The Summit Lecture Series 22: Is Christ the Only Way Part 2 with Brett Kunkle

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Christianity is an exclusivist point of view that there is only one true religion that leads to God. Therefore, by its very nature, it excludes other views. Of course, what many people would rather hear is a pluralist point of view: that all religions are somehow equally valid and get you to the same destination.

Now, certainly, the exclusive Christian viewpoint is offensive to some, and what we Christians need to be careful of is to not add any more offense to the Bible’s message. What I mean is this: don’t be an arrogant jerk as you proclaim God’s truth. Don’t be unwise in your conversations. However, it’s impossible to remove any offense that is innately in the Gospel, even in an effort to please other people. Actually, to take out this exclusivity would be to dismantle the Gospel itself.

Now, as soon as we begin to discuss this claim, we will run into obstacles.

The first one most often brought up is the question, “How can Christianity be the only true religion when there are so many other religions in the world?”

This objection is faulty in its very question.

Consider this analogy: If a kindergarten teacher were to ask his class what is the answer to 2+2?

The first student offers the answer “4”. Another kindergartner offers the answer “5”. Several other kids begin answering their own suggestions: 7, 3, 6, etc.

A good teacher would NEVER acknowledge all of these possible answers and teach his class that we could never conclude that there is only one true answer when we could obviously see on the board that there are a whole slew of different possibilities, as brought up by each of the students.

Instead, he would instruct the students to look at all the possible answers and then he would instruct the class on why there is one, exclusive answer (4, if you’re wondering) to this equation.

You see, to say that simply because there are multiple different possible answers eliminates the possibility of one true answer is faulty reasoning.

In the same way, the person who is objecting that since there are so many possible religions of the world – and we don’t disagree that there are, in fact, a plethora of varying religions across the world – therefore, there can’t be one true religion.

This is a non sequitur fallacy.

Now, which religion is the one true religion is a separate question, but we need to start by knocking down the objection that simply because several alternatives may exist, Christianity is not the truth that it claims to be.