Today is Wednesday, March 12th, 2008; Karen's Korner #1268
Our local ministerial association is putting on a series of Lenten luncheons on Wednesdays as we prepare for the Easter season. Each week a minister for a different church talks briefly on a chapter or two from "3:16", a book written by Max Lucado.
Here are a couple of exerpts from "The 3:16 Promise", taken from the well-known Bible verse John 3:16::
He loves.
He gave.
We believe.
We live.
Jesus declares, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but by me."
(John 14:6)
All roads lead to heaven, right?
But can they?
Is it accurate?
Can all approaches to God be correct?
Islam says Jesus was not crucified.
Christians say he was.
Both can't be right.
Judaism refuses the claim of Christ as the Messiah.
Christians accept it
Someone's making a mistake.
Buddhists look toward Nirvana, acheived from no less than 547 reincarnations.
Christians believe in one life, one death, and an eternity of enjoying God.
Doesn't one view exclude the other?
Humanists do not acknowledge a creator of life.
Jesus claims to be the source of life.
One of these speaks folly.
Spiritists read your palms.
Christians read the Bible.
Hindus perceive a plural and impersonal God.
Christ-followers believe "there is one God". (I Corinthians 8:4)
Somebody is wrong.
And, most supremely, every non-Christian religion says, "You can save you."
Jesus said, "My death on the cross saves you."
How can all religions lead to God when they are so different?
We don't tolerate such illogic in other matters.
We don't pretend that all roads lead to London, or all ships sail to Australia.
Imagine your response to a travel agent who claims they do.
You know better.
Different flights have different destinations.
That's not a thick-headed conclusion, but an honest one.
Every flight does not go to Rome.Every path does not lead to God.
Jesus blazed a stand-alone trail void of self-salvation.
He cleared a one-of-a-kind passageway uncluttered by human effort.
Christ came, not for the strong, but for the weak;
not for the righteous, but for the sinner.
We enter his way upon confession of our need,
not completion of our deeds.
He offers a unique-to-him invitation in which he works and we trust;
he dies and we live.
he invites and we believe.
~~
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