I was reading through the book Putting Jesus in His Place: The Case for the Deity of Christ and I found this surprising quote by John Hick who denies the deity of Christ:
"Traditional orthodoxy says that Jesus of Nazareth was God incarnate...who became man to die for the sins of the world and who founded the church to proclaim this to the ends of the earth, so that all who sincerely take Jesus as their Lord and Savior are justified by his atoning death and will inherit eternal life. It follows from this that Christianity, alone among the world religions, was founded by God in person. God came down from heaven to earth and launched the salvific movement that came to be know as Christianity. From this premise it seems obvious that God must wish all human beings to enter this stream of saved life, so that Christianity shall supersede all the other world faiths. They may perhaps have some good in them and be able to function to some extent as a preparation for the gospel, but nevertheless Christianity alone is God's own religion...It is therefore divinely intended for all men and women without exception. All this follows logically from the central dogma of the deity of Jesus."
He is exactly right. The deity of Christ is so offensive to our culture because it claims Christianity alone to be "God's religion". So how important is Christ's deity to us?
2 comments:
Very Important!!
We are not to be ashamed. We are not called to follow the status quo, not to be ashamed, not to be apologetic. It is a sad state when Christians sometimes refuse to call themselves Christians because they are afraid they will offend someone. The fact is Jesus was clear.... How clear are our colours to the world. Are we clear or do we have shades of political correctness?
Yo yo Nebby! You rock hard. Good reminder. Jesus isn't politically correct at all. I think sometimes, in my mind, I wish he was.
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