Q&A - How Can There Be Only One True Religion?

So, we'll be in uh 1 John chapter 4

1 John 4 · chapter mention

today. Uh and we're beginning a new

series that I'm calling questions and

answers. Questions and answers. We are

looking at some of the uh the big

questions that people ask. Um the the

questions about Christianity. Uh some

questions people ask out loud, other

questions people kind of wrestle with in

their in their hearts. And so, we're

going to ask these questions about

Christianity. And we're going to look at

the answers. uh to these questions. And

so over the next four weeks uh we're

going to cover topics like how can

Christianity claim to be the one true

religion or how is uh God really just

the one true God or how can I trust the

scripture to be absolute truth? And then

we're going to end up talking about the

resurrection of Jesus, whether or not

that is a a fact or a myth. And so I

realize that I cannot cover all of the

big questions that you all might have uh

in this four-week sermon series, but I

do want to encourage you if you do have

any questions about scripture, something

you'd like to see me address from the

pulpit or even offline in my office, uh

just send me an email, saw creek

pastorgmail.com,

um just send me an email, let me know

what you're thinking about, what you

want clarification on. I'll be happy to

answer those. Or if you'd just like to

be anonymous and you'd like to ask your

question but not have me know who you

are, all you got to do is write down the

question and put it in one of our giving

boxes located in the vestibule and also

in the hallway. So just slip a piece of

paper in there with question on it and

I'll be happy to work that into a future

sermon series. So today's question can

be summed up in one word which is

exclusivity. Exclusivity. So people ask

me, "How can you possibly claim that

your religion is the one true religion?"

They will say, "Pastor Kevin, is isn't

that arrogant? Isn't that divisive? And

isn't that dangerous?" So if you ask

people what the greatest threat to peace

is, you're going to get a bunch of

answers. A lot of times it's going to be

things like capitalism or nationalism or

communism, socialism, um race wars,

gender ethics. But one thing that will

come up in that conversation eventually

is religious exclusivity.

Religion can, has, and will divide

people. So, I don't know what your

family's like, but back in the day when

we used to meet at my grandma and

grandpa's house for Thanksgiving meal,

we would sit down around the table

together, and around our table, we had

Mormons, atheists, agnostics, Jews, and

Christians all gathered around a table

of a Baptist minister and his wife. So,

um, now, as far as I can tell, no

cranberry juice was ever spilled, uh,

during any of these conversations. Uh,

we were pretty tight-knit family, and I

don't think it ever, uh, went too far.

But it doesn't always break that way. A

lot of times when you have that many

religious beliefs in one one room, uh,

you can wind up with some pretty

controversial and divisive

conversations. So, I will admit,

religion is divisive. It's created

conflict throughout all of human

history. So I asked myself, why? Why

would religion be so divisive? Well,

there's two reasons. Number one, people

misrepresent the religion that they

claim to follow. This is especially bad

in Christianity. It's when people

identify themselves as Christians, yet

in their words and their deeds and their

actions, they show that they are not

truly followers of Christ. And that's

why in the Old Testament back in Exodus,

part of the big 10, the Ten

Commandments, Jesus says or God says do

not use my name in vain. He's not

talking about the cuss word. Okay? It's

bigger than that. What he's saying is

don't go out and proclaim that you are a

follower of Yahweh, that you are a

follower of God, and then live such a

lifestyle um that you misrepresent all

the things that God actually stands for.

So, like, don't put the bumper sticker

on your car claiming to be a Christian,

then drive around cutting people off and

flipping them off. Like, don't don't do

that. You know, that's misrepresenting

um the religion you claim to follow. So,

a lot of times it's divisive because

people say they're one thing, but then

they act another way, and the people on

the outside looking in are like, "Wow,

those people are are terrible people.

Why would I want anything to do with

their god?" And then number two,

religion creates a sense of superiority.

The great Tim Keller, who I'm going to

reference a lot over the next four

weeks, uh says this, if you believe you

have truth and you believe you are saved

by performing that truth, you will feel

superior. So superiority as we know

leads to separation and separation leads

to stereotypes and stereotypes lead to

devaluing people. So you kind of like

flatten them out. You identify all all

Christians are like this. you put

everybody in like one category and of

course we know if you devalue people

that leads to oppression. So there's a

real temptation for religious people to

look at the people who don't believe the

same way they do and say things like

well they deserve what they got because

they don't believe like I do. This

philosophy was espoused by the Pharisees

and the Sadducees, the religious leaders

of Jesus day. He had to push back

against this philosophy on a daily basis

and it's alive and well in our culture

too. So yes, religion is divisive. And

then you have things like the statement

Jesus makes in John 14:6 which makes

John 14:6

this even more difficult to talk about

publicly which he says these are his

words. I am the way, the truth and the

life. No one comes to the father except

through me. So this is a deeply

divisive, deeply controversial statement

and it raises the unavoidable question

which is how can there be just one true

religion? So, how do I handle this

question when my my kids at school ask

me or my my friends ask me or my my my

children come and or my co-orker comes

and asks me this question or maybe

somebody posted on social media like how

do we respond to this question? How can

there be just one true religion? Well,

let me start off by telling you two

things that will not work. Two

philosophies that will not work. They've

been tried. They don't work. Number one,

rid the world of religion. So bad strat

number one, people say, "Well, we'll

just rid the world of religion." If

religion causes the conflict, then

wouldn't the best thing to do to be to

get rid of the religion or at least

weaken it? Well, some people argue that

religion was useful for early humanity.

Um, they say that it was good for our

early development, that it helped people

make sense of the world around them. But

now we have science and we have

technology. So we really don't need that

uh the way we used to. We have modern

medicine, we have modern tech, we have

modern understandings. So religion is no

longer necessary. So the the assumption

was simple. As society became more

advanced and more educated, then

religion should just kind of slowly fade

away. But friends, the opposite has

happened. Religion isn't shrinking, it's

growing. For example, in 1925, the the

on the continent of Africa, it was 9%

Christian. A 100 years later, it is now

50% Christian. Over that same time

period in Korea in 1925, Korea was 1%

Christian. And now, if you fast forward

a 100 years to 2025, they are now 45%

Christian. And if you look at the

studies that are going on in China right

now, it looks like China is going to be

that next nation to take a huge leap in

Christianity. So, ironically, the more

you try to control or stamp out any

religion, the faster it usually grows.

And this is especially true for

Christianity, which seems to flourish

when people try to legislate it out or

stamp it out. Those are the times where

we see the biggest revivals [snorts] in

Christianity. It's a lot like the hydra

of Greek mythology where Hercules would

go and battle this this multi-headed

dragon and what he would do is he'd take

his sword and he'd cut off the head of

of the dragon and then all of a sudden

two heads would grow back in its place.

It's where we get this term the hydra

effect. It's when you try to solve a

problem by removing part of the problem

but in essence all you're doing is

creating more problems. That seems to be

how religion works. The fact is religion

cannot be replaced because worship is

wired into the heart of every human

being. It's a part of who you are. It's

a part of your DNA. It's why everybody,

even atheists, agnostics, whoever, they

they know that there's something greater

than themselves. It's that hole in their

heart that longs for eternity, for

connecting to something bigger than

them. So, let's see what John says about

this.

1 John chapter 4 verse one.

1 John 4 · chapter mention

He says, "Dear friends, do not believe

every what's the word?

>> Spirit." That's interesting. But test

the spirits to see if they are from God.

Because many false prophets have gone

out into the world. So he's talking

about religious teachers. So why doesn't

he say test the teachers?

He doesn't say that does he? He says

test the spirits. So John Sto has a

statement about this. He says you

mustn't make the mistake to think that

religious diversity and religious views

are merely intellectual and cognitive

phenomena like political views. Because

what this text is saying according to

John Sto is behind the range of

religious views there's a range of real

spiritual influences.

There's a transcendent realm and human

beings sense it and they want to connect

to it. So the impulse to worship is not

just a relic of the past. It's a part of

being human. So you can try to regulate

religion, you can try to criticize

religion, you can try to suppress

religion, but you cannot erase worship

from the human heart. So bottom line

here, you can you can't eliminate

religion. You can only redirect it. So

that's why that strategy doesn't work.

You can't eliminate religion. All you

can do is redirect it. Well, I'm going

to worship this thing or I'm going to

worship this thing. Number two thing

that does not work is the idea to keep

religion to yourself.

That's a that's a bad strategy. It

doesn't work. It's the strategy where

we're like, let's just tell all the

religious people to keep their religion

to themselves. So I have an 11-year-old

daughter. Her name is Emry. She invites

her friends over. They're allowed.

They're either arguing or they're happy.

And that switches so fast. I cannot

possibly keep up. It's a lot different

with a little girl than it was with a

little boy. She's 10, she's one. It's

like,

so in my house sometimes things get

loud. And so when I'm trying to watch

the college football game or the NBA or

whatever, I'm like, if they're getting

loud, I'm like, "Hey, if you're going to

be that loud, go to your room." So, what

I'm in essence saying is you can still

exist. You can still exist. I'm going to

let you live. Um, but what I need you to

do is keep it to yourself. Go lock

yourself in your room. That way, you're

not bothering me in this game that I'm

trying to watch. And that's how people

treat religion today. A lot of people,

they're not saying you can't believe

what you want to believe. They're not

even saying that your religion isn't

valid. What they're saying is keep it

quiet. Keep it personal. Don't bring

religion into the public forum. In other

words, religion is fine as long as it

stays locked up in its room. Well, look

at verse 5 here of chapter 4 in first

John.

John's speaking about that that mindset.

He says they those those types of

spirits that that teaching is from the

world. Therefore, what they say is from

the world and the world listens to them.

They here are critics of Christianity.

But the interesting thing is they are

coming from a religious point of view.

So they're religious themselves. They're

just saying Christianity is not uh not

right. It's not real. It's not something

you should uh follow. They say that that

all paths are equal and that we'll all

wind up in heaven someday. They they say

that no one has access to to all of the

truth and therefore all religions are

the same. And since all religions are

the same, they lead to the same place,

but people come at it from different

points of view. The best thing that that

we can do according to them is to just

keep our religious beliefs out of the

public discourse. So keep it out of the

public square.

See, what they're doing though is

they're making the mistake of thinking

about religion as an institution, as if

it's a church that you go and you

attend, as if it's a a Sunday school or

it's a small group, it's the thing where

you give money to, it's an organization.

And that is not at all what the

definition of religion actually is. Tim

Keller again astutely says that religion

is a set of answers to big life

questions. Religion is not an

institution. And it is an answer to a

set of questions um that you typically

would ask yourself. So things like

what's right, what's wrong, what should

I do with my time while I'm here. And so

the answers to those questions are

informed by faith and faith comes from

your religious point of view. So for

example, if you have two coaches, you

have coach A over here and coach A

decides that that they want to win and

they believe that the only way to win is

to play your best five players. So we'll

talk basketball. Your best five players

the other people sit on the bench, but

you only play your best five players.

That's the best way to win. Then you got

Coach B over here and Coach B believes

that the best way to win is to develop

an entire team concept because you know

somebody might get hurt. You need a

replacement player. So, it might cost

some games early on, but we're going to

develop the bench and the starters. See,

two different philosophies, same sport,

same rules, same goal, but completely

different coaching decisions. Why?

Because underneath all of our decisions

is this personal philosophy, a belief

that is not found in a rulebook. And in

the same way, the people that are out

there making laws and defining morality

or teaching our students, they're not

just using facts, they're using faith.

So, so the bottom line is keeping

religion private doesn't work because

everybody operates on a deeply personal

set of beliefs that come from their

faith, which is informed by their

religious views. And by the way, not

having a religious view is actually

having a religious view. So, I don't

want to get into that too deep, but that

is true.

So, we all have these exclusive beliefs.

All of us do. There's no way of getting

around that. And we now know that all

those exclusive beliefs cannot be locked

in their room. They're going to inform

every decision that we make. So, now

we're in a pickle here, aren't we? So,

so if we ask the question, how can there

be one true religion? We're asking a

kind of a question that has no answer

because everybody's got exclusive

beliefs and we can't lock them away.

They're going to come out some way. So

what what should we be asking? Well, the

real question that should be asked, and

this is what I do. I redirect the

conversation when this comes up, is

which exclusive beliefs are best for

everyone? Like like they're going to be

there, but which exclusive beliefs are

best for Camden and Pasquitang and

Kuratuck and North Carolina and the

United States? which which set of

exclusive beliefs that everybody has

that you can't lock away are best for

everyone. And this is where Christianity

shines brightly because it has three

unique aspects that are found nowhere

else in any other religion on earth. So

we're going to talk about those three

aspects. Number one, God entered human

history. Look at verse two of chapter 4.

This is how you know the spirit of God.

every spirit that confesses that Jesus

Christ has come in the flesh and is from

God. Look, it doesn't simply say that

Jesus was born. It says that he came,

that means he existed before Bethlehem.

He existed before the manger. He came to

earth from somewhere else.

Jesus existed in eternity past. We see

him in the Old Testament. We see him

before Bethlehem. He has always been

here. and then he came to earth. See the

commonality of other religions and other

founders and prophets is that they they

come along and they point you to how you

can get up to God. That every other

religion they they have their founder,

they have their their prophet and the

prophet says this is how you reach God.

You do these things, you climb up this

ladder and you will reach God. But Jesus

didn't begin in a major. He came from

eternity. Jesus is God who came to save

us. It's the other direction. It's the

other religions, they have you climbing

up this ladder through effort and

discipline and morality and

enlightenment and all these other things

that you have to do in order to get

yourself up to God. But Christianity is

solely different because it says that

God came down to us. Which is why we

call Jesus Emmanuel. That means God with

us. He came down from heaven to us. It's

not that we found God. It's that God

found or came to us. Number two, God

came to restore, not just rescue. So

look at verse four. 1 John 4:4.

1 John 4:4

You are from God, little children, and

you have conquered them because the one

who is in you is greater than the one

who is in the world. So most religions

teach us that we have to escape from

something in order to be saved. Eastern

religions, they lean a lot into this

idea that the physical world itself is

the problem. And so the only way to

acquire salvation is to escape from the

physical world and enter into a

spiritual world. Then your your more

western religions, they believe that our

problem is a moral failure. That that

salvation comes from escaping the

clutches of immorality through

self-discipline and self improvement. In

both cases, salvation is ultimately

about leaving the world behind. But

Christianity makes a radically different

claim. At the birth of Jesus, God did

not reject the physical world. He

entered into the physical world. It was

God taking on flesh. He walked in a

human body. He experienced hunger and

pain and and loss and devastation and

brokenness. He he everything that a

human can go through, Jesus experienced.

And after the cross, Jesus didn't raise

as a spirit. He rose as a human in the

flesh, in a perfected flesh. So he

didn't discard our flesh, he renewed it.

And then if you look in Revelation, as

we studied before, you you see that that

heaven one day is going to come down to

earth and there'll be no more famine and

no more poverty and no more injustice.

Everything is going to be renewed.

Therefore, our world is not discarded in

Christianity. It's renewed. So,

salvation does not come from abandonment

or escaping. It comes from

transformation. Our our religious view

as Christians is that the that we are

going to experience salvation. And part

of that is the hope of Jesus coming back

and making all things new. That is

exclusive to Christianity. There's one

more thing that's exclusive to

Christianity and that is the fact that

salvation is received not achieved.

So let's look at chapter 4 7 and 8.

John says, "Dear friends, let us love

one another because love is from God and

everyone who loves has been born of God

and knows God. The one who does not know

love does not know God because God is

love." So shot at all the people that

claim to be Christians and are unloving.

Okay. But if you stop there, you may

assume that in order to be saved, you

have to love others. You have to love

your neighbor. You have to love love

love. You have to love perfectly. And if

God sees you being loving enough, then

at the end of the day, you get to go to

heaven. He'll save you. But John doesn't

stop there. He goes on to verse n.

God's love was revealed among us in this

way. God sent his one and only son Jesus

into the world so that we might live

through him. Love consists in this. Get

this friends, not that we loved God, but

that he loved us and sent his son to be

the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

Friends, it's not that we loved God.

It's that God loved us. Other religions

will tell you that you have to perform

to earn salvation. Christianity says you

are loved. Therefore, now you can

perform. So our good works come from the

fact that God loved us even at our

worst. So I would argue then in summary

that Christianity is the answer to the

world's problems. See, if you say that

salvation is achieved by performance,

you're going to be tempted to think that

you are better than other people. But if

salvation is received by grace, then you

cannot brag about it.

You're not saved because you're wise or

good or virtuous. You're saved because

Jesus was wise and good and virtuous and

he gave his salvation to us as a free

gift. If salvation is about escaping the

world, then who cares about the world,

right? We're just trying to get out of

here. We're just trying to get to

heaven. But if salvation is about

transforming the world, then we're going

to take a profound interest in

evangelism and justice and ending

poverty and curing disease and being the

salt and the light of the world that

Jesus called us to be to bring a little

bit of heaven down to earth. as we say

in the Lord's prayer. We say, "God, we

want your will to be done on earth the

same way that it is in heaven."

So, I hear the objection right now. I I

hear it's ringing in my ears. It's the

same thing that people always say, which

is the fact that if Jesus is God, then

wouldn't that foster a superiority

complex in Christians? Like, nah nah

boo, our prophet was God and your

prophet was just a human. like that's

how they see us acting or they think

that we would act that way. But true

Christianity is de as demonstrated by

Jesus does not foster a superiority

complex. So let's take it right back to

Jesus time. Let's go to ancient Greece.

Let's let's look at Rome. Okay. So in

Rome, it looked like the government was

all about inclusivity. They had a

pantheon of gods and all you had to do

is fill out a form and pay some money

and you could put your god in that

pantheon. any god you wanted to worship

was fine by them as long as it was

registered and paid for and it would be

put in this Greek pantheon. It looked

very inclusive. And then all of the

sudden Jesus dies, comes back from the

dead and this small group of about a

hundred people starts sharing what

they've experienced in Christ. And then

Jesus comes back for a little while and

he appears to hundreds and hundreds of

witnesses and people see this

resurrected savior. And so Christianity

starts spreading all around the Roman

Empire. But part of the Christian motto

was that Jesus is Lord of all, which

sounds extremely exclusive, especially

in comparison to what the Roman

government was saying, which is that

that all gods are are gods and they

should all be worshiped. But

Christianity then created the most

inclusive community that's ever existed.

Like, how does that happen? Well, here's

how. The the Greeks and the Romans, they

didn't mix rich and poor. The Christians

did. the Greeks and the Romans, they

they they didn't associate with the

outcasts, with the tax collectors and

the the widows and the orphans and the

people with leprosy and all the diseased

and and the the lower class. They didn't

associate with those people. But you

know who did Christians.

They didn't humbly serve people that

could not pay them back. You know who

did?

Christians.

So, how could this exclusive belief that

Jesus is the only way to God lead to the

most inclusive behavior that has ever

been seen in mankind?

The answer is we saw Jesus on the cross.

Jesus showed love to people who did not

love him and then he taught his

followers to do the same thing. And he

didn't just teach them, he showed them.

Through his own core values, through the

way that he lived his life, through the

way that he spoke and his words and his

deeds, he demonstrated love and

especially loving people that don't

think the same way you do. Ultimately,

this led to his death on the cross,

which was the ultimate showcase of grace

and mercy. We say, "Put your money where

your mouth is." Well, he did. He put

himself on the cross. And that sacrifice

when people saw that and they saw the

early church living like Jesus taught

them to live, it captured their

imaginations. People wanted relief from

this oppressive world that they were

living in. And they saw truth and hope

in the gospel and Jesus. Because at the

cross, the moral and the immoral stand

equally needy.

Understand that. At the at that cross,

the moral and the immoral stand equally

needy and the religious and the

irreligious stand equally dependent. It

it leveled the playing field. There's no

superiority there. We all need Jesus.

And Jesus sacrificial love destroys all

forms of superiority. Look, everyone has

an exclusive belief system. And no, you

can't lock that in a room. It's going to

affect every part of your culture. So

what we need to be asking is which

exclusive set of beliefs are best for

the community in which we live, are best

for the world in which we live. Which

exclusive beliefs are going to produce

humble, loving people that care about

the world around them and are not afraid

to speak the truth in love? And the

answer is a belief system that says

this. You are more sinful than you ever

dared believed, but you are more loved

than you ever dared believe. And that's

Christianity. The answer is a belief

system where Jesus went to the cross and

he gave his life in place of mine so

that by his sacrifice I could experience

salvation and eternal life. The answer

is a belief system where Jesus didn't

stay dead, but three days later, he rose

from the dead, proving once and for all

that he really was God. You see, the

gospel in Christianity, it melts pride.

It It humbles arrogance. It fuels

forgiveness. It creates peace. And that

is why I believe that Christianity's

exclusive truth about being the only

about Jesus being the only way to God is

not something that we should hide from

or be ashamed of. It is something that

we should proclaim because it offers the

hope that our world is longing for.

Let's pray.