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Regarding Tom Smiley's article about Christian churches sharing their buildings with Muslims, I was intrigued by his statements regarding "truth."
He wrote, "Christians must realize that our task is first to tell the truth. The Christian truth is that the only way to know God and be forgiven of sin and to experience eternal life in heaven is by accepting Jesus Christ as your savior."
With all due respect to this good man, I want to share a different opinion.
First, according to Jesus, our first task is not to tell the truth but to love God and love our neighbor. St. Paul warned, "If I understand all mysteries and all knowledge, but have not love, I'm nothing."
Secondly, he refers to Muslims, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, etc., as "cultic groups." I assume he means they have not "accepted Jesus as their Savior."
My question is, how does he know? Is accepting Jesus an act of the intellect, an adherence to certain truths as defined by a particular group?
Or is it a much deeper conversion of one's heart and life which may or may not be correctly articulated or even understood. Is it possible that one could be following Jesus and not know it?
Or at least choose, for various reasons, not to describe it in traditional Christian language. What's primary? The right words or the right response to God's spirit over a lifetime?
Gandhi, a saintly Hindu, rejected a particular denomination's version of Christianity, but I'm not so sure he rejected Jesus. In fact, he seems to have followed Jesus more closely than most Christians do.
I know individual Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses who do not share my Christian theology, but they do seem to know God and to follow Jesus more faithfully than I do. I know Muslims and even atheists who reject Christian theology, at least the way it's been explained to them, yet I see Jesus in them.
I happen to believe, along with Rev. Smiley, that people come to "know God" and "experience eternal life" through and because of what God did in Christ. Where we disagree, however, is in the importance of understanding and articulating that experience in a particular way. For me the language and theology are not nearly as important as the experience itself. And the main evidence of that experience, according to scripture, is a life permeated with love. Not talking a talk, but walking a walk.
I think we have to be careful judging others based on whether or not they share our particular Christian vocabulary or our particular way of expressing Christian truth. What's far more important, according to scripture, is whether or not they exercise Christian love.
In Matthew 25, Jesus talked about many who will be surprised when He calls them "blessed" and asks them to enter his Father's kingdom. He goes on to explain to them how they were unknowingly, yet correctly, responding to Him when they acted in love toward others in need.
Alan Shope
Gainesville