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Is Christianity too narrow? That's the question we're talking about together. And like I said, this is where culture and Christianity really kind of intersect. And there's three words that have come to my mind, at least, over and over again as I've thought about this, as I've prepared, as I've read and studied these last couple of weeks. The three words that come to my mind when I think about this topic are interesting. I think this is a really interesting conversation to have. Confusing? I think it's somewhat confusing because once you kind of get into the interesting part of the conversation, that which seems to be isn't. I I think we'll kind of, I'm gonna try and articulate this as clearly as possible, but as we get kind of more into it, I think I'm hoping that all of us can see that it's it's a little confusing. It's a little grey. It's not exactly what it seems like. Okay? And then the third word that I think really pops out is important. This is an important conversation in our culture, in our world today. Uh, you don't have to look very far to see that there's a lot of different views, like we just saw in this video out there, as to is Christianity too narrow? And there is this real movement and push right now at the moment towards this view that takes in a lot of different avenues and says all these avenues have a valid uh part to bring to the table. So it's I I think it's hugely important. It's a part of our culture, and we need to discuss this. I was really reminded of this a couple of months ago. We were on our way back from Mexico. We'd been down there doing a mission trip over spring break, I guess it was. And we're on our way back, and by the way, I'll just add a little comment here. We are heading back to Mexico, it looks like, um, this coming spring break. So if any of you are interested in joining us this coming spring break, we're taking a trip back to Mexico to work with the same people we did working in villages. That was a side note. So anyway, on the plane, on the way back, and I sit down on the plane in my assigned seat um next to this lady, and I would say she was probably in her early 40s. And we had this conversation, the conversation went really great. We were talking about a lot of different things, um, you know, life and what we've been doing, and kind of sharing back and forth. It was it was a good conversation, but uh all of a sudden the awkward and fun conversation question came up in the conversation of what do you do? And that's as a pastor, I'm I'm just gonna say that's not always a fun question to answer because you know that as soon as you say, I'm a pastor, or I work at a church, or whatever you put in that that blank there, quite often a wall all of a sudden comes up when you say that. And if you don't believe me, you should try it sometime. Just tell somebody you're a pastor. Um so anyway, I I said to her, Well, I'm actually helping start a church. And I knew, you know, the awkwardness was probably coming. So the best way to kind of fight that is to ask another question straight back. So I said, What's what's your background on church? Tell me a little bit about your history and your, you know, what do you think about church? And I got this answer, which I would say was pretty much a textbook response of what we're talking about today and what is a a popular view in our culture. And I'll pr I'm gonna paraphrase her response, but it went something like this. She said, I believe in God, and Jesus is a really good guy, I like Jesus, but I really struggle to believe that Christianity is the only way to God. I know some really good Muslim people, I know some people who are just good people, and I struggle to think that the only way to God is through Jesus. That was basically her response. And I don't know if you guys have heard this response before, but I I hear this, I've heard it before, and I've heard it since then. But in that moment I had this like realization that this is such a common and popular view that's been pushed in and through our culture. And as I was thinking about it, I was thinking that she, like so many others, had swallowed what I would like to call a pluralist pill, okay? This pluralist pill, we're gonna talk about that word pluralist in a minute, but she'd swallowed this pill that is the quick fix medication to having an accurate view on religions of the world. That way you don't offend anybody, you don't step on anybody's toes, you're not intolerant. It's this pluralist view, it's a quick fix. It's a quick medication, okay? So the question again is, is Christianity too narrow? And today there's people in this room, I believe, that sit in three positions. Some of you sit in the room today and you're like, yes, I believe Christianity is too narrow. And if that's the position you sit in, I just want to applaud you for being here. Thank you for being here. Um, because if you believe Christianity is too narrow and you're sitting here in a Christian church, that's pretty open of you to be here. So that's cool. I'm glad that you're here. Uh if you answer no to that question, is Christianity too narrow? Well, I think this is still a good conversation for us to have because if you say no, oftentimes what a Christian would like to do is just brush this topic away. Is Christianity too narrow? No. Okay, move on. But people want more than a no. They want, okay, if you believe that, why? We need to be able to articulate, okay, if if that's what you believe, you need to be able to articulate what you believe. And then a big, I think surprisingly, probably big chunk of the people in the room here today say, in answer to the question, is Christianity too narrow? Maybe. That may be your answer. And that the reason you say this is because you see through the world around us day in, day out, the thought pushed time and time again, that yes, Christianity is too narrow. And so you may be a Christian and yet you still struggle with this. How could God limit things down to only, you know, Jesus being the only way to God? How could he do that? And so I think in one of those three positions you sit this morning, yes, no, or maybe. And my question of all of us here in the room today is would you be open enough to engage in this conversation, engage in this dialogue? Because I feel like we need to bring open minds, open hearts to this to the table this morning to kind of to have this discussion. If we're closed-minded about this, I'm just gonna talk for the next 20 minutes and you guys are gonna, I mean, it's pointless. Does that make sense? So I really encourage you to have open minds and thoughts in this in this dialogue. And if you have more to kind of questions and and things to engage in from this, I'd really encourage you to get into one of to come along to one of our redemption groups, because we're gonna talk exactly about this topic in redemption groups. And in that place, you have a format to really ask questions and have a back and forth dialogue. So if you've got questions about redemption groups, they're just smaller groups that meet throughout the week. So let me know if you're interested in finding out more about one of those. So, whatever view you sit in today, let's have open minds and let's start with the basis of this question. Is Christianity too narrow? We need to ask ourselves, what does a Christian believe and why would it be considered to be too narrow? And I think the great place to start for this is the book that all Christians believe in. This is the Bible, okay? So we're gonna start here in the Bible and look at what a Christian believes. Now, we're gonna do a series coming up on the validity of the Bible, but because we're talking about Christians today, let's just trust that it is valid because this is what Christians believe. So uh 1 Timothy is where we're gonna go. If you don't have a Bible today, there's one somewhere near you. It's black or brown, looks like this, and you can just pick that up. And um, if you don't own a Bible and you would like one, you can have one as our gift as long as you promise to read it, okay? So anybody wants a Bible, promises they'll use it, they can take that home. 1 Timothy chapter 2. On this Bible, it's page 765, if that helps. If you're pulling up the brown Bible. The black one's probably pretty close to that too, 765. 1 Timothy chapter 2. Let me give you a little background here. Paul is the guy writing this book, and he's a church starter. I like that about him. He's writing to his young apprentice, who is Timothy, who is also obviously a church starter. I like that about him too. So I like both of these guys. Uh but 1 Timothy chapter 2, verse 1 is where we're going to read, and we're going to read the next six verses. It says this First of all, then, I urge that petitions, prayers, and intercessions and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and for all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This is good. And it pleases God, our Savior, who wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. What is the truth? Well, let's read on. Verse 5. For there is one God and one mediator between God and humanity, Christ Jesus, Himself human, who gave himself a ransom for all, a testimony at the proper time. This is what Christians believe. We're going to come back to this. This is a rich text, by the way. There's so much in this that I would love to delve into today that we're not gonna we're just gonna brush over. But this is a rich text, and this is essentially what Christians believe. Your fill-in-the-blank for this next session uh section is simply this. A Christian believes that Jesus is God's son, and that we have access to God through him, and I probably should have put on your notes him alone. That's what a Christian believes. That Jesus is God's son, and that we have access to God through him. A lot of you have heard the Bible verse, John 3.16, for God so loved the world he gave his only son that whoever believes in him should have eternal life and not perish. It's a famous, famous Bible verse. And that's essentially saying this same thing, this same statement a different way. Now, where do we get this, where do we get this from? Is this just Paul writing some stuff saying, you know, Jesus is God and he's God's son, and we have access to God through Jesus? That's actually not where Paul's getting it from. Paul's getting it from Jesus himself. If we were to turn to John chapter 14, we're not going to do it right now, but I'll throw it up on the screen for you. John chapter 14, Jesus says himself. Jesus himself says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. So Jesus is a very interesting character in that he has some pretty exclusive claims, okay? This is an exclusive claim. I am the way, the truth, the truth, and the life. He doesn't say, I am a way, a truth, and a life. He says, I am the way, okay? So he has this exclusive claim that nobody gets to God except through him. Now, I'd love to talk more about Jesus today, but I can't because Nick's talking about him next week, okay? So I'm not, I'm trying not to get over in on the side of next week's topic too much here. But I just really wanted to bring up this verse because this is where we get, this is where Paul, this is where Christians get this view from that Jesus is the only way to God. And that is the lens which Christians look at the world through. Okay? Does that make sense? As a Christian, I look at the world through this lens. This is what I believe. Okay? Now, we all have lenses that we look at the world through, no matter who you are, whether you have a religion, whether you have a faith, or whether you don't. Any way you look at the world is any basis of belief you have, even if that belief is to not have a belief, that is a belief. Does that make sense? And you look at the world through that lens. Okay? So there's different lenses out there. There's the Christian lens to look at the world through. There's other religions. Um some of the big ones are obviously you've got Islam, you've got Buddhism, Hinduism, you've got Judaism, all these big religions of the world. And if you're a member of one of those religions, you look at the world through that lens. Does that make sense? Okay, there's other lenses out there. There's also the lens of like um naturalism or atheism. There's these other views in which ways that people look at the world. Well, the interesting lens that really has been pushed into our cult culture these last couple of decades is this lens of pluralism. And that's what we're gonna spend just the next few minutes talking about, okay? I mentioned it earlier, so it sounds like a kind of school word, you know, pluralism, but uh, we're gonna talk about this lens of pluralism, where it came from, and uh kind of its effect on our culture, and how it kind of contradicts itself, okay? So that's what we're what we're gonna talk about in the next few minutes. Little history lesson. Pluralism is the belief that there's many paths to God, okay? And this is not a new theme. This has happened since ancient times through to now. Let me give you a couple of quick examples. Uh in the Jewish faith, which is what Christianity is based on, in the Jewish faith, God this thousands of years ago, God called the people of Israel, the Jews, out of Egypt with Moses leading them. They go out into the desert, they're out in the desert to worship God, the one true God, Yahweh, and Moses goes up the hill to try and get the Ten Commandments from God. He's gone a long time. They think he's dead, they don't know where he's gone, and so they're like, what do we do? We need a God. And so they're gonna continue to kind of worship Yahweh, the one true God, but they build a calf and start worshiping this calf as well. And so there's this view of two gods that they're worshiping. Okay, you see that? It's multiple gods, multiple ways to God. They're starting to have this pluralist view. And that's that was something common in their culture. They were used to seeing lots of different idols in Egypt to different gods. But God called them, he got angry with them. He's like, I am the Lord your God. You will worship no other God before me. God's very protective about being the one and only God. Okay? So he got angry with them in that moment. That's an example way back in ancient history. Jump forward to Jesus' time, actually, just after Jesus' time, Paul, who we were talking about, traveling the world, starting churches, he walks into Athens. And as he walks into Athens, I want to I want to show you this scripture from Acts 17. It tells us what happens. When Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was troubled within him when he saw that the city was full of idols. There's idols everywhere in the city of Athens, in the Greco-Roman world. There's all these idols everywhere. He sees them. He actually sees, it's kind of funny, he sees an idol that has an inscription on it that says to an unknown God, because they wanted to make sure to cover all their bases in case they missed one, you know. They didn't want to offend the unknown God that they'd forgotten about, so they're covering all their bases, making sure they're okay. So Paul walks into this culture and he says, he stands up in the Arabic uh, I can't say that word, in their city square. I'll move on from that. And uh he stands up and he says, I believe in Yahweh, the one true God, this unknown God you're talking about. But in that culture there was this view of multiple gods. Well, fast forward, again, another couple of thousand years to almost today, in 1973, there was a man, a scholar, named John Hick, and he wrote a book called God and the Universe of Faiths. And this was the foundation on what modern pluralism was really built. Now, there's been pluralism all the way back through, but the the interesting thing from the 1970s on is the view of pluralism hasn't just been a standard pluralism. There's many paths to God, it's prescriptive pluralism. Okay? I know this there's a lot of big words, but stick with me. It's prescriptive pluralism. Uh let me tell you a little bit about what prescriptive pluralism is. It emphasizes pluralism or universalism as something to be embraced as positive. Okay, you see that difference? Belief is that all religions should not only coexist, there's a fun word, but that all religions are essentially the same. You hear that? So this prescriptive pluralism, man, I'm struggling with that, is unique in that it it's saying that all religions are essentially the same. And if you don't believe me that this this view is out there, I don't think you've been listening to enough tel uh music or television or watching enough movies because it is everywhere in our culture. Especially our movies. It's it's pushed its way in and through our culture. This view of pluralism, there's multiple ways to God, and they all have an equally valid standing on the table. Uh, a couple of examples. Uh The Life of Pi, anybody seen that movie? Okay, nobody's seen that movie? Okay, a couple of people have seen that movie. Hey, you're awake. That's good. Uh The Life of Pi, that is a movie that has this multiple strains of religions all leading in the same direction. Great example of that recent movie history. Another movie that really sticks out to me is there was a movie called The Kingdom of Heaven. Uh, Orlando Bloom was one of the main actors in that movie, and it was like set in the time of the Crusades. There was Christians, Jews, and uh Islamists all fighting over Jerusalem. And there was this thread right through the movie of this pluralist, universalist view that no matter who you were, as long as you were devout and worship God, whether that was Allah or Yahweh or Jesus, it didn't really matter. You're all headed in the same direction. And so if you don't believe me, just I would encourage you to look around you. I really do believe you will see this push throughout our culture. I mean, you see the bumper stickers coexist. There's a lot of a lot of this thought out there. The problem with this thought, and the reason we've talked about it for these last few minutes, is because I believe it's fundamentally flawed. Um I just want you to look at the next fill in the blank there on your page. It says this pluralism is fundamentally flawed in that it contradicts itself. Let me explain that. Pluralism is fundamentally flawed in that it contradicts itself. This is the part where I told you it was confusing. This is the confusing part. So stick with me here. Everybody stay awake at this point. Okay. So it's fundamentally flawed in this way. If I am somebody with a pluralist view, I believe that there's many path, equal paths, leading to God. If I have that view, you know, whether it's Buddhism, atheism, Christianity, whatever that path is, if I have this view, I've said I'm tolerant, I have an inclusive view of all these paths leading to God. The problem is, in trying to be inclusive and tolerant, I've become exclusive and intolerant to anybody who has a view different to me. Does that make sense? So it the argument cuts its own legs out from underneath it. Does that make sense? So by trying to be tolerant, it's intolerant. You guys sticking with me? Okay, so, and I I'm telling you, uh, Timothy Keller does a much better job of arguing this than me. I can't go into all of it now, but I really would recommend the read of the first chapter of this book. Because he explains from several angles how that by being trying to be inclusive, you're being exclusive. So if I'm if I'm tolerant of all these religions and yet I see, you know, another guy over here, let's call him Bob, and he believes that Jesus is the only way to God, I'm saying, no, no, no, you're wrong. It's many ways. And by saying no, you're wrong, I've put myself in a place of judgment. I've put myself in a place of being right and him being wrong, and I've put myself in a place of being exclusive and intolerant. Does that make sense? I'm trying to explain this in different ways, but that's essentially why it's fundamentally flawed and contradicts itself. And so the interesting thing to me is, like I said, when we scratch below the surface and it gets a little bit confusing, the interesting thing is that which claims to be wide, this pluralist view, is actually narrow. And that which is narrow is actually wide, as in the Christian view. Let me explain. Let's go back to 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 2. I'm going to read quickly the first few verses for you, and I want you essentially to hear verse 4 of chapter 2. It says, first of all, I urge you to give petitions, prayers, and intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all those who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This is good, and it pleases God, our Saviour, who wants everyone to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. But God isn't exclusive. God doesn't want, you know, he doesn't have, you know, a cut a scorecard figured out where he wants, you know, this percentage of people to be saved and an X percentage to not be saved. God is an inclusive God. He desires for all to be saved. There's many more scriptures that argue this and and state this, that Christianity in essence is a profoundly inclusive faith. I was thinking about this question, and I was thinking it'd be really interesting. Uh obviously I can't do this, but it'd be interesting if I could sit down here, put it, pull up a couple of chairs, and sit down across from Jesus and get to interview Jesus in front of you. And, you know, we'd do some small talk and go back and forth. And then I'd throw out this question you know, uh, Jesus, is belief in you being the only way is is Christianity. Too narrow. I'd ask him that question. And I've thought these last I've thought this last week about what would his response be to that question. And I think I think there'd be a sadness that would come over his face when I asked him that. And also a realization where I'm coming from. He knows the history of the world. He knows how his name has been used in a bad way. He understands all that. And yet there'd be a look of grace and mercy in his eyes as he leans forward, opens his hands, and says, Harley. And as he opens his hands, I get to see that there's nail scars right here, right here and here. And he says, Harley, man. I died for everyone. There isn't a single person I didn't die for. No matter who they are, where they're from, what country, what what race, what age. It doesn't matter what bad stuff they've done, what addictions they have, I died for everyone. I think that's what he'd say to me. I think that's what would happen here in the front of your room. So you next fill in the blank there, and your last one today is basically this. God provided a way for anyone. Got that in capitals. Oh no, I don't there. I do in my notes. God provided a way for anyone to have peace. This is profoundly inclusive and not exclusive. I think there's another good way to talk about this. It's been said before that religion is like, or religions are like mountains. So I want you to picture with me that religion is like a mountain. There's the mountain of Buddhism or any religion, there's a mountain. And God's at the top, and humanity is at the bottom trying to make its way up to God. Okay? Does that make sense? Everybody's picturing this with me. The problem with each of these mountains, any of these mountains, is that they're impossible to climb. They're pretty much impossible to climb. Picture them just with these steep sides of rock and cliffs and ice and snow, just impossible to climb. And many people throughout history have tried to climb these by themselves to reach God. No matter what the mountain is, whether it's Buddhism or Hinduism or Islam, whatever the mountain is. And as they've gotten up the mountain, some have gotten further than others. I think you could take the illustration to even say that people have gotten hurt along the way trying to climb the mountains. People get hurt trying to do the right things and follow religions. You guys have seen that, I'm sure. The difference between every other mountain, every other religion in the world, and Christianity is this, and it's profound. You've got to hear this this morning. If you don't hear anything else, I want you to hear this. Christianity is unique. That in if Christianity is a mountain, God is at the top, he takes his son and says, Would you go down and would you get and enter your name in there? He goes down, Jesus heads down the mountain, and he finds us in the deepest and darkest valleys. It doesn't matter where we are, he finds us. And rather than just walking us back up that mountain, taking us by the hand, he actually carries us up the mountain. That's what I believe Christianity is, and that's why I believe it's unique. It's completely unique in that Jesus gives us access to God. God came down to us rather than us trying to ascend to God. It's been said before that religion is humanity's attempt to reach God. Christianity is God's attempt to reach humanity. There's a couple of places you sit in today. One of those is you may not be a Christian. You may not believe this message. You may not believe that Jesus is the only way to God. And if you're here again, I'm really glad that you're here. But I just want to encourage you today, if if that's the place that you sit in, I just really want to encourage you today to do two things. The first is to ask God to reveal himself to you. That might sound weird, but I just ask you to do that. Just, and it doesn't have to be right now, it could be when we do a song, or it could even be tonight as you're going to bed and you're sitting there in the quiet by yourself, to say, hey God, if you're real, it has to it can be this simple. Hey God, if you're real, would you reveal yourself or would you show yourself to me? I challenge you to ask that question. The second question I challenge you to ask is this if God shows himself to be real to you, are you willing to respond? Are you willing to respond to God if he shows himself to you? I was really sobbered and reminded of this thought the other day. Last week I was in the elementary class with the elementary kids, and we were talking about a prophet in the Old Testament called Elijah. Elijah lived in a time where there was a king who really didn't like God, and he had another God that he did like called Baal. And Elijah said, Hey, king, you come up to this hill with me, and you bring all the prophets of your God Baal, and I'll bring myself, you bring the people of Israel, and let's see which God is real. Okay? So they go to the top of the hill, and he says, We're gonna build two altars and sacrifice two cows, and we're gonna ask our guards to light the fires on these altars, okay? So they're there on top of this hill, and Ahab the king, he's watching all of this happen. And so they um what happens next is the he lets the the Baal worshippers go first, and they're dancing around, singing, crying out to their God, who isn't real, doesn't exist, and nothing happens. I mean, this goes on for hours, literally hours. It's going on. And he says, you know, he he kind of teases them a little bit. He says, hey, maybe not crying out loud enough. And so they cry louder, and and eventually he's like, okay, okay, you've you've had enough time. It's my turn. So Elijah steps up to his altar and he says, Pour water all over this altar. So they pour water all over the altar, and in that moment, he says, God, would you reveal yourself? Like I just said, he says, God, would you reveal yourself to be true to these people? No sooner have the words come out of his mouth than lightning- this this bolt of fire comes down from heaven, and it doesn't just like light the and kindle the little fire there. It says that it consumes everything, including the rocks. Okay? So this is a supernatural fire. There's no way to explain this other than God did a miracle, okay? Ahab's there watching this whole thing, and yet he goes home and continues to deny that God exists. And so I was sobered, so sobered in that moment, by remembering that even though God may reveal himself to us, we still have this choice. It's a beautiful thing that he hasn't created us to be robots, but we still have this choice to accept him in that moment. We have a choice to accept him when he reveals himself to us. So if you're not a Christian here today, I just really want to encourage you to ask God to reveal himself to you and then ask yourself, hey, if God does reveal himself to me, am I willing to respond? That's really important to ask those two questions. If you are a Christian, I just want to really encourage you to engage in this conversation. This conversation about is Christianity too narrow? Because if it hasn't already come up in a conversation with a coworker, a neighbor, a friend, a family member, it's going to, okay? You're going to talk to somebody and they're like, I think, you know, I think that there's got to be many ways to reach God, okay? You're going to hear that. And so I want you to know how to engage in that conversation. And we're told time and time again in the scriptures to do that in truth and grace, that to show both of those things. So you're going to have to find that tension. Doesn't mean blasting somebody because they've got the wrong view, because then you've just become as, you know, intolerant as them in that moment, okay? But there is a way to express the things that you believe and try and find the way to do that. The other thing I'd encourage you to do is to talk about this with your children. Those of you who have kids, your kids are being exposed to this pluralist thought over and over and over again in school, in the things they're watching, the things they're listening to. This is being pushed so hard right now. You need to talk to your kids about it. And then finally, I just, if you're a Christian in the room today, I just would encourage you, as we sing these next few songs we're about to sing, to remember the grace that you have received. Remember the fact that when Jesus leans forwards, he's got stuck scars in his arms. And those scars are for you. That he came down from that mountain to reach out to you. Okay? So as we sing, let's not just be stoic about it. Let's celebrate and worship this God that we believe in who came and rescued us. Because Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Okay, that's what we believe. I'm gonna pray.