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his marvelous light. When we add Jesus promise from John 14:14,
If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it, it is easy to join
with the Psalmist in asking that God rescue us speedily from this
world of unbelievers.
Recently, I have heard of John 14:6 being used as a litmus
test of true Christianity. It has been said that we either believe that
Jesus is the way, and the truth, and the life, and that No one
comes to the Father except through (him), or we are not really
Christians at all. It is not my objective to argue with the beliefs of
others -- in fact, I believe that this text actually encourages us to
avoid judgement. If we believe that Jesus is the way, we can take
that as confirmation that Jesus death on the cross is the only thing
that makes righteousness possible for us. We can also take it to
mean that the ways of Jesus are to be our ways (as much as that is
possible). As far as no one coming to God except through Jesus, I
feel that determining the answer to the questions of who will be
saved and who will not, how the issue of different faiths or lack of
faith will play out, and the like are simply outside of my scope. While
I believe that it is my Christian duty to share my understanding of
Jesus with my neighbors, I do not believe that I am obligated to
shove it down their throats to save them from hellfire and
damnation.
Even more difficult is the final line of our gospel: If in my
name you ask me for anything, I will do it. How do we reconcile this
line with our understanding that we dont always get what we pray
for? We deal with this by saying that God always answers prayers,
but we dont always get the answer that we want or we explain that
The Lord is my Innkeeper, May 14, 2017 3