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Jesus Said


Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
            Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.” (John 14:4-7)
 

Once again, Jesus returns to this theme, and this is the theme I return to because so many insist that it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you sincerely believe it. “My god,” they declare “would never deny heaven to anyone.” To those who declare such things, I must say that they are calling Jesus a liar. For that matter, they’re calling Mohammed, the Buddha, and the founders (I suspect) almost all other religions liars, too. Except for the Universalists, I know of no religion that promotes the idea that everyone goes to heaven. Many claim that everyone can go to heaven, but they all have their own requirements. For Christianity, the requirement is Jesus Christ. To reject Him is to reject heaven. It’s not what God does to the one who rejects Jesus, it’s what the one who rejects Jesus does to himself. 
         So, Jesus tells Muslims, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” To Jews, Jesus says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” To Atheists, Buddhists, Taoists and all other people from all other religions, Jesus says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” If they then say, “No thanks, I’ll do it my way,” it is not God’s fault, or Jesus’ if their way does not get them there.
         If a Christian proclaims that what Jesus said is true, that those who do not seek salvation through Jesus do not gain salvation, and you don’t like hearing it, your argument is with Jesus, not the Christian. It’s Jesus you’re calling a liar or an idiot, not the Christian.  

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