PERSPECTIVES
By: JT When you have a door, you can have many people with the a key to the one door, but the key is the exact same for each person. You can’t just choose a random key on your ring and plug it in the keyhole and expect the door to open. The same is true for Jesus and heaven, there are many people in the world of have Jesus in their heart, who is the key, and that is the only key that will work for the door to heaven. You can’t take Buddha and expect him to open the door for you, he cant, he isn’t the key. By: Sy The law of non-contradiction says that ideas the contradict each other can’t both be correct. They may even both be wrong, but not right. An example is that the earth can’t be a sphere and and cube at the same time, it must be one or the other, or neither. The same is true for religions. Islam and Christianity have contradictory beliefs such as Christians believe that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are a trinity and Islam says that it is the worst sin in the world to believe in a trinity. They can’t both be right. Some say that all religions are all the same. They are not. Buddha does not offer salvation, Judaism doesn’t believe that Jesus was God, Islam seem to target the foundation of Christianity, and Hinduism has more than a few gods. In this case, the real question is which religion can be proven to be historically accurate. Which can be scientifically proven, and which makes the most sense. Jesus is the only way because we can prove that he existed, did miracles, rose from the dead, and confirmed the entire rest of the Bible (Old Testament). Islam does not offer salvation. Judaism missed Jesus when he was here. Buddhism didn’t become a religion with a God until after Buddha died, and Hinduism has far too many gods and no honest form of salvation. By: Devon The question itself presupposes the core tenet of the Christian worldview; that a man named Jesus died a substitutionary death in our place to pay for our sins. With that foundation in place, we will then examine the following points to answer the question about why adopting that worldview is the only way to get to heaven;
While we have the option to either believe or not believe the words Jesus spoke, we can’t believe that adopting the Christian worldview is just one way to get to heaven. That would violate the law of non-contradiction which states that opposite ideas can’t be true at the same time and in the same sense. Either Jesus is the only way or He’s not. He can’t be just one of many ways, that’s a logical contradiction. If there was more than one path to heaven, why did Jesus have to suffer and die a horrible death? If there was something we could do to save ourselves then why did God send His son to die in our place? The only logical reason why God would send His son to suffer and die, and the only logical reason why Jesus willingly submitted to this solution is because it was the only solution. There was no other way. All worldviews are exclusive. Islam says that only Muslims will get to heaven. Buddhists and Hindus have exclusive beliefs about heaven. Atheists believe that we cease to exist all together when we die. Every world view believes it is the “only way.” Theistic religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam) are the only worldviews that offer us a choice about where we go when we die. Christian theism is the only option that is not a merit based system. Christianity says that no one can bear the burden of being “good enough.” For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23 And yet it is the only option that offers a full pardon for our sin – because of the sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf! That’s why He is the only way! Consider these questions; Do you believe that moral crimes should be punished? Have you ever committed a moral crime? Would you like a full pardon? If so, Jesus is the only way. By: R. T.
If you wanted to go to heaven when you die, how would you get there? I suppose you would try to be a really good person and do a lot of things that would help you earn your way to this wonderful place. Okay! Let’s take look at this way to heaven. You might spend all your time, your entire life, doing things that are noble that you believe your acceptance into heaven surely must be guaranteed. The day comes for your life to end and now what? Are you sure you did enough and how will you get there? Did you talk to God about this momentous day and are you expecting God to let you in? It seems there could be something missing here! There is no way to know if you did enough virtuous things, no way to know if God will open up those pearly gates for you. This is one of the most important events in your life and you have to be absolutely certain it’s going to turn out the way you are hoping. What if this method doesn’t work? Let’s investigate another way. What you really want is eternal life in heaven, not just getting God to open that gate but also to be able to live there forever. How are you going to achieve this eternal state of living? We’ve already figured out doing good things really isn’t the answer so you will have to ask your god to change your dying body into one that can survive forever. What god are you going to ask to do that for you? Let’s take a look at some well-known religions and see which one offers you the best opportunity to get that eternal body. Hinduism offers reincarnation and the self is one with Brahman, you must do awesome things and take pilgrimages, but illusion prevents you from understanding it. There are about 10 deities that also have alternative avatars and names. It’s hard to say how many gods there really are but you’ll have to choose the right one. Buddhism offers 2 ways: The devotional way and the way of intuitive knowledge. Your obedience to the Four Noble Truths and the Eight Fold Path are required as well. How will you know which way to choose in the end and how will you know if you achieved the goal? Islam says Allah will weight your good and bad deeds in life and decide if you will get into paradise. You must also follow the Five Pillars. Jehovah’s Witness expects you to perform good works of all kinds and ultimately there is no guarantee you will be admitted into paradise because all the “spots” have already been filled. I think we covered this already, that doing awesome things isn’t enough to really get God to open the gate for you. There is no way to really know what your end result will be. I could go through each religion and lay out the requirements for eternal life, but really it’s pointless. Let me explain. You see, all of the other religions are based on someone who died and is still dead, or on a lifeless item crafted by men to represent a god that has never lived to begin with. It’s dead! This is what sets Christianity apart and above all other religions because Jesus is alive! God himself, Jesus, came to earth to become like you, to suffer like you, to feel all the things you feel. God lovingly reached down to us to save us through Jesus, His Son. (Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.) He was crucified and died but here is the huge difference. He arose from death back to life, he defeated death! (Revelation 1:18 "I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.) No other god claims these things. What difference does this make? First of all it’s not what you do to earn paradise, it’s what you have done. What have you done? Have you done anything that is unkind, mean, or deceitful? Have you lied, killed, hated or cheated? We all have! We have an unpaid debt called sin and no one on earth can pay it for you. We need the perfection of Jesus to pay our debts. You see, Jesus lived perfectly and is the only person who could ever paid your debts because God requires perfection to enter heaven. When Jesus willingly surrendered His life on the cross He paid your debts, all of them! You could say to yourself, “My debt is too big!” But Jesus says, “I paid it off.” You can say, “My debt is overwhelming, I’ve done so many terrible things!” But Jesus says, “I already paid for it.” The payment for your sins is offered to you as a free gift, there is nothing you can do to compensate God for it. You can’t earn a gift and it has nothing to do with your worthiness. (Titus 3:4-7 4 But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, 5 not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.) Jesus became the bearer of our sin and took on the wrath of God. (1 Peter 2:22-24 22 "Who committed no sin, Nor was deceit found in His mouth"; 23 who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously; 24 who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness--by whose stripes you were healed.) This brings us back to the question, what difference does it make that Jesus arose from death? Jesus is alive having defeated death and He is offering you this as well. A dead god cannot offer you anything, only a living God can provide you the opportunity to go to heaven, and because He has already defeated death, you can too! He will give you life, a new body and eternity. All you have to do is trust in Him, repent of your sins and accept the gift. PERSPECTIVES
By: Josiah “Why would a good God send people to Hell?” The question reads. It is a great question, but is one of the many questions pertaining to God, and things in the Bible that can be answered with confidence. First thing is first, the sin of man. God, originally, created a beautiful lush world. No living thing (mankind and animal kind) died. When God made the world and the rest of the universe He called it very good, it was the way He meant it to be. God warned Adam, the first man not to eat of one particular tree as recorded in Genesis 2:17, “but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” This one command shows us that God loved Adam enough to give him free will. But when Adam disobeyed this command, ate of the tree, and sinned against God–he was not “good” anymore because of his sin. Genesis 3:17-19, (17) Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: “Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. (18) Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, And you shall eat the herb of the field. (19) In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread Till you return to the ground, For out of it you were taken; For dust you are, And to dust you shall return.” Adam got what he deserved after what he had done and now all people everywhere die. This is because every one of us, except Jesus, has disobeyed the perfect good God. So how good and perfect is God? Mark 10:18, So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. Since God is so good and perfect, He also judges perfectly. Since we are not good we are bad, there is no in between. God’s judgment of sin is death and Hell. And since all of us have sinned we all fall short of God’s glory deserving our punishment due us. Since God judges perfectly He cannot just let imperfection by it has to be dealt with. Does God have authority over us, to do what He wants? Absolutely! See God made everything in the universe, He made everything around us and He made us. Not only that, He provides His planet, His animals, plants and minerals for us. He provides us with His own water. He literally owns us! He has every right to do whatever He wants with us! So God is perfect and He is in complete control of us, but He gives us free will and that is why we can choose what we do in this world, and why we can choose to follow after Him or not. But this good God also loves us, 2 Peter 3:9, The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering towards us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. So He (God) does not want us to perish, or go to Hell, but it must be done if we do not repent. God does not want us to go to Hell so much that He made a way for us to be saved from that punishment. He sent His son Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, to die and take that punishment we deserve. And if you believe and have faith in His son that He rose from the dead and repent of your sins you will be saved. By: Sy God doesn’t exactly send people to hell. We choose to do so. If we sin once we are unable to be with God. God gave us a great world, and we ruined it. It isn’t possible not to sin, which is why God sent Jesus to suffer for our sins. God desires to be with each and every one of us. By: JT God gives us a lifetime of opportunity to accept His free gift of mercy. Without it He sees us as the dirty disgusting rotten sinners that we really are and as such we deserve hell, eternal punishment. Just as a felon convicted and proven of committing murder deserves punishment so do we. If we accept God’s gift of mercy, He sees us as His perfect creation, blameless and without sin. We owe thanks and praise to Jesus for giving us an opportunity to be free from evil. By: Devon There are only two options for our existence when our earthly lives are over; eternity with God, which takes place in Heaven, or eternity without God, which takes place in Hell. God makes Himself known to us, and available to us in our lives here on earth. If a person rejects God during this time, then God won’t force that person to spend eternity with Him when this earthly existence is over. Therefore it is the free choice of each individual person whether to spend eternity with God, or without Him. Although God makes Himself known to us, He does not force Himself on us. That would not be loving. Real love cannot be forced. If a person rejects God during their lifetime, the most loving thing God can do is allow that person to have the eternal existence of their choice; eternity without God. While God is loving, He is also just. He cannot allow sin to go unpunished, that wouldn’t be just. Without hell, justice would never be served to those persons whose crimes went unpunished during this lifetime, people like Hitler, and Joseph Mengela By: R. T.
This statement is wrong in three ways. First it denies the freedom God has given us in making decisions. Secondly it denies the sovereignty of God being ruler over everything. Thirdly it mis-characterizes God as being mean or uncaring instead of righteous and just. Let’s look at all three of these wrong assumptions. 1 - God has given us the freedom to choose Him or to do things our own way. Revelation 3:20 says: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.” If we do not decide to choose God and His salvation through Jesus Christ then we have ourselves chosen to go to hell. It’s just that simple. We are free to choose, we choose the wrong path and therefore choose to go to hell on our own. 2 - The sovereignty of God is over all things, the earth and universe, over how to judge us because He made us and gave specific rules to follow. Deuteronomy 4:39 says: "Therefore know this day, and consider it in your heart, that the LORD Himself is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.” If we do not follow His will which is clearly and plainly described in scripture, then we have to know without a doubt that God will do what is necessary in accordance with righteousness. We cannot criticize God for what we ourselves do. 3 - God is such a great and caring God that He sent His most treasured Son to die on the cross for us. This gives us the opportunity to make things right with Him, to find that path to righteousness and salvation and to take part in living eternally with our wonderful God in heaven. Romans 8:38-39 says: “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” If you choose to do things Gods way then you cannot be separated from Him! How wonderful is that! If we don’t accept the free gift from Him, then we have chosen to place ourselves under the judgement of a righteous God and sadly, buy our own ticket to hell. Romans 10:8-11 says: “But what does it say? "The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, "Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame." This tells us how our loving God has made a way for us into heaven and to completely avoid hell. It’s not hard, just confess that Jesus is your Lord and Savior! Philippians 3:8-9 says: “Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith;” All life and actions in live come down to one thing, what is most important above everything? This one thing is your relationship with God and everything else we concern ourselves with is of very little importance, it’s just rubbish. Choose today to accept the free gift of salvation that God is offering you and don’t go to hell by ignoring His love and desire to save you. |
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