There are many religions in the world today. Among them are: Islam, Nonreligious, Hinduism, Chinese traditional religion, Buddhism, indigenous, African Traditional, Sikhism, Juche, Spiritism, Judaism, Baha’i Jainism, Shinto, Cao Dai, Zoreastrainism, Tenrikyo and Neo-Paganism.
But honest to say, none of these can save any man from sin, death and the wrath of God to come upon the world. None offers any rational exegesis to man’s present predicament of greed, irrationality and barbarism, or offer any logical explanation to the meaning of life such as the purpose of our existence, the fall of man, and what happens to man hereafter.
Only the Bible, as the revealed and infallible word of God provides concrete answers to all of these and answers man’s desperate cries and need. The Bible is absolutely coherent in its presentation of the truth. “Of all the books on earth, the Bible is the most wonderful in its matter and meaning and message. The whole Bible is the word of the living God.
There are many writings purported to have come from God, but none comes close to the Bible in inspiration and infallibility. Of course, many religious books do contain excerpts from the Bible, but that alone cannot make them the word of God.
Again, this is not to say that there is no wisdom at all in them. In fact, there is wisdom in many of them, but the problem is that they are all wisdom of men. They are man’s own beliefs and ideas or ideologies.
Religion is man’s own effort to please and serve God or gods. They are the philosophies of men – man’s search for the meaning to life. I must confess that there is nothing more damnable to man than the idea that there are many roads to the One and only True God.
Further, man’s attempt to explain away sin and to eradicate it from the mind and from the world confirms man’s depravity and bondage to the spirit of error.
The many conflicting views of the origin of life and nature which religions of the world offer establish the Bible as the only source of truth. Truth reveals what is not true.
Information gathered from past and recent archeological excavations and discoveries has in many ways confirmed the accuracy of the Bible and the infallibility of the divine testimony.
The self-effort of the human race to be politically, academically and morally correct has all proven to be fiasco. Man seems to be caught in a dark hole filled with dirt. He cannot get himself out and neither can he make himself clean.
The world of mankind is plagued with wars, rumors of wars, economic failures, dehumanization, moral decadence, social injustice, unrest and family breakdown. The fear that theworld is spiraling out of control has become a reality for many.
The works of man do not produce salvation and neither can it establish a right relationship with the Creator and moral governor of the universe: “Where no counsel is, the people fall: but in the multitude of counsellors there is safety” (Proverbs 11:14).
The wages of sin are even with us in this life. Our hospitals are overflowing with the incurably diseased. Our prisons are filled with both the innocent and the guilty. Suicide is on the increase. Many people have resigned themselves to a state of hopelessness and helplessness.
Governments have failed their people. Democracy has become autocracy. Socialism, communism and capitalism are the academic man’s dream and far removed from reality. It appears man has run out of ideas.
The Bible is clear that theocracy is the essence of a truly visible social order. But, the sad news is that despite this gloomy state of the world and its economy man still refuses to turn to God for answers.
Even though God is closer to man than ever, man is looking everywhere and even asking the devils for help with the exception of God. Increasingly, man is daily provoking God by his numerous flirtations with evil.
Yet, finding God and the salvation He alone provides has never been this easy. Today, by the grace of God, the Gospel of Jesus Christ is being preached in almost every nation under the sun. Everything about the Gospel is frank and open. There are no secret illuminations.
God in addition to Jesus has given us the Holy Spirit to teach us all things. We know all things because the Holy Spirit teaches us and not as the agnostics and new age teaches:
“But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him” (1 John 2:27; verse 20).
The Bible is being translated into many local languages and is available in almost every bookstore in the world. We are, if not already approaching the days God said the knowledge of His glory shall cover the entire world. God would not rush the end: “For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Habakkuk 2:14; Isaiah 11:9).
Jesus said the end shall come after the gospel of the kingdom is preached in the entire world for a witness unto all nations and commanded that the Good news of the Gospel of salvation be preached to every creature (cf. Mathew 24).
His will is that all would hear the Gospel of His Son and live. God has given to every human being eternal life, but this life is in His Son. God wants every man to come to Him to receive life. Christ Himself is both the gate and the way and God enables men to find the gate (cf. John 14:6; 6:44).
There are many on the broad way of life and seeking to arrive in heaven by means of their own works. But, the truth is that it is only the few who receive the grace of God in Jesus Christ who are guaranteed to enter therein: “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life” (1 John 5:11-12).
To be continued. Thanks for reading. From “The Man Nobody Can Ignore ISBN 978-1-60725-819-3