Speaker 1 00:00:08 Welcome to the thinking Christian podcast, your weekly guy to solid Christian thinking on culture science, faith, and Christian confidence hosted by Tom Gilson.
Speaker 2 00:00:22 Hello, I'm Tom Wilson. I'm a senior editor with a stream stream.org. And I
[email protected]. This is the thinking Christian podcast, and it's also in cooperation with the stream, a sample sermon to go with our pastors coroners series resources that we're offering to pastors and other Christian teachers of service to you with equipping on some of the hard questions, the difficult questions, the challenging ones that when you really dig into them deep, become some of the most discipleship building questions to when you get to the answers, the topic this time is Christian. Exclusivism the question of whether Christianity really is the only way to God, whether Jesus Christ is the only way to God and whether it's okay for us as believers to think so, and to say so, or whether that's arrogant, lacking, humility and wrong in today's world and in today's culture, especially Christian exclusivism versus religious pluralism.
Speaker 2 00:01:24 This is a sample sermon and sometimes words like exclusivism and pluralism. Aren't the words that you use in a sermon depends on your church, but it's also December. And what a great time to talk about Jesus as the one way, the only way, and what a great time to talk about his incarnation as the revelation of the true God. So that's what I'll be focusing on here in this sample sermon for you as with all of these sermons, you have permission to use any of this content whatsoever. Even the whole thing in its entirety provided that as you do so you just give appropriate attribution, you link to the stream stream.org. You'll link to the thinking, Christian blog thinking christian.net. And you mentioned where you got it from, from me, Tom, Gilson like to have you put that in your printed bulletin, along with any online versions of it that you may publish streaming or YouTube or whatever.
Speaker 2 00:02:25 I would love it. If you would let me know when you're doing that, you can use the contact
[email protected] slash contact and send a message to me. If you've got feedback, I want to know whether this is helping. I want to know how it's helping. I want to know how they could help you more. Be sure to go to the pastor's corner at the stream and check that out too. And again, you can give feedback and let me know how it's helping, whether it could help more in different ways. I really want to be. And the stream really wants to be a, to you in dealing, especially with these kinds of hard questions that we're taking up week by week and month by month in the pastor's corner at the stream and here at thinking Christian. So that's enough introduction. Now I'll launch into this sample sermon with you good morning and Merry Christmas week.
Speaker 2 00:03:19 And still say that here we're in church. After all, you remember the Christmas worse, they've actually died down some lately, which is okay with me. There were those years though, maybe 15, 20 years ago. And it seemed like almost the worst thing you could say out in public was Merry Christmas. My wife and my son were out shopping one day around that time. And they actually saw a greeting card that said happy December 25th. No kidding. How much more can you separate Christ from Christmas then that stores in those days put away their Christmas shopping signs and called everything happy holidays instead it's improved. I think since then, not that it's all back again. The way it was, it's still happy holidays and a lot of places. And I have a sneaking cynical sort of suspicion that half the stores that went back to Merry Christmas, did it really for the sake of sales, but you don't see many people fighting those old Christmas wars anymore.
Speaker 2 00:04:22 And maybe, maybe it's partly because we were a little embarrassed by it. We who say Jesus is the reason for the season. We almost got ourselves caught in the trap of fighting for being able to say Merry Christmas is the reason for the season. Being able to say Merry Christmas is not the reason for the season. We're going to talk some though about the larger problem of which the Christmas wars are really a symptom. They really were just a symptom. There is a larger issue. It's the problem called pluralism. The idea that there are many peoples, many cultures, many beliefs represented in our land and the time has come, that we give them all the respect that they're due. All those beliefs and cultures. Along with that, there comes the related issue that the time has come now to stop thinking there's anything special about the Christian faith.
Speaker 2 00:05:22 It's one religion among many, and we ought to treat it that way. That's the pluralism of our day. So for a few minutes here today, I want to talk about this pluralism. I'm going to narrow in on one key aspect of it. I could talk about the kind of pluralism that says we should respect people as people, regardless of their nationality or ethnicity, or even what they think or what they believe. I'm not going to spend time on that pluralism, that, that kind of mutual respect, because actually it's too obviously true. Every person, every person deserves the respect that comes with being like all of us created in God's image. The harder part is whether every belief deserves equal respect, does every belief deserve equal respect. There's a pluralism alive today that says that every belief should have equal value equal worth. And for today, I'm going to focus in on that specifically religious belief and right upfront, I'm going to tell you the whole point of this message, the big idea I want to get across.
Speaker 2 00:06:28 So you'll know where we're at. As we go through this, the message I want to tell you is this, our culture is pushing hard toward this religious pluralism. The idea that all beliefs are equally valid and worthy and true. We Christians, we feel the pressure to go along with it. And it's it's especially. So because man, it's easy to think. We're actually living out a Christian virtue as we do. So the virtue of humility, we can easily thinking that humility says we shouldn't elevate our own beliefs above anyone. Else's okay. That is humility of a sword, but I'm going to argue that it's upside down, humility, backwards, humility, humility, that's pointing in the wrong direction. So instead we're going to look at humility from another angle and upside, right? And forward angle is I'll try to explain to you. We'll see that there's still room for us to believe Jesus.
Speaker 2 00:07:28 When he said I am the way the truth and the life. And no one, no one comes to the father, but through me. And finally, before I close, I'm going to offer three ideas on how to live in true humility, along with true conviction in this pluralistic world, in which we live. So that's the plan, the pressure to be pluralistic, the mistake we make through backwards or upside down humility, and a better way to think about humility and then some practical ways to apply it all. So here we go. We feel the pressure. You can't live in this country without feeling at the pressure that you're supposed to live and act and think as if every religious belief is equally good and right, and true. And you ought to think twice before you say Merry Christmas, because that person you're talking to just might not believe in Christ during Christmas.
Speaker 2 00:08:23 And you need to respect their belief and above all that. Along with that pressure, there, there's the pressure to, to just ask yourself, who am I? Who am I to say that I am right? Who am I to say, they're wrong? They're going to think I'm arrogant. And who knows? They're probably right. Nothing says it better. Nothing says it better than the old Indian folk tale of the blind man and the elephant. Have you heard it before? It goes like this? The story says there's several blind men who encounter an elephant. And each one of them tries to tell what it is that they've run into. One of them's at the elephant's trunk and says it's a large and powerful snake. Another one feels the elephant's leg and says, no, no, it's a tree firmly planted. The third one runs in the animal side and says, how could you possibly think that we've bumped into a wall?
Speaker 2 00:09:20 And a fourth, one feels a sharp, strong tusk and warrants. The others look out, look out. It has a spear. And this is supposedly the way religion is everyone. Encounters truth differently. Everyone encounters reality differently. Everyone encounters, whatever you want to call it differently. And everyone thinks his own encounter is the whole story. Everyone thinks that they've got enough of the truth to tell the rest of the truth, but they don't. They don't any more than the blind man touching the elephant have touched the whole truth before long. We have many different religions with different quote truths about God, but we can't get there. God is great. And we are blind. God is huge and we can touch nothing, but the tiniest piece of him, or as John Godfrey sax, who wrote a poem on this parable set it at the end of the poem.
Speaker 2 00:10:19 He wrote this. He said so often theologic wars, the disputants. It seems rail on an utter ignorance of what each other mean and preach on about an elephant that not one of them has seen. I updated some of his language here for us, but you get the point, right? We're the disputants in were, were disputing about theologic wars and we're railing on an utter ignorance of what everyone else is seeing. And we're talking about an elephant. We haven't seen we're blind, we're blind. And yet we do this. We all think our story is better than everyone. Else's our reality is better than everyone else's but the truth is we're all talking about something that no one, no one could possibly begin to see in all his fullness, much less understand. And that's the problem or is it we're going to see, we're going to see that that's actually a misstatement of the problem.
Speaker 2 00:11:18 That's got the problem wrong. Sure. We can think who are we to claim? We have the one true religion, how proud are arrogant? And we can ask doesn't humility. Say we'd better pack down on that. You shouldn't. We say, well, if Christmas is our is about our belief in Jesus. Well, other people believe differently. So we'd better give their winter holidays equal billing too. It's actually kind of interesting. Just a little side, sidelight here to think where this came from. Christianity went a long time before anyone saw this as a kind of a problem. We went centuries. Actually. It was really the undisputed top dog, religion in Europe. Then later in America, that lasted until technology punched a hole in it. People traveled the world and could meet more people from Orlando. We had better worldwide communications because of that. We had more encounter with real people with real different beliefs.
Speaker 2 00:12:21 And we began respecting them as fellow human beings. Oh, and by the way, besides technology, a couple of world wars actually contributed to this. As soldiers saw peoples and co and cultures that were previously unknown to them of close face-to-face. So we realized we had differences and we kind of captured that in, in maybe something that we thought was Christian humility because Christ taught humility. And doesn't that mean we ought to treat other people with humility too. Doesn't that include taking a humble attitude toward our own beliefs alongside theirs. Isn't that what it means? Isn't that what it means to be a Christian, to be walking humbly that way alongside our fellow human being. That's the way it feels. That's the way it feels. That's the way the culture we live in wants it to feel. It feels like Christian here, but it isn't, this isn't real.
Speaker 2 00:13:22 It's a kind of humility, but it's backwards. Humility. It's humility pointing in the wrong direction. It's counterfeit humility. I'll grant you. It's a convincing counterfeit. I mean really very convincing if you've kind of settled into thinking that way, you've got a lot of company, but it's still not real. When Christians decide to treat other beliefs with the kind of humility we've been talking about, we are taking humility in a place. It was never meant to go. Where did we get it wrong? We got a wrong when we thought it was being humbled to doubt the truth. And no one has said it better than GK Chesterton. He wrote this about a hundred years ago, but I think it's more true now than it was. Then he said this. He said, what we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the Oregon of ambition.
Speaker 2 00:14:17 Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction where it was never meant to be a man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubtedly, about the truth. And this has been exactly reversed nowadays. The part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not assert himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part. He ought not to doubt the divine reason. So Chesterton said it's humility in the wrong place, humility about truth. Instead of humility about ourselves. Now at the end, he says the divine reason. That's the part we ought not to doubt. I would say that the part we ought not doubt is the truth that God has revealed in Jesus Christ. And I think he would agree with that. And I want to talk more about that before I can go there though. I think we need to clear away some confusion from that tail of the elephant and the blind man, because it's going to get in our way, this, this tail, the whole point that it makes it about humility and knowing what we know and not knowing what we don't know.
Speaker 2 00:15:26 And that tail, that parable has a lot of power. We need to clear away the confusion from that tail. Yeah. Does pack up. It really does a punch. It really does seem to tell us we'd better not take our beliefs too seriously. And I'll tell you this. I will tell you this. The parable works. Yes. The parable works. If God is an elephant, the parable works. If God is an elephant, the parable works. In other words, as long as God is like that, mute dumb beast. I mean, no disrespect because elephants are supposedly some of the smarter mammals. But think of the role this animal is playing in that story, it just stands there. Passive the blind men say all kinds of wrong things about it. And what does the elephant care? It doesn't know the blind men are getting it wrong. It doesn't care.
Speaker 2 00:16:20 They're getting it wrong. And even if it knew, and even if it cared, it wouldn't know how to say. So God is not an elephant. We're blind in a way that is we don't stand a chance of getting God right on our own. But the story only works. If God is dumb and mute and doesn't care. If he stands there and does nothing and says nothing and lets us all think he's a snake or a spear or a tree. But the first message of Christianity, the message of Christmas is that God is nothing like that. Nothing like that at all. God is love. God created us. God can communicate Psalm 94. Nine says he who planted the ear. Does he not here? He who formed the eye, does he not see? And we could add this. He who created the mouth. Can he not speak?
Speaker 2 00:17:16 We're blind? Sure. Can we figure out God on our own? No, but the parable goes badly wrong. When it assumes that it's our job to figure out God on our own. Do you know what that is? It's religious pride. That's not humility. It takes a lot of pride to think that figuring God out is supposed to be a human project. No one has ever seen God. That's true. That's in the gospel of John chapter one verse 18, no one has ever seen. God will never figure God out on our own, but that's only part of the sentence. Here's the rest of it. No one has ever seen God. The only God who is at the father's side has made him known, has made him known in the adverse. Sarah's talking about Jesus. We haven't seen God, but Jesus has made him known just a few verses earlier in verse 14.
Speaker 2 00:18:20 Also speaking about Jesus, the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory glory as of the only son from the father elsewhere in Colossians one 15. The Bible says that Jesus is the image of the invisible God. And in verse 19, Paul who wrote that letter for, in Jesus, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. You see there, how we can see God when we see Christ Hebrews one, starting at verse. One says that even clearer. It says long ago at many times. And in many ways, God spoke to our fathers through the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son whom he appointed heir of all things through whom he also made the world and get this, get this. It says, Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature.
Speaker 2 00:19:22 So as Jesus himself told Phillip the disciple in John chapter 14, if you have seen me, you have seen the father. We do get to see God because God has taken the initiative not to stand there like that mute uncaring elephant. He's taken the initiative to reveal himself to us. God is not an elephant. He's not mute. He's not passive. And I know some will still object that God is just way too great. Anyway, just, just way too great. So we can never know him as he is. Well, we'll never understand God. We'll never, we're we're too small. He's just way out of reach anyway. Okay. There's a little truth in there. I really expect the part of heaven's eternal joy will be the way forever and forever. We keep on learning more of God than we'd ever known before. I expect that it turned city itself.
Speaker 2 00:20:26 Won't be long enough for us to know God for all that. He is in himself. That's eternity now here on earth. Oh my goodness. We won't know anywhere near a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of all there is to know about God, but do we have to know that much? Do we have to know that much? What if it's enough just to know enough? Well, how much is enough? Do we decide that? No. See, now we're again, walking in territory or we're trying to be the blind person, figuring it out when God has actually taken care of it for us, it's not our job to know God on our own. It's not even enough. Our job to know how much knowledge of God is enough knowledge. God can solve that one too. And he has in his wisdom. He's given us his word, the Bible, and he's given us the life of Jesus Christ through which we see him.
Speaker 2 00:21:20 He gives us the light of the holy spirit within us and really quite clearly from God's point of view. That's what we need to know for now. It's not everything. It is enough. It really is enough. Not only can we know this about God though, we can know that we know we can know that we know what if there were time there isn't. But if there were time, I could tell you dozens and dozens of reasons that I'm confident. I'm really confident in this truth. That Jesus really is the truth of God revealed for us to know and to trust. And in whom defined salvation, we have every reason for confidence, the reasons of bound, but oh, to hear what I just said, we're still on this topic of humility, right?
Speaker 2 00:22:13 Maybe I'm starting to boast. Now, maybe I'm starting to boast. Maybe I'm starting to become arrogant, maybe acting like I hold the truth. Like Christian told the truth. And if I say we hold the truth, isn't that arrogant. Who can say that they hold the truth. That's a good question. I'm glad you asked it. We've talked about humility. We've talked about a false kind of humility that says we shouldn't have bad opinions about other people's religions. We've talked about the false way that we come to that point. If humility, by thinking that it's up to us to figure out God, a true kind of humility says there's a different way to view truth, different way to view our relationship to truth. There's a better way to be humble without letting go of the truth that we know I'm going to offer. First of three ideas that I said I was going to offer on how to live in humility, because now we're moving into application.
Speaker 2 00:23:14 Set your mind at ease. I don't think we hold the truth. We don't have to be arrogant that way. I don't think I hold the truth. Well, some of you are even more worried. Now you're wondering if I'm contradicting myself like, Hey Tom, I thought you said we do have the truth. Well it's okay. And then say we don't have it. I said, we don't hold it. Here's the rest of it that goes with it. We don't hold the truth. God holds the truth. We don't hold the truth. The truth holds us. This is the that helps us get past the elephant problem. This is the mindset that puts God at the center that takes us away from that central point and allows us to live in humility. It's not just mental manipulation. It's real. God never meant us to hold the truth. At least nine.
Speaker 2 00:24:04 If we mean it in the sense that we've got it packaged and under control as if we got some kind of a lock on it as if we're special people with special knowledge, no that's God's role, not ours. We don't hold the truth. God holds the truth. And he reveals to us, whatever he is pleased to reveal, God holds the truth and the truth holds us. I'm talking capital T truth. Now Jesus said in John 14, verse six, I am the way and the truth and the life is the truth. He said, no one comes to the father, but through me. Oh, and by the way, that was just before he told Philip what I've already quoted. Whoever has seen me has seen the father. Jesus is saying that he is the truth, the living truth, the very personal truth, this truth, this truth, who is Jesus told us, and yes, we don't hold this truth.
Speaker 2 00:25:05 We submit to it. We don't have it in a package. We don't control it. We bow down and worship before Jesus Christ, who is the truth. We bow down and worship and submission. This is what utility. It looks like. Not being humble toward other people's beliefs, but being humble toward actual truth. The truth who is Jesus Christ. It's about being humbled toward first of all, and most of all and above all God himself, that is how you move from counterfeit humility to true humility, not by claiming anything special for yourself, but by claiming everything special about God, not by claiming that you've got this relationship to truth where it's yours, but you've got this relationship to truth where it is God's and you submit to him and you submit to his truth. You yield to his truth. Let me put it this way. Suppose you wanted to say that your beliefs are no better than anyone else's beliefs.
Speaker 2 00:26:07 And you're here at church and you're kind of just not willing to say that anyone's beliefs are less than yours. Here's what that means. You're saying that you believe God is God. That's why you're not in some mosque. You're not in some Hindu temple or something like that. You're saying that you believe God is God and you're worshiping him here. You're worshiping him. And you also believe that Jesus is God, you believe he died on the cross to save you from your sins. You believe that it really is your belief. That is something you think is true. And yet you won't say that someone else's belief might not be true to you. Won't say that their belief is wrong just because you have a different belief. Let me rewind that and say it again quick are you believe God has God. Jesus died on the cross.
Speaker 2 00:26:54 Are you? And you probably also believe God deserves your worship. And here's what your worship looks like. Oh God, I praise you. God, I praise you. You are my creator. The awesome one. The holy one, you are my Lord and Jesus. I praise you. You paid the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of the world. And oh, by the way, I just want you to know that. As far as I'm concerned, you're kind of one option among many who am I to say, anyone else's wrong when they disbelieve in you and reject you and misunderstand you. I, I got to stay good with them. You know, it's more important to me than staying good with you. And then you turn around and sing the same song of worship. Really? How can you do that inside your head? I don't think you can, if God is God.
Speaker 2 00:27:38 If he is the creator and if Jesus Christ paid the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of the entire world, then I'm sorry. The other religions, if they have another option, if they're saying the cross is optional, if they're saying Jesus brutal, excruciating death on a cross was one of God's good ideas, but he had others. No, you cannot believe that that's a cross is optional. You either believe that God is God and Jesus is the one savior for all mankind, or you really don't believe in Christianity. One bit. You have got to recognize the choice that's to be made there. And then you have to make the choice. If you're going to worship Jesus as the one who died for you, you just can't do that without realizing that the other options are not options. And the other beliefs cannot be true. Some will still say, it's humility to say you don't have the truth.
Speaker 2 00:28:42 I say that if you've had a true encounter with this truth, capital T truth, that is so much bigger than all the rest of us, then it's pride. Not humility. It's pride that says you can walk away from it as if it wasn't there as if it was optional. It's pride that says you decide how you're going to worship God. And, and that it's okay with him. If you keep your options open, it's okay with other people have different options. That's pride. It's pride that says it's more important for me to stay good with all the other religions than it is for me to be right in God's eyes. That's not melody. It's not humility where it matters. Anyway, humility toward God. Humility is a Christian virtue. Let's keep it pointed and aimed in the right direction. No more backwards. Humility, no more upside down humility, no more humility.
Speaker 2 00:29:38 That's moved from the Oregon of conviction to some other organism Chesterton, no more humility that says I'm going to be humbled before other people. And it's more important than being humbled before God and his revealed truth in the one savior Jesus Christ, respect other people. They are fellow human beings bearing the image of God just as you and I, but don't think that means you have to be loosey goosey with your convictions. Jesus really is the one way to God. He really is. And if there's only one way to God, it's okay to believe it. It's okay to say it. Some people won't like it. If it's okay with God, hadn't that ought to matter more. But again sure. Some people won't like it. What do we do about that? Well, that brings us back around to Christmas. We're celebrating the same thing that I mentioned earlier, that this was the word became flesh and dwelt among us.
Speaker 2 00:30:39 And we beheld his glory glory as of the only begotten of the father. So let me close with a couple of really quick things to help you get through this month when it comes to saying Merry Christmas. And my first idea is this don't make it about the holiday. Don't make it about being able to say Merry Christmas is the reason for the season. No, Jesus is the reason for the season. If someone objects to you saying Merry Christmas, don't react. Just ask them a question, ask them a question that points to Jesus. You can ask them. So I'm curious, what do you think about this Jesus, this person whom Christians celebrate on Christmas, ask them that. What do you think about Jesus? And then listen, listen. Well, listen to hear what they have to say. Maybe God will open the door for you then to say more to them about Christ.
Speaker 2 00:31:34 And if not, then try this second. And last idea, ask them what they celebrate around this time of year again, listen, well, learn what they celebrate. You can always learn by listening. If, and if it's something you don't agree with, you can still grow an understanding. You show love by listening that way, listening to learn, listening to understand. And just maybe, maybe they'll ask you something like why is Christmas so important to you? Maybe you can ask them permission to explain it. Maybe they'll say yes. And maybe it will because they know that you cared enough to listen. Doesn't have to be a war. It could be a conversation. We celebrate Jesus because Jesus came to save us from our sin to conquer death on our behalf and to reveal God, God has no elephant. He's not mute. He's not dumb. And my goodness, he is not uncaring.
Speaker 2 00:32:34 God loved us enough to send his son to reveal himself to us. You can speak it freely as he spoken freely, freely and openly, believe it freely. It's okay. This is Christian humility in action. And that concludes the message. Thank you so much for staying with me here. I again, want you to know that you have permission to use any or all of it as mentioned at the beginning with proper attribution. I won't repeat what that all involves here. I want you also to be aware that if you go to thinking christian.net, you will see a sign up form there for downloads and updates on what's going
[email protected]. And when you do, you will have the opportunity to download a free chapter of the book I was talking about too good to be false. And a chapter that reveals Jesus' love in a way that many people, including seminary, professors have said, they have never realized the depth and the extent and the Donnish and quality of Jesus love the way it's presented in the book. And specifically in that chapter. So go to thinking christian.net, sign in there, get the updates and get your free chapter of too good to be false. That's it for this time. I hope you have a very Merry Christmas. I'm Tom Nelson. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1 00:34:06 The thinking Christian podcast is copyright by Thomas Gilson for more information, visit the thinking Christian
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