Christianity, the one true faith?

[PlentyGroovy]

How do we know that Christianity is the one true faith? (If this has already been covered, could someone link me up? :): )

[Walkerbyfaith]

well first off all of its prophecys cept Revelations has come true, its the only one not based on works, it doesnt say go kill your neighbors but love them its not flawed etc, im not sure how you'd know but for me I just have faith that i is, and besides Christianity isnt a religion its the truth

[floAty]

For me, it was a personal realization after God performed a miracle for me. (I prayed to Him in Jesus name for the first time, and He Heard me) It felt right that a holy and just and loving God would be the real God.

After He changed me, i started to delve into prophecy; his promises. This started to have an amazing effect on me...and every day my faith was strengthened. (Now so even much more watching the news)

check this out http://www.ccel.org/p/pink/awpinspr/htm/viii.htm

[Now You See HIM]

To throw another link at you...

http://www.tektonics.org/lp/nowayjose.html

(In addition to being interesting and thought-provoking, I just like the file name for the page. :D: )

[BHiles]

How do we know that Christianity is the one true faith? (If this has already been covered, could someone link me up? :): )It is not!

Religion and especially Christianity have never been the one true faith. In the name of Christianity many un-Christ like acts have been committed. Christianity is comprised by so many different beliefs and most man-made traditions.

This one true prophecy of Christ hold distintively true in this area.
Luke 21:8 And he said, Take heed that ye be not deceived: for many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and the time draweth near: go ye not therefore after them.

They come in Jesus name saying that Jesus is who He said He was however they will decieve many. Why?

Satan is not concerned that you worship him. He is concerned that you not accept Jesus Christ as your Savior. Satan gives you many ways to make sure that this is never accomplished in your life. Including stating that Jesus was who He says He was and the trying to get you to believe that there is another way to heaven other than what Jesus Christ stated.

It is a matter of you deciding to place your measure of faith that God has given you in Jesus Christ only for your salvation.
Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.

This is the one true faith:
You a sinner. Romans 3:10 As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: Romans 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;

There is a price on sin, eternal death. Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death; Romans 5:12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:


Jesus paid that price on the cross. Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

By faith in Christ we can be saved. Romans 10:13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.


I John 5:10 He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. 11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. 13 These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

It's a faith thing

[Paul]

How do we know that Christianity is the one true faith? (If this has already been covered, could someone link me up? :): )

Look at how the apostles and early church presented Christ as the Truth. They pointed to the Old Testament prophecies concerning the Messiah and the New Testament fulfillment of those prophecies in the life of Christ. Tha evidence is so strong and that is why I am a Christian today.

So how do we know God exists? We know because He has revealed Himself to us through Jesus Christ – the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15) – and that revelation has been recorded for us in the Bible. How do we know the Bible is true? We know because God has written history in advance on its pages to prove it is from Him.

The Old Testament predicts the Messiah's coming, the New Testament records it, and we can verify these events through secular history -- we have the evidence of a world completly changed by Jesus.

Here is a basic introduction to messianic prophecy (http://www.biblestudyplanet.com/s158.htm)

[PlentyGroovy]

I am being accused of being intolerant. I was asked, what would you say if a muslim woman said you will go to hell if you don't cover your head? Which boils down to, why are all other religions false? Yes, I'm getting into apologetics, defending the faith. Can anyone answer this? What is the problem with buddism, hinduism, and the other faiths? Is there a good argument other than because Jesus has relayed that he is the only way to the Father or is this statement alone the one and only reason christians discount other faiths?

[mld726]

I am being accused of being intolerant. I was asked, what would you say if a muslim woman said you will go to hell if you don't cover your head? Which boils down to, why are all other religions false? Yes, I'm getting into apologetics, defending the faith. Can anyone answer this? What is the problem with buddism, hinduism, and the other faiths? Is there a good argument other than because Jesus has relayed that he is the only way to the Father or is this statement alone the one and only reason christians discount other faiths?

If you can convince them that God is holy and just and that not one person is "good", then how can sinful people get to heaven? Wearing hajib and praying 5 times a day? Saying the rosary? Feeding the poor? Chanting? Will these works cancel out the daily sins we commit--gossiping, being angry at our spouse, cursing someone out while driving?

How can we be SURE these acts cancel out our sin in the eyes of a holy God? In my simple mind we can't. Only God can forgive our sins against him.

(I still have trouble understanding why a sacrifice of a spotless lamb -- but that's what God told Israel via Moses to do)

Anyway, all these other religions require us to DO something. If we believe that God provided his own spotless lamb, Jesus, who atoned for our sins on the cross, then we know God did it. Not us. Then it has to be true that our sins are forgiven. He did it for us, because He loves us that much!

Does that make any sense?

[goodboy]

Why Christianity?

When I was about 13 years old I had the thought, “is there really a God”? I had been raised as a Christian, but I had not really decided for myself that God really existed. Using my logic and viewing creation, I decided that there must be a creator. Was the creator in fact God? I mean the God of the bible, who is so mysterious and seems to only communicate through things like Prophets and such. Why couldn’t God be more human like? Why couldn’t he be just like a human, only on a much higher level?
I decided that there was indeed a Supreme Being. So who was this Supreme Being? Well I thought to myself, that he must be far more intelligent than any human that ever existed. In fact I thought that he would make Einstein look as if he were an idiot! Continuing with my logic, I thought that if Einstein would have a hard time explaining his theory of relativity to the average person, how hard would it be for the Supreme Being to explain things to us. I therefor concluded that the Supreme Being used the Bible stories as a way of communicating on our level. I concluded that these stories were not to be taken literally, but were given as a way for us to understand the Supreme Beings expectations, morals and values.
This all sounded very good to me, but there was one flaw in my thinking, I made it all up! What I mean is, that nothing I came up with was based on facts, just a theory that sounded very good to me. By facts I mean things that can either be proven, or collaborated by reliable sources. So even though I enjoyed my theory, I had the thought “what if this religious stuff really is true”? “What if there really is a Heaven and a Hell”? “What if there really is a God who will judge me”? “What can I tell this God as an excuse for not believing”?
I thought to myself “what do all the religions I know of have in common pertaining to God”? The answer I came up with was that “God is just”! “OK”, I thought, “now I’m getting somewhere”! I now had the perfect excuse I needed! If God was to ask me why I didn’t become a Muslim, a Jew, a Buddhist, a Catholic, a Jehovah’s Witness or whatever, I had the perfect answer. I would simply tell God that I would have been perfectly happy to become whatever religion was the right one. The problem I had was, that they ALL claimed to be the right one. Rather than choose one that went against God, I thought it better not to get involved. If God was indeed just, and as I really meant what I said, he would have to accept my excuse!
So I went along in life with my Supreme Being theory and my excuse, just in case my theory was wrong. Well when I was about 28 years old a co-worker ruined my excuse. He was sharing some things with me about how he came to be as he called it “saved”. He was telling me how he was literally lost and feared that he would die. Out of fear, he prayed to the God he did not yet believe in. He promised God that if he would be rescued or find his way out, he would then seek God out. Well he did find his way out and he did seek out God, and guess what he said he found? He said he found God, and was converted.
Well that made an interesting story, but it did not convince me of anything, besides I still had my excuse. Being curious, I asked the co-worker how someone might get “saved” without encountering a situation were they feared for their life. I of course was expecting him to say “if only you become a such and such or “if only you would do so and so” or “if only you would attend my something or other”. I wasn’t going to fall for that, how did I know his religion was the right one! Well, he said something that took me by surprise. He said that all I had to do was to pray a short prayer stating that “I was accepting Jesus Christ as my personal savoir”. I said, “that’s it”? “That’s all I have to do”? “That will take me about 30 seconds”! “What do I have to do after that”? He said, “nothing else”.
Now as I stated before, he had ruined my excuse. If God was to ask me why I never accepted his son Jesus Christ, what could I say? I could no longer say that I didn’t want to get involved in something that went against him, because I wasn’t getting involved in anything. I couldn’t say that I didn’t have the time (30 seconds). The only way to get my excuse back was to pray the prayer and see what happened. If nothing happened, then I could tell God, I tried that. I also thought, this is a good thing no matter what happens. If I find it to be true, then that’s great! If I find it to be false, then that’s good too, because I will be ready for the next person who tries to convert me.
Well I prayed the prayer and waited for some miracle of some sort to happen. Well nothing happened, at least nothing miraculous anyway. It took God about a month, but he then convinced me in a way I cannot explain. We only think of our five senses, but this was another sense. This was even more powerful than all five of my senses put together. I know that God and Jesus exist, more so than I know and believe in what I see, hear, taste, smell and feel! How is this possible? That I cannot explain, I only know it to be so.

So that’s how I got saved. You may say “that’s good for you, but why should I choose Christianity”? Well I will give you some things that make Christianity different from ALL other religions, although I’m sure this is the short list.

1. Time itself is based on Jesus Christ. What does the year 2003 AD mean?
2. The Christian Bible is the most widely translated and widely distributed book ever to exist.
3. Some of the predictions in the Bible have already come to pass. It is apparent that others also will.
4. The Bible has several different authors from different areas and times, yet it blends perfectly.
5. Although is has been attempted, the primary truths within any version of the Bible have not changed.
6. More and more historical accounts in the Bible have been proven to be correct.
7. Christianity is the only religion where the ONLY requirement is to accept what God has already done.
8. Because acceptance is the ONLY requirement, no one has any greater access than anyone else.

Why Christianity? Because of all of the different religions Christianity stands alone! Remember when I said that I had no facts to back up my “Supreme Being” theory. I also stated that a fact is something that can either be proven, or collaborated by reliable sources. Well Christianity is just that, a fact. It can be proven if you are willing to test it. It also can be collaborate by reliable sources, it you are willing to research. Think for a moment of things that you believe as a FACT. Other than gravity that you can personally put to the test, most things you believe are based on collaborative reliable resources. I say to you that the Bible will surpass most everything you now believe as a fact, when it comes to both proof and collaborative resources.
So why then doesn’t everyone believe in the Bible and Christianity? Because our standards for believing in God, religion, or the Bible are much, much higher than our standards for believing in other things. You may say, “well that’s good”. “This is such a critical and fundamental subject that it should have a higher standard.” I won’t argue with that, but if you put ALL religions to the same factual test, I assure you that you will find that Christianity far surpasses any other religion.

I hope this inspires or motivates the reader to at least do what the Bible states “Seek and you shall find!”. God promises, that ANYONE who truly seeks him without a preconceived notion of who he is, will indeed find him. May God reveal this to you heart!

[PlentyGroovy]

I'm so tired. I've been praying all night long. Thanks to all of you for helping me.

The final argument, the one he can't get past. So many good people in the world, kind hearted, moral, good people. He's travelled, he's seen them. He can't accept that they don't have heaven because they follow the wrong religion.

I know the answer, I trust the bible. I told him you can never say for certain this person or that person won't go to heaven. I told him you just don't know what people hold in their hearts and their relationship to God. Was that stupid? I'm running on empty. People are judged on the knowledge they have, if someone does not hear the good news and doesn't have the chance to accept Jesus, then God will judge them on what they were given. Oy, my brain hurts.

[Average Joey]

I'm so tired. I've been praying all night long. Thanks to all of you for helping me.

The final argument, the one he can't get past. So many good people in the world, kind hearted, moral, good people. He's travelled, he's seen them. He can't accept that they don't have heaven because they follow the wrong religion.

I know the answer, I trust the bible. I told him you can never say for certain this person or that person won't go to heaven. I told him you just don't know what people hold in their hearts and their relationship to God. Was that stupid? I'm running on empty. People are judged on the knowledge they have, if someone does not hear the good news and doesn't have the chance to accept Jesus, then God will judge them on what they were given. Oy, my brain hurts.

The main thing we need to realize is Christianity`s uniqueness to the rest of the world`s thinking of God.Every religion no matter what type has this reliability on the person instead of God.Also in these religions man is religious because he wants his felt desires fullfilled.Man in his mind wants what he wants and only serves God because he looks at God as his personal genie.Also religion puts that man is essentially good.Christianity sees man as wicked and in desperate need of God`s mercy.In Christianity man is warned that he will suffer and that this suffering glorifies God.We are not to concentrate on what we receive now but to continue living to glorify God by preaching the gospel to save souls.In other religions the man tries to convert another to his religion to make him feel better and to have another who agrees with him.Kind of like in politics when a certain political believing man tries to make another agree with him.We as Christians goal should be to save souls.To have pity and love for the lost to save them.To preach the gospel to sinners.We also believe in future different compared to the religion of man.The religions of the world believe in afterlife too.However they see the afterlife according to the lust of the flesh.Take Islam for example.What does the Jihadist believes his reward in heaven to be?72 virgins is what he looks forward to.In other words;lust.What do Christians look forward to?The opposite of what our flesh wants.In heaven we are to serve and worship our God.This will have nothing to do with pleasing ourselves.Our pleasure will be praising God and this goes completely against our sinful nature.Our sinful nature puts us into the mind of pride.To only think of and serve ourselves.I hope this helps.God bless you only in Christ.

Edit:Let me add one more thing.There is really no way of exlaining this to the lost most of the time.The only way a man to really understand this is when he is born again.Because then he is a new creature and understands.You cannot really convince anybody.He must experience being born again himself.

[antitox]

I don't think anyone can "convince" anyone to believe anything. It's really the power of the Holy Spirit that uses people in different ways. But here's my personal testimony in short form:

I has always believed God was "there" as far back as 5 yrs old. I somehow knew He was real even though I didn't seek Him. Even in those days I had stark nightmares and saw the presence of demons in the house. I would be screaming my head off in fear during the night while being held in my dad's arms all the while "seeing" the presence in a certain area of the room. I was just very sensitive to what my spirit picked up. Most young children seem to pick up on these things anyway. At 12 yrs old, my dad sent me to a Christian camp one summer and I received Christ as my saviour. It was that touch of God I could feel at that moment He cleaned me up on the inside. I knew He did a work in me and I knew he was real more than ever. I shortly fell away because I had no support to grow in Christ being as young as I was. The next 12 yrs I went my own way and my emotional problems worsened. At age 24 I thought, "Is this all that there is? Is there anything better than this lousy world?" I decided to read the Bible from cover to cover because I wanted answers and I thought answers were supposed to be in the Bible.
I read the whole thing and it blew me away. When I was in my apartment reading about Jesus, it just hit me that "this is what it's all about!" A huge "YES" resounded inside me, and at that realization, I literally felt an extremely beautiful presence descend through the ceiling of the apartment, and I immediately knew it was the Holy Spirit, and He alighted upon me. At that moment a seeming weight came off my shoulders and it was like my mind was opened up. I went outside and stared at the beautiful blue Texas sky; I was captivated by it because it so expressed what I realized about His infiniteness and beauty. I began to read the Bible about 8 hrs a day for awhile because I didn't start my new job for two weeks. So I spent the whole time soaking in the word. I couldn't stop reading it. I honestly don't know how many times I read the Bible again and again. Finding out about Him was a great pleasure because as I would read the Holy Spirit would remind me of other places where He said related statements. He actually helped me gain a better knowledge as I grew. This, I found was what He will do for any of His believers.
There are no words to explain what He is like except that there just isn't anyone or anything so massively powerful and yet so beautiful beyond description as He is. All it takes is one personal realization of Him and nothing is ever the same again.

[BloodoftheLamb]

Read the Bible and apply what it asks you to do.
Works every time if the heart is in the right place.