A few verses tonight from Romans chapter 8.
Romans chapter 8, we're just going to read
the first 8 verses of the chapter.
Romans chapter 8, verse 1, by reading from
the New International Version of the Bible.
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those
who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ
Jesus the law of the Spirit of life
set me free from the law of sin
and death.
What the law was powerless to do, in
that it was weakened by the sinful nature,
God did by sending his own Son in
the likeness of sinful man to be a
sin offering.
And so he condemned sin in sinful man,
in order that the righteous requirements of the
law might be fully met in us who
do not live according to the sinful nature,
but according to the Spirit.
Those who live according to the sinful nature,
have their minds set on what that nature
desires.
Those who live in accordance with the Spirit,
have their minds set on what the Spirit
desires.
The mind of sinful man is death, but
the mind controlled by the Spirit is life
and peace.
Because the sinful mind is hostile to God,
it does not submit to God's laws, nor
can it do so.
Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please
God.
May God give us understanding of those words.
Evangelical Christianity is against its exclusiveness and its
dogmatism.
There are many ways to God and Jesus
is one of them, is a very popular
idea in our country.
And we evangelicals who say there is only
one way to God, and we are on
it by God's grace, are looked upon by
many to be exceedingly dogmatic.
Following on from this idea that there are
many ways to God, many people go one
step further and say that therefore everyone will
one day get to God.
Everyone will one day get to heaven.
And so we have the idea of universalism,
universal salvation abroad in the world today.
Such a view is propounded by many interesting
people.
The Bishop of Guildford, who is a leading
light in the Nationwide Initiative on Evangelism, a
group which many evangelicals are linked with, recently
wrote the following, I find it difficult to
define precisely what salvation is.
When he was questioned on that statement, he
accepted that his contribution to his booklet entitled
Evangelism, Convergence and Divergence was correctly understood to
mean universalism.
He said, I mean by that the view
that everyone will be saved in the end.
That's the idea of a leading Anglican clergyman
of our generation.
Now Michael Green in his book You Must
Be Joking explains why such views are so
popular.
Writing concerning the assumption that all religions lead
to God, he says the following, such a
view has of course immense attractions.
It avoids the black and white choice, seeing
everything as a shade of grey.
It is essentially tolerant, and tolerance is a
very fashionable virtue.
It is modest of course, and does not
make strong pretensions for your own particular religion.
So the question tonight is, are we evangelicals
intolerant bigots?
Are the thousands of missionaries around the world
preaching to Muslims and to Hindus and to
Buddhists, are they all wasting their time?
Will all these people eventually find their way
to God?
Or is Christianity unique?
I have three simple points to make.
The first is the exclusiveness of biblical Christianity.
The classic statement is of course the words
of our Lord himself in John chapter 14
and verse 6.
Jesus answers, I am the way.
I am the truth.
I am the life.
Then that phrase which should be an enormous
challenge to every Christian.
No one, says Jesus, comes to the Father
except through me.
No one to the Father except through Christ.
No Hindu to the Father except through Christ.
No Buddhist to the Father except through Christ.
None of your unsaved relatives and friends will
come to the Father except through Christ.
Jesus could hardly be more clear.
But he makes many similar claims.
For example, in John chapter 10 verses 7
to 9, he says, I tell you the
truth.
I am the gate for the sheep.
And all who ever came before me were
just thieves and robbers.
I am the good shepherd.
I know my sheep.
And my sheep know me.
In John chapter 8 and verse 24, Jesus
is even more clear.
If you do not believe that I am
the one I claim to be, says Jesus,
you will all die in your sins.
Now you can't be more clear than that.
If you don't believe that the Christ is
who he claims to be, there is no
hope.
You will die in your sins.
And the apostles took up this exclusiveness in
their preaching.
Again, that classic statement is found in Acts
4 and verse 12.
Where Peter preaches, salvation is found in no
one else.
For there is no other name under heaven
given to men by which we must be
saved.
The apostle Paul carries on the same theme.
In 1 Timothy chapter 2, verse 3 of
that chapter, he speaks of God our Saviour
who wants all men to be saved and
to come to a knowledge of the truth.
But then he adds in verse 5, there
is one God and one mediator between God
and men.
That man is not Buddha or Mohammed.
That man is Christ Jesus.
So this is the first point we must
make.
And I don't think anyone can honestly read
their Bible without coming to the simple conclusion
that if we want our Christianity to be
a biblical Christianity, then it must have this
element of exclusiveness within it.
The gospel is available to all men, to
all who will come to Christ in repentance.
But that is the only gospel.
Paul in Galatians 1 verse 8 says, if
anybody else preaches another gospel, be it even
an angel from heaven, let him be eternally
condemned.
So that's our first point, the exclusiveness of
the Christianity of the Bible.
Secondly, I want to say this belief that
there are many ways to God is not
only unbiblical, but it's utterly illogical and it's
completely impossible.
It's a lovely sentimental idea, of course, to
suppose that all religions are basically one and
that they all represent variations on a common
theme.
But unfortunately, such a view flies in the
face of all the evidence.
How can all religions lead to God when
they're so utterly different?
The God of Hinduism is plural and impersonal.
You cannot know the God of the Hindu.
The God of Islam, the religion of the
Mohammedans, on the contrary, is singular and personal.
The God of Christianity is the creator of
the world.
But the divine in Buddhism is neither personal
nor creative.
You can scarcely have a greater contrast than
that.
Christianity teaches that God both forgives a man
and gives to him supernatural aid.
But in forgiveness, in Buddhism, sorry, there is
no forgiveness and there is no supernatural aid
whatsoever.
The goal of all existence in Christianity is
to know God and to enjoy God on
this earth.
The goal of all existence in Buddhism is
what they call nirvana or extinction.
And this, we're told, was attained by the
great Buddha after no less than 547 reincarnations.
Now, it's just as foolish to say that
all religions lead to God as it is
to say that all roads from Manchester lead
to London.
They don't.
And it's not in the least bit helpful
to pretend that they do.
You see, the trouble with today's tolerance is
that it's reached the point where it's no
longer a virtue.
It is a vice.
It is a cruel casualness to truth.
It's no kindness to anyone if we tell
everyone that their views are just as true
as anyone else's.
We're simply displaying our cynicism.
It's just like saying to a blind man
sitting on the edge of a precipice, it
doesn't matter which way you move.
All paths lead to the same goal.
Whether Christianity is true or not, whether it's
real or not, people must decide for themselves.
But one thing is certain.
It's utterly illogical and impossible to say that
all religions lead to God.
The third point I want to make, and
of course it's this third point which I
want us to spend time on tonight, is
the uniqueness of the Christian faith.
If all religions don't lead to God, what
is so special about Christianity?
What distinguishes our faith from all the other
religions and countless philosophies of the world?
What was it in our message which filled
those early apostles with such definite conviction that
they had something special, they had something which
was worth dying for, they had something which
every man on the earth must hear?
Well, first of all, I think we have
to show that Christianity is a totally different
message.
There are many similarities between Hinduism, Buddhism, and
so on.
Christianity is totally different.
What does the word religion mean?
Well, a dictionary definition of the word religion
would be man's search for God.
When you take that definition, you can immediately
see how different Christianity is from all religion.
If religion is man's search for God, then
the Bible says that man does not need
a religion.
In fact, the Bible says that religion, if
that's what religion is, will lead man into
unutterable bondage.
The Bible says that it is impossible for
a man to find God.
In Job chapter 11 and verse 7, the
question is posed, can you, by searching, find
out God?
Can you understand the Almighty to perfection?
And then comes the answer.
It's higher than the heights of heaven.
What can you know?
It's deeper than the depths of the grave.
Its measure is longer than the earth and
wider than the sea.
The declaration of the Bible is that man
does not need a religion which sets him
searching for that which is impossible.
He needs a revelation, not a religion.
He needs this revelation that rather than him
searching for God, God has come searching for
man.
Unlike every other religious book, this book does
not tell you of man's search for God.
It is a revelation of God coming to
man.
And that is what is so essentially and
fundamentally different from Christianity with all other religions.
When I was out in India, I heard
a story, which the missionaries tell out there,
which may well help us to understand, in
illustrative language, this essential difference.
They tell the story of a young boy
who fell into a very deep pit.
Of course, he was trying to cumber out
of the pit, but he found it impossible
to do so.
Along the road came a Hindu religious leader.
He heard his cries and looked down into
the pit and said, young man, next time
you walk this road, you must be much
more careful.
And if you read the religious writings of
the Hindus, you will find much excellent advice
for living.
Secondly, along the road came a Mohammedan.
The Mohammedan was very devout.
He was desperate to help this young man.
So he got down onto his stomach and
he reached down into the pit and he
said, young man, just reach up.
Our fingers will meet and I'll pull you
to safety.
And the man reached down and the boy
reached up and there were inches between their
outstretched hands.
The Mohammed is desperate to help.
But he is totally unable.
There is no power within his religious dogma
which will release man from his position.
Thirdly, along the road came Jesus Christ.
And on hearing the cries of the young
man, he went across to the pit and
he got down into the pit.
And he said, young man, stand on my
shoulders and walk to freedom.
Now there's the difference.
All the religions of the world are saying
to man, clamber out of your own predicament.
We will help you.
We will show you this teaching.
Jesus doesn't say that at all.
He comes down right to where we are.
And he says to us, not by your
own energy, not by your own strength, but
by my power within you, you will be
delivered from the miry clay and your feet
will be set upon the rock.
There is the essential difference between Christianity and
every other world religion.
And it is that, fundamentally, which makes our
faith unique.
But let's be a little more particular.
I've pointed out four major differences between Christianity
and every other religion.
First of all, we have a different view
of God.
I've already said how the message of so
many other religions is this encouragement, this exhortation
to reach out for God.
The Bible, on the contrary, says that man
is separated from God and there is nothing
he can do about it.
Paul, in 1 Timothy 6, 16, speaks of
our God as the King of Kings, the
Lord of Lords, who alone is immortal and
who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one
has seen and whom no one can see.
Habakkuk was quite right to say in chapter
1 and verse 3 of his little prophecy
that our God is of purer eyes than
to behold iniquity.
And Isaiah was right to say that our
sins have separated us from God and our
iniquities have hidden the face of God from
us.
The Christian's God is majestic.
He is a God to be feared.
He is a God to be reverenced.
And yet, in an amazing way, he is
a God of unutterable love, a God who
in the person of his all-incarnate Son
has come right down to where man is.
The cross is a marvellous demonstration of the
character of our God, that place where his
righteousness and his love meet together and kiss
each other, the cross of Calvary.
There is no other religion in the world
which presents to us such a God as
this, a God of immense majesty, a God
of intimate love.
Secondly, the Christian's view of man is entirely
different.
Once again, rather than encouraging man by his
own efforts, his own endeavours to reach God,
the Bible speaks, particularly here in Romans 8,
of man's total depravity and inability.
I want you to turn with me to
Romans chapter 8, and look at this very,
very important passage, verses 5 to 8 of
this chapter.
In this little paragraph, Paul is presenting a
contrast, a contrast between the Christian and the
non-Christian.
And tonight I want you to look at
what Paul says about the non-Christian.
He says six things about him.
Number one, verse 5, he says his mind
is set on what his nature desires.
Secondly, he says his mind is death, verse
6.
That word death means separated from God.
The mind of the non-Christian is utterly
separated from God.
Thirdly, verse 7, he says his mind is
hostile to God.
Now never forget that about the non-Christian.
The non-Christian you meet at your work,
your next door neighbour, that person, if they're
not a Christian, is hostile to God.
Now you may not like this idea.
I've heard many people who say, now listen,
they're not Christians, but they're not hostile to
God.
They're interested in God.
Not so long ago I was driving down
the motorway early in the morning, heading for
London, four o'clock in the morning, I
stopped at a service station just outside Birmingham.
There on the mat, as I went into
the service station, was a Muslim with his
prayer mat.
Four o'clock in the morning, in front
of everyone in the cafe, there weren't too
many people in there at that hour, but
in front of those who were there, he
was on his knees, facing Mecca, going through
his religious devotion.
And yet Paul says, that man is hostile
to God.
Now what does he mean?
Well your next door neighbour, who says to
you, I'm not a Christian, but I'm not
really a terrible sinner, you start describing to
them, the God of the Bible.
You tell them that the God of the
Bible is a God of love, and they'll
say, yes, yes, that's my God.
That's my God.
I'm interested in such a God.
Then you go on to say that the
God of the Bible is righteous.
The God of the Bible is just.
The God of the Bible is a God
of wrath, who can be angry with sin,
and who has prepared a place called hell,
with all who refuse his gospel.
And what will you find?
You will find even with your most respectable
next door neighbour, a sense of hostility, and
anger, that is not my God.
I do not believe in a God of
wrath, and a place called hell.
You will find that what Paul here says,
is perfectly true.
The mind of the man who does not
know God, however respectable they may appear on
the outside, is hostile to the God of
the Bible.
They may not be hostile to their own
view of God, but they're certainly hostile to
the God of the Bible.
Then fourthly, Paul says their mind does not
submit to God's law, verse 7.
And then fifthly, and this is so important,
he goes on to say again in verse
7, that their mind cannot, cannot, submit to
God's law, verse 8.
Such people cannot please God.
Never ever forget that, about man without Christ.
He cannot submit to the law of God.
He cannot please God.
He is utterly unable to do so.
Can you see the utter desperation and delusion
which the religions of the world put man
into?
They tell them, seek to please God.
Seek to obey his laws.
Do your very utmost to satisfy your God.
But the Christian alone admits that man is
depraved.
That man is utterly lost.
That man can do nothing at all to
please his maker.
Paul sums it all up in Romans 3.
There is no one righteous.
Not even one.
There is no one who understands.
No one who seeks God.
All have turned away.
They have become worthless.
There is no one who does good.
What other world religion do you find anything
even similar to the cross of Calvary?
Calvary sums up the uniqueness of the Christian
faith.
2 Corinthians 5.21 God made Jesus sin
who had no sin to be sin for
us so that in him we might become
the righteousness of God.
He has a unique message.
Michael Green expresses it like this.
Where else in the religions of the world
do you hear of a God...
Please turn the cassette over now.
Do not fast wind it in either direction.
Michael Green expresses it like this.
Where else in the religions of the world
do you hear of a God who undertakes
salvation for his people by personally bearing responsibility
for their wickedness and allowing that wickedness to
crush him?
Because of this glorious work of Jesus Christ
the Christian faith is based on the truth
of justification by faith alone.
Complete righteousness for man through the righteous life
and vicarious death of Jesus Christ.
This is a totally unique remedy for the
sin problem which every man faces.
And then fourthly we have a power which
no other religion offers.
As we've seen the desperate predicament that other
religions leave men in is that they show
a standard of life and they say to
man live up to that standard and you
will find life.
You should read the Koran, the book of
the Mohammedans.
It's the most interesting writing.
There is much valuable advice for living in
that book.
And they give these books to the young
Mohammedan children and the devout young Mohammedans you
all meet them on the streets of Karachi
and on the streets of Dhaka and on
the streets of many of the eastern cities
sitting cross-legged at the roadside learning the
Koran about the size of your New Testament
off by heart.
Many of the 16 year old holy men
of Islam can say it verbatim the size
of your New Testament.
Immensely devout young people desperately trying to live
up to the high standards for living of
that book but without any power to do
so.
Why?
Because Mohammed is dead.
Because Buddha is dead.
But as we saw last night Jesus uniquely
amongst all world religious leaders is alive today
and with this promise of entering mankind not
only delivering him from the guilt of sin
but lifting him out of the power of
sin setting him free to live a new
life.
Now here we reach a very important point.
I think it's tremendously important for every Christian
communicator be it gospel preacher, Sunday school teacher
or personal witness in the street to realize
the gospel which is the Christian gospel.
I want to ask you a question and
I want you to answer the question honestly
in your own mind.
Why did Christ die?
Why did he die?
What's your answer?
I would guarantee because I've carried out certain
censuses that a vast majority of you would
say to save us from our sins and
you would be right but what do you
mean by that?
Many people merely mean to save us from
the guilt of sin.
We are no longer condemned.
We will be in heaven.
We will not be in hell.
And certainly that's one reason why Jesus died
but it's not the only reason.
Jesus died not only to save us from
the guilt of our sin but he saved
us from the power of our sin today.
And as Christian communicators we must not forget
that.
Our message is not all about tomorrow.
It's not all about heaven rather than hell.
It's all about today.
It's all about life on this earth now.
It's all about breaking free from the chains
of sin to live a new life of
freedom.
That's what Paul is saying here in Romans
8, 1 and 2.
There is therefore now no condemnation.
The word condemnation is a bad translation says
Professor Bruce.
He says it should read there is therefore
now no penal servitude for those who are
in Christ Jesus.
What does he mean?
Before Christ died before you enjoyed the benefits
of his death you and I were servants
of sin.
But there's now no longer any penal servitude.
We don't need to bow under the dominion
of sin.
As chapter 6 of the same epistle shows
we've been set free.
Going on to verse 2 he says that
through Christ Jesus the law of the spirit
of life has set us free from what
J.B. Phillips calls the vicious circle of
sin which leads to death.
Now you go out into the streets of
Whitehaven and tell people that.
Christ died to set us free from the
vicious circle which so many people are living
in.
Sin which leads to death.
They cannot break out of it.
They try.
Their New Year's resolutions.
They want to make us new start.
They want to turn over a new leaf.
There's a whole vocabulary built up to describe
their efforts.
But they cannot break out of that vicious
circle of sin which leads to death.
Here is the uniqueness of the Christian message.
Jesus did not only die to set us
free from the guilt of our sin.
He set us free from its power.
And right now in 1981 we have a
message of freedom for humanity.
There is no other world religion which makes
such claims.
So that's the third point and the first
part of it.
The uniqueness of the Christian faith.
We have a totally different message to preach.
Different in every sense.
Finally and very briefly I want to say
that Christianity is unique because it makes a
totally different impact on people.
You know sometimes Christians in the Western world
and particularly in Britain get rather depressed, don't
they?
I wonder if I'm talking to any depressed
Christians tonight.
You're in some struggling assembly or some struggling
local church and you're seeing very little happening
and you just wonder whether the Christian message
really is the message of life and liberty.
We're going through hard times in the Western
world but the impact of Christianity worldwide is
immense.
It would be very interesting to have you
all write down on a piece of paper
how many people you think are becoming Christians
around the world every day.
I wonder what your estimate would be.
You make a mental estimate.
How many every day around the world are
becoming Christians?
Well of course we don't know the exact
number but there's a computer in America.
There are computers for everything now.
And every major denomination of the church and
every missionary society is feeding its statistics back
to this vast computer in the city of
Chicago.
And they have come out with the following
figure.
Around the world, and we are estimating conservatively,
55,000 people are becoming Christians every day.
And something which can be more accurately accounted
for, 1,400 new churches are being opened
around the world every week.
Victory saving, go ahead.
Jesus shall reign where'er the sun doth
its successive journeys run.
One great concern of mine as I've travelled
around recently for assemblies in the United Kingdom
is that we might not miss out on
what God is doing around the world in
our generation.
He's doing so much.
And we must be open to all that
God is doing in our day.
But a remarkable thing about Christianity's impact is
its worldwide impact.
People from every culture, from every strata of
society are becoming Christians.
It's the only truly worldwide religion.
From the tribes of New Guinea to the
university students of the Western world, people are
bowing the knee to Jesus Christ.
I spend the majority of my time in
universities.
And it's just amazing to see what God
is doing in British universities.
Of course you hear all the bad news
about our universities.
I want to tell you the good news.
Every Saturday night in the University of Cambridge,
a university with a population of 10,000
young people, there are over 1,000 studying
the Bible.
I was at Oxford University for their Saturday
night Bible reading just a few months ago.
550 young people, students from this university of
9,500 people sat down to listen to
one hour's exposition of the scriptures and do
so every Saturday night, every Sunday night, and
many of them meet at 6.30 every
morning for prayer before their studies.
What is the largest society on the university
campus of Oxford?
Of course if you listen to the news
media you'd expect the answer to be Marxist
or Communist.
It's not at all.
The largest society, and it's at least five
times the size of these societies, is the
Christian Union.
All over the world, God is moving by
his Spirit, bringing people to his Son, in
this only truly worldwide religion, the Christian faith.
Finally, it's important to realize that the impact
which Jesus Christ makes on a life is
so different from the impact which the other
religions make.
The world religions can sometimes bring outward reformation
to a person's life.
They can change his outward actions.
But the Gospel of Christ alone brings inward
transformation.
I think you can see this very clearly
in Paul's life.
To the Philippian church he testified in chapter
3 verse 6 that as far as legalistic
righteousness was concerned, he was faultless.
Judaism had certainly altered the Apostle Paul.
He kept all the outward codes and he
kept all the outward laws.
It changed him as a man.
But then he was confronted by Jesus Christ.
In Romans chapter 7 verse 22, he speaks
of delighting in God's law in his inner
being.
There's the difference.
His outward actions had been altered by Judaism,
but his heart remained the same.
Confronted by Jesus Christ, his heart was transformed.
His inner being became new.
Truly, as he said to the Corinthians, he
became a new man in Christ.
Let me sum up this whole matter with
a quotation from the book Is There Really
Only One Way?
A book by Dick Hillis.
This is how he describes the differences.
Religion is man-made.
The Gospel is God-given.
Religion is what man does for God.
The Gospel is God's search for man.
Religion is good views.
The Gospel is good news.
Religion is good advice.
The Gospel is a glorious announcement.
Religion takes man and leaves him as he
is.
The Gospel takes a man as he is
and makes him what he ought to be.
Religion ends in an outward reformation.
The Gospel in an inner transformation.
Religion whitewashes.
The Gospel washes white.
Religion places the prime emphasis upon doing.
The Gospel places the emphasis on a person.
You can take Buddhism out of, Buddha, sorry,
out of Buddhism and Buddhism still remains with
its four noble truths and its eightfold path.
You can take Mohammed out of Islam and
Islam is still intact with its five pillars
of action and its six articles of belief.
But if you take Christ out of the
Gospel, there's nothing left because the Gospel is
Christ.
That's the difference.
Christianity is the life of Christ implanted in
the heart of man.
Christianity is unique in that it alone has
a living author.
No religion claims such a distinction.
I trust we're going to go away from
this series of four messages.
I trust we're going to go away with
a desire to present this unique message with
a new urgency and fervency on the basis
of God's impenetrable will which we looked together
at on Thursday evening.
What do we do?
On the basis of that word, we preach
Christ, the eternal Son of God crucified.
We don't stop there.
As we saw last night, we present Christ
not only crucified but risen and reigning.
And if we will go and preach that
message, we will preach something which is absolutely
unique in this world.
May God give us the grace to do
so.
Let's close by singing 606.
606.
Oh, Jesus, I have promised to serve Thee
to the end.
Be Thou forever near me, my master and
my friend.
Father, as we've looked together at this subject
tonight, we've recognized again our entire dependence upon
Yourself.
Man is dead in trespasses and sins, unable
to help himself.
He cannot please You.
Lord, we call men to repentance, but what
can they do?
Lord, unless You give life, unless You give
sight to the blind, unless You give hearing
to those who are deaf, there is no
hope.
Father, by Your Spirit we pray that You
might descend upon this area again and give
to men a sense of need that conviction
of sin which we just cannot produce by
human methods.
Oh, God, by Your Spirit, give to men
a desire to be saved, we pray.
Give life to the dead, give sight to
the blind.
Use us, we pray, to present this unique
message of a righteous, loving God being bruised
himself for man's sin.
Lord, give us the strength to go on
to the end as we've sung in this
closing hymn, presenting that message faithfully to those
whom we come into contact with.
Thank You for our fellowship together these past
few days.
Part us now with Your blessing, we pray,
in the name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.