Someone told a friend of mine, “You Baptists are so narrow. You think only Baptists are going to heaven.”\u00a0 He replied, “I’m narrower than that. I don’t even think some of them are going!”<\/p>\n
In truth, I know of no one who believes only their denomination is going to heaven. (We may be narrow, but we’re not ridiculous.)<\/p>\n
How narrow are we?\u00a0 Narrow enough to quote the following Scriptures and then to announce that we believe them and are ordering our lives by them….<\/strong><\/p>\n “Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).\u00a0 There is only one name of salvation. Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “I am the door.\u00a0 If anyone enters by me, he will be saved: \u00a0(John 10:9).\u00a0 There is only one door to salvation.\u00a0 Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me” (John 14:6).\u00a0 There is only one way to God.\u00a0 Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son, and those to whom the Son wills to reveal Him” (Luke 10:22).\u00a0 There is one way to know God. Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified” (Hebrews 10:14).\u00a0 There is one sin offering. Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “So Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many” (Hebrews 10:28). There is one sin offering. Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all” (I Timothy 2:5).\u00a0 There is one go-between. Only one: Jesus. <\/strong><\/p>\n “No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man” (John 3:12).\u00a0 There is one authority on heaven.\u00a0 Only one: Jesus.<\/strong><\/p>\n There will come a day, we are told, when…<\/p>\n Every eye shall see Jesus.<\/p>\n Every knee shall bow before Him.<\/p>\n And every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.\u00a0 (See Philippians 2:10-11 and Romans 14:10-11)<\/p>\n So, the problem is not with us, actually.<\/strong><\/p>\n The problem–if narrowness is indeed a problem–is with the Lord Jesus Himself. He said these things, and we’re merely taking Him at face value and believing them and building our lives on them.<\/p>\n Truth tends to be narrow, we are told.\u00a0 In the medical field, the surgeon follows a narrow routine for all he\/she does to save the life of the patient.\u00a0 In chemistry, formulae are exact and not given to the free expression of the whims of the chemist.\u00a0 In science, numbers are exact, even infinitesimal.<\/p>\n Only in religion does it seem people want to throw out any regard for truth and let everyone design his own faith and believe any hodge-podge he pleases, and the rest of us have to honor it as “right for him, though not for me.”<\/p>\n Into that kind of morass, the Lord Jesus comes saying things like: “Before Abraham was, I am.”\u00a0 And, things like “I am the only one who has been to heaven, therefore I’m the only one who knows.”\u00a0 And, “No one can introduce you to the Father except me.”<\/p>\n People react against that, today as they did when the words were first spoken.<\/p>\n What we must not do is categorically reject Jesus’s words simply because we find them objectionable.\u00a0 At the very least, the seeker should investigate Jesus to see whether His words and His claims could be the actual truth.\u00a0 And how to do that?<\/p>\n The starting place–as it always is with this sort of thing–is to consult the primary source.\u00a0 In this case, that would be the words of Jesus.\u00a0 And this would take us to the New Testament, beginning with the first page of Matthew’s Gospel.<\/p>\n One must be warned however. This word is alive.\u00a0 It claims that, actually, in Hebrews 4:12 and John 6:63.\u00a0 As C. S. Lewis once said, “A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading.”<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Someone told a friend of mine, “You Baptists are so narrow. You think only Baptists are going to heaven.”\u00a0 He replied, “I’m narrower than that. I don’t even think some of them are going!” In truth, I know of no … Continue reading