As you rightly know, there are hundreds, if not thousands of religions in the world, with millions (some can boast of billions) of adherents across the globe, with Christianity and Islam standing out as the two most popular religions. There are others like Buddhism, Hinduism, Krishna, African Traditional Religion (ATR), amongst others. Even within these same religions, there are sects who believe their tenets and doctrines are the best and those of others are faulty, if not out-rightly heretic. The case of Sunni and the Shiite Muslims comes to mind, just like those of Jehovah’s witnesses, white garment-wearing churches, Pentecostals, orthodox churches, Brotherhood of the Cross and star etc. They all claim to be members of one big umbrella-Christianity, but members of each of these sects or groups do not see themselves as being members of one big family, instead more like rivals or antagonists, with each claiming to be serving the only true God . Just like people claim to have found inner peace and a reason to live and love because of religion, others have family members mourning because they have lost loved ones owing to the fall-outs of religious intolerance and extremism.

Many people were born into a particular religion and grow up with the feeling that their religion is superior and only true way to God. There is the air of arrogance amongst the adherents of these religions, with most Christians and Muslims believing that anyone who doesn’t worship God in their own way, will end in hell-fire where they would burn till eternity. Being just members of any of these two religions is not even enough to make you escape the fury of “hell-fire” as is the case with Christianity except you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and personal savior and live your life according to his dictates. All of these religions have influential people in all areas of human endeavours, that is to say they’re not doing too badly, and also they’ve been able to start from just a few hundreds of adherents and spread across the world, gaining more grounds and momentum as the years go by, meaning they have stood the test of time. One quick question that comes to mind is this- if only just one of these religions is the most genuine and approved by “God”, then why has He allowed all others to thrive and stand the test of time and not destroyed the wrong ones ? Also, what if on the last day, “Judgment day” as believed by some religions, you find out that you have been in the wrong religion all through and been serving the wrong God all along. How would you feel?


www.naijaawake.com/2016/07/17/what-if-youve-been-serving-the-wrong-god-all-along/