On this seventh episode of the Evangelist Podcast, we're looking at some big questions that often crop up when we're talking about issues of faith.
SPEAKER_01The Evangelist Podcast from Revival. Find out what's new in telling people the good news about God, the world, and you. With Andy Brinkley and Glenn Scrivener.
SPEAKER_02Welcome back to the Evangelist Podcast. And last week we started looking at some big questions, and this time we're going to carry on looking at some of those big questions. We would we were looking at issues of other religions. We will just kick off straight away, Glenn. What about sincere adherents of other faiths? And what about um people that are, say, Muslims or Hindus that are really sincere, they believe God, they try to do their best.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because I mean the Christian claim is only Jesus saves. Only Jesus saves. And you know that that might sound very narrow, very unfair, um, but I think it's demonstrably true if you just look at the religions of the world. If you if you look into Islam and you ask, does Allah save? Is there a is there a category in Islamic theology about salvation? Uh well no Allah doesn't save people, he rewards good Muslims. I mean there's no there's no real salvation in Islam. There's no real salvation in Hinduism or Buddhism. You know, it's all down to your karma, whether you go up and or down in in the next reincarnation. It's it's all down to you. There's no salvation uh in any of these faiths. Only Jesus saves. It's it it's actually just a a matter of demonstrable facts. Only Jesus saves. So what what about what about the devout Muslim? Well, uh you know, I uh just this week I met up with uh a Muslim guy, uh or met on the street a Muslim guy who'd just come from from prayer time uh at the local mosque, and uh and I said, Do you do it five times a day? And he sort of looked at his shoes and said, No, I I know I should, but uh, you know, it's it's very difficult, and you know, so he he he tries to get to one of the prayer times a you know a day, which is like you know, if I had to go to church five times a day to pray, there's you know very much doubt that I I would get there. It's uh it's amazing that he would do that. But as I talked to him about whether he thought that he was saved, if you like, if if if he thought that he was in with Allah, if he thought he had an assurance that he was in going to paradise, uh he had absolutely no kind of assurance whatsoever. Um so even within his own worldview, even within this kind of striving towards salvation that or towards paradise that he was engaged in, he had no hope. Um his only hope really is Jesus. And actually as as the conversation unfolded, that became clear because he he kept on saying, you know, how how little he could do and how much he kept messing up and and and and all those sorts of things. So when I come to him, I don't preach bad news, actually, that your thing's not working, let me let me give you this other thing that works. It's good news, because in a sense he knows that his thing isn't working. When Jesus says John fourteen, verse six, I am the way and the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me. That's not bad news. Um, and it's not even bad news for the Muslim, because the Muslim knows they're not coming to a Father. They they they know that they're not coming into the family love of a father who has eternally loved his son, and they they know they're not being adopted by the spirit of adoption into a into a son and coming to know the father. They just hope that Allah is not going to burn them forever. No one comes to the Father except through Jesus Christ. What the Christian is saying is that that the Son of God has come into the world to save us from all our slaveries, whether they be religious slaveries, whether they be other addictions, whether they be other immoral lifestyles, whatever it is, Jesus comes to save us from all those things and to bring us to the Father. So uh it's good news, it's good news for the world that that no one no other religion kinda has this. No other religion has this sort of saviour who can really bridge that entire distance from God down to ask him back again.
SPEAKER_02What about um you know, like uh someone that perhaps you see on the door or or in the street who's a really good atheist and they don't believe in God, they don't believe there is a God, um, but they uh give to charity and you know they say of themselves, you know, God should accept me because I've you know I've never hurt anybody or done anything wrong, I'm as good as anybody in church.
SPEAKER_00Oh, probably better. Probably much better. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Now what response can you say to them to kind of perhaps shift their view a bit?
SPEAKER_00In a sense I'd say what I'd say to the Muslim. You know, you can be as good a Muslim as you like, you can be as as good an atheist as you like, how does that get you into a family? You know, how d how does being a good a good boy or a good girl actually get you adopted into a family? It it makes no odds really. It doesn't it doesn't it doesn't give you entrance into a family. And so both to the Muslim, I'd I'd say, you know, work as hard as you like, all you can ever be is a slave, you'll never be a son, you'll never be a daughter. For the atheist, you know, be as good a person as you ever like, but but God is not fundamentally this uh rewarder of moral behaviour, as though you know there's a bearded guy on a throne with a clipboard, like checking off moral behaviour against some list. Unfortunately, some Christians kind of preach God like that, and so the the atheist might say, Well, I'm doing all the good stuff, but but actually the the God of the Bible is the father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Um so you can be as good as you like, and you can be better than me, absolutely. But what has that got to do with getting you into the family? Um and I think a lot of this stems from it's it's it's our it's our fault, it's Christians' fault, that um we kind of see Jesus as in incidental. We kind of think basically it is all about being a good boy or a good girl. And the only the only reason that Jesus comes, we you know, we falsely think, is he comes to deal with the way that we mess up in life and he dies on the cross to pay for our sins so that we have a good moral record, because that's what counts, right? And we we think that what really counts is a moral record before God. Jesus helps us to get the moral record, um, but then it just seems so arbitrary. What about people who don't have Jesus? They've still got a good moral record, don't they? But it completely misses the point that actually Jesus himself is our salvation. And I I think we need to be a lot clearer on this as Christians. Um Jesus defines eternal life in John 17, verse 3, he says, This is eternal life that people might know the only true God, the Father, and know Jesus Christ who he has sent. So according to Jesus, eternal life is knowing the Father through knowing him the Son. Jesus Himself is eternal life. 1 John 5 says, uh, you know, um God has given us eternal life, this eternal life is in his Son. Jesus Himself is eternal life. And I think if we're much clearer on that, then that just makes perfect sense of you know, the Muslim can be good and they can be much better than I can. The uh the atheists can be good, they can be much better than I can, but they don't have Jesus. Jesus Himself is salvation, because he brings us into the family. He is the Son who brings us to the Father. And you can be as good as you like in the in the world, but none of that gets you into the family. Only Jesus can get you into the family.
SPEAKER_02Jesus is the only way. Um some might say that God is being unkind by making Jesus the only way.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Except that um you know, Jesus is not a He's not a bridgeway to something else called paradise. He's not it's it's not like I need this this weird kind of extra thing called Jesus over here, so that I can get to that other nice stuff called salvation over there. Um it's that God is a Father, loving his Son in the power of the Spirit, and the Father makes a world through the Son, and we plunge ourselves into all kinds of darkness and depravity, and we name all sorts of other things as gods over us. Jesus comes into the world and says, Ta da, here I am, I no, I really am Lord, I really am your maker, I really am the Son of God. Um and you know, we can stay in ignorance if we like, but Jesus is is the gift of the Father to us, so that we can know what reality really is like. Um I think that the every time we have a w every time we struggle with the exclusivity of Jesus, it's always because we don't have a big enough Jesus. You know, when you when you talk when you say Jesus is the only way it can sound narrow, but it's only as narrow as Jesus is, you know. And how cosmic is Jesus when you when you read John one, when you read Hebrews one, you read Colossians one. You know. How cosmic. So what we're really saying is Jesus is just the God who's really God. All sorts of people who claim that something is ultimate reality. The great claim that the Christian has is that Jesus is ultimate reality. He's the one who defines all things. And so hopefully we can get people to a stage where they can see, wouldn't it be a great thing if Jesus was ultimate reality? Wouldn't it be a great thing if that guy who washed his disciples' feet, who bled and died for them, you know, who dies with his arms outstretched for the world, wouldn't it be a great thing if this guy really was ultimate reality? Not I'm afraid Jesus and his death on the cross, I'm afraid that's the only narrow path to this other thing called salvation. That's not really what we're saying. What we're really saying is that guy on the cross, he's it. He's the explanation for everything. Put your finger on the pulse of reality and it's this Jesus who, you know, who loves us and gives his life for us.
SPEAKER_02And Jesus couldn't have saved us if he wasn't God.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02You know, he if he was an angel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Because we need salvation by the death of one who is is God.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Not just a good perfect person, you know, like an angel or something.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Which is again that that phrase that that verse John 14, six, you know, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Contemplating that that idea of Jesus the way, he kind of comprehends in himself the Father and us in himself. He is the way. He doesn't just point to another way. He is the way. In his in his very being, he is the the Father's son who became the son of Mary and sort of holds God and man together. He in himself is the way. He he himself is salvation. Um He doesn't point to this narrow thing called salvation, and he isn't particularly narrow himself. He's he's the creator of all things. So when we're when we're pointing to Jesus and saying, Yeah, he's the way, may maybe some of our emphasis should really be on He's the way, you know, Jesus, Jesus is the way. Isn't that isn't that brilliant news? You know, the one who loves us more than his own life, the one who bleeds his own heart's blood for us, he is the way. Suddenly, hopefully that that can become a happier truth than uh is otherwise uh uh thought when when people talk about the exclusivity of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02Well, Glenn, we've uh made a good start on uh some of these uh questions. Next time we'll uh we'll take some more hot topics and see if we can uh deconstruct them in a certain way. I hope you like listening to the Evangelist Podcast. If so, why not leave us a review on iTunes? We've set up a simple forwarding link to go straight to the podcast on iTunes. You can go to revivalmedia.org slash iTunes. That should take you directly to the podcast page where you can leave us a review and rating. We'd be very happy if you did, if you consider it to be a good podcast.
SPEAKER_00Or even a no, I I I could I could handle a negative one. That's fine. Yeah, well.
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