By Rev. Mark H. Creech
January 15, 2003

(AgapePress) - Martin Luther once said, "Anything that one imagines of God apart from Christ is only useless thinking and vain idolatry." However, a number of today's so-called "Christian" leaders would take issue with that statement.

Recently, in a lively televised debate concerning the exclusivity of the Gospel, MSNBC's Donahue featured Joseph Hough, president of Union Theological Seminary of Richmond. saying: "I am a Christian. I believe in Jesus as the one who showed me the way. But I would be the last person to be so arrogant as to assert that my God has so little imagination that he or she could not reach out to other people in other cultures and other ways."

A Pentecostal bishop in Tulsa, Carlton Pearson, author of a variety of books and even a Dove award nominee, continues to stir tremendous controversy among Pentecostals by saying, "The finished work of Christ redeemed all of humanity, not just Christians back to God ....The whole world is already saved -- they just don't know it."

Clearly, New Testament Christianity confronts a modern world that is broadminded in its reception of different faiths. We are like the Romans whom Edward Gibbon sarcastically described in Decline of the Roman Empire: "To the people all religions were equally true; to the philosophers all religions were equally false; and to the politicians all religions were equally useful." This is the same spirit of our age -- a spirit that now undermines the faithful witness of the Church.

Is Jesus Christ the only way to God? Will those who reject the Gospel message be eternally lost? Or is this simply the belief of Christian bigots?

To the surprise of many, the belief that Jesus is the only way did not originate with divisive people who wanted the wrath of God to fall on those who disagreed. The claim actually came from Jesus and was repeated by His apostles.

Jesus said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me" (Jn. 14:6). He also said, "For unless you believe that I am He, you shall die in your sins" (Jn. 8:24).

The Apostle Peter echoed these words, saying, "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). St. Paul agreed saying, "There is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."(I Tim. 2:5).

It is without question, the united witness of the New Testament that no one can know God except through the person of Christ.

Another witness to Christ as the only way is the testimony of the first Christians who were martyred. What was it that motivated innumerable followers of Christ in a religiously pluralistic and liberal-minded society like Rome to give their lives for Him? If a Christian would just take a pinch of incense and place it on a fire before a graven image of Caesar, his life would be spared. Instead Christians chose to die of unspeakable tortures. Why? It was because they were unwilling for Jesus to be just another god in a Roman pantheon. To them, He was the one true God and there was none other besides Him. For that faith they were willing to seal their testimony with their blood!

Still, there is one other reason why we ought to believe in Christ as our only hope. Josh McDowell used this example: Suppose a group is taking a hike in a very dense forest and gets lost. Realizing that they've taken the wrong path means they will lose their lives. So, they become afraid.

But they soon notice ahead in the distance where the trail splits, there are two human forms at the fork in the road. Running up to these two people, they note that one has a park ranger's uniform on and is standing there healthy and alive, while the other is laying face down, dead.

Now which of the two are they going to ask the way out? Obviously, the one who is living. When it comes to eternal matters, it's best to ask the one who is alive the way out. This is not Muhammad, not Confucius, but Jesus Christ. The greatest proof that Jesus is the only way to God is His resurrection from the dead.

The resurrection of Christ is one of the best-attested events in human history. Thomas Arnold, author of the famous three-volume History of Rome, appointed to the chair of modern history at Oxford, and certainly a man well acquainted with the value of evidence in determining historical facts, said: "I have been used for many years to study the histories of other times, and to examine and weigh the evidence of those who have written about them, and I know of no one fact in the history of mankind which is proved by better and fuller evidence of every sort, to the understanding of a fair enquirer, than the great sign which God hath given us that Christ died and rose again from the dead." Numerous other prestigious scholars of history and law down through the centuries would concur.

Indeed, Jesus is the only way to God! In the days of Noah, there was no salvation outside of the Ark. In the days of Moses, there was no deliverance except for those who were under the blood. And in our day, there is no redemption outside of Christ.

Rev. Mark H. Creech (calact@aol.com) is the executive director of the Christian Action League of North Carolina, Inc.

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