Category Archives: Christianity

Are All Who Haven’t Heard of Christ Damned?

Dan Vander Lugt
Christianity, World Religions, , , ,

In John 14:6 Jesus declared, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” Jesus’ words make it clear that He alone has brought God’s gift of salvation to the world. But do His words also mean that everyone who hasn’t heard of Him will be condemned to hell?

Abraham lived long before Christ. When he told Isaac that God would provide a sacrifice, his words were strikingly prophetic, but he didn’t understand their true significance. He knew nothing about the Lamb of God who would die on a cross nearly 2,000 years later. People like Abel, Enoch, Noah, Job, Melchizedek, Abraham, Sarah, and Jacob never heard the gospel, yet Hebrews 11:13 leaves no doubt that they will be in heaven.

No one in Old Testament times had a clear understanding of the role that Jesus Christ would someday play in atoning for sin. But centuries before the gospel was revealed, the faith of Old Testament believers was already “credited to them as righteousness” ( Genesis 15:6; Psalm 106:31; Galatians 3:6 ).

One of the most remarkable missionary stories of this century was the martyrdom of five young missionaries in Ecuador and the conversion of the Auca Indians. The first convert from the Auca tribe was a young woman named Dayuma. Remarkably, Dayuma was predisposed to accept the gospel because of her father’s influence. Although he had never heard the name of Jesus, he spoke out against the blood feuds and murder that were an Auca way of life. Unlike the others of his tribe, he was deeply conscious of his sinfulness and knew that he and his people needed forgiveness. He told Dayuma that some day God would send a messenger to the Aucas to tell them the way of salvation. Like Old Testament believers, Dayuma’s father was still living by faith when he died ( Hebrews 11:13 ). The witness of his life implies that he would have been overjoyed to hear the gospel, but he died before missionaries came.

Does Scripture give us grounds for insisting that Dayuma’s father is any different in God’s eyes than the believers of the Old Testament? Clearly, Dayuma’s father, like Abraham, would face eternal damnation apart from Christ’s shed blood. Apparent, too, is the desperate spiritual need of those, like the Auca people, who live in fear and spiritual darkness. The fact that Christ is the only way to God places on us the responsibility to make Him known to all.

Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles asked:

How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? (Romans 10:13-14).

But there isn’t a passage of Scripture that definitively proves that God looks upon Dayuma’s father differently than He looked upon Old Testament believers who had only a faint idea of the nature of coming redemption. (See the ATQ article, How Could Old Testament People Be Saved?) The apostle Paul may have had this issue in mind when he wrote the first chapters of Romans, declaring that God has revealed Himself in creation ( Romans 1:18-20 ) and in human conscience ( Romans 2:12-16 ). Paul said that each individual will be judged according to his response to these two revelations of God. To those who respond positively, God gives more knowledge—as He did to the Ethiopian eunuch and the Roman centurion, Cornelius (see Acts 8,10 ). Those who are lost will be judged according to their response to the spiritual light they have received ( Hebrews 4:12-13 ). 1

It may be that God will extend His grace to Dayuma’s father on the basis of Christ’s shed blood, just as He did to Enoch, Melchizedek, Job, Abraham, and Sarah—people who had only the faintest intimation of the means by which God would provide for their redemption. In the final analysis, we must leave this matter in God’s keeping. He is both just and loving. We can be assured that the Judge of all the earth will do right ( Genesis 18:25 ).

(See the ATQ article, How Can Christianity Claim To Be the Only Way to God?)

  1. Jesus made it clear that those who had little light will be punished lightly:
    That servant who knows his master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked ( Luke 12:47-48 ). Back To Article
Did this answer your question?
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (15 votes, average: 3.60 out of 5)
Loading...

Is Christianity a European Religion?

Dan Vander Lugt
Christianity, World Religions, ,

Far from being a European religion, Christianity’s origins were in the Mideast, a place far from Europe but just next door to Egypt and North Africa. Jesus and His followers weren’t blue-eyed and light-skinned. They were Semitic people, dark-skinned and dark-eyed. For that matter, Scripture itself declares that the religion of Jehovah and Christ is a universal religion ( Genesis 22:17-18; 26:4 ; Psalm 72 ; Daniel 2:44 ; Mark 16:15 ; Acts 8:27-38; 17:22-28 ; Revelation 11:15 ).

When the Christian gospel first began to spread about 2,000 years ago through the lands that bordered on the Mediterranean Sea, the peoples of the subcontinent that today is known as Europe were living a tribal existence, divided by hundreds of tribal languages. Just like other tribal peoples, Europeans were animists who worshiped and feared the spirits and sometimes practiced human sacrifice to appease them. They told and retold the legends of their gods and ancestral heroes around their night fires.

Although many of them had already been forced to submit to Roman authority, the European tribes in those days were much like African tribes today, or Native Americans at the time of Columbus. Among the warriors captured in battle and sold in Mediterranean slave markets were tall, blond Germans (then known as Goths), red-haired Celts and Britons, and short, dark-haired Iberians (from the regions we know as Spain and Portugal). More than a thousand years of tremendous cultural, social, linguistic, and political change would occur before the scattered, warring European tribes would be consolidated into the great modern, nominally Christian nations of Europe.

All people, whether African, Asian, Native American, or European,have tribal beginnings. Christianity was essential to the civilization of Europe. But Christianity isn’t unique to European civilization. Christianity is a religion of all mankind, a tree that has its roots planted among people of every race and culture.

We don’t know why God chose the Jews as the people through whom He revealed Himself. Their racial characteristics are as unlike Europeans as they are unlike Africans, Asians, and Native Americans. Certainly, the central location of Palestine was important to the spread of the gospel. But the pagan tribal peoples of Europe were civilized through a gospel that came to mankind in the person of Jesus Christ, a dark-skinned Semite who lived His entire life in a small area of the Mideast, far away from the Europe.

Did this answer your question?
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (25 votes, average: 3.20 out of 5)
Loading...

Should Forgiveness Be Unconditional?

Dan Vander Lugt
Christianity, Relationships, , , ,

People often have the impression that the Bible requires forgiveness to be unconditional.

1 But the Bible doesn’t say that. It tells us that we should “Forgive as the Lord forgave you” (Colossians 3:13). While God’s forgiveness is undeserved, it certainly isn’t unconditional. The Lord’s forgiveness is offered only to those who confess their sin and repent (2 Chronicles 7:14; Leviticus 26; Luke 13:3; 1 John 1:8-10).

On the surface, it might seem noble to forgive unconditionally. But unconditional forgiveness is usually motivated more by fear than by love. And because of this it’s usually destructive. If a wife continues to forgive a habitually unfaithful and abusive husband unconditionally, her toleration of his behavior will probably result in even more abuse and disrespect. This kind of “unconditional” forgiveness expresses a determination to cling to the status quo. No matter how bad things are, this woman fears that things will probably get worse if she holds her husband accountable. Her passive acceptance of his behavior will probably encourage him to continue in his sin. Instead of her forgiveness being a helpful act of love, it is actually a violation of love that will hinder his growth toward Christlikeness.

Jesus’ specific teaching about forgiveness in Luke 17:3-4 makes it clear that forgiveness should follow repentance:

Take heed to yourselves. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, “I repent,” you shall forgive him.

Undeserved forgiveness and unconditional forgiveness are radically different. It takes courage and character to forgive those who repent and ask our forgiveness. If we forgive them, we expose ourselves to the risk of being hurt again. Their repentance doesn’t earn our forgiveness in any way. They are still responsible for the harm they’ve done. But though their repentance doesn’t make them deserving of our forgiveness, it makes them eligible. We can forgive them because of the example of forgiveness that God has given us in Christ (Matthew 18:21-35).

Unconditional forgiveness is an affront against justice and a denial of the significance of sin and its cruel effects. Undeserved forgiveness is an expression of divine love and the only basis of our hope for salvation.

In a flawed world, forgiveness shouldn’t be given unconditionally. But we should always be willing to share the undeserved forgiveness we have received through Christ. We should be realistic in confronting our enemies, but we should also seek to love them and respond to them in a way that is ultimately in their best interest.

  1. In Matthew 5:38-47, Jesus made three radical statements. First, He said that a person should turn the other cheek when someone strikes him. Second, He declared that His followers should give those who sue them more than they are asking. And third, He said that a person who is conscripted by a Roman officer to carry a load for one mile should offer to go two. Does this mean that we shouldn’t defend ourselves when somebody attacks us? Is it our duty to let others take advantage of us? This couldn’t have been Jesus’ intention. After all, He counseled His disciples to be as “wise as serpents and as gentle as doves” (Matthew 10:16). His well-known “golden rule” (Matthew 7:12) contains the clear implication that we shouldn’t encourage people to do something that would harm their character (like abuse others, steal, etc.). Back To Article
Did this answer your question?
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (50 votes, average: 3.58 out of 5)
Loading...

Why Did Many Jewish Leaders Hate Jesus Christ and the Apostolic Church?

Dan Vander Lugt
Christianity, World Religions, , , , , , , ,

Some people have the impression that Jewish hostility for Christianity began only after Jews experienced persecution by Christians. Actually, Jewish hostility toward Jesus Christ and His church began long before Jews experienced persecution by Christians. Biblical scholar N. T. Wright summarized the reason for Jewish rejection of Jesus and the church:

What evokes persecution is precisely that which challenges a worldview, that which up-ends a symbolic universe. (N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God, Fortress Press, p. 451) 1

Jesus taught that Jewish nationalism and commitment to the “oral law” (“traditions of men”) distorted the purpose of the written law (Torah) (Mark 7:1-20). He declared that Israel’s dominant religious leaders were not in the tradition of Moses, David, and the prophets, but were servants of Satan (John 8:37-44). Their “Judaism” depended on legal righteousness based in “oral law” (the “traditions of men”; see Mark 7:1-23) and “works” that artificially distinguished them from the Gentiles whom they regarded as ritualistically unclean. Adherents of this perspective believed that their legal righteousness would assure them of the future Messiah’s approval when he appeared on the scene to cast off the Roman yoke and institute worldwide Jewish rule.

John the Baptist proclaimed the worthlessness of legalistic righteousness (Matthew 3:1-12), and Jesus declared that the legalistic righteousness of the Pharisees was pitted against the genuine law of God He had come to uphold.

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:17-20 NIV).

Instead of leading them toward fulfillment of the promises God had given Israel, their legalistically based self-righteousness motivated them to reject and kill the Messiah and His followers (Matthew 21:23-46; John 8:42-59; Acts 4-5; 7-9; 12:1f; 13:42-51; 14:2-5; 14:19; 17-18; 24:5; 26:9-11; Galatians 1:11-16; 4:29; Philippians 3:5-7; 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16).

Jesus called into question the meaning of the primary Jewish symbols—Sabbath, food taboos, ethnic identity, ancestral lands, and ultimately the Temple itself.2

The quotation below is by a modern Jewish man who, like the religious leaders of the first century, misunderstands what Jesus came to offer His people. It vividly illustrates the radical effect Jesus’ teaching must have had on His contemporaries.

John’s Gospel abolishes what is sacred for Judaism and replaces it with “Christ”. Everything that was held to be important by “the Jews” is dismissed in John as insignificant. Christ replaces or supersedes Judaism. The Church expresses this idea today by claiming to be the “New Israel.” According to John, Christ replaces the Temple (John 2:18-22); the Law (John 5:39-40) and Israel itself (John 15:1-17)—the “vine” being a symbol of Israel (Psalm 80:8; Ezekiel 15:1-6 and Hosea 10:1). There is no room left for Judaism as an expression of God’s will. This has led to what one author has called “a theological vendetta” against the Jews. Too often in history those who have concluded that Judaism is obsolete, have also concluded that the Jews are equally obsolete, with tragic results. Christology is the study of the nature of “Christ.” In Johannine Christology, Christ is portrayed as a divine man who fulfills prophecy and reveals God in his own flesh. This was and still remains, pure anathema to Jews. From a Jewish perspective the Johannine god-man vision of Christ is a repulsive paganism. By virtue of their innate inability to accept such a vision of the Messiah, Jews are automatically condemned by Johannine Christology. It is inherently antisemitic (“Anti-Semitism and John’s Gospel,” by Tom Macabi from Web site “Holocaust Understanding and Prevention”).

A Jewish scholar and Bar-Ilan University academic makes it clear that in some Jewish minds today, orthodox Christianity is “the root cause of 1500 years of the Christian idolatrous anti-Semitism which led to the holocaust.” He declared that Christians have a choice:

Either retain their present belief system and be anti-Semitic or form a partnership with the Jewish people. . . . As long as Christians keep Jesus as God, they will be anti-Semitic because that belief must lead them to believe that those who reject Jesus reject God. (Rabbi Dr. Pinchas Hayman, Australian Jewish News, Melbourne Edition, Vol. 62, no. 43, p. 9)

Obviously most Christians wouldn’t agree with this rabbi’s conclusion that faith in Christ is anti-Semitic. However, the fact that he sees the issue in these terms demonstrates that some Jews today still have the mindset of Jesus’ enemies in the first century, and to those with this mindset the challenge of Jesus Christ and the gospel remain a call to war (Matthew 10:32-42).

  1. Jesus was claiming to be speaking for Israel’s god, her scriptures, and her true vocation. Israel was trusting in her ancestral religious symbols; Jesus was claiming to speak for the reality to which those symbols pointed, and to show that, by her concentration on them, Israel had turned inwards upon herself and was being not only disobedient, but dangerously disobedient, to her god’s vision for her, his vocation that she should be the light of the world. Jesus’ contemporaries, however, could not but regard someone doing and saying these things as a deceiver. His agenda clashed at every point with theirs. In symbol, as in praxis and story, his way of being Israel, his way of loyalty to Israel’s god, was radically different from theirs. (N.T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God, Fortress Press, p. 442) Back To Article
  2. The clash between Jesus and his Jewish contemporaries, especially the Pharisees, must be seen in terms of alternative political agendas generated by alternative eschatological beliefs and expectations. Jesus was announcing the kingdom in a way which did not reinforce but rather called into question, the agenda of revolutionary zeal which dominated the horizon of, especially, the dominant group within Pharisaism. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that he called into question the great emphases on those symbols which had become the focal points of that zeal: Sabbath, food taboos, ethnic identity, ancestral lands, and ultimately the Temple itself. The symbols had become enacted codes for the aspirations of his contemporaries. Jesus, in challenging them, was not ‘speaking against the Torah’ per se. He was certainly not ‘speaking against’ the idea of Israel as the chosen people of the one true god. Rather, he was offering an alternative construal of Israel’s destiny and god-given vocation, an alternative way of telling Israel’s true story, and alternative to the piety which expressed itself in nationalistic symbols. He was affirming Israel’s election even as he redefined it. (N.T. Wright,  Jesus and the Victory of God, Fortress Press, p. 390) Back To Article
Did this answer your question?
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (62 votes, average: 3.19 out of 5)
Loading...

What Was Paul’s “Thorn”?

Dan Vander Lugt
Bible, Christianity, , ,

What was the “thorn” that Paul referred to in 2 Corinthians 12:7?

We do not know exactly what the affliction was that Paul called his “thorn in the flesh.” It probably was a physical malady. There is some evidence in Scripture that Paul had an eye problem. He spoke of the large letters he used in writing to the Galatians (Galatians 6:11). He also declared that the Galatians would have plucked out their own eyes and given them to him (Galatians 4:13-15). Some have suggested that this may have been a chronic eye disease or an injury suffered when he was stoned in Lystra (Acts 14:19,20).

Paul also referred to his “thorn” as “a messenger of Satan.” We know that the devil afflicted Job with a physical malady (Job 2:7) and caused physical deformity to a woman (Luke 13:16). We therefore have scriptural support for the idea that the “messenger of Satan” can be something physical.

Those who believe that the thorn was something other than a physical affliction point out that it was sent to “buffet” Paul (2 Corinthians 12:7), that is to prick the apostle’s arrogance which may have lingered on after he had been converted from Pharisaism. Some scholars prefer this interpretation and think Paul referred to Alexander the coppersmith (2 Timothy 4:14), Hymenaeus, and Philetus (2 Timothy 2:17), as the “thorns” who were adversaries of the work and therefore doing Satan’s business.

Those who hold to this view also refer to Numbers 33:55, where Moses warned the children of Israel as they were about to enter Canaan, “But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell.”

Another example of such a “thorn” would be Elymas, the sorcerer mentioned in Acts 13, who tried to turn the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, away from the faith (v.8) and was addressed by Paul as “you son of the devil” (v.10). And in 1 Thessalonians 2:18, Satan is said to have prevented Paul more than once from visiting the Thessalonians.

The fact of the matter is that the Bible doesn’t identify Paul’s thorn. God must have had a good reason for not giving this information. He probably left it this way so that people with various kinds of physical and spiritual problems might identify with Paul and experience the grace that God has promised (2 Corinthians 12:9).

Did this answer your question?
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (30 votes, average: 4.27 out of 5)
Loading...