the influence of the Spirit and allowing Him to speak through us when He indicates it is the right time. Even then we must be very careful not to elicit conviction in their heart but stand by while the Holy Spirit uses all means at His disposal to awaken the conscience of the other individual and bring them to accept repentance. Conviction is based on love as its foundation. Sometimes when we are so conditioned to only give our attention to what we fear God will use fear to get our attention focused on Him. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. But conviction based on fear is only a transition step to more mature convictions of the beauty and glory of God's overwhelming passion and perfect love for us.
Confession	Confession is maybe one of the most misunderstood terms in religion. It is important to understand what it is not as well as what it is. It is not groveling in humiliation rehearsing all the bad things one can think of about himself. It is not grudging admission of guilt under duress. That may be a form of confession but is not genuine confession marked by true repentance. When understood from its original root confession is very simple. It is simply agreeing, that's all. This is linked directly with conviction. When the Holy Spirit impresses us with what is real as opposed to what we believe or feel and we choose to agree with God's view rather than our own we confess. That's all it means – to agree. That also makes it much easier to understand what it means to confess Jesus before the world or when Jesus said He would confess us before the Father. When we are in agreement with Jesus He can confess (agree with) us before all of heaven. When we agree with the truth about God and Jesus and ourselves that He shows us we confess Him before men. (Matt. 10:32)
Repentance	Repentance is a word greatly misunderstood among most Christians with widely differing teachings and beliefs. While we are instructed to repent and be baptized, repentance is a gift that has to be received and exercised, not something that we can just work up and do whenever we decide to on our own. It is important to know that it is the goodness, the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. (Rom. 2:4) While it is true that the original root word in Greek for repentance means to turn or to change direction, it really means a change of mind, a change in our thinking. This is something that is done inside of us by God, not something we can do on our own. Most people seem to believe that repentance involves a great deal of effort to try to change their bad habits and be good. Repentance is a change of heart performed by God with the results being exhibited in our choices from that point on. It is a heart-oriented experience more than an external religious exercise. But while repentance is something that must be performed by God within us, it cannot happen without our choice to embrace it. And the purpose of repentance is to bring glory to God, to vindicate His reputation. (Rev. 16:9)
Forgiveness	Forgiveness is another often misunderstood concept. Many people vaguely believe it is something along the line of trying to forget some offense or pretending it never happened which is very harmful and counter-productive. Trying to force others or ourselves to forgive is also wrong and accomplishes little more than producing frustration and confusion. Forgiveness is a transaction carried out in our heart and mind. When there is an offense that needs forgiveness it creates a debt which usually carries along with it pain to some degree or other. This pain can lodge deep in the heart and memory and will fester over time causing much more pain and difficulties in relationships. Trying to mask it over with imitation forgiveness is not healing anymore than putting a band-aid over a splinter will cure the wound. Our heart tends to gravitate toward resentment and bitterness as the pain lingers on and we often want revenge to inflict at least as much if not more pain back into the persons life that wronged us. We may feel this secretly or openly, but it is the natural reaction of human nature to offenses against us. Forgiveness is a decision entered into by both the mind and the heart first of all to face the inner pain and stop avoiding or ignoring it. It involves truthfully understanding as much as possible what really happened and how it affected us. Then forgiveness does something that is not natural – it chooses to take full ownership of the pain and stop holding the offender responsible for the pain. It is not until one takes full responsibility for his own feelings and decisions and reactions that he can take the steps necessary to freedom. As long as we blame another for our pain we are disabled from becoming free from it. We continue to empower the offender with authority over our hearts, even if they are long since dead and gone. After we choose to discontinue allowing the offender control over our pain by accepting full responsibility ourselves, we then take that pain that we now have ownership of and give it to God who alone has the power and grace to replace it with mercy and peace. This process and series of choices is the essence of forgiveness. It is not holding onto animosity toward an offender. It is releasing all rights to revenge. It is taking ownership of our own feelings and seeing reality from a new perspective. It is trusting the God of perfect justice to settle all offenses in His ways and in His perfect timing. Forgiveness is an attitude and experience that progresses from dealing with past offenses and enjoying the resultant healing to living in a present-tense continuous state of forgiveness whereby all offenses are forgiven instantly and no longer have the chance to embed pain and lies that foster resentment in our hearts. It does not mean that we are not pained by offenses, it means that they will not be allowed to poison our hearts and defile our relationships like they do when they are not resolved. When forgiveness is asked for and received by an offender it leads to reconciliation and restoration of relationships. Forgiveness is at the heart of salvation since salvation is all about reconnecting broken relationships and restoration of the interconnectedness and harmony God designed for us to thrive in.
Righteousness	This is possibly the most misunderstood and vague term in all of religion. It is usually thought of as related to “good” behavior and treating people right. This idea is rooted largely in the narrow thinking of religion from purely an external and intellectual perspective. The true understanding of righteousness is still a work in progress and there is much more to be learned as well as much to be unlearned. Righteousness is also a very broad term with various differing applications, almost like a catch-all term for several different concepts.
Condemnation	Condemnation is closely related to shame and unworthiness. Condemnation, contrary to many people's opinion, does not come from God. It originates in the accuser of God's people, Satan. Condemnation is counterfeit conviction. Jesus made it very clear in John 3:17 that He did not come to condemn but to save. Condemnation is rooted in fear and is designed to crush hope out of our hearts and fill us with despair.
Heart	The heart is a very slippery, evasive part of our make up that is very difficult to describe clearly in words since words involve primarily a left brain function. The heart may reside mostly in the right brain though it is most likely more extensive than that. The heart is largely where our emotions reside along with many of our deepest experiential beliefs and longings. It is the core of our identity and uniqueness. It is the gem that lies at the center around which God created all the rest of our being to protect, contain and nurture. Since religion has for the most part evolved into mostly an intellectual information oriented system of beliefs, the heart has become eclipsed and mostly forgotten except for a lot of loose but powerless jargon thrown around in religious circles. Teaching us to live transparently and honestly from our heart is one of the primary goals of the gospel and the plan of salvation. Many who have grown weary of the hypocrisy of those in organized religion who profess to represent God but do not live from their heart have left religion and rejected the church to embrace lifestyles that more freely allow them to be honest about what they feel on the inside. They are the ones that Jesus liked to hang out with and was roundly criticized for doing so. But Jesus connects easier to people who are real wherever they are found than with those who have great pride in their piety but refuse to acknowledge the emptiness and pain stuffed under many layers of deception. Both groups need His healing love to restore them to wholeness but the first group are more often likely to respond to His grace than the second. An almost completely unattended truth is the existence and condition of God's heart. We are designed with hearts to synchronize with God's heart and with each others. This is where we find our greatest joy and satisfaction.
Mind	The term mind is most often used in connection with what is now known to be primarily left-brain functions. This is where we process intellectual information, where we reason, analyze and store retrievable information on demand. This is where we store the libraries of information collected from books, teachers and other resources of intellectual instruction. It is the base where we store our opinions of what is right and wrong based on analytical information. However, it is now known that during periods of intense emotion and stress that an “untrained” brain will literally shut down this side of the brain and will revert to experiential memories to guide in reactions until the crisis is over. At that point the left brain will come back on line and openly wonder why the previous actions or words occurred since they were completely uncharacteristic with the beliefs and ideas stored in the left-brain libraries. The mind was given partly to be a screener and “virus checker” for the right brain. The beliefs and concepts fed into the mind need to be true according to how we were created to function to synchronize the growth and nurture of the heart. When false ideas are cherished in the mind the resultant dissonance with the right brain causes uneasiness and guilt. But when the heart and the mind are in full agreement on any issue they lock into a state of harmony and synchronization that makes them unchangeable through any and all circumstances.
Faith	Faith is an idea that has been abused and counterfeited very often in religion. Many think faith is just forcing our mind to believe something is true or something will happen so hard that it forces it to be so. This view is very egocentric and is often used to try to manipulate God to accomplish our desires and whims. Faith is actually a state of mind that grows naturally out of a healthy relationship. It is not something that we work hard at producing, it is the natural trust that is evident in a small child toward a loving, protective emotionally balanced parent. Luke 17:5-10 is the blueprint for how to experience true faith. Here the disciples asked Jesus to increase their faith and Jesus' answer laid out the relationship that would naturally foster dynamic faith. Faith occurs – it is not worked up. Faith springs up and thrives when we focus on the truth about what God is really like and how He really feels about us.
Joy	Joy and the need for joy is rooted into the deepest parts of our brain and our heart. It is connected to our attachment circuits and is actually now known to be the greatest craving of every human being born into the world. Joy is the feeling the heart and mind experiences when the person recognizes that he or she is the sparkle in someone's eye, when they are the object of someone's focused affections and interest. Joy is the experience of being loved and accepted and cherished irregardless of circumstances or history. Joy is when someone is genuinely glad to be with you. Joy literally gives us strength, both emotionally and physically. Because joy is rooted in someone's gladness to be with me, I can experience joy in any circumstance or emotion or condition if someone is simply glad to be with me in those emotions and circumstances. Joy is not always necessarily happiness. Joy can be experienced during times of intense sorrow, shame or even anger. When another person cares about me enough to enter into my emotion with me and go through the experience with me as a caring friend, I experience what joy is all about.
Transgression	Transgression is best understood by disassembling the word and looking at the parts carefully and then putting them back together. Trans means to go crosswise to, to cut across what is normal or natural. Gress has to do with movement as in regress, progress, retrogress etc. So trans-gress means to move in a way that is crosswise or out of harmony with something or someone. Transgression is to be out of synchronization.
Sin	There are Biblical definitions for sin that are helpful but sometimes have been abused and misused for unhelpful ends. The most often quoted definition is found in 1 John 3:4 where it states that “sin is the transgression of the law.” Romans 14:23 is a less familiar but maybe even more important definition of sin. It states that whatever is not from faith is sin. Taken together and understood in the context of the true meaning of salvation, it can be seen that sin is a condition of being out of right relationship with God the source of life. Because faith occurs naturally from a right understanding and relationship with God then it is easy to see that sin shows up outside of that condition. And because the law of God is simply a description of God's character, His identity, then anything crossways to God's ways and perfect character would be sin. Another misunderstanding about sin is the lack of differentiating between the condition of sin and the resulting symptoms of that condition acted out in our behavior and relationships. Many identify sin as only the outward manifestations of the condition of sin and believe that if the symptoms can be eliminated then sin is under control in their lives. But sin is systemic in nature and cannot be eliminated or overcome by treating the symptoms. Sin is rooted deeply in the psyche of every human being born since Adam and Eve sinned in the beginning. It is only by the implantation of a counter-nature by the supernatural grace of God in conversion and complete trust in the righteous merits of Jesus Christ alone for our redemption that sin can be brought under control and curbed in our lives. It is by the mysterious but very real choice of dying to our selfish natures every day and allowing the Spirit of God to make us alive in Christ that we can be free of the stranglehold of sin from within us.
Wrath of God	This most misunderstood term is covered much more extensively by reading the various notes under the label of “Hell”. But briefly and simply, if the Bible is allowed to supply its own definitions this will ultimately be understood to be actually God's very intense passion rather than the demonic type of anger that humans are so familiar with. The original word that is improperly translated “wrath” could more accurately be translated passion and in fact in some instances is translated by some versions as passion as in Rev. 14:8. If one were to replace every instance of the word wrath with the word passion it would reveal much more accurate revelations about the God that is in charge of the universe.
Know	This is a word that, when properly understood opens up much deeper revelations about the true nature of God's feelings for us and our potential relationship with Him. Many times when the Bible uses the word “know” what is really meant in the original language is a very intimate knowledge based on the most intimate possible relationship. Genesis 4:1 is an example of this where it states that Adam “knew” his wife Eve and she bore him a son. When applied to many other verses where we are instructed to “know” God these verses take on a whole new dimension.
Iniquity	Iniquity and sin are often spoken of together in the Bible. Many people think they are more or less the same thing since it is not commonly known what this word means. But iniquity is different than sin in an important respect. Without going into a whole study on the word which will be saved for another spot, iniquity is the internal “faults”, the hidden predispositions (2 Cor. 4:2) that are passed down generationally (Ex. 20:5) that cause inward compulsions to particular types of sin. They are a type of false identity that is passed down from our fathers before we are born. They are dealt with in the soul by choosing to forgive our fathers for passing them to us, taking ownership of them by confessing them (agreeing that they exist within us), renouncing them before God and receiving forgiveness and cleansing from Him. Isaiah 53:5 defines two different penalties that Jesus paid for us on the cross – one for sin and another for iniquities. The penalty for sin was wounds, an external thing. The penalty He paid for iniquities was bruises, an internal, hidden wound that may not be seen from the outside at all. Because of this He is able to heal both problems in our lives because He took the consequences upon Himself so we could be healed.
Bless	To speak well of. To reveal one's true identity as designed by the Creator. Empowerment for success. To praise and honor one for their real value.
Love	Love is the out-pouring of one personality in fellowship with another personality. (Chambers, Oswald: My Utmost for His Highest December 12)
Hell	This word has been used to translate different original words that mean different things. Sheol is the word in Hebrew that is usually translated as Hell. In the Greek the two words, Ge-henna and Hades are both used. Sheol and Hades both mean basically the same thing and care must be taken that tradition should not unduly influence the interpretation of these words. What they mean quite simply is “the grave” or the place of death where all life and consciousness cease. Gehenna on the other hand was an actual place outside of Jerusalem where people took their trash and garbage to burn very much like our “landfills” today except they didn't take so much pains to cover it with dirt like we often do today. They simply kept fires burning continuously for years on end as they added daily to the refuse to be burned. Of course, as one could easily imagine, this created quite a revolting odor and created an environment that was most unpleasant to linger near. Given the radical difference between these two meanings one must be very careful to know which original word lies behind the reference to Hell in any particular text to properly understand the meaning it is conveying to us. And contrary to the biases of the translators, none of these carry the implication of a time-eternal torturing of conscious souls of lost sinners by an angry God. That is a doctrine straight from the wicked mind of Satan himself and has been most successful in destroying the reputation of the true God of love and compassion.
Faithful	Faith is a confident, positive belief in someone. Faithful is to be full of faith. Faithful when applied to God means constancy, reliability, hope and belief in our eventual response to His love and attraction. Faith on our part is a spontaneous response in kind to the faith God has in us combined with knowledge of His trustworthiness. When we are faithful it shows that we are filled with that responsive faith to the faithfulness and goodness of God.
Covenant
Justify
Sanctify
Glory
Holy	This is another one of the most misunderstood words in religion. Leaving all preconceived notions of this aside, Holy simply means completely dedicated to something or someone. An excellent illustration is an analogy of a “dedicated” telephone line for a fax machine. In the purest use of the word Holy, that telephone line could be called holy. Holy always must have an object toward which it is directed, it does not stand alone. In the above analogy, the phone line is dedicated for the exclusive use of of the fax machine and no other uses. When men and women are “holy unto the Lord”, they are completely and exclusively devoted to God for His use alone.
Spiritual
Religious	Human system of belief in a supernatural being or power.
Truth
Obedience
Grace
Judgment