Acts 4:8-12
What are Urban Legends?
Urban Legend is the name given to some of the stories that get circulated, mostly on the Internet. Some of the stories are true, many are false and some are a mixture of true and false. Most people , however believe the stories are true. One of the current Urban Legends surrounds the minting of the new dollar coin. Early pictures showed a picture of George Washington on the obverse and the Statue of Liberty on the reverse. But no where on the face of the coin do you read the words, “In God We Trust.” Some people got mad and started an email campaign telling people about how the government was removing the national motto from our coins. If they had bothered to read the whole article they would have know that the National mottos, “In God We Trust,” and “E Pluribus Unum” along with the date were incised on the edge of the coin.

So in this series I want to explore some of the Urban Legends we as God’s people sometimes believe. The first is, There are many paths to God.

A listener responded to a religious radio talk show host with the following comment: “They may not believe in Jesus, but they love God and serve God with all of their hearts. They love God. You love God. How can you say one is wrong and the other is right?” We live in an age of religious pluralism.

Maybe you have seen the bumper sticker which spells out the word COEXIST with the symbols of several of the worlds religions. Each religion should work for the betterment of human kind. Each religion should cooperate in humanitarian concerns. But sometimes it means they are all equal paths to God and no one religion is more right than another. I can not agree with that and here is why.

The Nature of Truth
A proposition is true if and only if it corresponds to the way things are. For something to be true it must correspond to reality. The principle of non-contradiction says that a statement can not be true and false at the same time. It can not be true that all unmarried men are bachelors and that married men are bachelors. One of them can be true but not both of them. Contradictory claims can’t be simultaneously true.

If you believe that absolute truth exists, then if one thing is true the opposite can not equally be true. If we know the grass to be green, it cannot be red, yellow, black or blue.
With that in mind…

Many people believe that all religions teach the same things, it simply is not true. Oh there may be some similarity in surface aspects like the “Golden Rule” but there are major differences as well. For example:

  • Christianity believes that Jesus is the Messiah and equal to God, Judaism does not. Both can be wrong, but both can not be right.
  • Buddhism believes in reincarnation and the transmigration of the soul, Christianity does not.
  • Hinduism is pantheistic, everything is part of God, Christianity teaches that God is separate from creation.
  • Islam believes that God is strict, aloof unpredictable and responsible for both good and evil acts, Christianity teaches that God is good, merciful, faithful and not the author of evil.
  • Hinduism teaches that the world is an illusion, Christianity teaches that the universe was created by God and the real habitation for all living things.
  • New age practitioners believe that we are all god. Christianity believes that there in only one God.

To say that all religions are equally true you would have to either deny the existence of absolute truth or believe all truth is relative.

The most amazing thing about those that believe all truth is relative is that they claim to know a truth which trumps all truth — their’s, of course, is absolute.Each of these practitioners of the various religions believe theirs is true. And for their’s to be true ours must be wrong unless truth doesn’t really mean anything.

I have shared my faith with people who sometimes say things like this: “I know you mean well, but I just don’t see it like that. I think I live a pretty good life so I don’t really need to believe in God.”
This person in effect has said, “Look I don’t believe that a person has to believe in God.” That person is saying in effect, “I am the highest authority and the arbiter of all truth. I am my own god. Believing in God is just one of many options.”

What Jesus said
It is not Christians that are narrow minded, bigoted, and exclusive. Jesus is the one who made this thing exclusive.

[Jn 5:23 ESV ] that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.

[Jn 5:26-27 ESV ] For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man.

[Mt 24:4-5 ESV ] And Jesus answered them, “See that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray.

[Jn 10:30 ESV ] I and the Father are one.”

[Jn 14:6 ESV ] Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

So the question everyone must deal with is “What will you do with Jesus?”
C.S. Lewis has put forth the classic statement on Jesus
You can not say that Jesus is a great moral teacher. Either he is a liar (he knew he was wrong) a lunatic (he did not know he was wrong) or he is Lord.

No Other Name
The text for this sermon reminds us of something very important. The only way to be saved is through the name of Jesus. It is obvious that unbelievers try to find salvation in other names, but there are even some Christians who do the same. Salvation is defined as deliverance, reconciliation, healing, wholeness, atonement.

Many are seeking these things in other names:
Entertainment, wealth, pornography, material goods, status, fantasy, power, sports, relationships, alcohol, over-eating, shopping, sex, doing good deeds, drugs, church.
How do you know if you have fallen into these? Here is a good test.
When you feel the pain of your life, when you are at you lowest and feel lost and alone, frustrated, empty, what do you turn to in those times? That is what you consider your savior.

But, Acts 4:12 says, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

The only way of salvation starts with repentance: confessing that you have sought deliverance, reconciliation, healing, wholeness, atonement in other names.

It continues with faith: trusting that Jesus is the only way of salvation and relying on him.

The evidence of faith is: obedience, prayer
worship, sharing, growing, serving, giving, connecting, living

The essence of the Gospel is this: you cannot save yourself, God has to do it, that’s why he sent Jesus