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Religious Acceptance
I think that for many people, it is a natural instinct to condemn the people that do not belong to their group and its way of thinking. To say, ‘if you do not believe what we believe, worship as we worship, and follow what we are following, then you do not belong to what is right.’ It is a sad way to affirm that what you believe in is true and the only truth. Being a Christian, I’m afraid to say that we hold great fault when it comes to accepting other religions. Many Christians think that if you don’t follow Jesus, then you will end up in Hell, a though which seems to me to be very flawed.
My view of acceptance is very different from my view of tolerance. Tolerating something, to me, indicates that there is something that must be put up with. Accepting something is greeting it with open arms. It would be something if the arguing religions found a way to tolerate each other. However, it would be so much more to understand and embrace each other. We must recognize than no one is completely right or completely wrong about death, life, and God. Let’s stop excluding the spiritual stranger and be able to learn something from them.
The key to this policy of open arms is to recognize that God is infinitely bigger than one faith, one religion. God is too complex for us to know all about him, so no one can decide who he acknowledges as his ‘chosen people.’ Even though I’m a Christian, I whole-heartedly believe that God loves, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, agnostics, the nonreligious, and so on. He loves them and accepts them into heaven after death.
My grandmother once told me that the spiritual journey is like a cluster of paths. Some are longer and more difficult to walk than others, but they all lead to the same place. Everybody forges their own paths; the paths sometimes cross, join, and wind in different directions. Each soul makes its own journey, sometimes inadvertently. Each soul finds its way to God. It is not a certain religion that leads us quickest to him, but faith in what we believe in and devotion to it. Most of all, it is following what God stands for even if you don’t know that it is him that you are following. The quickest path to God is standing for love, compassion, kindness, purity, etc. God is too caring to choose one group of people over another. So the least we can do is follow in his footsteps and love one another, even if are beliefs are different.
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This article has 65 comments.
“He was in the world, and the world was created through Him, yet the world did not recognize Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, He gave them right to be children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood, or of the will of the flesh, or the will of man, but of God.”(JN 1:10-13) People end up in Hell because they do not accept the Lord and follow Him, allowing Him to reign inside of them.
There's a reason that God tells all to repent. There's a reason God URGES us to "deny himself and take up his cross daily"(LK 9:23), die to self, live after the spirit (Romans 8), to test ourselves to see that we are in the faith (2 Corinthians 13:5) (bearing good fruit). Those who actually are in Him must seek Him and bear good fruit, in order to remain a part of the "vine" of Christ: "Every branch in me that does not produce fruit He removes, and He prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit...Remain in Me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless it remains in Me. I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in Me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without Me. If anyone does not remain in Me, he is thrown aside like a branch and he withers. They gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned." (John 15:1-6) Parables like these and several others are used for warning of Hell—to both the believer and non-believer—Christ, John the Baptist, Paul, and the other disciples preached the gospel: The huge sacrifice God gave sinner’s, to save them from the depths of Hell…AND that gift is for those with TRUE faith: those who CONTINUALLY humble themselves and repent, those who CONTINUALLY pick up their crosses, love their enemies and commission them to the same call—the call to a life in the Spirit—for the fear that they’d go to Hell. This fear is the same fear that Paul had for the body of Christ: “But I fear that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your minds may be corrupted from a complete and pure devotion to Christ.”—2 Corinthians 1:4 He also feared for other groups of the body. Reading the Bible, you should see the obvious importance of accepting Christ, dying to self, and living everyday of your life for Him. Also, you should see that Hell is real, relevant, and is a justified punishment for those who do not live for God. You are absolutely correct that God’s love and our love for God and people are the greatest things of all, but where you’re mistaken about God’s love is that, out of pure, powerful love, God beckons to us to live as Christ, lest we go to Hell; and that “All the Law and the Prophet’s depend on these two commands”(Matthew 22:40). This is the truth, my friend, and, in due time, if the Holy Spirit does, in fact, dwell in you, you will see this truth.
I apoligize for commenting so much, but I am passionate about the truth of Christianity.
Jesus Christ told us followers to make fishers of men and to spread the gospel. Therefore, we do have an obligation to evangelize to non-believers about this salvation from hell. We do not do this to push them away. We do this to lead them to the love, the goodness, the grace of our Father. Moreover, we do this (hopefully!) out of our anguish for what might happen to them otherwise, had they not accepted our Lord. Jesus died for that Muslim, that Atheist, that Jew, that Satanist. He died for Hitler Hussein, Dahmer, Bin Ladin, for the opportunity for them--His children--to turn around and accept Him, to live for Him, and to live with Him (using their own free will).
Why would He become despised and rejected and accept someone who persecutes His children ("radical" muslims ) Or belives that the mahadi (Muslim messiah) is the messiah instead of Himself. That doesn't make sense in any case.
These rapist, murderers, idolaters, etc. are given the chance of salvation plenty of times in their life. If they continue to do what they do, worship who they want to worship, what makes you think that they'd be happy in Heaven, living with their adversary?
His love for them is indescribable. He wants His babies to know the Truth and choose to accept Him.
Think about it.;)
I hope you also know that, as a Christian, Jesus is God in the flesh. Also, the Bible is not contradictory: Jesus came as the fulfillment of the Old Law(Old Testament/Torah). He came to fulfill the law because the Pharisees thought that they were more righteous than anyone else and many other reasons.
I hope you take this into account. I'll be praying for you. Remember: "the truth shall set you free"--John 8:32
You do know that, as a Christian, you are omitting Jesus's own words about salvation ("I am the way, the truth and the life. The ONLY way to the Father is through me", "For God so loved the world", Etc, etc). To even say that a muslim or buddhist can get into heaven refutes the word of God. I am all for accepting muslims, atheists, etc., assuming that you present them with the TRUTH (the word of God)--if they are open to discussing religious view--and the TRUTH is that, if they don't beleive that Jesus is the messiah, they will not get into heaven. By all means, don't push them away, but make sure that you are biblically correct.
God Bless!
No, no. I just often have an eye for subtleties.
Of course, you had everything to do with it!
Thesilentraven:
Thank you so much for writing this article. It's helped strengthen what I've always known. I especially liked the last paragraph. I'm a Cath.olic and I share your views wholeheartedly. I feel sad when Christ.ians are so blind to others. Once I mentioned to my parents how I felt and they were horrified. I was very depressed and confused. I'm not confused anymore.
