Just over one month ago, my brother-in-law, Justin, passed away. He was working for the US Special Forces when his plane went down in an accident near his base in Djibouti, Africa. While this has been a tough time, the support of family and friends has been enormously encouraging and strengthening. Personally, I have also found that hymns and worship songs have helped with processing this loss.

One of the key functions of sung worship is its ability to remind us what we believe in and the hope that we have through Christ. At Justin’s funeral we sang Matt Redman’s song, ‘Blessed Be Your Name’. The bridge in the song reads as follows: ‘You give and take away. You give and take away. But my heart will choose to say, Lord, Blessed be your name.’ I found it hard to sing those lyrics during the service but it was still important for me to hear those words instruct me and remind me of what I actually believe.

Remembrance is often one of the main themes that runs throughout funeral services. Songs are sung and speeches are given in honour of the person who has passed away. Likewise, the act of remembrance is also intrinsic to the Christian faith. It is a type of lifeline to hope.

The Bible is full of stories that show the direct link between remembrance and hope. The children of Israel, for example, were reminded countless times by YHWH not to forget who he was or what he had done. When they forgot who he was they would lose hope and when they lost hope they would do things that they would regret because they lost sight of reality. Indeed, forgetfulness was the enemy of their hope.

But when they remembered YHWH things were much better. Their recall of YHWH’s faithfulness would remind them that true life was not found inside them but in and through YHWH. When they remembered YHWH they remembered him as their provider and sustainer. Walter Brueggemann uses the word ‘satiation’ to describe the type of life YHWH provided for his people. When they remembered YHWH, they would think of satiation. They would have hope.

Our capacity for remembering is not any better than that of the people of Israel. We forget. We need reminders. At Easter we are called to remember Christ, the cross and the victory of the resurrection. Events in life can cause us to forget Christ and the story of Easter, but if we forget the profundity of Easter we will lose hope. This is why we sing Christian songs. This is why we go to church. This is why we preach Christ crucified – that some might believe and therefore have something to hope in: Christ in us the hope of glory.

Everywhere you look a resurgent atheism is on the rise: loud, aggressive and all over the media. Just a year ago, three of the top ten books on the New York Times bestseller list were by atheists. So how do we respond to atheist friends and colleagues who’ve read books by the likes of Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens and are keen to beat Christians over the head with them?

It’s worth beginning our response by observing that atheism itself is not new. This is not to belittle our atheist friends, but simply to note that most answers to the challenges of the so-called “New Atheism” are ancient ones. Christians have always engaged their critics and been willing to answer the tough questions.

The intellectual peak of atheism probably came in the early nineteenth century. The rise of science, especially the publication of Darwin’s The Origin of Species in 1859, meant many atheists thought religion was dying and they could look forward to a godless, secular utopia. The twentieth century demolished that dream. Two world wars showed the evils that mechanised scientific warfare could cause, whilst the collapse of the Soviet Union saw the end of one the biggest attempts to build a modern atheistic state. All these factors and others mean that today, religion is as strong as ever. This partly explains the anger of the New Atheists today — religion has failed to disappear as predicted. It is this that lies behind some of the features that are genuinely new in the “New Atheism”, namely its dogmatism and aggressiveness.

So how should Christians respond to atheist friends and colleagues? Let me briefly outline six broad principles.

First, don’t respond with anger or sarcasm. Show respect and take every question seriously.

Second, pray, frequently and intentionally for atheist friends. Pray for opportunities to speak with them. Pray that they would encounter Christ. Pray that tensions would arise in their worldview that open up questions.

Third, learn to ask insightful questions. Find out what your friends believe (or don’t believe) by asking questions. In particular, questions like “why do you think that?” or “what’s your evidence for that?” are very powerful — many atheists have not thought through what they believe, so look for opportunities to ask questions and then engage with the responses.

Fourth, demonstrate the richness of Christianity in your conversations. The Christian worldview is much deeper than atheism so use that depth in apologetics: talk about beauty and justice, truth and art, morality and wonder, love and virtue. The Christian worldview better explains these things than atheism which often struggles to accommodate them.

Fifth, remember the important of character. Many atheists have tried church and had bad experiences, or have looked at Christianity and concluded that its adherents are hypocrites. Our character needs to display Christ as much as our words. The nineteenth-century British evangelist, Gipsy Smith, once said that there are five gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and the life of the Christian. Most people will not read the first four.

And finally, as obvious as it sounds, remember to always point people to Jesus. It’s not just about arguments (and certainly not about being argumentative), it’s about introducing people to Jesus. So take every opportunity to talk about Jesus and to introduce your atheist friends to him. Jesus must be the beginning and the end of all of our apologetics.

We are pleased to announce that the next Engaging Culture Seminar
will be held on Saturday, May 26th, 2012 at Rexdale Alliance Church.

“A very informative and useful seminar. Looking forward to the next one.” (Derek, Toronto)

The response to Engaging Culture has been very positive. Many have said that these training sessions have been vital in their quest to talk about their faith and answer tough questions..

What do you do when confronted with questions like; “Is the Bible reliable?” “Is there such a thing as Truth?” “Aren’t all worldviews essentially the same?” These are questions you may encounter when trying to talk about your faith in Christ with friends, neighbours, colleagues or classmates. It’s vital that we’re equipped to engage in conversations where these deep questions may arise. 1 Peter 3:15 encourages believers to revere Christ as Lord and to always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks about the reason for the hope one has in Christ and to do so in a gentle and respectful way.

RZIM Canada would like to help you feel more confident in engaging the culture, more relaxed in answering questions you encounter and better able to stay in the conversation with those you talk with. To this end, we’d like to invite you to take part in the Engaging Culture Series.

Along with the Canadian team, we are particluarly pleased that on May 26th, Dr. Stuart McAllister, who has been part of the RZIM team for over a decade will be a guest lecturer. Stuart will also be offering a bonus lecture following the main seminar sessions. So come, learn from expert speakers, ask your burning questions, get practically equipped, share ideas, make new friends — and enjoy a great breakfast.

Engaging Culture Seminar
Saturday May 26, 2012 @ Rexdale Alliance Church
2459 Islington Avenue, Toronto
Cost is just $20 (discounted rates available for students)

For more information, speaker bios, or to book your place at Engaging Culture, please click below:

]]> http://stayintheconversation.org/rzimcanada/events/engaging-culture-seminars/feed/ 0 http://stayintheconversation.org/rzimcanada/articles/why-trust-the-bible/ http://stayintheconversation.org/rzimcanada/articles/why-trust-the-bible/#comments Tue, 24 Jan 2012 18:53:27 +0000 Andy Bannister http://stayintheconversation.org/rzimcanada/?p=831

The Bible’s Power and Influence

In some countries today, the Bible is forbidden. Bringing a Bible into Saudi Arabia, for example, or North Korea, or China, or Libya, or Burma — along with many other countries — can result in expulsion for the westerner or arrest and torture if you’re native to the country. It wasn’t that long ago that the Bible was banned in communist Eastern Europe, too; a good friend of mine was involved in Bible smuggling into places like Romania and Hungary during the 1970s and 80s and can tell hair-raising stories of near arrests and fortunate escapes.

Banned in many countries, yet desperately sought by persecuted Christians. The best selling, most widely studied piece of literature, whose influence is unquestionable, whatever you think of the book. Much of our art, law, philosophy, music and literature have drawn upon the Bible.

Yet this potency and influence aside, many people today want to ignore, rubbish, or reject the Bible. “How can you trust the Bible?” sceptics often ask. “New Atheist” writers like Richard Dawkins regularly attack the Bible, calling those who believe in it, “died in the wool faith-heads”.

Three Initial Thoughts

So how might we answer the sceptic? How can Christians show that is rational and reasonable to trust the Bible and take seriously what it says? There are numerous ways one might approach this question but this evening, I want to focus on a historical approach, as that’s my own academic background. But before that, let me start by making three general comments.

First, when somebody says “why trust the Bible?” I sometimes respond “why not trust the Bible?” One can only really doubt something if one has something more solid to believe in. Unless you merely want to be a sceptic. Whilst that’s very fashionable, it’s hard to be a consistent sceptic. Why not be sceptical about your scepticism?

Second, lots of people have bought into popular assumptions and myths about the Bible. So if somebody suggests the Bible is unreliable, ask them to be specific. How exactly? If they claim it’s full of myths, ask them which one they had in mind? Encourage them to read the Bible for themselves before passing judgement on it.

Third, there’s a lot of chronological snobbery about these days. Just because something is old or ancient, doesn’t make it false. Indeed, ancient-icity doesn’t tell us anything about whether something is true or false. Something can be ancient and true. Likewise something can be bang up to date and false.

The Historian and the Bible

Those comments aside, why trust the Bible? Well, first, many people are not aware that most historians take the Bible, especially the New Testament, very seriously indeed. The Bible has been subjected to extremely vigorous literary and historical criticism, probably more than any other ancient work, and it’s emerged unscathed. Hans Kung put it nicely:

Lay people are usually unaware that the scrupulous scholarly work achieved by modern biblical criticism … represented by scrupulous academic work over about 300 years, belongs among the greatest intellectual achievements of the human race. Has any of the great world religions outside of the Jewish-Christian tradition investigated its own foundations and its own history so thoroughly and impartially? None of them has remotely approached this. The Bible is far and away the most studied book in world literature.

In other words, the Bible doesn’t need defending or protecting from historical criticism — Christians haven’t shut themselves off from academic questions — far from it. Indeed, as the 19th century Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon once quipped: “Defend the Bible? I’d sooner defend a lion!”

When one approaches the Bible from a historical perspective, one can approach it much as one would any other ancient work. Broadly speaking, there are three tests a historian can utilise to determine the veracity of an ancient document. The bibliographic test, the internal test, and the external test. Let’s briefly look at each of these and how they apply to the Bible.

The Bibliographic Test

The bibliographic test looks at the ancient manuscripts of the Bible and asks whether the text of the Bible we have today is the same as the original? The simple answer is “yes”. There are thousands upon thousands of ancient manuscripts of the Bible, dating from the early second century down to the middle ages. When you compare what we have for the Bible with, say, what we have in terms of manuscripts for other important works of antiquity — Plato or Thucydides — it’s striking. For the Bible, we have 5,000 Greek manuscripts, hundreds of papyri, almost 350 Syriac copies (most dating to the 400s). On top of this, virtually the entire New Testament could be reproduced from quotations in the early church fathers; 32,000 such quotations exist before the Council of Nicaea in AD325, for example.

Many of these manuscripts are staggeringly early. For example, the John Rylands fragment (P52) dates to around AD120. Codex Sinaiticus dates to about 350AD and contains virtually all of the New Testament — I remember visiting the British Library a few years ago and staring at this beautiful object, just a few centimetres away from me behind a pane of glass. One felt that one was in touch with history.

Why are these manuscripts important? Because they enable us to be confident that the text of the Bible we have today is extremely accurate and close to the original. Historian and textual critic Ben Witherington has remarked that critical scholarship is about 99% certain of all of the New Testament text now — indeed, that we’re closer to the original text of the New Testament now than anytime since the first couple of centuries, so good is the scholarship.

The Internal Test

What about the historian’s second test, the internal test? This test asks whether we can determine whether the document we have before us was written by eyewitnesses. When it comes to the Bible, especially to the New Testament, things get very interesting.

First, we have multiple witnesses. Many people who are unfamiliar with the Bible tend to think of it as one book — but, of course, the Bible contains multiple books — it’s more like a library than a book. So, when we come to the New Testament, for example, we have multiple authors writing about the life of Jesus. Critical scholars would count at least six — Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul and probably also “Q”, a collection of sayings of Jesus that Matthew and Luke referred to.

Furthermore, these sources are all very early. Most scholars date the Gospels to the 60s, 70s and 80s AD, although some argue that Mark, especially, is much earlier. British New Testament scholar James Crossley — who, I’d note, is not a Christian — believes Mark was written in the late 30s or early 40s — that’s within a decade of Jesus. Another very early witness is Paul, who is writing his letters between AD48 and AD65, well within the lifetimes of the eyewitnesses. Why is this important?

Because one thing historians get very excited about is multiple attestation and early dating.
To return to the Gospels, though, for a moment. Not merely are they very early, but it’s now fairly universally accepted in critical scholarship that the Gospel writers were trying to write history; in terms of genre, the Gospels are biographies. The seminal work that demonstrated this was a book called What Are the Gospels? by Richard Burridge. Interestingly, Burridge set out to disprove that the gospels are biographies but the evidence caused him to change his mind. Historian David Aune sums up the implications of this:

[Bios, ancient biography] was firmly rooted in historical fact rather than literary fiction. Thus while the Evangelists clearly had an important theological agenda, the very fact that they chose to adapt Greco-Roman biographical conventions to tell the story of Jesus indicated that they were centrally concerned to communicate what they really thought happened.”

There’s a further point here, too. If one wants to reject the Gospels as history, then one is still left with the problem of explaining the early church. It had to come from somewhere and if Jesus’ life and career didn’t play out as the Gospels claim, one has to explain where. As German historian Martin Dibelius put it: you have to posit an X big enough to explain the Y of the early church. The best explanation remains that given in the Gospels: that Jesus existed and something very remarkable happened to him.

The External Test
Finally, there’s the external evidence for the Bible, in particular archaeology. Time and time again, archaeology has confirmed that the writers of the biblical texts knew what they were talking about. Along with the writings of non-Christian historians from the first century, men like the Jewish historian, Josephus, archaeology endorses the biblical text at many points. As Millar Burrows, former professor of archaeology at Yale wrote:

On the whole … archaeological work has unquestionably strengthened confidence in the reliability of the Scriptural record. More than one archaeologist has found his respect for the Bible increased by the experience of excavation in Palestine. Archaeology has in many cases refuted the views of modern critics.

Let me give you a few fascinating examples. First, two examples from Luke. In Acts 17:6-8, Luke uses the Greek word politarchs to describe the city officials in Thessalonica. That word doesn’t appear in classical Greek literature so for many years, critics accused Luke of making a mistake. Then archaeologists discovered a first-century arch in the town that used this very term — showing that the term was in use for government officials at the very time Luke was writing. It was a similar phenomena with Acts 18:12, where Luke uses the term “proconsul” to describe a gentleman called Gallio. That word didn’t appear either in classical literature so, again, scholars questioned Luke’s accuracy. Then an inscription was found at Delphi, dating to AD51, using the same term — and amazingly, to describe the very same official, Gallio. Once again Luke was proven to be a very accurate historian.

It’s a similar story with the other Gospel writers. For example, in John 5:1-2, the fourth Gospel writer speaks of “a pool in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Gate, called in Hebrew ‘Bethesda’, which has five porticoes”. Until the 20th century, there was no evidence outside of John’s Gospel for such a place and, again, critics questioned John’s reliability. Then in the 1930s, the pool was uncovered by archaeologists — complete with four colonnades around the edges and one across the middle.

One more example will suffice and it’s perhaps the most intriguing — the so-called “James Ossuary”. According to the Gospels — and to the Jewish historian, Josephus, James was the brother of Jesus and was killed in AD62. In 2002, a mid-first century bone box or ossuary was discovered in Jerusalem, bearing the Aramaic inscription “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus”. There is very strong evidence that the box and its inscription are authentic. Ed Keall, of the Royal Ontario Museum here in Toronto, has said “we stand by our opinion that the James Ossuary is not a forgery”. As New Testament historian Ben Witherington put it:

If, as seems probable, the ossuary found in the vicinity of Jerusalem and dated to about AD 63 is indeed the burial box of James, the brother of Jesus, this inscription is the most important extra-biblical evidence of its kind.

If we had more time, numerous other examples could be listed. The key point is this: archaeology doesn’t prove the New Testament is true. But what it does do is endorse the narratives. It shows that the biblical writings are historical and geographical in character — and thus deserve to be weighed and treated as seriously as an other texts from antiquity.

Conclusions
In the short time available to us, we’ve only been able to scratch the surface of what is a fascinating and rich area of study. But I hope in this brief survey I’ve been able to show that there are very good reasons to trust the Bible. And thus very good reasons to approach it with an open mind, willing to take what it says seriously and weigh its claims seriously.

So why read the Bible? Because from a historian’s perspective, we have good reason to trust it. Why read the Bible? Because only by reading it can you draw your own conclusions, rather than uncritically swallow somebody else’s second-hand-scepticism. Why read the Bible? Because through the pages of the four biographies in the New Testament, the gospels, one encounters a historical figure — Jesus of Nazareth — whose powerful personality continues to resonate and impact lives two thousand years on.

A common accusation thrown at Christians is that they are anti-gay, anti-abortion, anti-contraception. Many people have a perception that the church is negative — anti-everything — and Christians utterly prejudiced. How might we respond?

A good place to begin is by acknowledging that Christians have often made mistakes in this area. Not so much in the moral positions we’ve adopted but in the way we’ve presented them. We’ve been so loud and strident on some issues that many people think all we’re all about is abortion and homosexuality. Too many people know what Christianity is against but not what it’s for. We need to be careful not to put the moral cart before the gospel horse.

However, when the issue of morality is raised, it’s also important Christians have the confidence to ask our secular friends some questions. If we’re accused of being prejudiced simply because we believe something to be wrong, a helpful response is to ask a question in reply: “Do you think that anything is absolutely right or wrong? Do good and evil actually exist, or do we just make it all up as we go along?” For example, Richard Dawkins put it very bluntly: “The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”

But is this liveable? Most of us want to say that there is such a thing as right and wrong, good and evil. To deny this leads to a terrible relativism. For the relativist, nothing is absolutely right or wrong, ethics is merely illusion, there are simply choices. Hitler made choices, Mother Theresa made choices, but who is to say that one set of choices is better than another? Any worldview that cannot properly and intelligently talk about “good” and “evil” is a non-starter.

In order to talk intelligently about good and evil requires a basis for the value of human life. If the atheist story is true, you and I are just a random collocation of atoms, a sack of chemicals, no more precious or unique than the aardvark, apricot, or amoeba. But if the Christian story is true, then you and I are, as the Bible puts, “made in the image of God” and of infinite value.

As Christians we recognise we live in a messy world, full of humans beings with broken, messy lives, and that will raise questions of morality and ethics. We need to be confident in talking, lovingly and respectfully, about those issues.

However, Christianity is not about our moral superiority, pointing the finger, being “holier than thou”. Nor is Christianity some kind of self-help plan to help us be good so that we can get to heaven. Rather, the claim of Christianity is uniquely this: that the whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry and mission was not to provide a self-help programme but rather to transform our very hearts. We must never make the mistake of presenting Christianity as just-another-set-of-ideas: Christianity is about transformation, new creation. Unless something radical is done to address the human heart, no amount of self improvement will ever work.

So when moral issues arise, talk about them sensitively with your friends, but always take every opportunity to also talk about the God who revealed himself in Christ, demonstrating the inherent value of each human being not just by creating us in His image, but also, in the cross, being willing to pay the ultimate price to repair and restore His broken children.

A common claim made by many atheists is that religion causes evil, suffering, division and war. For example, at the Munk Debate in Toronto last November, Christopher Hitchens argued this very point against Tony Blair. Religion, Hitchens claimed, causes sectarianism, division, strife, disagreement, war, poverty and a host of societal evils. In his best-selling book, God is Not Great, Hitchens even wrote that “religion poisons everything”.

How might a Christian respond? Well, first, I’d point out there’s a major problem with Hitchens’ argument. You could remove the word “religion” from his statement “religion poisons everything” and replace it with many other words. Politics, for example. Politics causes division, bloodshed, argument, and war. Politics poisons everything. Or what about money? Money causes crime, resentment, bloodshed, division and poverty. Money poisons everything.

You see the problem is that those like Christopher Hitchens have built their worldview on the idea that human beings are essentially good and that the world is getting better — a kind of naïve utopianism. But the world isn’t like that. Rather it seems to be the case that whatever human beings lay hold off, they use to cause damage. That applies to money, politics, government, science — and religion. The problem is not with religion or politics, the problem is not out there somewhere, the problem lies in us. In the human heart. As Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the Russian novelist and political commentator, who survived the Russian gulags and wrote with amazing insight into the human condition, once famously put it: “The dividing line between good and evil runs right through the middle of every human heart”.

What the world needs, as an answer to violence and injustice, poverty and pain, is not a clever philosophy, not a religious system, not a new politic, not more money, more education — none will fundamentally change anything. Rather it needs individual transformation — a radical transformation of the human heart. Only Jesus Christ offers that possibility if we’re willing to surrender our lives to him.

I often find it interesting to point out to my atheist friends that Jesus himself was also anti-religion. He regularly clashed with the religious leaders of his day, the Pharisees, because he saw empty religion as powerless, damaging and enslaving. Ultimately that stance led to his crucifixion. And Christians, of course, cannot talk about suffering and evil, pain and violence, without talking about the example of Jesus, one to whom violence was done. His example has inspired millions if not billions of Christians to give sacrificially, love their neighbour, to engage in peace making. One of the most powerful recent examples was the Amish School Shooting in 2006. Not only did the families of the victims publically forgive the perpetrator and offer pastoral support to his family, but set up a trust fund to help the wife of the shooter, who’d killed himself too. Only Jesus Christ offers the transformative power that makes that kind of choice possible.

A common claim made by many of our atheist friends is that science has replaced religion. Atheist authors like Sam Harris claim that “the success of science comes at the expense of religion” whilst Richard Dawkins says the “God Hypothesis” can be scientifically tested and proven false. In short, they claim that there is a war between science and religion which, given time, science will win.

Yet there are many problems with this view. First, there are many examples of eminent scientists who believe and trust in God. Richard Dawkins snootily remarks that whenever he has met a religious scientist and asked them to justify their belief, they always say they have no evidence but believe on faith. Now I’m not sure which scientists Dawkins has been hanging out with, but this is not the position of John Polkinghorne, John Lennox, Alister McGrath or Francis Collins — all scientists who have written about how their religious faith and their scientific careers cohere.

Furthermore, if you examine the history of science, you discover not merely the fact that the majority of scientists in the past were Christians, but it was their very faith that led them to approach the universe expecting to find it coherent, because a rational God created it. This led them to ask how God did it.

Another of the consistent problems exhibited by many atheists is a failure to recognise where the boundaries of science lie. Science can tell you what will happen if you fire 3,000 volts through your grandma; science can’t tell you if you should do this. In short, science is very good at how questions — how something works. It’s utterly useless when it comes to “why” questions — why should I be moral? Why am I here?

Our atheist friends also forget that science itself rests upon a number of faith-based, metaphysical assumptions about the way that the universe works. For example: why is reality rational and ordered? Why are the fundamental laws of the universe written in the language of mathematics, one we can understand? Where did rationality and consciousness come from and how can we trust our minds? It’s easy to forget that at the heart of the scientific method lie a number of assumptions about reality.

Finally, there’s the problem of reductionism. Reducing everything to what we can measure scientifically leads to some fairly drastic consequences. Atheist Ingrid Newkirk once said that “a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy — they’re all mammals”. Whatever one thinks of the science behind that statement, it leads to a very obvious problem: once you can see people as no more than animals, what’s wrong with treating them as such? Indeed, a fascinating question to ask our atheist friends is “if humans are just sacks of chemicals, why does it matter what anybody does to them?”

The Christian worldview offers a much more coherent, wholistic view of reality. It says that science is important — all truth is God’s truth. But the universe does not merely consist of physical causes, but also personal causes. Why is the universe understandable and rational, why is science even possible? Because ultimate reality is personal. And the Christian worldview says that we can know that reality — because the personal creator of the universe has spoken: in Jesus Christ, his son.

Through a series of straight-to-the-point interviews with scholars — including RZIM Canada Director, Andy Bannister — experts and former Muslims, this exciting six-session DVD explores opportunities and challenges the presence of so many Muslims in our communities.

The DVD provides an introduction to the Muslim faith, culture and world-view; explores the differences between the Muslim and Christian understanding of God; provides insights into ways that we can engage in genuine dialogue; and challenges all of us to open up our lives and our homes to our new Muslim neighbors in a way that introduces them to the unique love of Jesus.

For more information about Truth Unlocked or to order a copy, please visit the Truth Unlocked website.

A common accusation flung at Christians is that we’re arrogant. “How can you believe that you’re right and Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims — all the thousands of other religions — are wrong?” Isn’t it the height of arrogance to claim that Jesus is the way to God. A way, possibly. But the only way?

Many Christians struggle with this issue. We don’t want to appear arrogant, bigoted, or intolerant. And so a pluralistic view of religions thrives easily here in Canada. It’s easy to slip from the true claim — “all people have equal value” — to the false claim that “all ideas have equal merit”. Those are two very different claims indeed.

So let’s explore this “all religions are really the same” idea. Suppose I say that I’ve just got into literature in a big way. This last year, I’ve read Shakespeare, Virginia Woolf and Tolkien, but I’ve also read Harry Potter and “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” — and I’ve concluded that every book is identical. Would you think that this claim made me wise or tolerant? I suspect you’d conclude I haven’t read any of them. And the same goes for religion. To say “all religions are the same” simply shows that you haven’t investigated any of them. Because once you do, you quickly discover that most religions are not fundamentally the same with superficial differences but the reverse is true: most religions have superficial similarities but fundamental differences.

You see truth, by its very nature, is exclusive. If it is true, as Christianity claims, that Jesus was crucified, died, and rose again, it is not true, as Islam claims, that Jesus never died in the first place and somebody else was killed in his place. Both claims cannot be true.

There’s another problem, too, and it’s with the common idea that religions are all just human attempts to fumble their way towards God, in a vague, “let’s have our best guess” kind of way. That’s not the Christian claim at all. Christianity doesn’t claim to be a set of vague ideas about God. It’s nothing to do with humans trying to reach up to God, hoping we’ve got it right. Rather, at the very heart of Christianity, stands the idea that humans can’t reach up to God — but that God, in his love, has chosen to reach down us. As the Bible says, in two of the most famous verses in the New Testament:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not die, but have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save the world through him. (John 3:16-17)

In Jesus, God has reached out to us, offering us the chance of life. Real life. The challenge when it comes to Christianity is not whether we’re clever enough, holy enough, or religious enough. It’s whether we’re humble enough to admit that there’s nothing we can do from our side of things to reach God. We need to accept his offer to reach out to us. As C S Lewis put it:

Jesus offers us something for nothing. He even offers everything for nothing. In a sense, the whole Christian life consists in accepting that very remarkable offer.

That’s what’s unique about Christianity when you contrast it with every other religion. Jesus Christ is what’s unique. Take the “Christ” out of “Christian” and you’re left with nothing.

Ultimately, Jesus refuses to fit into the pluralistic box but stands alone. To ask Christians why we think Jesus is the only way misses the point entirely. Jesus competes with nobody. Nobody else in history made the claims he did, claimed to be able to deal with the problems of the human heart like he did, or claimed, as he did, to be God with us. Whether you believe his claims or not, Jesus was utterly unique.

The Winter 2011 issue of the RZIM Canada newsletter, inCONTEXT is now available. Everybody on our mailing list has been sent a copy, but if you’d prefer to download it as a PDF, download links can be found below.

Front Page (1.4 MB PDF)     Back Page (0.3 MB PDF)