"So, you asked...?"
Date: February 26, 2009 | Author: Albert Kienle
The question was recently asked of me: How deeply have you explored other religions/beliefs in order to feel so solid in Christianity that it is the only right one?
The question presents itself as Christ versus Other Religious World Views and everything between. What makes Christianity at variance with all the others? Why do I accept Christianity as "the only right one"?
You may have often asked or wondered the same questions. And so, I'll give you the answer I gave this friend.
The question presents itself as Christ versus Other Religious World Views and everything between. What makes Christianity at variance with all the others? Why do I accept Christianity as "the only right one"?
You may have often asked or wondered the same questions. And so, I'll give you the answer I gave this friend.
Over my many years I've read, studied, and observed various religious faiths and while they all have positives, such as goodwill and brotherhood, they all, without exception, fail in three essential areas:
- Credibility - Their leaders are human, beset with the same frailties, weaknesses, and sins like the rest of us. So how can they connect us with God, a God whom they themselves do not fully understand or may have questions and/or doubts about. Jesus was and is different; He was one of us and yet is 'Other'. Only someone who is himself God can explain God; God explaining God. This Jesus did! "No one has ever seen God. But his only Son, who is himself God, is near to the Father's heart; he has told us about (explained, declared, made him known, revealed) him." (John 1:18) Jesus has 'connections' with us and with God, thus able to connect or bond us with God. He has authoritative credibility!
- Truthfulness - They all have or claim some truth but they cannot claim all truth. Being so, what if they are wrong, even partially, in truth that they do claim? Especially in matters that really matter: God, meaning of life and death, sin and salvation, eternity, etc. Only God who claims perfection in knowledge and wisdom can claim all truth; truth about everything and everyone. Jesus claims as God all truth. "Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." (John 14:6)
- Longevity- Their leaders live ... and die; they do not live forever to prove their claims or empower their teachings. Which of their sacred writings offers the hope and assurance of the forgiveness of sins and eternal life? When death claims them will their successors be better or perhaps worse? There's no telling; they may deny or change previous truths, therefore their followers are left hanging in the loop. Only the Eternal God "has the power of an endless life". (Heb. 7:16) Death did not claim Jesus, He overcame death and lives forever to empower us and His teachings.
That is why, in short, I believe and claim Jesus Christ as He is for myself.
The following e-mail came my way and because of its poignancy to the above question thought I'd include it.
You are in your car driving home. Thoughts wander to the game you want to see or meal you want to eat, when suddenly a sound unlike any you've ever heard fills the air. The sound is high above you. A trumpet? A choir? A choir of trumpets? You don't know, but you want to know ... So you pull over, get out of your car, and look up. As you do, you see you aren't the only curious one. The roadside has become a parking lot. Car doors are open, and people are standing, gazing upward.
As if the sky were a curtain, the drapes of the atmosphere part. A brilliant light spills onto the earth. There are no shadows. None.
From every hue ever seen and a million more never seen, riding on the flow is an endless fleet of angels. They pass through the curtains one myriad at a time, until they occupy every square inch of the sky. North. South. East. West.
Thousands of silvery wings rise and fall in unison, and over the sounds of the trumpets, you can hear the cherubim and seraphim chanting Holy, Holy, Holy. The final flank of angels is followed by twenty-four silver-bearded elders and a multitude of souls who join the angels in worship.
Suddenly the heavens are quiet. All is quiet. The angels turn, you turn, the entire world turns, and there He is. JESUS.
Through waves of light you see the silhouetted figure of Christ the King. He sits saddled on a great stallion, and the stallion prances atop a billowing cloud. The King opens His mouth, and you are surrounded by His declaration:
The following e-mail came my way and because of its poignancy to the above question thought I'd include it.
You are in your car driving home. Thoughts wander to the game you want to see or meal you want to eat, when suddenly a sound unlike any you've ever heard fills the air. The sound is high above you. A trumpet? A choir? A choir of trumpets? You don't know, but you want to know ... So you pull over, get out of your car, and look up. As you do, you see you aren't the only curious one. The roadside has become a parking lot. Car doors are open, and people are standing, gazing upward.
As if the sky were a curtain, the drapes of the atmosphere part. A brilliant light spills onto the earth. There are no shadows. None.
From every hue ever seen and a million more never seen, riding on the flow is an endless fleet of angels. They pass through the curtains one myriad at a time, until they occupy every square inch of the sky. North. South. East. West.
Thousands of silvery wings rise and fall in unison, and over the sounds of the trumpets, you can hear the cherubim and seraphim chanting Holy, Holy, Holy. The final flank of angels is followed by twenty-four silver-bearded elders and a multitude of souls who join the angels in worship.
Suddenly the heavens are quiet. All is quiet. The angels turn, you turn, the entire world turns, and there He is. JESUS.
Through waves of light you see the silhouetted figure of Christ the King. He sits saddled on a great stallion, and the stallion prances atop a billowing cloud. The King opens His mouth, and you are surrounded by His declaration:
I AM THE ALPHA AND THE OMEGA.
The angels bow their heads. The elders remove their crowns. And before you is Someone so consuming that you know, instantly you know: Nothing else matters. Forget stock markets and school reports. Sale meetings and football games. Nothing is newsworthy. All that mattered matters no more .... for Jesus Christ has come!
This scene is reserved for and befitting Jesus Christ, The King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and Him alone! Not Mohammed. Buddha. The Islamic Messiah known as the Mahdi or the "Twelfth Iman". Mother Earth. Don Cherry. Nor any other god or goddess.
Jesus only. Only Jesus.
Come. Believe. Follow. Live.
This scene is reserved for and befitting Jesus Christ, The King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and Him alone! Not Mohammed. Buddha. The Islamic Messiah known as the Mahdi or the "Twelfth Iman". Mother Earth. Don Cherry. Nor any other god or goddess.
Jesus only. Only Jesus.
Come. Believe. Follow. Live.
