Is Jesus the only way to God? (Acts 4:1-12)
Sermon preached by Revd. Canon Alan Bing on Sunday 20th June 2010. This was the third of a series of four sermons answering questions raised by members of the congregation.
Of all the questions asked by non-Christians and those on the journey to faith, the most common is, ‘Why does God allow suffering?’ No surprises there! The next most common is, ‘Do all roads lead to God?’ or, to put it another way, ‘Is Jesus the only way to God?’ If we answer, ‘Yes’ to that question, many people will think us arrogant, intolerant, or just plain wrong.
Peter Kay, the popular comedian, probably speaks for many when he says, ‘I believe that a man called Jesus did walk the earth at one time, but I don’t think he was the superhero that the Bible makes him out to be. Could he really turn water into wine? Did he raise people from the dead? Well if David Blaine can’t survive underwater in a tank for seven days without needing medical attention, then I very much doubt it. I think Jesus was just an ordinary person like me and you (well, I’m comparing you with myself in the hope that you’re not a mentalist)’ (‘The Sound of Laughter’, p.103). In other words, you probably are a mentalist if you believe Jesus was the superhero that the Bible makes him out to be.
So are all religions equally valid?
We live in what’s called a post-modern, pluralistic world where you can pick and mix when it comes to religion. You might find that your children are making native American dreamcatchers or Muslim prayer mats, your neighbour is going to tai chi or yoga classes and your boss is applying the principles of feng-shui to the office furniture and the pot plants! To quote Peter Kay again, ‘I can believe what I like, it’s my life. I like to believe in a God of some kind, in some sort of higher being or force. Personally, I find it very comforting, plus it gives me somebody to talk to on long train journeys when there’s no phone signal’ (ibid, p.111). The general feeling is that any religion or spiritual path is valid so long as it works for you. Why shouldn’t all roads lead to God?
There is one major problem with this view, which is that not all religions are the same, and different religions teach different things. They teach different things about life after death – do you come back as a higher or lower life form depending on how good you have been, or is death the end, or do you die once and then face God’s judgement? They teach different things about God – are there many gods, or no God, or one God, and, if so, what kind of God is that? They teach different things about how we are saved from ourselves – are you saved by detaching yourself from this world, or by good works, or by trusting in God? They teach a variety of things about what life is like and how it should be lived.
It is also difficult to take an element like Native American spirituality, or yoga or feng-shui and use it without being influenced by the world-view of the religion that lies behind it. So we need to beware of leading ourselves or others astray if we get involved in such things however innocent they may seem, or of ending up with a pick and mix world-view which makes no sense at all.
When you look at different religions carefully, you can see that, although they may have some things in common (the ‘golden rule’, for example) they take you in a variety of directions; all roads don’t lead to God any more than all the roads from Ulverston lead to London. All religions are not equally valid.
So is Jesus the only way to God?
If you take the religions that believe in one God, Christianity agrees with Judaism and Islam in believing that there is one God who created all things, including human beings. The question is, ‘how can we come to know this God?’
Although all three religions have a special place for Abraham, they answer this question in a different way. As a follower of Jesus Christ, the apostle Peter is very clear. When he and John heal a crippled beggar outside the Temple, a large crowd gathers, amazed that this man crippled from birth was now walking and jumping and praising God (3:8). These are all descendants of Abraham (3:13), but they have never come across anything like this. They think Peter and John have some miraculous healing power. Peter assures them that this power to heal doesn’t come from them but from Jesus, whom they had crucified, but whom God raised from the dead (v.10). They need to know that through his name, they can receive not only healing, but forgiveness for sins and ‘times of refreshing’ (3:19) through the Holy Spirit. Peter directs their attention away from himself and the healed man to Jesus Christ, the Healer (v.10), and he goes on to say that ‘salvation is found in no-one else’ (v.12).
So Peter backs up the exclusive claim Jesus made for himself when he said, ‘no-one goes to the Father except by me’ (John 14:6). The proof that that claim is true is that the Father raised him from the dead (v.10). Because he was raised from the dead, he is alive today, which means we can know him in a way that we cannot know Buddha or Mohammed. The NT states quite clearly and unequivocally that Jesus is the only way to God.
What about other religions?
Does this mean that all other religions are wrong, and all their followers are deluded and cut off from God? Broadly speaking, there are three understandings of other faiths:
Universalist:
The first, which we have already looked at, is that all religions lead to God and it doesn’t matter which one you follow, so long as you are sincere. Everyone needs to find their own truth and their own way to God, so Jesus is one way to the Father, but not necessarily the only way. So, when Paul says to Timothy that ‘God wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth’ (1 Tim. 2:4), this is understood this to mean that God is love and would never condemn anyone to hell. One problem with this understanding is that it implies that Jesus died on the cross in vain; there is no penalty for sin, because everyone will end up in heaven. It also suggests that people who have rejected God will effectively end up in heaven against their will. As we have seen, it also ignores the fact that different religions teach different, and often contradictory, things about God.
Exclusivist: Not only is Jesus Christ the only way to God, but anyone who does not explicitly acknowledge him as Lord cannot be saved. So when Peter said that ‘salvation is found in no one else’ (v.12) and Jesus says that he is ‘the way, the truth and the life’ (John 14:6), this is taken to mean that people who follow other religions have no hope of salvation. One problem with this understanding is that it implies that God is unjust if he condemns those who haven’t even heard of Jesus Christ through no fault of their own. It also contradicts what Paul says to the Romans about how God has revealed himself to all humanity through the natural world and will judge us according to the response we have made: ‘ever since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities have been clearly seen... so that people are without excuse’ (Rom. 1:20).
Inclusivist:
Jesus Christ is unique and the only way to God, but the salvation he offers can include people who have not yet heard or responded to the Gospel. They may be followers of other faiths or seekers after the truth, like Abraham, but earnestly seeking God and responding in faith to what they know of Him. Abraham and the other heroes of the faith listed in Hebrews 11 all lived before Christ, but ‘Abraham believed God, it was credited to him as righteousness’ (Rom. 4:3). If Christ’s victory over sin through his death on the cross and resurrection from the dead is effective for all eternity, it is effective for all who respond in faith to God, even those who lived before Jesus, even those who haven’t heard the Gospel. The danger of this understanding is that it can downplay the necessity for a personal response to Christ, but it acknowledges that all people are made in God’s image and his grace is at work in them. It also allows us to accept that there is truth in other religions and goodness in many of their followers. Above all, it accepts that God will be the final judge of who will enter his Kingdom.
We see something of this in the final book in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series, ‘The Last Battle’. A clever ape called Shift persuades the people of Narnia to work for the Calormenes and overthrows King Tirian. During the last battle between the Narnians and the Calormenes, a noble young Calormene soldier who has worshipped the god Tash all his life dies bravely and wakes up in Aslan’s Country, which is a picture of heaven. There he joins all those who have been loyal to Aslan.
Bishop Leslie Newbigin, who was Bishop of Madras in South India, noticed how many people who converted to Christianity from other religions found a strange element of continuity: ‘Even though this conversion involves a radical discontinuity, yet there is often the strong conviction afterwards that it was the living and true God who was dealing with them in the days of their pre-Christian wrestlings.’ (‘The Finality of Christ’ p.59)
He was thinking of people from a Hindu background, but we see the same thing with Bilquis Sheikh, who came from a Muslim background, and came to know God as Father through Jesus Christ. (‘I dared to call him Father’, p.41)
All the major religions contain truth and error. They all have some insights into God, people and the world. But none have the special and direct revelation that Jesus brought, as the way, the truth and the life, through whom we can know God as our Father in heaven.
How should we respond?
We live in a world where people are desperately searching for spiritual reality without knowing where to find it. The apostle Peter was able to point his fellow Jews to Jesus Christ, crucified and risen from the dead, as the one through whom they could find salvation and healing. We too have an urgent task to tell others the good news about Jesus and the salvation and healing he brings. Be courageous ‘in a world where tolerance, not truth is the order of the day’, as Nicky Gumbel puts it.
But, like Peter, it is important for us, if we are not to come across as arrogant and intolerant as followers of Christ, that we combine boldness with humility. As Christians, we are no better than anyone else, and should respect others as made in the image of God We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We all need a saviour.
So we can be positive – we don’t need to attack other faiths but to tell the good news about Jesus. We are not asking people to join a religion, but to follow Jesus Christ who came to earth to show us what God is like. It is through him that we can know God as Father and experience life in all its fullness.