Do you think God and religion are separate?

@vinayag I would have thought that God and religion are two very separate things altogether. Surely God exists independently of religion. Even if all people turned away from religion and refused to believe in God God would still exist because he doesn't depend of the acknowledgement or worship of anyone - He is God.

Well god came to me in a dream and he said that religions should be destroyed. So since he doesn't wish his own destruction, I'd say they are very different.

God did not create religion. Religion was created by humans ostensibly to coordinate worship and educate people about beliefs in God and the afterlife. It also was very quickly apparent that religion and the hierarchy of priesthood could be used to control a community by fear very effectively. You could not have religion without a God because the effectiveness of religion depends on the fear of what might happen if you do not subscribe to it and, ultimately, the fear of the perceived power of the spiritual world. If religion is defined, as I have outlined above, as a social institution, then it is obvious that God exists independently of religion. He can be acknowledged and worshipped and understood by an individual independently of an organised religion.

However much one likes to separate the two, at some point they do get interlinked. Customs and traditions are also partly religious and partly what one has inherited through civilisation.However I feel that it is difficult to separate the two.

What God wants is for us to have a relationship with him... God wants us to live our lives according to his laws.....

God is religion and religion is God. They are one in the same.

The word religion is usually defined to be the belief in and worship of a personal God, or gods. Some religions worship multiple Gods, like Hinduism. A less strict definition might be that a religion is about a certain belief, or belief system. Satanism then, or witchcraft, might not worship God at all, but some other figure instead. What is a religion to God, anyway? Does he want religions to spring up around himself with their sole object to worship him, or not? Personality as belief beleaguers the truth, because God exists to exist. He is so he is. “I am, so I am,”, he told Moses himself. Religions just are parties of people who believe all of the same thing. You can call them what you like. God himself though is not within empty worship halls. He is always in the heart of his people. God's personality is not there to suit you. He is what he is, no matter what you are. God is multidimensional, and religious leaders should not separate themselves out and cut themselves off into various religions, because God is God. A religion is only an institution.