The World

John Stott

• Publisher: IVP
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780830864454
• Topic: Theologie & Religion
• Subtopic: Christlicher Dienst

How can Christians effectively engage today's world while staying true to Scripture? Calling us to listen well to both the Word and the world, John Stott shows how Christianity can preserve its authentic identity and remain relevant to current realities. With the God's Word for Today series, pastor Tim Chester has updated Stott's classic book The Contemporary Christian and made it accessible to new generations of readers. In The World, Stott presents four major aspects of the church's mission—God's assignment to infiltrate the world and share the good news. How do we understand the uniqueness of Christ in a pluralistic world? What is the biblical basis for mission? What is the relationship between evangelism and social responsibility? And what can we learn about mission from the life and work of Jesus? Each chapter includes questions for reflection or discussion. The Christianity of the Bible is not a safe, escapist religion but an explosive force pulling us into the world to witness and serve. This book equips individuals and churches to join the mission that flows from the heart of God.

1

The uniqueness of Jesus Christ

A social worker in Nigeria once visited a young man in one of the back streets of Lagos. Beside his bed he found the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, the Qur’an, three copies of Watchtower (the magazine of the Jehovah’s Witnesses), a biography of Karl Marx, a book of yoga exercises and – what the poor fellow evidently needed most – a popular paperback entitled How to Stop Worrying.1

In 1966 the first multi-faith service was held in the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields in London. Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and Christians took part on equal terms, making four affirmations of a supposedly common faith, giving four readings from their respective sacred scriptures, and pronouncing four blessings. In only one of these blessings was the name of Jesus mentioned for the first and last time. The secular press was enthusiastic, hailing it as ‘a significant milestone in religious history’. But the Christian newspapers described it as ‘a betrayal of the Christian faith’. It is doubtful if they would write anything similar today, for multi-faith services are held regularly.

These two incidents, the one in Lagos and the other in London, are examples of the spirit of syncretism. Dr Visser ’t Hooft, the first General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, defined syncretism as the view ‘that there is no unique revelation in history, that there are many different ways to reach the divine reality, that all formulations of religious truth or experience are by their very nature inadequate expressions of that truth, and that it is necessary to harmonize as much as possible all religious ideas and experiences so as to create one universal religion for mankind’.2 He was outspoken in his rejection of this outlook. ‘It is high time that Christians should rediscover,’ he went on, ‘that the very heart of their faith is that Jesus Christ did not come to make a contribution to the religious storehouse of mankind, but that in him God reconciled the world unto himself.’3

Today the main challenge to the traditional understanding of the uniqueness of Christ is not ‘syncretism’, but ‘pluralism’, not the attempt to fuse the world’s religions into a single, universal faith, but the recognition of the integrity of each in all its distinctive diversity.

The options before us are now usually summarized as ‘exclusivism’, ‘inclusivism’ and ‘pluralism’.4

‘Exclusivism’ (an unfortunately negative term, which gives the impression of wanting to exclude people from the kingdom of God) is used to denote the historic Christian view that salvation cannot be found in other religions, but only in Jesus Christ.

‘Inclusivism’ allows that salvation is possible to adherents of other faiths, but says this salvation is due to the secret and often unrecognized work of Christ. At the Vatican II Council, Roman Catholics embraced this view, stating that Christ’s saving work holds good ‘not only for Christians, but for all men of good will in whose hearts grace works in an unseen way’.5

‘Pluralism’ goes further still. Its advocates rejecting exclusivism as ‘presumptuous’ and ‘arrogant’, and inclusivism as ‘patronizing’ or ‘condescending’. Whereas ‘plurality’ expresses the simple fact that there are many religions, ‘pluralism’ affirms their independent validity. It renounces every claim that Christianity is ‘absolute’, ‘unique’, ‘definitive’, ‘final’, ‘normative’, ‘ultimate’ or ‘universal’. ‘Unlimited growth is cancer, and so would be an ever-growing single Christian religion all over the world.’6 Instead, Christianity must be viewed as only one religion among many, and Jesus as only one saviour among others. This is the so-called ‘deeper and larger ecumenism that embraces the whole of humanity’, of which the rainbow remains ‘a timeless symbol’.7

Arguments for pluralism

What is it about ‘pluralism’ that many find attractive?

First, there is a global consciousness. Threats to the natural environment, fears of a nuclear conflict and the continuing economic injustice between North and South have led to a planetary perspective. The very survival of the human race seems to depend on learning to live together in harmony and to cooperate for the common good. Whatever divides us, therefore, including our religions, is understandably regarded with increasing disfavour.

In response, Christians should indeed be in the forefront of seeking global harmony. By God’s creation we are one people in the world. We should be committed to international peace-making, democracy, human rights, community relations, environmental responsibility and the search for a new international economic order. Moreover, people of different races and religions can, should and do cooperate in these kinds of social action. In order to do so, however, it is not necessary to renounce our belief in the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. It would be folly to seek unity at the expense of truth, or reconciliation without Christ the mediator. Besides, Christ unavoidably divides people as well as uniting them. He said he had come not ‘to bring peace, but a sword’.8 He envisaged that some conflict would continue, as people ranged themselves for or against him.

Second, there is an appreciation of other religions. Modern communications (especially television, travel and the internet) have caused the world to shrink. People of strange beliefs and customs, who previously were very remote from us, now live next door. They enter our homes – if not in person then on the screen. This is ‘a newly experienced reality for many today’.9 The sacred books of other faiths, translated into our languages, are now readily available. And, as we become better acquainted with the world’s religions, what Professor John Hick has called their ‘immense spiritual riches’ have ‘tended to erode the plausibility of the old Christian exclusivism’.10 Furthermore, some ancient faiths are showing signs of resurgence, just when the perception is that Christianity, declining in the West, ‘has not succeeded in breaking the power of the great historical religions’.11

We should welcome today’s more thorough knowledge of world faiths, not least through the comparative study of religions in schools. But if we discover ‘riches’ in other religions, we will also discern more clearly the absolute uniqueness of Jesus Christ, as we will see later. ‘To make exclusive claims for our particular tradition,’ writes Stanley Samartha, an advocate of pluralism, ‘is not the best way to love our neighbours as ourselves.’12 But in fact, it is the very best and highest way to express neighbour-love, if the gospel is true. For if the gospel is true, then we cannot claim to love our neighbours if we leave them in ignorance of Christ. As for the vitality of other religions, and the comparative failure of Christianity, these things should lead us not to the conclusion that the gospel is untrue, but rather to self-examination, repentance, change, and the adoption of better ways of sharing the good news with others.

Third, there is a post-colonial modesty. For four centuries the West dominated the world in political, military, economic and scientific terms, and took for granted its moral and spiritual superiority. Indeed, Christianity’s ‘attitude to other religions has been shaped by the colonial mentality’.13 The end of the Second World War, however, heralded the end of the colonial era. As the West underwent a profound cultural shift ‘from a position of clear superiority to one of rough parity’, a parallel shift took place in theological consciousness. Professor Langdon Gilkey writes, ‘This dramatic situation has forced . . . a new understanding of the interrelationships of religions, a new balance of spiritual power, so to speak, on all.’ It has pushed us all out of ‘superiority’ into ‘parity’.14 To continue, therefore, to claim Christian universality, it is said, is to lapse into the old imperialist mindset.

It is certainly embarrassing for us in the West to acknowledge that during those centuries of colonial expansion, territorial and spiritual conquest, politics and religion, gun and Bible, the flag and the cross, too often went hand in hand. Representatives of the imperial power developed attitudes of proud superiority towards those they ruled. But ‘superiority’ is a slippery word. It can describe an air of intolerable conceit, and we need to repent of every vestige of this. But seeking to win followers of other religions to Christ is not in itself a mark of arrogance. Instead, it indicates a profound and humble conviction that the gospel is superior to other faiths because it is God’s revealed truth.

The attraction of pluralism is more, however, than a concern for global harmony, an appreciation of other religions and a desire for post-colonial modesty. It has even deeper roots, which the twelve contributors to the 1987 book The Myth of Christian Uniqueness examined. These scholars describe themselves as having ‘crossed a theological Rubicon’, not only from exclusivism to inclusivism, but from inclusivism to pluralism,15 and they tell us about the three ‘bridges’ which led them to make the crossing.

The first they call the historico-cultural bridge, or relativity. Since people began applying Einstein’s general theory of relativity beyond physics to other spheres (including religion), seemingly nothing has remained absolute. A historical and comparative study of religions, argues Professor Gordon Kaufman, suggests that they are simply ‘creations of the human imagination’,16 each from its particular cultural perspective. So Christian theology must give up any claim to absolute or final truth, and understand itself instead as ‘a human imaginative response to the necessity to find orientation for life in a particular historical situation’.17 Professor Tom Driver goes further, declaring that ‘even Scripture . . . is the creation of us human beings’.18

Now of course we also affirm that the Bible is a culturally conditioned bo...