What About Other Religions? "Discussion Panel" Tim Mackie (The Bible Project) 11/8/2009

been to our topic tonight and again the rotten tomato that we're kind of doing our best to address uh tonight is what about all the other uh religions what about those exclusive claims of christianity in the story that just doesn't seem to sit right with me how would you guys answer that so we're gonna dive right in these are your questions and uh brit we get the first one up there all right first question don't most religions essentially worship the same god but honor different prophets don't most religions essentially worship the same god but honor different prophets one of you guys want to want to start out yeah i was going to give chris a break here for a little bit so that's good i'll be glad i need a break yeah you can pay me later so all right um okay i'll maybe let's just make a couple observations it's a great question this one's very common i think in western culture in particular there's an assump actually you can see there's right off there's an assumption built into the question um about what uh most religions actually believe um that there is a god or that there's one god that itself is an assumption about religions um not all religions obviously believe in a deity right so with nature religions um pantheistic religions where god is really the divine energy in the world um so there's already an assumption that we're talking about religions that believe in a all-powerful divine being which narrows the playing field pretty yes pretty considerably like the assumption is that there's a personal deity that kind of thing and not all religions would hold enough yeah that's right so so that being said so if we're talking about like polytheistic or theistic religions where we have a personal being is it just that there's one deity behind there but they just have different spokes people in in different religions or different different cultures so i'm the the question makes it makes sense from our perspective um i mean it's this is just utterly a western uh a western question i have a friend uh i actually recently moved um uh matt uh metzger we did a a series kind of on the three monotheistic religions about a year ago and uh we had a guy from the muslim community come and we were on a panel together his name is mamoon you know and he when he gets this question a lot of the times too and and he will answer this and he'll just say only americans or europeans ask this question this this is if you're raised in a different culture where you're raised in whether buddhist culture or or raised in a really conservative muslim culture or something like that this question doesn't even occur to you because we can't we we actually believe different things um it's not that we all just like are going to the same god and are getting there through different spokes people or different paths but these gods of these different religions are actually mutually exclusive in in who they are so you know uh we have a mutual friend named bill tooman used to teach at edgewood college and religious studies department and he would say the same thing that in his class because he would ask the students this uh in his class it was the westerners who basically said all religions kind of believe in the same kind of thing and he said all of his students who were not from the west none of them no no they would not say that at all so they understand it's completely different yeah so it's kind of really the elephant illustration that chris used earlier today the assumption is that we really know that all religions are actually just basically about the same thing but if you ask it here especially non-american adherents of these religions what what buddhists are striving for just has absolutely nothing to do with any of the categories that we have in in the jewish or christian tradition you know this nirvana is not salvation you know what i mean ramana is losing uh your kind of your own personal uh and being absorbed into the divine energy of the world and that's just it's just really different than anything in the jewish christian tradition so i guess a short response would be i just know if you actually look at what these different the conceptions of these gods are in the different religions they're they're just not not the same at all i guess mike pearce recommended his book in the category in categories why the why the rest hate the west and he makes this point too it's the it's the kind of western arrogance of really all of you people who have these different faiths you ought to all see now that you're all worshipping the same god that is the western arrogance as he kind of frames that's why they don't like us no that's not actually we disagree with each other so my point in that elephant illustration was just exactly this uh it it there's this outside observer who does in fact know the truth that's that's that statement of kind of arrogance if you could and it kind of just kind of disproven he the the the parable borrows on what it's trying to disprove which is not a very logical way of trying to prove something um so i don't think i have any more to add about that i just throughout mike's book it's a great uh it's a good read i think of it it maybe it's the bad title but it it's not all about uh anger and stuff but it really helps you to see uh the west from the perspective of other folks all right so the the two kind of main answers that i got that i heard are one this is kind of a western question and and if you're not from the west you're probably not even asking this or thinking that um and two um no because there's logical contradictions in what most the religions believe about god and um if they believe in a god if they believe in a god and it kind of go back to i think most people go to the elephant example to kind of say well from your perspective it feels like a snake or or you know a tree trunk but if you had a broader perspective you'd see that it was logically coherent to believe all these different things and um i think the illustration falls apart on that front as well because there's a lot of things that different religions believe there are logically contradictions it doesn't matter how high you get or what perspective they just frankly disagree you know jesus is god or he isn't god or god is triune or god is not trying it doesn't matter how much perspective you get on something new no matter how you get there going to be contradictions maybe i'm sorry just to follow up i'm thinking just really clearly state chris's point about this western point this feels sympathetic and and and like we're actually being kind or fair when we say well really we just all believe the same thing but what we're actually doing is imposing a world view and we're we're actually dishonoring these different religious traditions who believe mutually exclusive things that's an excellent point so i mean because the value that the person has is one to honor people but they don't understand it's actually dishonoring to say that right yeah that's right that's a good point yeah and i used the illustration not too long ago when i was on campus uh for the lubar institute like a year or so ago there was an imam and a rabbi myself and we had this great moment i didn't put it in the message because i used it not too long ago where this imam asks in the audience he says is there some reporter here from and somebody said yes and he says i want you to look at us we don't agree with each other but we all like each other so it was really a powerful kind of a moment so just because we don't agree doesn't mean we can't get along and like each other and and have discussion but it doesn't mean we're all melted into the same kind of thing brit we can get the next one up there all right next question when someone asks christian what is it that they believe wait when someone asks a christian what it is that they believe happens to people of other faiths at the end of time what do we answer um you will not be saved yeah that would probably not be the the best grammar yeah well no it's not the way to make friends and influence people well actually you're not going to be saved but next question that kind of thing yeah there's some grammar issues there well but not to make fun of that i i think whenever i get questions about what happened to my grandfather or what happened to this person or that i you some of you might think this is cop-out but i'm actually not god and i'm not the judge i'm not the judge so i don't know what ha i've been a pastor long enough to know about people who have placed their faith in christ at the very last moment so i actually don't know a lot about people so i'm not the judge so god is the judge so that's kind of one thing but i don't think it's good form really to say that someone is not saved or something actually that's god's business it might be a cop-out but usually they kind of then they there's then they come to me with another question well in theory that kind of a thing so that might be the way we handle this i just wanted to throw that out timmy of anything that um yeah i mean i i i do echo that and i i don't i don't think it's a cop out i think it's uh as christ followers we are never given the prerogative you know to make declarations about who's in and who's out and that kind of thing and what's funny is when you actually a lot of times the words of jesus about there's only two paths or two ways or is very stark kind of challenges to people about whether you think you're in and out but the irony is that whenever jesus is challenging people uh to think about who's in and who's out he's challenging people religious people who think we think that they're in he's saying no no you're out actually it's the prostitute that's in and so it's funny it's jesus it's very challenging and subversive of religious people who want to nail down who's in and and who's out and so it's just i think it's important observation to make he always took that angle and and and flip flipped it over yeah the more religious you were the more a good good chance you were out from his perspective yeah that's right so but at the same time there's the heart of this there is a question of theology here so regardless of the personal dynamics or of us not having the prerogative i mean the the question is why do we actually want to compel people of of the story um if we don't think it matters you know if they're just fine yes it's defined the way that they are and uh so i i would shift the question to that as opposed to speculating about what i think is going to happen to someone after they die so what how would that turn out how would you should make that shift so i would just say i you know i'm not it's not my prerogative to make that kind of decision um but i do think that this story of the gospel offers something that other religious traditions can't can't get you um and and so that the story has something compelling and truthful about it that other religions don't don't have to offer and i mean the moment i uh if you're inside my head you know i'm like i'm shuddering or something as i say that because again that sounds very arrogant to us especially in our cultural context our western culture has made these but it is a truth claim so we're just making a truth claim right someone else is making a truth claim and that is also narrow so do you guys follow that because i want to try to make this clear so if you say all religions lead to the same place whatever let's let's just say you're that you're making you're making a truth claim okay let's say that's your view we'll call that view a okay so let's say we say that uh you can only have relationship with god through christ let's call that view be okay so uh those are two different views uh we don't have to say anybody's arrogant the person who holds view a is a has a narrow view see they're exclusive with respect to a they do not hold view b or view c or view d they too are exclusivists do you follow that they're holding they oh no no they say well i i believe your way is true for you but otherwise well that is something that view b doesn't hold to so you hold view a i hold you b they are not the same views try to try to make that so the person understands it oh no no all religions leave the same no no no i view b doesn't hold that view b holds that it's only through christ so you don't hold you b and finally they'll say oh i guess you're right i don't know if you be you are an exclusivist see you hold only view a you don't hold other views so if you can help people see that kind of a thing because it's all this push to arrogance and intolerance but really if people are making truth claims you can't have the same truth claims there this is a truth claim that's a truth claim and you kind of get them back to that kind of place that was a long tangent i don't know if you can maybe yeah i think you know the the point chris is making is pretty much everybody that's living and breathing holds exclusive claims and uh you know whether we hold them with arrogance or not or how much we hold them with what level of certainty i've got a friend that i meet with he's a philosophy student and and his claim we go back and forth is that you can't know truth or i don't know or you know that well that in and of itself is an exclusive claim and it sets apart other claims and other belief systems so uh even when you try to dodge even knowing truth you're making certain assumptions and claims is that you want to add anything to that temple that's no i'm just looking at the question again realizing that we ended up in a different conversation which is okay but i'm just like oh look i think i think that's why my wife is so frustrated with me most of the time i guess that's yeah that's only i think chris answered in like the first two seconds no that's not what we'd say right you will not be safe right oh well the point was it's not our prerogative so i mean i thought it might just be helpful that's what i would go to somebody i don't know i don't it's i don't know what they came to believe right there at the end or something like that it may be helpful i think just to map out really quickly different views it's kind of the spectrum of views in the christian tradition on on this on this issue um so i just thought i'd throw them up here um so kind of at one end of the spectrum is you called universalist view um where christ's death and uh is paying uh and absorbing the sin into the world on our behalf that that benefits all people regardless of whether they consciously acknowledge jesus or not that's the universalist view so you don't actually have to ever hear about jesus to benefit from his work on the cross and in his resurrection so that's one view the other view then would be the uh exclusivist and this would be only humans who have had the opportunity to hear about jesus the message about him and and acknowledge him are going to make it in the end or whatever you know i mean we'll will be saved or something so those are kind of the two polar opposites um the problem is that neither one can find fully explicit warrant in the scriptures you can get certain passages to go certain directions along along this route but then you have a passage like that chris brought up in revelation 5 and and it just starts to put gray here and and for some people gray in between these two is really uncomfortable but that is where the scriptures that is where the scriptures land us it's interesting too as you'll see the questions as we go through lots of the questions are related to that last point that i was making that last movement about these uh this uh which i told people i don't i don't understand but uh so that's my answer we'll let tim answer that yeah yeah so we'll come back to this question again yeah it's gonna resurface because those verses are the ones that are interesting people here yeah i think something you said today in your message chris it does go with this that i think resonates with me is we do know how to answer this scripturally in some ways and that we do know for certainty that no one will ever stand before god and have a relationship with them on their own merit yeah i think scripture is abundantly clear on that um and that that any future relationship with god salvation if you will is procured through christ yes we're talking more about the means of that and how they come into awareness of christ and and how much knowledge is necessary and you know and you know you didn't address it today but you can also bring in the whole old testament yeah where we know old testament people are are in heaven for lack of a better term and they certainly didn't know um about christ like we would know about maybe now we're way off the question now is this what we should be doing well i i can go through a little thing that maybe might be helpful for you let's see she thinks this is what you should be doing oh okay is that all right the front row is on board with you this might be this might be helpful the object of faith in every age in all peoples it should be the same it's the god this god has revealed himself to all things that's the object of faith uh the means of self the means of object of salvation is god the means of salvation is faith so that's real clear you have to put your faith in this god so the basis of salvation is the work of christ upon the cross no one can have a relationship with god apart from that now this is the thing that gets into the hairy issues of time and all this kind of stuff because uh christ died in a point of time but the work of christ on the cross this is romans 3 uh god uh was always for the old testament jew before what about those people before christ well god who's outside of time uh he he always knew that christ was going to die and the blood of christ would pay for the sins of every single person who's ever lived people before him people after him it's the work of christ it's the basis of salvation an illustration for this would be if somebody somebody have a dollar somebody pull out a dollar bill somebody give me a dollar nobody has a dollar definitely college students nobody's reaching right now okay all right thanks good uh this dollar this would be an illustration of what i'm trying to say this dollar uh is actually what is this worth okay so disregarding inflation this dollar is worth a dollar but actually it's not this is actually a piece of paper that our government has written a note to us if you look at the top of a dollar it says it's a federal reserve note it's a note from the united states government that says there is a dollar of real value someplace else in the old days it was gold i'm really we're not on the gold system anymore but at any rate this is not worth a thing there's real value someplace else but you can give this to a child and they can place their faith in this dollar and get a dollars worth of goods never knowing anything about gold or the federal reserve government or whatever it means they don't have to know anything about that and they can benefit from this as they place their faith in that yet the way it really works is that something of real value is happening someplace else so people who never heard of christ that's the basis of salvation is the work of christ upon the cross that's the goal that's what makes anything happen that's why god can accept anyone because of what uh god the incarnate one did so that's the me the basis of salvation the content of faith changes that's the thing the i don't know about christ what do i know so what people put their faith in is different that was some of the point that i was trying to make so my yeah i think that's good i think a lot of the questions are upcoming play off of that such as why then go and what do we need to know and those kind of things so let's move on and at the end we'll have a time to come back and kind of pull everything together we have the next question okay uh how does the beauty of nature lead all humans to christ don't some religions worship nature not christ i think chris this is going off a point that you made today from romans so if you want to address that yeah well uh it doesn't lead all people to christ the beauty of nature does not i mean it could lead people to god that's the that's the point of the romans passage in psalm 19 and the other passages that speak about these natural things that happen so again they wouldn't know christ but they would know that there must be a being the stars are telling me there's something great that's doing this they wouldn't know about christ specifically but they would know about god so i may not have communicated that clearly today so then that's a misunderstanding don't some religion uh religions worship you got anything to say i'm just thinking the question what romans 1 is saying is precisely this point is that uh who that there is in fact some sort of creator and that there's a personal reality at the heart of the universe um is is something that's kind of in the human soul and it's very intuitive to think that about our world yes but that doesn't lead many or most humans to to acknowledge or actually respond to that that being in some way and that's precisely the point paul is making with his whole thing about idolatry in chapter one is that we'd actually rather place our identity uh our way of you know i mean our way of getting meaning or ultimate significance in life in in this in the world which is paul's definitely one of the problems we're doing in this series both tim and i struggle with this they were just ripping verses out of context romans 1 is in the context of all people are guilty actually right romans 1 18 through 320 that's what paul is trying to establish that he has revealed there is no excuse everyone and yet in romans 2 everybody is messed up we we don't acknowledge him so we're all guilty that's the point he's trying to make um and we're moving on okay got it this is the only time i can really cut him off and he can't do anything so uh if there will be people from all nations in heaven even those who have never heard of jesus then why does jesus say he is the only way there will be people from all nations in heaven even those who have never heard of jesus then why does jesus say he's the only way so chris i think again this is going off of something you said today if you want to start yeah um i put a question mark next to this because i think there's something else going on here and i'm not really sure i can't follow the question that way well i mean i think we should do popular vote by nodding it seems to me this is the heart of the question is very similar to the one what happens to people of other religions at the end of time like what uh why why does it seems contradictory to the question i think don't you think got it that if all people can get there through heaven or through nature why would he say he's the only way actually this might help jesus uh i am the way the truth and life what biblical passage are we talking about here john 14 yeah exactly so what's interesting about sorry i'm just uh throwing up something up the bible here um john 14 some some verses in the bible take on lives of their own once you take them out of the context you know what i'm saying and they get used in lots of different interesting ways and and the sentence john 14 6 is right down here that's very that's confusing okay it's very uh it's very powerful just kind of hmm just please stay there how you doing man you doing all right all right all right dude yeah um it didn't work again i used paper bibles uh my wife knows that there are two things that can get me to the verge of cursing and one of them is is my computer because i need to turn off his mic that's right so he's in he's in the upper room with his disciples and they're freaking out because he's saying i'm going away like i'm leaving you and so the disciples asked like where are you going how can we know the way and jesus responds to their question way with this with john 14 6 essentially you you know where i'm going we don't know the way i am in the way so i think it's at least important to recognize who the context of the passage when jesus says this um he's not in the passage making a a wide universal claim about other religions he's in he's in a room with a bunch of people who are scared to death that he's about to leave and he's saying you're with me i'm the way you can find your way if you found me and uh so that that being said i think it's just important to recognize that when we take the passage out of context then it can begin to fly around in this whole question of people of other religions and i'm not sure it's the most helpful well i think i think again chris is right i think we're going over some of the same ground i think the the question embedded in there is are there gonna be people in heaven that didn't have knowledge of jesus and and yeah it seems like it seems like there will be well what does that look like and i think chris said today we don't know yes um unless you guys have come from the science perspective the basis of their being there is the work of christ on the cross that they may have never ever seen but that's how the wrath of god is satisfied and so scripture is clear on the basis why they're there but not necessarily how they get there it doesn't reveal all of that so it seems like that's what the question is getting at and that's what a previous one so i think we've we've gone over that ground a little bit and maybe we'll come back to do we have the next one uh what about people who have only uh ever heard about a distorted version of the gospel or a different version of jesus than who he really was wow yeah that's a good question that's a very good question yeah wow well like what version would be a question then like what version um so i'm thinking like maybe a context would be in some sort of setting where the person representing jesus is just a really horrible person something like that you know and it's uh so someone re rejects christianity or jesus not really because they've understood the gospel and are rejecting that it's because they can't stand the christians that they meet yeah that's not a very relevant question to our day is it yeah uh so i i appreciate that question i guess i don't know what to say i mean what would be the distorted version of the gospel i guess that would be the follow-up question that's the issue well let me just throw an example out to you guys then let's uh and i don't mean to open up too many other questions here but let's say something like mormonism all right so mormonism is uh you know i think they would actively claim to be christians if they've come to your door that's what what they will say and jesus is certainly an essential part of their faith but i think you know any intellectually honest mormon will will admit that they believe drastically different things about jesus than we do as as christians so let's say there's a culture that in in mormons is why it's a good example they're very good at missions work that the mormons have kind of gotten to a culture and and kind of and people have acquiesced and believed and are on board and passionately following the jesus that they put out go with that what would you say so there's a couple things with lds latter-day saint folks the one would be what jesus who's the jesus that they would believe and so i think in their teaching again other people might be from the lds tradition i've never been a part of that but they know enough they are actually denying something that is a claim of christ that is incarnate that he's got himself so that would be a problem right there so they're knowing enough it's not that they they don't affirm it but they know the christian doctrine and they deny that so that would be a problem this is what the bible teaches and they are denying that and then the other part of lds is the idea of grace and they it's the idea grace is i don't deserve it i can't do anything to deserve it it's a free gift that god gives me so i think in their tradition it's a matter of doing things in order to receive favor from god so that's not grace and that would be a problem also so the gospel is about this particular jesus and it incorporates the idea of grace i'm assuming something here but it seems like the question is trying to get to the fairness of the issue so what would you say to that person asking that question so those people have only ever heard that that's been what's been revealed to them they're passionately following that jeez like you know god's really going to like condemn them because that's all they've ever known of jesus i'm again i'm maybe assuming the wrong things but it seems like that's embedded in the question how would you respond to and a little bit of territory we've already covered again kind of the you know a different permeation of not knowing anything about jesus yeah right well i guess so i would just come around and say i it's just it's not my prerogative to we do have this i mean i feel like in the question and i can understand this there's like a checklist about god will accept me if i have right belief about abc but what if somebody knows about jesus but only believes a b or something like that you know what i mean oh so c no you don't know c you're out you know that kind of thing and then and that gets to the the thing of being not fair right and he's not good so it's a kind of a trapping of god it's kind of a thing so then again we have to go back to verses about that's what i try to do with that list is that god is actually loving god is just and so you just have to hypothetically say you know god wants that person who's only heard a false gospel to actually know him and god will reveal you know himself and nature but god actually wants that person to come to him and we would like to think that if that person moves to god sincerely god will make more revelation known or whatever so the idea is that we're not trying to box god in a corner somehow with our situation so that aha he is not fair because the bible teaches that he is fair and he is just and he is good and no one deserves it anyway the the bottom line is we should be praising god that anyone is saved no one deserves it at war so it's by grace all right next question does it go against the universal love of god that he would choose or give favor to one group of people over another i.e the israelites in this instance so does it go against the universal love of god that he would choose or give favor to one group of people over another so tim you're like the hebrew guy so why don't you uh why don't you take this no this is this is great this is a question this really is a good question uh there's um yeah i've been i've wrestled through this and talked talked about this this kind of thing before behind it is an idea that if god were really fair he would communicate to the human race in a way that everybody would have equal access to all the right whatever information or whatever at the same time you know write it on the clouds that kind of thing and so why does he pick certain people in certain places and times to you know work out his plan of redemption or something like that so why does he why does he do it through just one group of people um so i mean first of all we don't i don't know why god does any anything that he does you know i mean i'm just not privy to that information uh but uh really say uh you know this is genesis 12 where the the israelite story begins and uh god calls uh abram and this is the key passage here um now he's why why is he calling abram i'm going to make you into a great nation bless you make your name great you'll be a blessing bless those who bless you christian curse all peoples on earth will be blessed is he choosing the israelites to work out the story through their family because he just wants to have favor on this people because when they all have brown hair or you know like why why does why does he do what's the goal is the goal just to bless the israelites the goal is for everybody right and this is the last the last phrase here the goal is through one family all families will be affected and you're like what about you know the people group that lives on the other side of the planet when when god is doing this like they're never gonna hear the story about the israelites and so i mean there it's it's not like he likes them this is just how he chooses to work out his story and other people in other places you know god's working out in their lives what he needs to work out in their lives this is the main vehicle in deuteronomy 9 as the lord is recalling to them what's going on from his perspective like in 9 5 deuteronomy 9 5 deuteronomy 9 6 he rehearses for them again it's not because of your righteousness it's not because of your goodness that i'm choosing you his choice of them is all by his grace anyway so he's kind of re rehearsing that for them and in in the deuteronomy passage this is moses reiterating to these uh people who've already failed god a bunch of times so it's just rehearsing it's not because you've done anything well it's all by grace so it's from it's by grace from first to last so maybe just to i would actually reverse the question or just to say an answer is that god choosing particular people to work out his story is is the evidence of his love for humanity like it's the outworking of his love to want to redeem and yes and work out his grace so at least in the scriptural tradition it does not go against god's universal love it's actually god's expression of his universal love to choose a certain family to work out and they weren't chosen because of their brilliance or their wonder or anything like that abraham's father was just you know like you know who is this guy and he doesn't know anything and so you know it's really it's really cool story so it's a picture of grace actually you think that's helpful yeah i think again something you said today that's resonated with me and and i work a lot with the younger generation so kind of you have to when you get these questions you have to kind of boil it down to kind of really simple things then grab hold of and chew on um but the idea that god has has revealed salvation in an exclusive way which if you really think about it you kind of have to as it plays out especially with jesus because he was like the only way because he was god and man and perfect and there wasn't like a plan b so it's an exclusive way but it's such an inclusive message and i keep on hearing you guys say that none of us deserve it and god wants the whole world to come to a knowledge of him and he wanted the israelites to kind of spread his love and reflect his love and he wanted you know paul to go to the gentiles and you just see that heartbeat uh throughout the story of of ex of just including everyone god just saying come on everyone i've i've given you the means and you know many of us by our questions are taking umbrage with those means you know i don't know if i do it that way it doesn't seem fair you say umbridge yeah whoa yeah i don't i don't even know what that means did i use it right anyway i don't know what that was i don't know how do you spell that i don't even know he's gonna do it at least look it up right now my wife does that because i say a lot of words out of context trying to sound really smart and she's like that's not correct usage and i'm just like great so does that kind of resonate with everybody i think that's something krista today that again it's not an easy answer this is a difficult difficult thing and and you get to a point where you're still like i don't know you know i'm not sure exactly why i got your israelites and on israelites i'm not sure why everybody doesn't have knowledge of the gospel but we do know some things god is this and god wants everyone to be saved and got you know those kind of things and it does sound i admit like a cop-out but i don't think that it is so the the inclusive exclusive play is like yeah we seem to be very exclusive people as christ followers but really our story and our god he's amazingly inclusive and uh that's something i hear both of you continually saying yeah and the the the uh exclusive is looked at as a pejorative and stuff that's i'm just trying to make that point to the audience if you're making it if you're not making truth claims fine but if you're making a truth claim it by its nature is exclusive because you believe that and you don't believe that so there you go all right let's go to the next one are other religions wrong because they do not believe in christ even though they may produce followers who have christ-like life so chris it gets to a little something that you just went at in your summer today and i think we got a number of texts about this kind of you know to paraphrase you oh man there's so many people that are like better people yes than christians what's up with that like you know like i know a lot of christians are just angry and mean and i don't want to be around them and my neighbor who's a buddhist or a mormon or whatever of faith or or no faith at all they're the greatest people on earth yeah what's up with that yeah so that's again it's no that's not a judge they're wonderful many wonderful people that are not christ followers at all and they they put us to shame actually uh with their immorals and their care for people in the world and respect of others and poverty and stuff like that it's fantastic so the issue is not about deserving or lifestyle or any other thing again it comes back to the bible about these truth claims there's just a few compelling arguments and questions that's what i said in a couple of messages and i'm not sure to me these are the compelling questions there are only a few does god exist so you got to answer that if you say yes then it's like okay has he revealed himself okay if he's revealed himself as he revealed himself through christ has he revealed himself through this these are all separate questions so you finally get to a person place and they say well he has not revealed himself to the bible i don't believe that and i think jesus is just another person and stuff well okay i would disagree with that so and then you would engage at that level so we would say uh they're wrong or we disagree or whatever and it really is not about lifestyle or they can be much better people than we are but again it's about the answers to these questions do you believe that god exists there's lots of good people who are wonderful people who live exemplary lives who don't believe god exists so do we believe they're wrong yes based upon that kind of question so i know wrong is a pejorative two nobody wants to say wrong but we disagree and that was part of my message is let's not make it about arrogance or you're exclusive or whatever let's just say here are the issues especially in university culture we ought to be free to do this this is the this is the question i disagree with you let's engage so i believe you're wrong it doesn't mean i don't like you it's just i think you're wrong so we ought to kind of bring wrongness it's okay you know because we don't agree with each other so one person again it's a truth claim issue so okay i don't hold of that view so i from my perspective i disagree with you so i think you're wrong but again it's kind of that whole thing of wrong is a bad word and again i can't i think it gets back to truth claims again i may be wrong do you do you uh i may be wrong yes we think do you follow me do you have anything to add about that um no i i appreciate your point i was just going to make a different comment about something underneath here yeah when this kind of question comes up the assumption underneath it is that the end goal of any religion is to make us good people right so um if the end if you believe that what is the goal of religion to make us into good people so if any religion gets you there why and why what's the problem yeah so and and i i appreciate that point i guess what to me one of the most compelling parts about the christian worldview is uh is that i'm i'm incapable of becoming a good person which which may seem ridiculous because you know if you're like my friend you know i hope you think i'm a nice person something like that but it's not about whether or not you're mostly good or mostly bad of course most humans are not as bad as they could be and there's nothing in the gospel that says you know only you only have to realize you're utterly rotten and actually could probably be a murderer before god will forgive you no we're not it's not but it's just is recognizing there's something wrong with me there's something wrong with me and i need to recognize that and that's at the core step in realizing i i may actually appear to someone like i'm a nice person or good but i know what goes on in my heart and you know if it goes on in yours my hearts it probably goes on and everyone else's too and so that that needs to be addressed yes and that's in what in my mind the story of the gospel is about yes it's not about making me a better person it's about god fixing a huge problem that i have and a disconnection i have with him and with others and and that's accomplished yeah that's in that in the in our telling of the story that's what we were trying to get i think in the rescue message that you're not going to come into a relationship with god until you're drowning and you see i need a savior and if everything is about i'm trying to be a good person i am a good person those people don't see a need for the hero they don't see that need and uh so we would that's what the gospel is about trying to help people see that need yeah i think a lot of christians set themselves up or we set ourselves up for this by making our story or what we're about our own righteousness as opposed to the righteousness of god is kind of what i hear you saying to him and it kind of harkens back to the pharisees and who were very you know religious people and memorized scripture and did good things and were probably pretty decent guys and yet jesus was clear they did not get it and they were missing it and and i think a lot of us myself included make our faith and more of a religion it's about what i do it's about my righteousness as opposed to continually going back to the heart of the story which is the righteousness of god and that is unaffected by whether we drop the ball or not or by whether we fail to love as as well as we should or or fall into adultery on all these things are despicable and sad and wounds the faith but it doesn't mess with the heart of the story and the gospel which is god's grace let's go to the next one what is the importance of missions and disciple making since people from all tribes will make it to heaven uh is inclusivity only for pre jesus time so obviously embedding that question is the assumption that that people from all tribes will make which chris talked about um so this is kind of we got a lot of questions about this so okay uh chris uh you you proved it to us you know we read revelation people from all tribes will be there they may not have the knowledge of jesus that we have but somehow you don't have the answer somehow they're going to get there on the base of jesus good so why why have an impact wall you know why have short-term trips what's the purpose of going if people from those tribes who don't have full knowledge will get there anyway i think is a lot of questions that we got how would you how would you guys go with that well i can answer simply and then tim can answer better uh we're commanded to do it jesus says this is what you should do and so he's god he knows again we all wrestle with this whole idea of time and sovereignty and the way god works things out well quite simply jesus says this is exactly what we should do we should take this message to people so they can come to grips with these truth claims about who i am and you know romans was it romans 10 talks about how they how can they hear that's actually good passage um i don't know we'll get off on that but that's a good passage because it also refers back to psalm 19. how can they know and but you've heard so the idea that we need to uh we so we have this messiness of daniel 7 revelation 5 revelation 7 this messiness oh well now no one needs to go out with the good news of that would be a false no no that's not i'm happy the messiness is there i have no idea how that's going to work out but indeed i know from a ton of passages in the bible matthew 28 and the places that we are to take the message out romans 10 would be another like romans 10 12 or something like that we are how can they hear if no one takes the message we're to take the message to them so the simple answer is god says we should do this and i'm not sure how he's worked all this stuff out we we need to be ambassadors we take this message of reconciliation to other people yeah to use your example the mayan culture this morning um you know i think i would respond well wouldn't the mayan culture be better if they did have the story of the gospel as a people group as a community i think those of us who follow christ and believe the story would have to say yes that having the spirit of god in our midst and following jesus in this life again we come fixated with the life to come um is qualitatively better with the spirit of god in our midst in our lives interacting with us and you know i mean again we're getting into areas we don't know but we'll they'll be mines in heaven yes we don't know exactly how on the basis of jesus what was the means we don't know but if they had the story and there were christ followers in their minds articulating the story telling them who the real jesus was would there be a greater number of them um again i'm guessing here but i would guess yes that that the heartbeat of of missions is to take the story to these people so they can know for life here and i think it's fair to say too that not all uh christians agree with my interpretation of of daniel 7 revelation 5 revelation 7. now they would see those as metaphor it's apocalyptic literature he's just generally speaking all people but not really all somebody from every so not all uh christ followers would agree with that view i'm i'm kind of holding a messy view i just think it's it helps me to think that so i mean that's a silly way of saying why hold the view but you know if you look at daniel and you look at revelation and say it seems like there's this massive group of people from all these different places and i think i think the reading i have is the correct reading but i just want to be fair not all christians agree with that so the real strict exclusivists would say that nobody from the mayan culture is there tim how would you weigh in on chris's view of that because uh how would you go there's passages do you do you agree with with uh his more i guess literal view for lack of a better term that there will be distinct people from those cultures are you taking the the writers just kind of saying there'll be a lot of people from different cultures but you know maybe not everyone yeah yeah i mean i i guess the point is here's the language on the on on the on the page right there uh all all people groups and even like in this is even like in the book of daniel which is pre jesus you know i mean it's using this kind of language and so it's recognizing that the scope of god's redemption is uni it's universal it's a bummer that universalism has come to have the meaning that it has because the gospel is truly universal it's actually one of the few religious traditions in the world that is so universal and uh i guess in my mind those passages point me yeah the paintings that we see in the isaiah where is it the kings of the nations will be coming in and out of this place i mean it really looks like uh wonderful it's a wonderful kind of a thing so there is this universal language everywhere yeah i i was one just in responding to the question whether just point or angle to take on it it seems like behind this is an idea where the purpose of missions is to tell people a verbal message of the gospel about jesus so that they can be connected to god and not go to hell forever and ever something like that and i appreciate the heart of what's going on there but there's a whole lot more and this is why we did the story of the gospel series is that the gospel there's a whole lot more to why we're sharing the story and what the story is about than just what happens to us after we die and so i just i brought up matthew 28 in in the great commission passage jesus says to his followers go make disciples of all nations baptizing them father son the holy spirit teaching them to obey everything i commanded you the book of matthew where is jesus teaching his followers to do what he commands book of matthew we spent the whole summer in this part of matthew you know write a sermon on the mount and what's the sermon on the mount is about transforming uh god god transforming our hearts and and having right enabling us to have challenging us to have right relationship with with other people and so in my mind the point isn't to just deliver this verbal message the point is to plant jesus communities that are actually becoming sources of renewal in human societies and in our relationships and uh to say that that's not a worthwhile project just because well some because of this gray area about revelation 5 it just seems silly to me the point is that if we actually believe jesus transforms us and people then we we should obviously be sharing the story if it if we actually believe it if we don't believe it or if we don't if we say we believe it but if we don't actually have anything going jesus actually life transformation going on inside of us then we're not going to be very motivated to share it because well you know if they can make it in the end and they don't have to hear about it then i don't i don't want to bother you yes that's but if we really believe that uh jesus wants to transform us as humans not just get us to a certain destination after we die then it's it's worth going all over the planet it's a good point do you guys follow that point that's a good it's exactly am i being very clear because the idea is that this is the whole thing of well it's all about heaven and it's really not yeah it's not only about heaven but it's yeah so they're going to be in heaven someday i don't need to share this message no no no it's way more than that yeah that's a good point brit do you have any uh questions coming in from this group that you're going to add in or are we going to stick to the script yeah we're pretty tight on time so if you guys can go down to question 11. all right thanks how long do we go uh we got about five more minutes or so okay are you nervous time goes fast uh no okay but i've been here all day sorry you did it last week that's right all right so is that it is that the last yeah okay so um oh yeah whoa there it's gone sorry that was michael talking i guess that was a the office guy all right uh yeah you don't say those things yeah you just think that you don't want to be here with these people they just want to go home see what i'm talking about he just says i'm sorry all right so all right last question here uh couldn't it be that people of other religions do know christ only by different names and different culturally meaningful stories therefore our all religions could be a vehicle to the same destiny and granted this is going over some some ground we've already covered we're kind of getting to the end here let's just tighten up a response for the people that keep on um no i think this we've covered this ground i think again this is a kind of a way of looking at it that people in those faith traditions would not say that at all they're making different claims i don't know how else to say it the the the the it's a value of honoring others and we are all going to be right there there is that hope and there's that value behind the question but indeed uh no they're saying different things the different religions and the point you made earlier for us who mostly are from western culture i think to to even suggest that uh to to our friends from from from the eastern side of the world and whatnot could actually be offensive to them and demeaning uh to their beliefs um which i think is a really good thing for us to chew on that maybe grow up in a place like madison and yeah so i think the best book for that is this one by pierce that uh it's from ivp904 i think that would be a good for if the questioner is here i think it would be a good read for you he uh he's uh american but he grew up in the middle east and so i think it could help you see that actually it's not honoring uh and it's uh it's why the people from the the rest of the world don't like us and uh so he makes a good point at that so but the they're trying to be honoring but actually it's dishonoring because these faith systems which are ancient they are saying different things uh chris can you talk just for a second on the book you recommend next i think you know some people have looked into other religions a lot and other world views and know a lot about them uh some people haven't and and i think yes with cordon's book on neighboring faiths that was to be a great book now he is from the christian tradition so i think it says the subtitle is a christian introduction or something like that yeah a christian introduction so he's a christ follower he teaches at taylor university actually was influential in my son's life he was one of my son's mentors and so i recommend the book it's very good so he'll go through this is what this faith tradition says and as a christ follower here are the things that we have in common here's what we don't have in common and here's would be a way to respond to that tradition so it's a very good introduction to world religions many introductions to world religions will just tell you about that religion and and sort and and and go to their sources so he goes a step more because he's trying he's really a fantastic guy because uh he would take his classes uh from uh taylor's in indiana and he would take them to a mosque he had a great relationship with this guy who ran a mosque in indianapolis and he would take them to this mosque and they'd interact they would go to a synagogue and they would interact so he's really he lives it out so he says this is what those traditions teach this is what we have in common with them and this is what we don't have in common and this is a christ follower a way in which you can reach people from those traditions so i highly recommend it's a good book all right so to kind of conclude our night um i'd like to hear from both of you guys on this um somebody from from our community comes up to you i'm sure this is probably happening they say hey like this what do i do when this rotten tomato gets thrown right at me and you you give them a 30 second response what would you guys say to him what's what's the heart of what you would uh tell them or or kind of coach them or encourage them to say to that friend throwing this rotten tomato in their face like yeah well i i if i go first uh let you have the last word i would try some of the things i was trying to say today first of all like i'm the college kid and i'm throwing this at christians it would have been mike the guy who kind of really turned my life around he was interested in me as a person so get behind the tomato why is that person throwing that why are they throwing it with such velocity what is their story and try to listen there is a story behind every angry person what is their story are you interested in them or just defending the faith and being right or are you actually interested in that person and loving them and respecting them and trying to understand where they're coming from so that's what i said about the my son's phrase kill him with kindness i think love is the most powerful apologetic whether you have right answers or not i'm not saying that reason is not important it's very important it's kind of what we're doing up here but love is the most powerful thing so i would say somebody's throwing this tomato at you you can respond but be loving interested in them listening trying to find out where they're coming from i guess yeah and a response would be one would would be i would reframe it in a certain way it's not that somehow we think everything about every other religion is wrong exactly something like that that's right um there's an immense amount of common ground between religious traditions but on the core these what do you call fundamental questions on these core issues they're just exclusive differences and so uh the the passage that matt spoke from on acts 17 paul goes in and instead of saying that they're wrong he goes in and he finds in their religious tradition things that point to jesus and that's how he how he interacts with them so in my mind the fact that somebody actually maybe even believes a different religion is a step forward because it means they're going to be open to talking about things so i it's not about proving that other religions are wrong it's that we have a particular claim wrapped up in the man jesus of nazareth and and that god did something in him that he that's kind of this climactic act to to rescue his world and we carry that conviction and it actually i think enriches our dialogue with other religions as opposed to having to show that they're wrong that probably wasn't very short can can you uh get up second timothy 2 22-26 i just want to kind of close our time by reading you guys uh these verses i think they're great advice from uh from paul kind of to a young guy timothy who was in a culture that was quite contrary to what he believed um and and i'll i'll go down to verse 24 and the lord's servant must not quarrel instead he must be kind to everyone able to teach not resentful those who oppose him he must gently instruct and hope that god will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth they'll come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil has taken them captive i think there's some great stuff in there but the line uh that we must be uh we must be patient with difficult people is kind of another translation um in there that's uh embedded in that in the greek as i understand it is this idea of tolerance so it isn't ironic that kind of paul's telling young timothy in a culture where he is the minority and his views are contrary to the to be tolerant you know and that idea of tyler and i think chris said this a ton of times isn't uh saying that you know everybody's right it's it's it's saying embedded with intolerance is the understanding that we disagree i mean if you really think about the definition it's saying but i'm going to do so agreeably i'm going to honor you and i'm going to love you in that but we do disagree that's the very definition of tolerance so i just think it's really cool i've used this with some students through the years of when we in our cultures becoming more increasingly in western america or america and western culture like first century or we will be in minority very shortly and so i think that these are just really great words that that paul is in imploring timothy to be tolerant yeah you disagree that's important and these matters of truth are important but do so in a loving way don't quarrel that's going to lead nowhere and uh and i think that that's just a great thing to chew on i struggle with that because i love to argue and i love to be right and those are that's a bad combination you know that's a bad combination yeah and another just i know we're going to stop somerville's work that i also referred to here the decline of the secular university by john somerville oxford university press 06. it's another good work for people who are interested in that kind of discussion because uh he he goes there a lot yeah so if you're a christ father and i'm part of our community hopefully this equipped you to kind of maybe think uh through these issues in a deeper way and as you have interactions with people maybe to equip you to kind of go at them in a different way that may be more purposeful and if you're not from our community and you're here and you have these questions man thanks for thanks for being here and maybe we challenge you in some ways you haven't thought of before but i think the challenge for all of us is continue to learn continue to grow continue to move towards these questions that are really really important and we frankly don't have all the answers too so um can we can we thank our panel especially chris who's been here all day

Channel: Bible Nerds & Tim Mackie Fans

Views: 43,104

Rating: 4.788331 out of 5

Keywords: Tim Mackie, Bible Project

Id: vLNrW25SrRA

Length: 62min 19sec (3739 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 16 2020