1 John 1:1-4

One of the great things that I've experienced about Ealing already, even just being here a week, is that I've noticed in my brief time that it's made up of so many different people from so many different parts of the world.

And all of these individuals, many of whom are your friends and your family, maybe just your neighbours, they make up lots of different views about who God is, if there is a God, and what he's like.

Whether Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, whether spiritual, we've all got friends like that, whether atheist or just apathetic.

We all have a view of God, but the question is, how do you know who's right?

With all of these different views, how do you know who's right?

As Christians, what makes us so certain that while other views claim to be right, that it's only Christianity that is right when it comes to the truth about who God is?

So the question we're going to be engaging with from this text in 1 John is why the incarnation means that only Christianity can be true.

By incarnation, what we mean is the idea that God, the God of the universe, became flesh.

That God became man in the person of Jesus, which is what John is getting at in our text when he says, verse 2, that the life was made manifest in a way that was able to be seen, touched, heard.

Now this is an idea we're going to come back to again and again.

Now even as I say, only Christianity can be true.

There's a weird atmosphere, isn't there?

I sense a few feathers being ruffled because engaging with the issue of other religions is always tricky.

We feel like we're stepping on other people's toes and we don't want to make people feel uncomfortable or unnecessarily cause offence.

Do you know what we do in response to not wanting to unnecessarily cause offence?

I think it's actually far worse.

What we do is we flatten out all religion.

We flatten out all spirituality.

And pretend that there isn't any differences between any of them.

We make Allah the same as Brahman.

We make Nirvana the same as heaven.

And we make all practices of different religions essentially the same.

You must have heard this.

Whether it's in coffee shops or around.

People who say, well, essentially they're all the same.

It's just different religions emphasize different aspects of God.

And that brings us to our first heading.

The first thing we're going to look at.

Aren't all religions essentially the same?

Generally people collapse these different views of God into saying that no one really knows.

So we're all right.

There's a well-known parable about six blind men and an elephant that illustrates this really well.

Those unfamiliar with the story, here it goes.

The six blind men, they encounter an elephant.

Although in the story no one really knows how they know it's an elephant.

But the first blind man, he touches the trunk of the elephant and says,

do you know what, an elephant is like a palm tree.

Another blind man touches its big side and says, well, an elephant's like a rough wall.

Another feels its tail and another one feels, you know, says it's like rope.

And a tusk says, well, it's more like a sphere.

Each comes in contact with a different part of the elephant.

And it's convinced that their own explanation is correct.

That all the others are wrong.

The thing is, none of them realize that they're all experiencing just one part of the same elephant.

And that none of the explanations are really complete.

And in the same way, it's argued that different religions are just experiencing different parts of one God.

But fail to realize that each is just part of the complete truth.

Do you think that?

Let's sat here this morning.

Do you think that?

That all religions are just different aspects of one God?

Well, maybe you don't, but maybe people around you do.

But the problem with that interpretation of this parable offers,

it's best phrased with a question.

How does the interpreter know that every religion is just part of the overall idea of God?

How does the one telling the story know that it's an elephant?

In order to know this, one would have to be able to see God,

or in the story, see the elephant in all his fullness,

to understand how each of the religions reflect just part of the complete picture.

You see, people who claim that they can dismiss the distinctive claims of Christianity

by saying they're all the same,

that's a really arrogant claim.

It claims to sit above God,

and everyone else,

and be able to be the one who can adjudicate who's right and who's wrong.

But we know that that's not right, is it?

Who has seen everything,

and who has seen God himself,

in order to say who's right and who's wrong?

The answer is no one.

The answer is no one.

No one has the right to say that all religions are the same,

because it dismisses the blatant contradictions between different religions,

but also puts the one who's making that claim

in a position they could never occupy,

above everything.

So if we're not all right,

how do we know which view of God is?

And that brings us to our second section.

We can't say that all religions are the same,

so how do we know who's right?

If all religions are not the same,

how can we know who's right?

It doesn't feel, often,

in the marketplace of different religions,

we're just fumbling around in the dark,

trying to make the best of a bad situation.

This bit seems a bit right,

and this bit seems a bit right.

Because we're kind of trapped in this world,

and we can't get outside the world to find out who's out there.

We're trapped by the laws of physics and chemistry and biology

and all the other constraints on mankind.

We can't get outside of ourselves to see in.

In order to grasp our situation,

as we fumble around to make different claims about God,

I'm going to use another illustration,

so park your elephant and your six blind men over here,

and come with me,

and I want you to imagine for a moment,

that sat in this room,

everything goes black.

just momentarily,

but when the light returns,

you find that you've got no memory

of how you got into this room,

and no memory of what's outside.

And as you look around the room,

you see that the windows are all blocked,

and the doors are locked.

There's no way in,

and there's no way out.

The question is,

how would you know

if there was anything or anyone outside the room?

How would you know?

You have no memory or knowledge

of anything outside the room.

So we'd do our best

with what we could from inside the room

to figure it out.

We'd have those that claim

there is nothing outside the room.

We'd have those who imagine

fantastical things outside the room.

You'd have the poets among us

start writing great odes

about the arrangement of the chairs

and the green blinds at the back.

You'd have the geography lovers

measuring the distance of the room

and undulations in this wooden floor.

You'd have the physicists among us

dropping chairs

to make sure that gravity was here.

You'd have the philosophers

contemplating what was outside the room

and the sociologists among us

just monitoring the groupings

of how we're arranged.

But ultimately,

left to our own devices,

we could explore this locked room

but we could never know

if there was anyone

or anything outside the room.

That's like us in this world, isn't it?

We can explore this world,

we can contemplate this world,

but we could never know

if there was anyone outside this world.

But it doesn't stop us, does it?

You have people saying

that science has got rid of God,

but how could it

when it can't test

what's outside the world

and it can't test

what it can't comprehend?

And you have all sorts of religions

and spiritualities

claiming they have the truth about God

or how we should live,

but how can they

when they're locked in the room,

when they're trapped in this world?

We cannot know

unless,

unless someone

came from outside the room

and came into the room.

And that's what our passage today is.

It's taken us a while to get there,

but our passage today

tells us

that someone from outside the room,

outside of this world,

stepped in.

In a way

that could be seen,

could be heard,

could be touched.

To tell us

about the outside,

that's exactly

what the incarnation is about.

The incarnation,

the coming of Jesus,

means that we're not

blindly groping around

in the dark

trying to figure out

some conception of God,

but God has come to us

to make himself known.

He has made himself manifest.

Listen to how

John 1 puts it

in verse 18.

No one

has ever seen God.

The only God

who is at the Father's side,

He has made him known.

Or,

to use the Adam Wilson paraphrase,

no one has ever been

outside the room

or been face to face

with God

to know what He's like.

But,

the one and only

Son of God

who is God,

has made himself

known to us.

He has come into the room

so that we are

without question

of what God is like.

2,000 years ago,

in history,

in a way that could be

seen,

heard,

touched,

God came into the world.

The world that He had made

in order to reveal Himself

to those He had made.

Knowing we could never find Him

fumbling around in the room,

He came to us.

Do you know what?

The incarnation is

God's personal introduction

to the world He's made.

The great writer,

C.S. Lewis,

he gave this great illustration,

thinking of it like Hamlet

bumbling around

inside one of Shakespeare's plays,

trying to find Shakespeare.

But how could Hamlet

ever know Shakespeare,

although the world

that he was in

would have the strokes

of Shakespeare's pen

surrounding him?

He could never come

face to face with Shakespeare

unless Shakespeare

wrote himself

into the play.

And that's what

the incarnation is.

The God

whose fingerprints

are on every aspect

of this world

wrote Himself

into the script

of history

that we might know

what He's like.

In each of the four Gospels,

the Bible,

in the Bible,

we're given eyewitness accounts

to the life of Jesus.

Accounts of when God

stepped into the room

when God wrote Himself

into history.

history.

And if you're familiar

at all

with the Gospels,

then you'll know

that John,

who wrote the passage

that we read earlier,

and the rest of his followers,

they were with Him

at every turn.

You know,

the followers of Jesus,

they ate with Him,

they prayed with Him,

they walked down dirt roads

with Him

in the hot sunshine.

They saw Him

do the miraculous,

miraculous,

and they saw Him

do the very ordinary.

The followers of Jesus

were witness to His life,

His death,

and even His resurrection.

They were there

every step of the way,

watching,

hearing,

touching.

This man,

who was also God,

and they wrote it

all down.

They wrote it

all down

for people like you

and me

to know the truth

about what God

is like.

They left no ambiguity.

Thousands and thousands

witnessed,

marveled at His miracles

as He healed the sick

and cared for the weak.

They were astonished

at the teaching

about the rebellion

of mankind,

but the grace

and forgiveness

that God gives

to all those

who return to Him.

A teaching which

they'd never heard

the likeness of before.

They believed

and followed Him,

having seen Him

physically raised

from the dead,

proving all of His claims

about everlasting life

and life outside the room

were true.

Do you know what?

God coming into His creation

in the person of Jesus

means that He has

the final word

on what God is like.

Do you know what?

Every other religion

that challenges Jesus

is false.

But the good news is

that Jesus,

in Him,

when we come face

to face with God,

we come face to face

with a God

that no human imagination

could ever have come up with.

A God who is

infinitely powerful

yet cares for the people

He's made.

A God holy

and just

and yet makes a way

for sinful people

who deserve justice

to be forgiven.

a God that is

good.

All religions

that imagine,

sorry,

all other religions

imagine a God

that is trivial

in comparison

to the God of the Bible.

To the beauty

of the true God

revealed in Jesus.

And perhaps

what's most remarkable

is that He came

so that people

like you and me

could know

this great God

personally.

And that brings us

to our closing

point.

So why does

all this matter?

You know,

if God has

personally introduced

Himself

so there is no

ambiguity anymore

about what God

is like,

that expels

all false religion,

man-made religion

just imagining

what God is like,

what are we to do?

we start by asking

the question

why the incarnation

means that only

Christianity is true

but I hope you can see

that the answer

is simple.

That if

Jesus really is

who He says He is,

if God has really

come into His creation

in order to make it

beyond doubt

about who He is

and what He's like,

then it means

any other view

can't be true.

But more than that,

look at those

three of our passage.

That

which we have

seen

and heard

we proclaim

also to you.

Why?

This is the so what?

This is the

wake up and listen

point.

Why have we gone

and done all of

this work?

Why have we

said, you know,

this is who Jesus is?

Why has He gone

to great pains

to write this letter?

So why has the

whole Bible

been recorded?

Well, this message

about God

incarnate

is so that you

too may have

fellowship with us

and indeed

our fellowship

is with,

here we go,

with the Father

and with His Son

Jesus Christ.

So what John

wants us,

as well as his

original readers,

to know that

God in the flesh

has come

so that we

can know God.

Now,

there's a whole

host of things

we need to talk

about because

Jesus makes a lot

of claims about

who we are

in His world

and how we've

rebelled against Him

and the consequences

for that.

But the coming

of God in the

person of Jesus

is good news.

And we're going

to unpack that

more because

Him coming

is the way

that it makes

it possible

for us to

have fellowship

with Him,

to know God,

to be friends

with God.

And we're going

to think about

the life,

death and

resurrection

of Jesus

in a lot

more detail

next time.

So for now,

if you're a

Christian,

maybe new to

Christianity,

and you've never

read these

eyewitness accounts

of Jesus,

I really want

to encourage you

to do so.

We've got some

copies of John's

Gospel at the

back.

In those pages,

you will come

face to face

with the God

who made you.

And for those

of you who are

not Christians,

but are kind of

interested in

thinking about it,

and maybe this

talk has sparks

for questions for

you,

I really want to

encourage you to

come and ask

them.

I remember

that moment

when I had

lots of questions

about who

Jesus was,

and why he

came.

And if I

hadn't asked

them, I

wouldn't be

stood here.

But I also

want to encourage

you to come

next time.

We're going to

be thinking

about the

significance,

why he had

to come bodily

and physically,

and not just

spiritually and

abstractly.

And I want to

assure you,

there's even

better news

than that.

Let me just

pray.