The Inclusive Exclusivity

Today on Summit Life, a fundamental question is answered. You see, for as long as there has been human history, this has been the fundamental religious question.

Are there multiple ways to God or not? Because what I'm going to show you is that that question goes to the core of what's wrong with the world. It goes to the core of our relationship to God.

It goes to the core of how we're going to fix it. Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author, and theologian J.D. Greer. I'm your host, Molly Vidovitch. Today on Summit Life, Pastor J.D. explores that age-old question, is there more than one way to get to heaven? And let's be honest, we've probably all asked ourselves this at some point, or someone else has asked it of us. And it's time for a solid biblical answer. Today's teaching is part of our series called Sent.

And if you've missed any of the previous messages, you can listen to them online free of charge by visiting us at jdgreer.com. Pastor J.D. is teaching from the book of Acts chapter four in a message that he's titled, The Inclusive Exclusivity. Well, one of the biggest objections that people have to Christianity, or at least one that I have heard over the years as I've talked with people, is the idea that Christianity is too narrow.

And the idea that there is only one way to God just sounds like it's arrogant for us to say that, or it's unfair. You know, the idea is like you got somebody who, you know, has never heard about Jesus, and when they die, God shows up at their deathbed and says, aha, you didn't receive Jesus. And they're like, Jesus who? And he says, well, it's too late now. And he cast their souls into hell. And as they go tumbling into hell, screaming, wait, wait, you know, he mumbles in Latin like tough cookies or something like that.

And that's just the idea. And it just sounds unfair that God would have some arbitrary thing that a lot of people don't even know about is one way that people get to heaven. Plus, it's kind of an unspoken rule in our society that you just don't tell people that their religion is wrong. If you want to be thought of as a civilized, educated person, do not say anything that would imply that your belief system that you think your belief system is superior to somebody else's. So the rule in our society is you can be really sincere about your religion. That's good. Just don't be too excited about it.

Certainly not so excited that you're trying to convert other people into it. What I want to do this weekend is evaluate these objections in the light of a sermon that Peter preached in Acts 4. The first miracle that was done in Acts 3, Peter's explanation of it is part one is in Acts 3, part two is in Acts 4.

Then I want to show you how he dealt with this question right at the very beginning of the Christian movement, and I want to show you what his answer was to it. Acts 4, if you have your Bible, you take it out and, like I said last week, you can open it up or you can turn it on. If you wear skinny jeans and you're super cool and you turn your Bible on, do that right now. My pastor used to say that he loved to hear the sound of ruffling pages. I just had to give that up, but I do love to see the warm glow of Scripture on people's faces when I preach.

So turn it on on your phone. Verse one, and as they were speaking to the people, they being the apostles, this is right after the miracle, and Peter's explaining to them, a large group of people, that this miracle gives them a picture of the salvation that Jesus can bring to the soul. He raised a lame man, gave him the ability to walk, and Peter said this is like Jesus's ability to save you from your sin. When they were doing this, the priest and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. The Sadducees were in control of the government at the time, and the Sadducees had a couple of problems. Number one, they didn't like Jesus because Jesus had been a threat to their power and they didn't believe in him as the Messiah. Number two, just as a group, they rejected the whole concept of the resurrection from the dead. So they had no Messiah and no hope, and that's why they were sad, you see. Nine years of seminary, baby, right there.

That's what we paid for. Verse three, and so they arrested them and they put them in custody until the next day because it was already evening, but many of those who had heard the word believed, and the number of men came to be about 5,000. In those days, they'd often discount the men as the heads of the household. So when you add that number, 5,000 heads of household to the 3,000 that became believers in Acts 2, and then you consider, by the way, that the population of Jerusalem at that time, even if you counted all the visitors that frequented Jerusalem, was only about 40,000. You're talking about a massive movement. We're talking nearly half the city becomes followers of Jesus. Verse five, on the next day, their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem with Annas the high priest.

Tough name, tough name. And Caiaphas and John and Alexander and all who were of the high priestly family, and when they had set them in their midst, they inquired by what power or by what name did you do this? Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, rulers of the people and elders, if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man by what means this man has been healed, in other words, if we are actually on trial for healing a guy, well then let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but God raised from the dead, by him this man is standing before you well.

In other words, if you're actually putting us on trial for healing a guy, then yeah, let it be known this power comes from Jesus. I read an article this week called the Evangelical Adoption Scam. Basically it was lamenting all the evangelicals that are getting involved in international adoptions and was just talking about what a problem it was, and the article said this, it said evangelicals suffer from pathological altruism. Altruism is the idea that you always got to be doing good. I sent this to one of our other pastors who said back, he said, you know, when the best slur that you can come up with is to label somebody a pathological altruist, I'll take it. All right, how dare we seek the good of others.

That's how we break bad, you know, we just go seek the good of others. If we are on trial today for good deeds done to needy children, let it be known that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, these children are alive. All right, verse 11. This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, who has now become the cornerstone. A cornerstone is a very important concept in this passage.

I'll come back to it, so underline it or just press on the word on it and it'll give you an option to say highlight, okay, and I'll come back to that here in a minute. All right, then the conclusion of the whole message. You see, there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. Now, when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, they perceived that they were uneducated, uneducated common men. These were not polished men, they didn't have fancy degrees. They were fishermen, what we would call in our vernacular regular Joes, but they were speaking with something that went beyond their education, something that went beyond their personality. They spoke with an eloquence and a force that just spoke boldness. When they saw that, they were astonished and they recognized that they had been with Jesus. You see, he must have been like that.

He must have struck you as somebody that wasn't really all that spectacular in his personality or how he looked or how he dressed. He's just a regular guy, but when he spoke, you knew that you were hearing from heaven. Verse 14, seeing the man, but seeing the man who was healed standing beside them, they had nothing to say in opposition. And they want to just dismiss these guys and write them off, but then there's this other guy standing there grinning like an idiot, going, hey, look at me, I can jump.

Want to go for a run? Then they got nothing to say. Verse 15, but when they commanded them to leave the council, they conferred with one another saying, what shall we do with these men? For that a notable sign has been performed to them as evident to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And we can't deny it, but in order that it may spread no further among the people, because the last thing we want is all the people in wheelchairs getting up.

No, we don't want that. Let us warn them to speak no more to anyone in his name. So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach at all the name of Jesus. What's that like for Peter and John? I mean, they know that the power of Jesus has healed somebody and they know the Sadducees know that. And they know the Sadducees know that they know the Sadducees know. So how awkward is this? So Peter responds, and you can almost hear the sarcasm in this.

In fact, you have to read it with sarcasm because that's how it's written. Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you got to judge that, pal. We cannot but help. We cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard. Verse 21, and when they had further threatened them, what were those threats like? No, we're serious. We see any more people that we knew were dead and they're walking around, we're coming after you.

When they threatened them some more, they let them go, finding no way to punish them because of the people. For all of them, we're praising God because of what had happened. Last week, we saw that this miracle showed us God's purposes for all miracles. This week, we're going to see that it addresses that primary objection that people often have toward Christianity, that salvation is found only in Jesus. First thing I want you to note is that this is not a new controversy at all. People sometimes think that. They think that it came around with the coexist bumper sticker, or that it's something we invented in the 1980s now that we became aware of all the different good philosophies that are out there in the world. But notice this.

You see it? The apostles are not in trouble because they privately believe that Jesus rose from the dead. They're in trouble because they convinced 8,000 other people to believe it, and they told everybody who disagreed with them that they're dead wrong about Jesus and are going to be held accountable by God for it.

Because they said there's no other name under heaven given by which they must be saved. You see, the world into which Christianity was birthed was an extremely pluralistic one. I've told you before that the Romans had perfected this as a matter of politics. The Romans who ruled the world at the time had a rule in the Pax Romana, which meant the peace of Rome.

Basically, the rule was you could believe whatever you want. There were thousands of gods represented in the Roman Empire, gods of various natural spheres, gods of different peoples. They had them all in the Pantheon. That's where you had all these statues, all these gods, and the rule was you can worship whatever gods you want. Just don't say that your god is the supreme god, because if you say your god is the supreme god, they thought that would mean you would want to rule over everybody. So on the top of the Pantheon was this little symbol with Caesar's emblem, and it said, get this, Caesar is the king of kings, and he is the lord of lords.

Do you recognize that phraseology? It's when the apostles say, no, he's not. Jesus is the king of kings and lord of lords.

That's the fight that they're picking. The problem was not that they believed that Jesus was raised from the dead. The problem is they're telling everybody that they've got to believe Jesus rose from the dead, because he's the only name given under heaven by which he can be saved. You see, for as long as there has been human history, this has been the fundamental religious question. Are there multiple ways to God or not? Because what I'm going to show you is that that question goes to the core of what's wrong with the world, that goes to the core of our relationship to God, goes to the core of how we're going to fix it. Peter's explanation deals with two of the biggest objections that people make today about salvation being found only in Jesus.

Here they are, objection number one. Objection number one, claiming that Jesus is the only way to God is arrogant. Claiming that Jesus is the only way to God is arrogant. People say, well, if you think that Jesus is the only way, then you must think that you're better than everybody else. You must see things that nobody else sees. You must think that God prefers you and people who believe like you. So let's just ask that question. Is Peter claiming to be smarter?

No. In fact, the text goes out of its way to point out that they weren't that smart. Verse 13, do you see it? When they saw, they were uneducated, common in. They were astonished. Luke, the author says, hey, these guys were not the spiciest Doritos in the back. Which is all the more funny to me when you consider the fact that Luke, who wrote this, was a friend of Peter and John's. And he was a doctor, which means he was smart. He's like, yeah, my friends are not really smart. I can imagine Peter reading this later going, seriously, Luke, is that necessary?

Did you have to put that in? There's no presumption here to superior intelligence. In fact, Peter just kind of puts his shoulders up and says, look, we cannot help but speak what we have seen and heard. In other words, this has nothing to do with us being smarter. When it comes to education, you guys got us beat hands down. Your IQs are higher. You got more degrees hanging on your wall than a thermometer.

I get that. But see, there was this guy, and you killed him because you thought he was a fraud. And then you put him in a tomb and guarded it with a garrison of Roman soldiers. But then he came back from the dead just like he said he would. And we saw him, and we ate with him, and we watched him ascend to heaven.

No offense to your massive education, but if you've got a choice between believing a bunch of guys with degrees hanging on their wall and another guy who came back from the dead, we're going with the guy who came back from the dead. That's essentially what Peter said. Is it arrogant to believe that Jesus is who he says he is? No, I mean, not necessarily.

In fact, it can be just as arrogant, if not more so, to say that he's not. When I was in college, one of my professors told me this parable. And I'm sure you've heard some version of it before, too. He basically explained the world like this. His parable actually comes from India. He said, our quest for God is like three blind men that fall into a pit.

You heard this? Three blind men fall into a pit, and there's an elephant in there. So they're blind, so obviously they can't see the elephant. So each of them stands up, and one of them grabs hold of the trunk of the elephant and says, oh, it's a snake. And the other one grabs hold of the tusk of the elephant and says, no, it's a spear. And the other one touches the side of the elephant and says, no, it's a big wall. And the moral of the story is no one blind person sees the whole elephant, and if they would be humble enough to listen to what the other ones had to say, they would get a more full picture of the elephant. And so it is with God.

Each of the people in the world have a different viewpoint on God, and if we would be humble enough to listen to each other, we'd get a fuller view of God than any one of us by ourselves. Have you heard this? This is like The Life of Pi, the whole movie, right?

Yeah, so, right, that's the message. I was reading a book after college by a guy named Leslie Newbiggin. I don't know if you've ever heard of him. He was a missionary in India, and he said for years in India, he was told this parable, and he didn't really know how to respond to it. He said until one day it occurred to him that the parable had two major problems in it. He said, number one, he said the first problem is, who is it that actually sees the whole elephant? Who is the only person in the parable who sees the whole elephant?

The person telling the parable. How does he know each of the blind men only see a part? Well, because he sees the whole thing. So Leslie Newbiggin says, doesn't that mean he is claiming for himself what he denies to everybody else? Isn't he saying everyone else is blind and only sees a part, and I know that because I see the whole thing? He says that's kind of hypocritical. You see, if you're listening to me and you say, well, you know, what you've got about God is partially true, but you need to open your mind to all the different viewpoints on God because then we'll get a fuller picture of God. You're doing the exact same thing I'm doing. You're just not admitting it, and you're a hypocrite.

Right? So that's one problem. He said the second problem with the parable is, what if the elephant starts to speak? What if the elephant says, hey, I'm an elephant?

That changes the equation, right? Christian faith, listen, is essentially believing that God spoke in Jesus and told us who he was, verified it by prophecies and miracles and, most importantly, the resurrection. To believe that Jesus was telling the truth and that he is who he says he is is not necessarily arrogant. You might claim that it's gullible, but you shouldn't say that it's arrogant.

If you think that, be intellectually consistent. It's not inherently arrogant. Peter's like, look, the elephant spoke, and then the elephant got killed and raised from the dead and said that this is what the elephant was like.

We cannot but speak what we've seen and heard. Believing Jesus is who he says he is, if you ask me, is quite humble because it means admitting that we weren't smart enough to figure out truth, so God had to come down himself and reveal it to us. Well, is Peter saying that the apostles are morally superior? Is that what he's saying? He's saying that the reason we understand this is because we're morally better than all you people? No. In fact, right after the miracle, Peter said this.

This was last week. Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or piety we made him walk?

Is there a word piety? He's saying, you really feel like that we did this because we're more spiritual than you? Peter, if you remember, is still raw with embarrassment over denying Jesus three times in the space of one night. Almost all the people that he's talking to know that he did that, and Peter can probably feel the shame coming toward him when he stands up to preach.

If I knew that a bunch of you knew that I was a hypocrite, and you just had reason to know that I'm going to complete it, when I stand up here, I feel compromised, right? Peter's standing up, and he knows there are people out in the audience going, that's the guy who's like this 14-year-old girl. He's like, hey, do you know Jesus? He's like, no, I don't even know him.

They're snickering and laughing while he's up there. Peter's still raw with embarrassment. He knows he's not morally superior, but see, he knew that God's salvation was a gift of grace, not according to how good Peter was. It was a gift of God's grace, and he gave it just like he gave healing to the lame man. That lame man was not healed because he was better than all the other lame people. He wasn't healed because he had more potential in his legs. God didn't say, well, that one right there is not really that lame.

Go heal him. He healed him just because he received it by grace. Peter said salvation is like that. It's not that we're morally superior.

It's a gift of grace to all who will receive it by faith. So Peter's claim and our claim that salvation is only found in Jesus has nothing to do with believing that we're intellectually or morally superior. You say, well, I just don't like anything that is exclusive and puts people on the outside. Listen, all religious claims, all moral claims are exclusive. For example, I have had people say this to me, I believe that all good people of every religion goes to heaven. That sounds like a pretty inclusive statement, doesn't it?

All right. Who have you just excluded? All good people of every religion, you excluded bad people, and I guess you get to define what's bad. I'm assuming that racists, rapists, child molesters, terrorists, they're on that list, right? Well, depending on your viewpoint, maybe you would put sexually immoral people on that list, or maybe if you're of a different viewpoint, you'd put anybody who judges somebody else for their sexual immorality, maybe you put them on the bad list. The point is you've got a list, and some people are on it and some aren't. Plus, if you exclude bad people, guess who else you cut out? Moral failures.

That's what you cut out. So Paul's not on your list. King David's not on your list. Moses is not on your list. Those are murderers and adulterers. You see, I would say that even your attempt at inclusivity actually turns out to be quite exclusive. You say, well, that's why I'm not religious at all. I just don't exclude anybody for any reason.

You still have a standard for what constitutes a good person. And there's a line for you. I've told you this before, I used to live right on the border of Durham and Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill, that's a pretty open, accepting place, right? Try driving an SUV through downtown Chapel Hill with an NRA sticker on it and a little one that says global warming is a hoax, and that's why you refuse to recycle.

And you'll see just how open that place really is. I used to say that my neighbors believed in justification by recycling. That's how you get saved is you recycle. All religious and all moral viewpoints end up being exclusive. Everybody has a line for who's in and who's out, and I'm just telling you, you've got to be intellectually consistent with that. But see, the gospel of Jesus is a different kind of exclusivity. It's a different kind of exclusivity because the gospel teaches that our acceptance with God is not based on anything about us. It's not based on the superiority of our moral record. It's not based on the viewpoint given to us by our education.

It's certainly not based on our race or sociopolitical status. God gives salvation as a gift to all who will repent and receive it that way. You see, that lame man in that story is a picture of you and me. Did you know that according to the Jewish law, lame people could not go into the temple?

That's why he's outside of it. Leviticus 16 21, no one that is lame or with a physical deformity can go into the temple which represents the presence of God. That's a picture of you and me, for all have sinned and all have fallen short of the glory of God. That we cannot stand in God's presence for a sinner to stand in God's presence means that they would die.

I am that lame person and so are you. Salvation is a gift of grace to any lame person excluded from the presence of God who realizes that and receives it by faith. You might think, my friend, that you're a terribly bad sinner, that you're more lame than any of the rest of us.

But you know what? God has salvation and the ability to forgive and make new for anybody who will repent and believe anybody. On the other hand, you might think that you're not that bad of a sinner.

You might think that on the whole, you're pretty good. God's verdict on you is still lame, blind, wicked, poor, dead. And in fact, you're the one that's probably going to have a harder time with salvation because in order for you to be able to receive that healing, you've got to acknowledge there's no way you're getting in the presence of God on your own. As Pastor Tim Keller says, all religions are exclusive, but Christianity is the most inclusive exclusivity there is.

That makes it gracious and loving and open to all. You're listening to Summit Life with Pastor J.D. Greer.

You can always find us online at jdgreer.com. Now, J.D., we've been in the book of Acts for a bit now, and it really is kind of unique from the other books of the New Testament, isn't it? It's the only book, Molly, that tells a bunch of narrative stories about what it looks like to walk with the Spirit of God in our day and age. I love the Gospels. Jesus has ascended to heaven.

He's going to return, but he sent his spirit and the church operating to the power of the Spirit. The story of that is in the book of Acts. The book of Acts really doesn't have an ending. That's another thing I love about it, is that it ends with Paul in prison.

Just imagine three little periods of ellipsis at the end, because it's not supposed to have an ending. It's continuing to be written through you and me in one sense. The stories, the movement that was begun in Acts continues today. Many of your stories will never make it officially into the book of Acts, but it's the story of how the Gospel went into the lives of my children. It's the story of how the Gospel went into the peoples of Raleigh-Durham, where I live.

It's the story of how God used you to bring Christ to a friend, to a neighbor. I know that there are people listening to me right now that God is sending. He's sending locally.

He's sending to places all across the planet. Every person in the world needs to hear the Gospel, and you and I are the only witnesses they can hear the Gospel from. So we've got to embrace this identity of being sent. That's why we created this Bible study that will help take you deeper into the truths that Acts is teaching to show you what it means to receive this responsibility to be sent and then to live sin. It would be our pleasure to help you dive deeper into the Gospel, because at Summit Life, we believe the Gospel isn't just the diving board into Christianity.

It's the whole pool. And when you donate to support this ministry, you're helping us reach people around the world with this Gospel-centered Bible teaching. When you give today to support this ministry, we'll express our gratitude as well as the gratitude of your fellow listeners by sending you the workbook that Pastor JD mentioned titled Scent, The Book of Acts Volume 1.

This is an interactive study guide created exclusively for you from the Summit Life team, and it's yours with a donation of $25 or more. Request your copy by calling 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220.

Or give online at jdgrier.com. I'm Molly Vitovich. Join us tomorrow as we continue this message on the inclusive exclusivity of the Gospel. See you Wednesday on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.