Isn't Christianity Exclusive and Arrogant?

The scripture reading comes from the Gospel of John chapter 4, starting at verse 1.

John 4 · chapter mention

Please follow along in the screen or in your Bible.

Now, when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John,

although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples,

he left Judea and departed again for Galilee.

Then he had to pass through Samaria.

So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.

Jacob's well was there, so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well.

It was about the sixth hour.

A woman from Samaria came to draw water.

Jesus said to her,

Give me a drink, for his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

The Samaritan woman said to him,

How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?

For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.

Jesus answered her,

If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you,

Give me a drink, you would have asked him,

and he would have given you living water.

The woman said to him,

Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep.

Where do you get the living water?

Are you greater than our father Jacob?

He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.

Jesus said to her,

Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again,

but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again.

The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water,

welling up to eternal life.

The woman said to him,

Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.

Jesus said to her,

Go, call your husband and come here.

The woman answered him,

I have no husband.

Jesus said to her,

You are right in saying I have no husband,

for you have had five husbands,

and the one you now have is not your husband.

What you have said is true.

The woman said to him,

Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.

Our fathers worshipped on this mountain,

but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.

Jesus said to her,

Woman, believe me,

the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.

You worship what you do not know.

We worship what we know,

for salvation is from the Jews.

But the hour is coming and is now here

when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.

For the Father is seeking such people to worship him.

God is spirit,

and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

The woman said to him,

I know that Messiah is coming,

he who is called Christ.

When he comes,

he will tell us all things.

Jesus said to her,

I who speak to you am he.

Just then his disciples came back.

They marveled that he was talking with a woman,

but no one said,

What do you seek?

Or,

Why are you talking with her?

So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people,

Come,

see a man who told me all that I ever did.

Can this be the Christ?

Amen.

Amen.

Great.

Good morning,

everybody.

And it's wonderful to be with you again this morning.

Again,

if you're new to Watermark and you don't know me,

my name is Kevin.

I'm one of the leaders,

one of the pastors here.

And it's wonderful to be able to be with you this morning.

And to kick off our new series that we're starting called,

Why Christianity?

For the next couple of weeks,

we're going to be exploring some of the questions and the difficulties that we have

when we consider the claims of Jesus Christ in the Bible.

And so we're so glad that you're joining us this morning.

And we're looking forward to the next couple of weeks.

Now this morning,

we're looking at the question,

Isn't Christianity exclusivist and therefore arrogant?

Isn't Christianity exclusivist and arrogant?

You may have heard the story.

It's based on an old Hindu parable from many,

many years ago that says there were four blind men walking through the jungle.

They stumble across an elephant,

a very tame elephant.

And each one of them takes an aspect of the element and feels it,

trying to work out what it is.

And so the first blind man grabs hold of the trunk and he says,

This thing is long and narrow and bendy.

It feels a little bit like a snake.

The second man grabs a tusk and says,

No, no, no.

This thing is hard.

It narrows.

It's got a point on the end.

This thing feels like a spear.

The third man grabs the ear and says,

No, this is flat and wavy and it creates air movement like a fan.

And the fourth man grabs the elephant's leg and says,

No, no.

This is hard.

It's solid.

It's sturdy.

It feels like a tree trunk.

And so the parable says,

Well, they're all partly right,

but they're all partly wrong.

Wouldn't it be arrogant?

Wouldn't it be exclusivistic for any one of them to say,

I have the answer.

I am right.

I know what's going on here.

Sometimes when we think of religion and faith,

it can feel a little bit like that.

When somebody says,

I believe something to be true,

we tend to think that all religions are fundamentally the same,

superficially different.

They're all heading in the same direction.

And it's simply arrogant.

It's exclusivistic for one person,

one faith to say,

We believe this is how things really are.

This is the truth.

Sometimes when we hear people talking like that,

we can feel that those people have a sense of superiority about them,

as if they're looking down on anybody who believes differently from them,

and judges them with a sense of,

I'm right.

You're wrong.

I know what's going on.

You don't.

I'm better than you.

Isn't Christianity arrogant and exclusivist?

This morning,

what I want to put to us is that all people are of equal value and dignity and respect.

All people have freedom of religion,

freedom of worship,

freedom to believe what they want.

And yet not all beliefs or ideas are equally valid,

because not all ideas are equally true.

There's four things I want us to think about this morning as we think about this question.

I want to think about the nature of truth,

the challenge of truth,

the promise of truth,

and finally,

the person of truth.

So let's dive straight in.

Firstly,

the nature of truth.

We're looking at this passage that Betty read to us this morning,

this encounter in John's gospel in John chapter four.

And in order to understand what's going on here,

it helps to understand some of the backstory.

Jesus encounters this lady at a watering well in Samaria.

Now,

this lady that Jesus encounters is a lady who carries a lot of shame in her life.

And we know this for two reasons.

The first reason is the scripture tells us she's been married,

five times.

And the man she's with at the moment is not actually her husband.

And even in our modern day,

that would be quite a story.

But in ancient Israel,

this was nothing less than scandalous.

The village in which she lives isn't a big city.

It's not a mega city.

These are small villages.

Everybody in the town knows that this lady has had five husbands.

And everybody in the town knows that she's with somebody at the moment

who's not really her husband.

This was a cause for great gossip and scandal all throughout the town.

But the other reason we know this is because the woman is coming to the well at midday.

Nobody in the ancient world went to go collect water,

heavy buckets of water in the heat of the day.

In the middle of the day,

temperatures could get to 45,

50 degrees Celsius.

No one would go to the watering well then.

Everyone would go in the earliest part of the day

or late in the evening to avoid the heat of the day.

Why does this lady come in the middle of the day?

The reason is because she knows that nobody else will be there.

She's going there because it's the one time of the day

that she can get away from the scowls,

the looks,

the comments,

the mocking thoughts,

the jabs of the other woman in the town.

All those who know her story

and are judging her.

And so she comes to the watering well

in the middle of the day

hoping to avoid everybody else

for just a bit of peace and quiet.

And yet she encounters Jesus.

And as she encounters Jesus,

Jesus makes this radical claim

because Jesus makes the unashamedly

strong claim

that he's nothing less than the Messiah,

God in human form.

And yet as we're going to see,

this is not bad news.

This is good news.

Let's look firstly at the nature of truth.

Jesus, in his conversation with this lady,

makes some pretty big claims about himself.

They're at the watering well

and Jesus says to her,

everyone who drinks of this water

will be thirsty again,

but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him

will never be thirsty again.

The water that I give

will become within him or her

a spring of living water

welling up to eternal life.

What's Jesus saying?

Well, he's making a pretty big

and binary claim.

He's saying,

to find what your heart

and your soul is looking for,

you have to come to me.

But if you reject me,

you'll never find

what you're looking for

in the deepest part of you.

Jesus is not saying

that he is a path

to meaning and satisfaction in life.

All the things

that that lady's been looking for

and the five men that she's married

and the man she's with now,

all the affirmation

and the acceptance

and the approval

and the love.

Jesus says,

I'm not just one path

to all of those things.

I'm the path.

Either you come to me

and find what your heart is looking for

or you reject me

and you never find

what you're looking for.

Again, Jesus says to her,

he says,

look, go and call your husband.

And she says,

well, I don't have a husband.

And Jesus so graciously says,

what you've said is true.

You're right in saying

I have no husband

for you've had five

and the man that you're with

right now is not your husband.

And then Jesus says

this amazing thing.

He says,

what you've said

is just,

is true.

Now that's an incredible thing to say

because let's be honest,

what she said

was technically true

but it wasn't really

the whole truth, right?

She's being,

what some people have called

is economical with the truth.

She's saying something

that's technically true

but it's actually misleading.

And rather than Jesus

calling her out

and saying,

you liar,

you're deceiving me,

Jesus graciously

challenges her

with what is really true

while not judging her

or exposing her

to more shame.

The tenderness of Jesus

is just amazing.

And yet,

Jesus doesn't brush over it.

He confronts her

with the reality.

Why does Jesus do that?

The reason is

because Jesus

doesn't want this lady

or any of us

to be confused

about the absolute,

even binary nature

of truth claims.

Jesus is unashamedly

challenging

the post-truth culture

by saying

that truth is real,

it's knowable,

it's absolute,

and it corresponds

to reality.

Jesus claiming

that what is true

is by nature exclusive

because what is

is distinct

from what isn't.

What's true

is distinct

from what's false.

And friends,

I want to put it to us

that we all actually

know this.

We all,

in order to function

in an ordered

and logical world,

we all need to believe

in the objective reality,

the nature of truth.

Imagine,

you're about to step

out of your apartment

and your housemate

or your spouse

says to you,

oh,

it's just started raining,

you better take

an umbrella with you.

How many of us

would feel

that our housemate

is being arrogant,

exclusivistic,

to impose upon us

their version

of the truth?

How many of us

would say,

that may be true of you,

but that's not true

for me.

Don't impose

your worldview upon us.

Now,

you can say that,

but if you don't

want to get wet

while walking in the rain,

you have to conform

to the reality

that walking in the rain

without an umbrella

is going to render you wet.

You see,

truth is not a social construct.

It's not something

people came up with

to control

or manipulate people.

Truth corresponds

to reality.

Here's another example.

I know this is

a little bit hypothetical,

but just bear with me

for a second.

Just imagine for a second

that the airports are open

and that you're actually

flying on an airplane

to go on holiday.

I know that hasn't happened

for any of us

for a very long time,

but just imagine

that the airports are open

and you're flying somewhere.

How many of us

want to fly on an airplane

when the co-pilot

says to his pilot,

look,

in order to land safely,

you need to drop your speed,

tilt the wings,

and drop your altitude.

How many of us

want a pilot that says,

don't impose your truth on me?

Don't be so arrogant

as to tell me

what is your version of truth?

That may be true for you,

but that's not true for me.

None of us want that,

right?

In order to function

in an ordered

and a logical world,

we all actually believe

in the objective nature

of truth.

We believe that truth

corresponds to reality.

A few years ago,

the atheist astrophysicist

Neil deGrasse Tyson,

a very famous astrophysicist

in the US,

said this.

He said,

the good thing about science

is that it's true

whether you believe in it

or not.

Well,

that's absolutely true,

right?

Whether you believe

in gravitational forces

or the earth is round

or not,

doesn't really matter.

Those things are real.

That is reality.

But if you think about it,

that's not just true

for science.

That's the good news

about all truth.

Truth is truth,

and it's real

whether you believe in it

or not.

As Os Guinness said,

truth is truth

even if nobody believes in it

and falsehood is false

even if everybody

believes in it.

And what that means

is that truth

by nature

is exclusive.

It makes a claim

about the world.

It says,

this is the way the world is.

This is the way

the world is not.

It separates what's true

from what's false,

what's real

from what isn't,

what's dependable

from what is faulty.

And this is the case

for all truth,

not just religious truth.

Anything that claims

to be truth

by nature

is exclusive.

And so when someone says,

there's no such thing

as absolute truth,

all religions

are just the same,

well that is actually

a truth claim.

That's a propositional claim

about the way

the world is.

That's saying that

the world is this way,

it's not this way.

I believe the world

is like this.

That is a false view

of religion

and who God is.

Even the belief

that there's no such thing

as objective,

exclusive truth

is an objective truth

claim about the way

that the world is.

And so if you think

about the story,

the parable of the elephant,

the only way,

the only reason

that it seems

to make sense

is because that story

is told

from the vantage point,

the viewpoint

of the narrator.

Somebody who claims

to have absolute

perfect perspective

on the world,

somebody who says,

let me tell you

about how the world is.

This is what

the world is like.

It's like four men

that stumble across

an elephant.

The only way

you can possibly claim

that no religion

can see the whole truth

is if you yourself

have superior,

comprehensive knowledge

about spiritual reality,

the very knowledge

that you've just claimed

nobody really has.

You see,

all truth claims

by nature

are exclusive.

They make a claim.

This is the way

the world is.

Secondly,

the challenge of truth.

Now,

why do we struggle

with this nature of truth?

Why do we struggle

with the idea

that this is the way

the world is?

And we push back

and we like the idea

of living in a post-truth culture.

Part of the reason

is because the character

of truth

is that it's confrontational.

It's challenging.

It challenges us

to say,

this is a reality.

You need to align your life

to reality.

In other words,

it calls us

to surrender

and submit

to the reality

of what the truth is.

There's an old story.

It's a bit of a folklore story.

But there's an old story

of a U.S. battleship

sailing somewhere

along the coast

of Central America.

And it's twilight.

It's going into the evening.

There's fog all around.

The weather's very bad.

Nobody can really see

much around them.

But up ahead,

the battleship sees

a light flashing

in its direction

and realizes

there's a ship

in its way.

And so the captain

says to his radio man,

get on the radio

and tell that ship

to adjust their course

by 20 degrees,

otherwise we're going

to collide.

And so the radio man

sends this message across

and the message

comes back saying,

no,

we're not adjusting.

You change your course.

The captain's

a bit irritated.

He says,

listen,

tell them

they better change

their course quickly,

otherwise this is going

to end up in a collision.

The message comes back

saying,

we're not moving.

You adjust your course.

The captain grabs

the radio

and he says,

listen,

this is the captain

of the U.S. destroyer.

I command you now

to immediately

adjust your course.

The message comes back

saying,

this is the keeper

of the lighthouse.

I suggest

you adjust

your course.

It's a silly story,

but it illustrates

the point

that reality

and truth

are confrontational.

It challenges us.

When we're confronted

with the reality

of truth,

we can't just

carry on

as if life

is arbitrary

or has no reality.

Truth confronts us

and says,

what are you going

to do

with the truth

that you've just

been told?

In this exchange

with the woman,

after Jesus

has revealed

her situation

with her various

romantic partners,

the woman replies

and says,

sir,

I perceive

that you're a prophet.

And she changes

the conversation

to spiritual matters,

things that she thinks

are a little bit

more ethereal.

And she says to Jesus,

look,

our people say

that you should

worship on this mountain.

Your people,

the Jews,

say that we should

worship on this mountain.

Who knows really

what's right

and what's true.

I guess they both

kind of work.

And Jesus replies

in effect

and says,

look,

it doesn't matter

where you worship

or how you worship.

What matters

is the condition

of your heart.

What's Jesus saying?

Jesus is saying,

look,

you can do it here,

you can worship there,

you worship in your home

or a schoolyard

or a cathedral.

That's not what's important.

What's important

is that if you want

to know God,

if you want to know

the truth,

you've got to

encounter God,

you've got to be truthful,

not fake.

You've got to be surrendered.

You've got to come

to Him

and let Him

confront you

with the reality

of who He is.

And then she says

something very interesting.

She says,

well,

I guess,

who knows how

these things work out.

I hear the Messiah's coming.

When He comes,

He'll tell us reality.

And Jesus says to her,

lady,

the man that speaks

to you

is He.

I am

the Messiah.

Jesus is confronting her

with the fact

that He's not only

someone who's bringing

the truth,

He claims to be

the truth.

And throughout the Gospels,

Jesus is constantly saying

these confrontational,

these challenging things.

Jesus is constantly

challenging the people

who are listening to Him

to saying,

this is a reality.

What are you going

to do about it?

Jesus says things like,

whoever holds on

to His life

will find that He loses it.

But if you're willing

to lay down your life

for my sake

in order to know me,

you'll actually find life.

Jesus says things like,

nobody can come

to the Father.

Nobody can discover

the reality of who God is

unless you come to me.

At one point,

some people are debating,

should they follow Jesus

or should they stick

with the family business?

And they're oscillating

a little bit

between the two.

And Jesus says,

either you're in

or you're out.

You can't be in two camps.

Either you believe

I am who I say I am

or you reject me,

but you can't just

admire me.

You can't sit on the fence.

Jesus is constantly

making statements.

Things like,

I am the door

to reality.

I am the gate.

I am living water.

I am truth.

And what He's saying is,

you can't just admire Him.

You can't just tolerate Him.

Jesus doesn't allow us

just to consider Himself

a good moral man

that had some wisdom.

He lays down a claim,

a binary claim,

an exclusive claim.

And He says,

what are you going to do with it?

How are you going to respond

to my claim

that I am the way to truth?

Os Guinness said it like this.

He said,

there's two people in the world.

Those who conform their lives

to the truth

or those who try

and conform truth

to their lives.

And again,

we actually know

that this is self-evident.

That when somebody says,

this is the way the world is,

this is reality,

we either conform to it

or reject it.

But you can't sit on the fence.

Imagine your doctor comes to you

and he says,

listen,

you are in an unhealthy state

unless you lose some weight,

you start eating healthy

and you take this medication,

you're going to be dead

in six months' time.

Well,

we can philosophize

all we want

about how arrogant that is,

how exclusivist that is.

But the reality is,

if you want to live

longer than six months,

you have to conform,

align your life

to the truth

of what the doctor said.

You see, friends,

in our post-truth culture,

we may be tempted to say,

well,

why can't I pick and choose?

I'll take a bit of Jesus,

the Sermon on the Mount

that's about turning

the other cheek

and forgiving your enemies.

I'll take a bit

of Eastern meditation.

I'll blend my own fusion

of what I believe

is to be true.

But friends,

when we do that,

we form a God

in our own image.

We make a God

who looks just like us,

a God who never challenges us,

but ultimately,

we make up a God

that doesn't have

any connection

to reality.

The challenge of truth

is that it calls us

to submit,

to surrender.

Now,

why is this so important?

Well,

thirdly,

because the promise

of truth.

You see,

the stakes

couldn't be higher.

Truth promises

nothing less

than freedom.

In the mid-20th century,

philosophers

like Michel Foucault

and others

came up with the idea

that truth

and reality

is relative.

It's not really

a real thing.

Michel Foucault

taught that

truth and reality

is a social construct,

something that

those in power

have created

in order to

oppress

the powerless.

And so,

Foucault and others

were saying that

when somebody,

especially those in power,

claim that something

is right

or something is true

or use things

like divine decree,

God has said so,

actually,

that's a social construct

to manipulate

or control

those that

oppose them

or their opponents.

The great example

of this,

of course,

is the Crusades

in the Middle Ages,

right,

where the church

was saying,

we need to impose

the reality of Christianity

on the rest of the world.

And they went

in their army

and try to

oppose and oppress

their opponents.

Remember the famous saying,

religion is the opium

of the masses.

It's used to

oppress and suppress,

manipulate and control

people.

And of course,

one of the great examples

of this is Nazi Germany.

Hitler claimed that

Jews and homosexuals

and gypsies

were the scourge

of Germany.

They were the problem

of everything.

They were the source

of all Germany's problems.

And for Germany

to really be

the nation

it was meant to be,

we need to get rid

of the scourge

of Germany.

Hitler propagated

this truth

that these people

were stealing

the jobs

of hard-working

German nationals

and we need to

eradicate

such people

from our nation

so that we can be

a pure

and a wholesome

country again.

Michel Foucault

said,

people like Hitler,

people like the Crusaders,

were constructing

truth.

Truth isn't really real.

It was a social construct

to impose their will

upon others

to control

and manipulate them.

But is this really true?

As we discover,

the problem

is not actually truth.

The problem

is the contortion

of truth

or the manipulation

of truth.

In fact,

the greatest problem

is half-truths.

Any authoritarian regime

or dictator

has found

that truth

is so powerful

that if you can

take something

and dress it up

as truth,

if you can make

something look

like truth,

it's a powerful weapon

that you can use

to control others.

But the problem

isn't actually

the nature

of truth itself.

It's the contortion

and the distortion

of truth.

One of Hitler's

great ministers

in parliament

was a man

by the name

of Joseph Goebbels

and he was

the minister

of propaganda.

Joseph Goebbels

said this.

He said,

if you tell

a lie

big enough

and you keep

repeating it,

people will eventually

come to believe it.

Now just pause there

for a second.

What does that sound like?

That sounds like

fake news, right?

If you can come up

with a lie

big enough

and keep repeating it,

people will eventually

come to believe it.

It thus becomes

vitally important

for the Nazi state

to use all

of its powers

to repress

dissent

and the truth.

For truth

is the mortal

enemy

of the lie

and thus

by extension

is the greatest

enemy

of our state.

You see what Goebbels

is saying?

He's saying

the problem is

we've come up

with a version

of truth,

a half truth.

We've come up

with a hypothesis

and we better

not let anybody

find out

what the truth is.

There's a

fascinating documentary

on Netflix

at the moment

called

The Social Dilemma.

I'm not sure

if you've seen it.

In this documentary,

the creators

interview a whole

bunch of

previous VPs,

presidents,

top executives

of a bunch

of social media

companies

from Silicon Valley.

They're talking

about the challenge

that the social

media age

that we live in

presents

and particularly

the challenge

of the smartphone

and what this

is doing

for our civilization.

One of the

people that they

interview is a man

by the name

of Tristan Harris,

a former executive

at Google.

Listen to what

Tristan Harris says.

He says,

if we don't agree

on what is true

or that there is

such a thing

as truth,

then we are toast.

This is the problem

beneath all other

problems because

if we can't agree

on what is true,

we can't navigate

out of any

of our problems.

Do you see

what he's saying?

He's saying

the problem

of fake news

in our age

is rampant

and actually

what's at stake

is nothing less

than the freedom

of our civilization.

The answer

is not to suppress

truth.

The answer

is not to deny

truth.

It's to come

to a comprehensive

understanding

that this is truth

and unless we can

agree on that,

we are toast.

We are finished.

Friends,

the ramifications

of truth

are so vitally

important because

what's at stake

is nothing less

than freedom,

both for individuals

and nations

and entire civilizations

because even though

truth demands

your submission,

your alignment,

even though it claims

certain things

are always true

and certain things

are always false,

when we align ourselves

to what's truth,

the result is always

freedom and liberty.

And it's not only

true socially

or nationally,

it's equally true

personally and individually.

I'm not sure

how many of us

have ever been

in this situation

where maybe

you know something

or you've been

sworn to secrecy

something that

you cannot tell

or maybe

you've done

something that

you're so ashamed

of,

embarrassed about

and you swear

that you're going

to go to your grave

and nobody's going

to find out about it.

Friends,

how are you ever

going to be free

from the burden

and the weight

of such responsibility?

The only way

is to speak the truth

because truth

leads to freedom.

That's why

anyone who's engaged

in Alcoholics Anonymous

program

or another 12-step

program knows

that the very

first step

is to acknowledge

reality

because the denial

of reality

never leads

to freedom.

In order to be free

you have to face

the reality

that is before you.

The ancient Hebrews

had a proverb

that said this,

buy the truth

and do not sell it.

It's so simple

but it's so profound.

Whatever it costs you,

whatever the cost

involved,

buy the truth,

obtain the truth

and no matter

what it costs you,

never ever sell it.

Never give up on truth

because to give up

on truth

will always cost you

more

than holding on

to truth.

Truth is costly,

it's true

but it's liberating

and it's free.

And Jesus

in one of his

most famous teachings

says this,

if you listen

to my teachings

you'll be free.

You will discover

the truth

and the truth

will set you free.

Earlier this year

I was listening

to the story

of a man

by the name

of Michael Ramston

and he was telling

the story

of how he became

a follower of Jesus.

He said he grew up

in a family

that wasn't religious

at all.

He grew up in Lebanon

and as a teenager

he had big questions

about life

and faith

and meaning

and purpose

and what is true

and in Lebanon

he discovers

this old missionary

and he starts asking

this missionary questions,

big questions

about life

and eventually

some of his brother

and his friends

they join this bit

of a group

and they hang out

with this missionary

asking him

these questions

of life

and this missionary

one day says

listen,

let's arrange

a weekend away

and you can ask me

all the questions

that you want

and we can debate

and talk about

the nature of truth.

So they go away

for the weekend

and on the Friday night

Michael Ramston

realizes that the claims

of Jesus are true

but for him

that's a problem

he didn't want

them to be true.

Listen to what he says.

He says,

I've come to the realization

that Christianity

was true

but I didn't want

it to be true

because I thought

it would make

my life miserable.

I was debating

how long

can I hold off

making this decision

because I thought

that becoming

a Christian

would be the end

of my happiness.

So on the Saturday morning

he wakes up early

he's wrestling

with the decision.

He knows it's true

but he doesn't want

to follow Jesus

because he thinks

it'll be the end

of his happiness.

He goes up

onto a mountainside

and he smokes

40 cigarettes.

Chain smokes

two packs of cigarettes

wrestling with this decision.

He eventually comes down

and he gets his brother

and his best friends together

and he says,

guys,

I've got some bad news.

I've decided

tonight's the night

I'm going to become

a Christian.

And this is what he says,

tonight I'm going

to sacrifice

my happiness

on the altar

of truth.

Do you see

what he's saying?

He's saying

I've discovered

the truth

and it's demanding

that I align

my life to it.

Even if it costs me

my happiness,

my freedom,

my joy,

I've come to the realization

I have to sacrifice

my happiness

on the altar

of truth.

Except that's not

how it turned out.

This is how

he finishes the story.

When I eventually

became a Christian,

the thing that totally

surprised me

was that I didn't

sink into some kind

of depression

as I had expected.

But unexpectedly,

I actually discovered

this inexplicable joy.

I got the opposite

of what I thought

was coming my way

as a result

of coming

to Jesus.

He thought

that he was going

to sacrifice

his happiness

and his freedom

and his joy

as he aligned

himself to truth.

But what he found

was the opposite.

That coming to the truth

actually gave him

freedom.

It gave him joy.

It gave him

a happiness

he never expected

and had never

anticipated

in his life.

And that leads us

to the fourth point

which is the person

of truth.

The person of truth

is Jesus Christ.

You see,

we said earlier

that every worldview,

every claim

is binary.

It claims

that some things

are true

and some things

are not.

Even the objective

worldview that says

there's no such thing

as truth

is a truth claim

in and of itself.

But Christianity

is distinctive

in this way.

Every worldview

whether atheistic

or theistic

every worldview

says this is truth.

Here is the truth.

Jesus Christ

comes along

and says

I am truth.

I am truth.

I am the way.

I am life.

Everything we've

spoken about

this morning

comes to final

fulfillment in Jesus.

We spoke about

the nature of truth

that it's binary.

It claims

that certain things

are true

certain things are not.

Jesus comes along

and he doesn't say

I am a version of truth

or a part to truth.

He says

I'm the part to truth.

Either you accept me

or you reject me

but you can't sit

on the fence.

We spoke about

the challenge of truth.

It confronts us.

It calls us

to align ourselves

with reality.

Jesus comes and says

either you reject me

or you accept me

but you can't

just tolerate me.

You can't just admire me.

If you're going

to follow me

your whole life

has to come into alignment

and you have to surrender

and give your whole life

to me.

I demand wholehearted devotion.

We spoke about

the promise of truth

liberty and freedom.

Jesus comes along

and says

if anyone listens

to my teaching

they will know the truth

and the truth

will set them free

because I am truth.

But there's more

to Jesus

than just his claim

to being true.

You see

just because Jesus

claims to be truth

and exclusivist

how does that

stop Christians

from being judgmental

and arrogant?

Tim Keller

helps us here.

Listen to what he says.

He says

you cannot avoid

truth claims

and binaries.

The real issue

is which kinds

of truth claims

lead you to embrace

people who are

different from you

even those who

believe differently.

Which truth claims

lead to community?

Which truth claims

both humble

and affirm you

so that you aren't

afraid of people

who are different from you

nor do you despise

and judge them.

You see what

Tim Keller is saying?

He's saying

how do we find

a truth claim

that contrary

to contemporary culture

it doesn't just say

well everything's true.

It actually believes

this is true.

But how do we find

a truth claim?

Where do we find

a truth claim

that contrary

to traditional religion

isn't judgmental

and arrogant

towards those

that are different

from them?

That can even

be gracious

and welcoming

and loving

towards people

who even believe

differently?

Where are we going

to find such

a truth claim?

Friends the answer

is the gospel.

The gospel.

I don't know

if you picked up

in the story

in John chapter 4

John 4 · chapter mention

that Betty read

to us earlier.

This lady

experiences

the truth claim

of Jesus

and yet doesn't

experience

judgmentalism.

She starts off

coming to the well

at the middle of day

to avoid the other

people in the village

because she's tired

of their judgmental

attitudes.

And yet at the end

of the story

after discovering

Jesus

she puts down

her jars of water

she runs

into the village

and she tells

everybody

come to me

listen to me

I've just met

the man

who told me

everything about

my life.

For her whole life

she's tried to hide

the story of her life.

She's tried to

cover up her shame.

She's tried to

let people

not find out

what's going on

her life

because she's

tired of the

judgmentalism.

She discovers

Jesus and she

says everybody

I've just met

a man

who knows

everything about

me and told

me my whole

life

you've got to

come and

discover him.

Why?

Because though

she discovered

the truth of

Jesus

she didn't

encounter

his

judgmentalism

she discovered

his grace.

Friends

in typical

religion

says that

you're accepted

and you're

affirmed

you're in

because of

what you do

because you've

met the grade

you've obeyed

the teachings

you've fulfilled

the commandments

you've done

everything that's

required of you

you've observed

the rules

but in the gospel

Jesus says

you can be

accepted

you can be

affirmed

you can be

welcomed into

his family

not because of

what you've

done

but because of

what he's

done

because he

died on the

cross to

take our

sin

and our

judgment

and our

shame

upon himself

friends

Jesus died

on the cross

to welcome

those in

who were once

on the outside

and that means

that there's no

room for arrogance

there's no room

for judgmentalism

Christians certainly

don't always get

this right

and if you've

ever been judged

by Christians

I am so sorry

but friends

the more truly

we get the gospel

the more we

understand the

nature of the

gospel

that the only

thing that I

contribute to

my salvation

is my sin

and my shame

that the reason

I'm included

is because of

Jesus grace

and his mercy

and his forgiveness

there's no ways

I can be arrogant

there's no ways

I can be judgmental

there's no ways

I can look at

those of other

religions and

look down my

nose at them

and think I'm

better than you

because when I

look at the gospel

it tells me that

I'm a sinner

I'm broken

that I'm in deep

trouble

that I need a

savior

that it's only the

mercy and the

forgiveness of

Jesus

that welcomes

me in

friends the gospel

tells me that I'm

incredibly loved and

accepted by God

not because of my

pedigree

not because of my

culture

not because of my

moral performance

but because Jesus

went to the cross

for me

but the second

thing is this

the gospel tells us

that rather than

being exclusive

Jesus is the most

inclusive man

that ever lived

in the previous

chapter to John

John 4 · chapter mention

chapter 4

and John chapter 3

John 3 · chapter mention

Jesus meets

another truth

seeker

a man by the

name of

Nicodemus

and Nicodemus

comes to Jesus

by the cover of

night in darkness

and at the end of

that exchange

Jesus says one of

the most famous

words in the

entire world

he says

for God so loved

the world

that he gave his

only son

that whoever

would believe in

him will not

perish

but experience

eternal life

friends

look at what

it says

it says

who will get

to experience

eternal life

who is welcomed

by Jesus

it's whoever

whoever

whoever will

simply come to

him

friends it doesn't

matter what your

background is

what your culture

is what your

ethnicity is

it doesn't matter

what your race is

it doesn't matter

what family you

were born into

it doesn't matter

the size of your

bank account

it doesn't matter

whether you live

up on the peak

whether you live

in student housing

or whether you live

under a bridge

in downtown

Hong Kong

friends it doesn't

matter whether

you have a PhD

in astrophysics

or whether you

dropped out of

high school

it doesn't matter

friends who your

family is

what your background

is it doesn't

matter whether

you've committed

some heinous crime

of which you're

deeply ashamed

or whether you

followed all the

rules perfectly

Jesus stands

with open arms

and he says

whoever

if anyone

would come to

me

irrespective of

your age

your culture

your language

your background

anyone who

will come to

me and

believe in

me

anyone who

will align

their lives

to the truth

of me

is welcome

to experience

my kingdom

my kingdom

of life

my kingdom

of truth

my kingdom

of joy

my kingdom

of freedom

let's pray

together

heavenly father

thank you so

much for

the truth

of the gospel

for many of us

we have discovered

that the gospel

is not just

good advice

it's good news

it's true

and because of

that we've

experienced the