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What about other religions?
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| WHEN JOHN Wesley was preaching, there was
no debate about non–Christian religions. Most Englishmen had only ever
met Anglicans, Catholics, Dissenters and Jews. In fact, except in the cities, most Englishmen had only heard about Jews and Muslims; and Catholics and Dissenters were not found everywhere, either. Today every Western country is host to Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Mandaeans, Bahais, Theosophists, Latter Day Saints, Scientologists and who knows what other religions. Even Christians are divided: Catholics, Charismatics and Conservatives, Liberals. Some are evangelical and others rely on an historical identity. The religious diversity is phenomenal. The religious questions and issues we face today are vastly different from those that concerned people two or three hundred years ago, when much of what we focus on in our churches was debated and worked through. So, a major question today, one we have few historic guidelines for is, can non-Christians be saved? It is easy to say, “Apart from Christ, there is no salvation.” But, to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs and everyday Aussie agnostics, that sounds arrogant and even the talk of a potential persecutor. I am an Evangelical. I have been criticised for being too soft on non-Evangelicals, but I look for faith where faith is. I don’t judge people by the name they go under. I am Evangelical. I am glad that someone once called me a Fundamentalist. I am not Fundamentalist in the modern sense, but he was right. I preach the fundamentals, the basics of the Gospel. That was praise, because that man did not agree with every point of my theology. But he listened and saw what I try to do. I am not saying this to praise myself. I am saying it because I want you to know that what I say comes from my evangelical perspective. The first thing to know is God reveals himself to everyone. That was in our passage. ...what may be known
about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his
eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being
understood from what has been made...
God reveals his power and his divine nature to everyone who is willing
to observe and reflect.I have a friend who grew up a Hindu. His mother was raising the children on her own, and Christians came and helped. In his teen years, my friend came to personal faith in Christ. He says that, despite their myriad gods, despite their idolatry, there is a strand of essential truth about God in many Hindu beliefs. When he speaks to Hindus about Christ, he always begins with their concepts of sacrifice, and moves on to speak of Jesus, God’s precious sacrifice. He says that he often finds similar strands of truth in other religions. People who earnestly seek truth about God find a great amount of truth. But it is often so overlaid with falsehood that people can miss the forest for the trees. In addition, there are people who deliberately suppress the truth so that what favours their own interests comes to the fore. For example, Western Rationalism and Islam are both very much centred on their own cultures to the extent that other cultures and languages are suppressed. In that way, God’s diversity in creation is rejected, and either Westernism or Arabism is idolised. So, the truth of God is out there, but hard to find without guidance. The next thing to know is, God wants people of other religions saved. Right back in the Old Testament, we repeatedly read passages like this: 2CH 6:32 “As
for the foreigner who does not belong to your people Israel but has
come from a distant land because of your great name and your mighty
hand and your outstretched arm—when he comes and prays toward this
temple, 33 then hear from heaven, your
dwelling place, and do whatever
the foreigner asks of you, so that all the peoples of the earth may
know your name and fear you, as do your own people Israel, and may know
that this house I have built bears your Name.
orPS 102:21 So the name
of the LORD will be declared in Zion
In
a similar vein, we read,and his praise in Jerusalem 22 when the peoples and the kingdoms assemble to worship the LORD. ISA 2:2
In the last days
In fact, the entire story of Jonah and the great fish is about Israel’s
failure to reach out and include the gentile nations in the knowledge
of God.the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. 3 Many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.” The law will go out from Zion, the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. Don’t forget that, throughout the Old Testament, when it speaks of foreigners and nations, these are never believers in the God if Israel. They are always adherents of other religions. And that would include Hindus and Zoroastrians and, in later times, Buddhists. God wants to save people of other religions. Third, It is possible for someone to live a righteous life, even without God’s full revelation as in the Bible. Paul notices a truth about gentiles who do not have the law, that they still have a moral sense which they either live by or reject. He says in Romans 2: 12ff, All who sin apart
from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who sin under
the law will be judged by the law. 13
For it is not those who hear the
law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law
who will be declared righteous. 14
(Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not
have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law
for themselves, even though they do not have the law, 15
since they
show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts,
their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now
accusing, now even defending them.) 16
This will take place on the day
when God will judge men’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel
declares.
Many philosophical theologians have said that this inbuilt moral sense
that we all have is another demonstration that God truly exists.However, you need to look more closely at what Paul says here. He is not saying that the Gentiles will all be saved. The passage is about God’s judgment of those who reject God’s truth; it is about God’s judgment of those who know the law and don’t do it, or who know in their hearts what God wants, and reject that inner witness. Paul assumes that it is more likely that people — Jews, Gentiles or whatever — will reject the truth they know, than that they will live fully by it. When I say that it is possible to live a righteous life, essentially that means that there is no necessary barrier. It’s not that some people can’t possibly know what God requires. He doesn’t demand more than we could possibly give. And, in fact, in Romans 3, Paul declares under the inspiration of God’s Spirit, that All have sinned and
come short of the Glory of God.
His observation of human beings is that we chronically reject the truth
when we are confronted with it.Fourth, Even reducing all laws and moral demands to their basics, every single person fails consistently and absolutely. In Matthew 22, we read, ...an expert in the
law, tested [Jesus] with this question: 36
“Teacher, which is the
greatest commandment in the Law?”
The old–time theologians were right in saying that we can only claim a
legal right to salvation if we can show that, throughout our entire
lives, we have obeyed those two commands “...without let or
intermission.” Is there anyone, has there ever been anyone, in all
creation, who consistently and uninterruptedly loved God with entire
and pure devotion, apart from Jesus himself? Is there anyone, has there
ever been anyone, in all creation, who consistently and uninterruptedly
loved his neighbour as hie or she loved himself or herself, apart from
Jesus himself?MT 22:37 Jesus replied: “ `Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: `Love your neighbour as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Here is where every religion falls down -- even Christianity as a religion. The forms and the rituals and the practices of Christianity are no better at changing hearts than any other religion's forms, rituals and practices are. The difference is not in the outward things, but in Jesus. No matter how good, no matter how noble, no matter how self–abnegating that religion is, it is entirely powerless to change that core failure to love either God or our neighbour as God commands that we should. I’ve told you before about the time I was driving along Parramatta Road, praying fervently for someone whom I was having difficulty relating to. I wanted the person to have a new experience of God’s power and grace. I thought I was being really obedient to God until he spoke to me. “You want that person to be easier for you to get on with, don’t you?” That was all. That was enough. My prayer wasn’t love, it was selfishness wrapped in religious paper. We rarely do a good deed, and the weight of sins on our shoulders increases by the moment. Fifth, No other religion provides an adequate response to our sinfulness. The failure of other religions to respond to sinfulness comes from two sources. First, they don’t really grasp the seriousness of sin. They redefine sin in terms of what is possible to us. So you sin if you break wind while praying — that is a genuine example from one religion — and you win if you don‘t. The chances are that you will win more than you sin, as long as you watch your diet. And winners, people with more successes than failures, receive God’s heavenly Pat on the Head. Don’t imagine that non–Christian religions don’t have a concept of serious sin. They all say that murder and theft and certain kinds of sexual transgression are sin. They just don’t see that a person can have clean hands when it comes to murder, theft and adultery but still be a sinner through failure to see that the underlying principles of all law are humanly impossible to keep. The second reason why other religions fail to provide an adequate response to sin is that they have no concept of sin creating a debt or ripping the relationship with God apart. The result of a limited grasp of sin is an inability to respond. If you broke a rich man’s window and didn’t compensate him, the $100 it costs to replace it and the inconvenience of having to close off that room of the mansion until the glazier does the repair is just nuisance stuff. There are many people who earn $100 in an hour — I’m not one, though! But the same sized window in the poor widow’s shack costs her half a week’s pension and gives her pneumonia because she can’t close off her single room from the freezing weather. Only Christianity really grasps that all sin is a murderous crime like breaking the old lady’s window rather than a misdemeanour like breaking the rich man’ window. So only Christianity truly seeks the death penalty for all sin; and only Christianity is capable of having mercy equally on all through the substitution of Jesus in my place. So we can come to a conclusion about whether religions other than Christianity are capable of bringing a person to salvation. In summary, we can say that God reveals himself to everyone and wants everyone to be saved, regardless of their religion. We can also say that he provides everyone the opportunity to know and respond to his moral requirements. However, we can also say that all religions other than Christianity miss the depth of sinfulness. Consequently, they fail to provide an adequate response. We could have gone further and shown that the rules and rituals of most religious systems actually lead people further into sin, because they create pride and engender division. People become proud of their achievements in prayer or fasting, or look down on those who don’t follow the same rules, or who don’t follow the rules as well. Action: You can’t turn all the world’s animists to Christ — though he might call you to be a mssionary to some of them. But you can deal with yourself. You can acknowledge the fact that you constantly and consistently sin against God and your fellow humans, to the extent that there is no health in your own spiritual nature. You can decide to turn back to God, to reject the hold of sin over your life. You can trust Jesus to save you — the Lord who says, Come to me all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest... Come now, and find life. And then begin sharing that life with others, until the world is filled with the knowledge of our God. AMEN! |
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| © Peter R. Green 2003. Permission is granted for quotation in full for non-commercial purposes provided that authorship is acknowledged and this copyright notice is displayed with the text. | |
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