Only One Way?

In John's Gospel, chapter 14 verse 6, Jesus says to his followers:

I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.

He is here making a claim to be unique, and to be the only way to God. This is not just the claim of Jesus himself. It is also the unanimous teaching of the early Church. For example, when Peter is hauled before the religious leaders in Jerusalem, he tells them, in Acts chapter 4 verse 12:

There is no other name in all of heaven for people to call on to save them..

From the other end of the New Testament era, Paul writes in 1 Timothy chapter 2 verse 5,

There is only one God, and one mediator who can reconcile God and people - the man Christ Jesus.

So is there only one way to God, or are there many ways? If there is only one way, is Jesus that way?

If you have been a follower of Jesus Christ for a long time - perhaps you were brought up in a home where the Bible was believed and taught - you may feel that we do not even need to ask this question. But it is becoming more and more important and controversial for many people today:

We live in a day of 'truths' rather than 'Truth'

The common view today is that we all have partial truths:

A religious elephant

You have heard the parable of the three blind men encountering an elephant: One caught its tail, and said 'it's like a rope'. One caught it's leg. 'No,' he said, 'It isn't a rope. It's a tree.' The third caught its trunk. 'No,' he said, 'you're both wrong. It's like a huge snake.' The same elephant, you see, but three different, apparently contradictory, views of it. And this is put forward as a picture of the relationship between different religions. We all have partial truths, but none of us has the whole truth.

A Spiritual Mountain

Another picture that is often used today is of the roads leading up a mountain. We are all, apparently, climbing the same spiritual mountain, but we all have different roads up it. We must each find our own way.

The writer and broadcaster Libby Purves, interviewed in the Christian magazine 'Woman Alive' in June 2000, said:

'God comes in different hats.'

- and this is a very common view today.

So there is no such thing today as absolute truth, true for all of us, whether or not anyone believes it. There is only whatever is 'true for you' and 'true for me'.

The BBC TV series 'Soul of Britain', with Michael Buerk, surveyed people's beliefs and attitudes: Fewer than one in ten of us are confident that our tradition is the best path to God. About a third of us think that all religions are equally valid. (Soul of Britain, BBC TV, Sunday 4^th June 2000). One contributor put it like this:

'There are many many paths to god, and it depends on the individual as to which is their path. I very much believe in Christ's teaching, the Buddha's teaching, many other teachings. It's the same path.'

The greatest good is tolerance of other people

An article about the Millennium Dome in the June 2000 issue of 'Reader's Digest' talks about the:

'thunkingly obvious enjoinders in the show and several of the zones on the need to get on with fellow occupants of the planet.'

A bit later, it describes how, in the 'Faith Zone',

Someone has done massive research in compiling the uncanny similarities in so many of the world's most sacred texts, inscribed along one wall:

Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself. (Bahai)

Do not hurt others with that which hurts yourself. (Buddha),

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. (The Holy Bible).

None of you is a true believer unless he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself. (Mohammed).

You do not need to be a rocket scientists to get the underlying point: Deep down, all religions are really saying the same thing, so we need to be tolerant of our surface differences.

In a time when all beliefs are equally valid, the most important moral value of all is what? Tolerance for other people's beliefs and lifestyles. As Prime Minister Tony Blair said recently,

'We shall be intolerant of prejudice and bigotry!'

In such a world, there is no place for seeking to convert people from other religions (or none) to following Jesus Christ

So the common contemporary challenge is: 'How can you be so arrogant and bigoted and intolerant as to think that one truth fits everyone, that there is only one way to God?'

In today's world, a missionary is seen with suspicion, or as the butt of jokes. If the contemporary view is right, there is no place for missionaries, in the sense of those who go to convert people from following other religions to following Christ. At best, missionaries are social workers, providing schools and hospitals that the local government can not or will not afford. At worst, they are interfering bigots who bring disease, pave the way for the rape of the environment, and all the other benefits of 'civilization' so-called.

Today even followers of Christ think like this

As one student, who claimed to be a follower of Christ, said recently:

Surely if the Bible says one thing and I deeply feel another, the only thing I really have to go on is my feelings.

A couple of years ago, Christian Research carried out a survey of church-attending teenagers.

They found that 79% of them - about four out of five, are not sure whether there is such a thing as absolute truth, and many believe that two people can have contradictory beliefs yet both be correct. One in three of those who define themselves as committed Christians doubts whether we can know for certain that God exists. A substantial minority of teenagers from Bible believing Churches do not believe that Christianity is the only true religion.

So Jesus, and the New Testament Church got it wrong about there being only one way to God. All religions are basically the same, so let's be tolerant!

It sounds nice, doesn't it? It sounds affable and open to get on well with everyone. And of course in a world torn apart by ethnic cleansing and religious fundamentalism, getting on with everyone is rather important.

But does it really work? When we start to think about it, this claim will not stand up for a moment. There are at least four reasons why not:

1. We do not think like this about anything else

We know that water boils at the same temperature for all of us (as long as we're at the same altitude and pressure). We may express it in different scales, but the underlying reality does not change. It is not one temperature for you, and another temperature for me.

If I want to climb a mountain, there may indeed be a variety of different routes that will bring me to the top - but that does not mean I can just go in whatever direction I choose - there are many more routes that will not take me up the mountain at all.

In the real world, we all know that some things are really true (however inconvenient), and other things are really false (however nice it would be if they were true). And whether something is true or false does not in the least depend on whether or not anyone believes it, or on how different people view it.

The Bible's message claims to be the same kind of truth as (for example) the law of gravity - it claims to describe how the universe really is, whether or not anyone believes it.

2. All religions are not saying the same thing

We quoted earlier someone who said this:

Now that sounds nice, but the person who said it could not have know anything about Christ's teaching (and perhaps they did not know much about the Buddha's teaching either). Christ's teaching and the Buddha's teaching are hopelessly at odds with each other. You just cannot try to believe both of them and keep up any kind of mental integrity. Right at the heart of Christ's teaching is his own claim to be utterly unique - as we quoted at the beginning of this article. All religions are not saying the same thing.

For example, most Moslems believe that Jesus was not really crucified on the cross. Followers of Christ believe that he was crucified (and that, far from being a mistake or an accident, the death of Christ was right at the center of God's purposes in human history). To acknowledge this does not mean we are being intolerant, or arrogant, any more than we are being arrogant when we say that the Earth is round. As Peter Cotterell says:

'Truth is not a matter of pride or humility. It is a matter of fact. Islam says Jesus wasn't crucified. We say he was. Only one of us can be right. Hinduism says that God has often been incarnate. We say only once. And we can't both be right... Any intelligent person could decide that all religions are wrong. Any intelligent person could decide that one is right and the rest are wrong. But no intelligent person can seriously believe that all religions are essentially the same.'

Of course, some people will say that these 'brute facts' or surface level facts are not what really matters; the core of every religion is some kind of mystical experience of supernatural reality. This is also very appealing in a day when people are rather keen on experiences, and rather less keen on 'facts'. But does it work?

I do not want for one moment to deny the reality of mystical experiences. They are far too widely documented to be denied. But how do we even know that people are talking about the same mystical experience, when the essence of the experience is that you cannot communicate it in words - you cannot talk about it?

Muslims and Jews and Christians do all believe certain facts- not as peripheral add-ons, but as the core of our faith. These are not just window-dressing; they are what we believe about history. The idea that religion is at heart a matter of mystical experience rather than historical facts is itself an eastern idea, alien to the Judeo-Christian tradition.

So by saying that what really matters is some kind of mystical core, what you are actually doing is choosing one kind of religious belief (an eastern one that gives priority to mysticism) over against another kind (a Judeo-Christian one, that gives priority to historical facts). But who makes this choice? And what gives them the right to make this choice? I suggest that no-one has the right to sweep in and say to a religious believer (of whatever faith) 'never mind what you think you believe. Actually, I know better than you do about your own beliefs.'

The reality is that all religions are not saying the same thing.

3. It is an incredibly arrogant claim

It sounds so humble and open, but just think about it for a moment!

The implication is that person making it knows better than everyone else who actually believes anything! They are the only one who can see the whole elephant.

The more you think about it, the more you realize how breathtakingly arrogant this is. How does the person making this claim know? What is it based on, other than the sheer personal opinion of the speaker? It might sound very pleasant to say that all religions are equally valid - just as it might be pleasant if we could all fly - but God, who really is there, has decreed the law of gravity, and we cannot all fly. And in the same way, he has said that there is only one way to him, and that is through Jesus Christ. Not all roads lead up the mountain. Some lead down it. Some lead away from God. Some lead into the swamp.

4. It denies Christ

If all religions lead to God, then Jesus need not have died on the cross. It was all a cosmic mistake!

But, as we have seen, Jesus said that he was the only way. And the key thing that makes you or me a follower of Christ is that we believe in, and actually commit ourselves in practice to follow Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Now, if he really is the Son of God, who is better informed - him, or me? Who is smarter? Who knows reality best? Am I going to say that I know better than him, or am I going to bow to his authority? If I operate on the basis that I know better than Jesus, I am really saying that he was not the Son of God at all; He was just a man of his times, who knew no better. And today, I know better than he did.

So the idea that all religions are equally true will not stand up to examination. It is basically a dishonest idea. The only way you can hold it is if you really mean that all religions are equally false, so it does not really matter what you believe. Just choose whatever works for you, whatever helps you get through the day.

An alternative

Is there an alternative? Is it worth re-examining the Bible's message, its claims? What kind of sense does this message make for us today?

It tells us of a God who really is there (not just inside my head, not just a psychological crutch). It tells us this God is a person, not a vague impersonal force. It tells us this God made the universe, made us, is in control of what happens in the natural world, in human history, and in our individual lives. It tells us this God has spoken to us, through the Bible, and told us how he wants us to live - a way of life that is not just God inflicting his demands on us, but is actually best for us because it fits with how we are made.

If the Bible is true, our most basic problem is that we have fallen short of God's moral standards. We know what is right, but we do what is wrong, and we are guilty before God, and deserve his judgment. If we keep on going our own way, we put ourselves in danger of being permanently excluded from his presence, and from everything that gives life any real meaning, purpose, or happiness. This is what the Bible calls hell.

If the Bible is true, Jesus is not just a man, not just a guru or religious teacher, but God himself, in person, come to earth on a rescue mission; come to die in my place; come to take the punishment due for my guilt; to pay the penalty I could not pay.

If it is true, this is the only message that can deal with our most basic problem of all.

And whether it is trueor not is not a matter of our attitude (whether or not we are tolerant or bigoted). It is a matter of examining the evidence in history, in creation. It is important to say that we are not just followers of Christ because it helps us to get through the day (although it may do that), not just because it works for us, but because there are good reasons for believing the Good News - there is evidence.

Does making this claim mean that we are being arrogant and bigoted? Well, in the current climate - it may mean being accused of that. But true tolerance is an attitude that respects the other person's freedom to hold their own beliefs and live in their own ways. It does not mean I think that all beliefs really are equally true, that all lifestyles really are equally good.

Holding to the truth of the Bible's message does not mean that all followers of Christ are good people, and all the followers of other religions are bad people. There are certainly bad people who are followers of Christ, and there are certainly better people who follow other religions.

It does not mean that everything the other religions say about moral standards is false - of course not. It does not even mean that everything the other religions say about God is wrong either.

It does not mean that the founders of other religions were all villains or fools. If someone tells me that Gandhi was a better person than I am, or that the Buddha was wiser than I am, or that Mohammed was more concerned for God's glory than I am, all of those things may be true, and I can respect them for it.

But what it does mean is that Jesus is much more than just a good or wise man. He is the Son of God. As such, he alone is God's answer to our needs, rather than an answer that grows out of our own wisdom or goodness.

And as such, Jesus - alone of all the people on earth - has the right to say that he is the only way to God. 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.'

Because this is the reality of the world we live in, just as much as the law of gravity is the reality of the world we live in, the way God has made the world.

If God really is there; if He really has created us; if He really has spoken through the Bible; if our greatest problem is our moral guilt and alienation from God, if Jesus really was (and is) the Son of God, if He really died on the cross to save us, and rose again, then we cannot get away from it. However politically incorrect it may be, and however much we are accused of being intolerant and bigoted, we still have to face up to the fact that Jesus knew what he was talking about, and meant what he said:

I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.

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