God Never Said Christianity Is The Way To Heaven
I have a friend who is an Atheist. Another who is Muslim. Another Agnostic. Jewish. Over my 11 years working for Apple I've become friends with people who have drastically different views than me regarding God, the Bible, Jesus, and all the things.
And you know what? God never said they aren't going to heaven.
That's right - I said what I said. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that in order to enter into "heaven" when you "die" you need to first "be a Christian" or "believe in Jesus".
It doesn't say that.
One time, though, Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me" and those words (along with John 3:16, which I talk about HERE with my friend Doug Pagitt) are often assumed to mean that the only way to get into heaven is to believe in Jesus.
BUT.
(And this a massive BUT.)
In order to make the verse say that we need to assume that ...
"Comes to the Father" means "get into heaven".
"Through Me" means "believe in Jesus".
"The way, the truth, and the life" are not much more than nice words to describe Jesus.
... And I'm not so sure that's a very responsible way of reading the Bible.
Sadly, Evangelical Christianity has hijacked these very inclusive words of Jesus and made them into an exclusive rule that can only be met by certain people who believe what the gatekeepers of the church say are the right things about Jesus.
If you're reading this and you're one of those gatekeepers and you're seething as you read this (or your heart is breaking because of how far I've strayed from your path), let me say this in the most offensive way I can (this is our "Offensive Blog Series For Lent", after all) - I don’t care.
These words from Jesus are inclusive, not exclusive.
He said ...
I am the Way.
I am the Truth.
I am the Life.
No one comes.
To the Father.
BUT.
Through Me.
... And so perhaps the main idea here isn't that you need to believe in Jesus in order to get into heaven, but that the Way of Christ that was marked by love and grace and mercy and the Truth that this is how the Divine has always intended to us to live and the Life that this way and this truth brings to the world around us - perhaps that is what brings us into the present of our Creator, of the Divine, of the Logos, of the Christ.
In other words, when we life the way that Jesus lived, walk the truth he walked, and pour out the life that is instilled deeply within us all ... perhaps when we do those things we bring ourselves and our world and all the people in our path right into the presence of the Divine.
AND.
If this is true, then it means that ...
My Atheist friend.
My Muslim friend.
My Agnostic Friend.
My Jewish friend.
... Can live the WAY of love and grace, let the TRUTH of love and grace pour from their mouths, and operate in the shadow of the LIFE of Christ without ever even paying him a word of honor and bring people into the presence of the Divine just as much as the most devoted Christian on the planet.
Every time my Atheist friend LOVES his neighbor, he has found the WAY.
Every time my Muslim friend choose to FORGIVE, he has spoken the TRUTH.
Every time my Agnostic or Jewish friend INCLUDES an outcast, they bring LIFE.
... They walk in way of the Christ and usher everyone around them right into the presence of the Divine whether they realize it or intended it or not.
Listen, friends. I'm sharing this with you today to hopefully cut you free from the fear that if you don't believe the right thing or say the right "sinner's prayer" then you're not going to "inherit the Kingdom of Heaven".
The reality is that much of that language is fear driven to ...
Keep you in line.
Keep you coming to church every Sunday.
Keep you putting your money in the offering plate.
... AND keep you telling your friends about Jesus and the Sinner's Prayer and the way to heaven so that they start to believe the same things you do and then bring themselves and their money to church with you every Sunday. It's an understanding of God and Jesus and the Gospel (a false one, I believe) that has been drilled into people's heads for years and years and years and I'm not really sure it holds all that much merit not only because of what I just shared with you, but (more so) because when I look at Jesus (who supposedly is the exact representation of God) I see someone who doesn't turn anyone away.
Not you.
Not me.
Not my Atheist, Muslim, Agnostic, Jewish friends.
The reality is that God never said you need to be a Christian in order to get to heaven. If that's the kind of God that Jesus came to represent then Jesus did a pretty crappy job of representing him because Jesus hung out with all of the wrong crowds - all of the people who believed the wrong things and lived in the wrong ways - tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, and all the people that the world and some of the Temple considered to be losers.
Yeah?
Yeah.
Peace.
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