Running To Win

Dave McCallister: Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Genuine authority flows from within, no matter who you are. Jesus Christ had the kind of authority we feel even today, 2,000 years down the road. How can he still command such devotion? Stay with us. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line.

Pastor Lutzer, it's one thing to tell the truth, it's quite another to claim to be the truth.

Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer: And you know, Dave, because Jesus Christ claimed to be the truth and gave evidence that he was the truth, he is the only qualified savior. Very quickly, I want to tell all of our listeners a story that changed the trajectory of the life of Dwight L. Moody. He began a Sunday school here in the city of Chicago, and there was a teacher who was going back east because he was dying. The teacher said, "I have girls in my class and none of them is converted."

So Moody said, "Let's visit each of them independently this coming week." Well, that's what they did. They led these girls to Christ. Now, here's what happened. On Sunday evening, they knelt to say goodbye to this teacher. The teacher prayed, Moody prayed, Moody's about to get up off of his knees, and then one of these girls begins to pray, and then the next one prayed, and then the next one, all around in a circle. And D.L. Moody said this: "After that, money could never tempt me again."

Well, that's just one of the stories about Dwight L. Moody that you need to know about. It will increase your faith. And it's in the book *Marx and Moody: Two Contemporaries, Two Gospels, Two Tombstones, and One Choice*. I hope that you have a pen or pencil handy because here's our contact info. Go to rtwoffer.com. That's rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. Now, because I believe that this book will be such a great inspiration to you, will help you to understand the culture, understand the contrast of the gospel, I'm going to be giving you that contact info again at the end of this message. For now, let us listen.

Next, Jesus Christ says, "I am the truth." Lessing, to whom I introduced you very briefly in the last message, a great German dramatist, lived in the 1700s, said on one occasion, "If God were to offer me eternal truth on his right hand and the eternal quest for truth on his left, I would take the left hand, even if that meant that I should never attain the truth because the fun is in the journey." Lessing was a brilliant fool. Brilliant fool.

You see, number one, if he did not have any truth, he would not even know what he was searching for. He wouldn't recognize it after he found it because, after all, he has not got any truth in that left hand. And furthermore, it is important to know the truth about poison, the truth about a faulty parachute. And if it is important for us to know the truth about these matters, how important it is that we might know the truth about eternity. What Lessing did not understand, though he was brought up in the home of a very pious Lutheran father, what he didn't understand was that his eternal destiny depended on whether or not he knew the truth and what he did with the truth that he knew.

Jesus said, "I am the truth. I'm not just a way-shower; I am the truth." This means, of course, reliability. He does not mislead us. It means consistency, the consistency of his own life with what he taught, his own sinlessness, which we considered in a previous message. It means universality; it means truth for everybody. It's very important for you to realize that when you are talking to somebody and they say, "I'm into Buddhism and you're into Christianity, and we all have to do what is right for us or what is true for us," you have to point out, as was previously mentioned, that everybody is entitled to his own opinion, but nobody is entitled to his own truth. Truth has universality. And Jesus said, "I am the truth," and all speculations end when he walks onto the stage.

He says, "I am the life." I am the life. Physical life? Yes, as Creator. For by him were all things created, both which are in heaven and which are on earth, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things created by him and for him, and by him all things are upheld; they consist. But also the author of spiritual life. "I give unto them eternal life." "I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly." That has to do with a certain quality of life that lasts forever for those who place personal faith in Christ. Is it any wonder that the rest of the statement says, "No man comes to the Father but through me"?

Jesus takes that gate and he makes it narrow. And behind that narrow gate, there is a narrow pathway that leads to the very heart of God, and there is no other path, no other option out there, no other alternative. You say, "Yes, but we're living in a society that is trying to uproot that gate and to make it broad." Well, there is a broad way. Jesus said that on the Sermon on the Mount, that leads to destruction, and many people think it is the way labeled to heaven and it is the way labeled to hell because Christ said, "No man comes except through me." What are the implications of this? Very important implications. The first of which is the fact that Jesus Christ is the final and most complete revelation from God. Period.

In the Parliament of World Religions and elsewhere in your witnessing, you know people say, "Well, I think that Jesus was one stage in the evolutionary development of religion. I mean, after all, there is Muhammad, and it's true that he contradicted Christ at every point, but he is a more recent revelation. And then there is Baha'u'llah, who was born in Persia in 1817 and was the founder of the Baha'i faith. And the Baha'i faith wants to encompass all the different religions. And the Baha'i faith teaches that there was information that was needed when the human race was a child, and then more information when it was a teenager, and now the human race is an adult, and Jesus is one stage in that evolutionary process."

Let me give you two reasons why that is illogical and wrong. The first reason is because the fact that Baha'u'llah contradicted Jesus Christ at every point. There is no way that Jesus could have been part of the evolutionary spiral because Baha'u'llah has a faith that is totally contradictory to what preceded it. There is no unity. There is no evolutionary thread. For example, Baha'u'llah believed in the perfection of human nature, the fact that all that we have to do is to reach within and see all the goodness that is laden within us. Well, my friend, have you noticed all the goodness in your heart recently? Jesus said that from within the heart proceed evil thoughts, adultery, fornication, theft, covetousness, wickedness. All these things proceed from the heart.

Baha'u'llah believed that we should believe doctrines without discrimination. He was opposed to those who were seeking truth and insisted on doctrinal accuracy. Yet Jesus said in the 10th chapter of John, "I am the door," and he says, "All that ever came before me were thieves and robbers." That does not sound as if Jesus was as inclusive as people make him out to be. Baha'u'llah believed in that evolutionary view of religion, and Jesus Christ said of himself, "I am the Alpha and the Omega," the first letter of the Greek alphabet and the last letter of the Greek alphabet. Encyclopedia Britannica has something like 30 volumes with all this information, but they use only 26 letters to put it together. And everything that we need to know about God and everything that we need to know about our relationship with him is bound up in Jesus, who is Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. There is no evolutionary view of religion.

And then he also taught the ability of man and the fact that there was the condemnation for those who sought the truth; that is, Baha'u'llah taught those things. And if there's any way that you recognize the doctrine of antichrist, there is always one similarity, and that is this utopian idea that what we need to do is to get together, unify all the religions of the world, bring them together under the same umbrella, and then why indeed we'll solve the problems of world hunger and greed and war, and we will live happily ever after. What a different picture Jesus painted.

He said that near the end there would be wars and rumors of wars. He says nation shall rise up against nation, kingdom shall rise up against kingdom. He says that people will be betraying one another, and he says many false Christs will arise and do great signs and wonders and shall deceive many. And rather than ending in sweetness and light, there will be a judgment from God with the personal return of Jesus Christ to the Mount of Olives to establish the kingdom and to end existence as it is now constituted. What a different picture. So that's one of the reasons why there's no such thing as the evolutionary view of religion. You cannot class Jesus as one step in the evolutionary process.

But there's another reason, and that is this: Do you really mean to tell me that there's another prophet that has now arisen who knows God better than Christ, who was God, and you're telling me that he knows more than Jesus? You're telling me that there's someone who has better insights into the Divine and his relationship to the world than Jesus Christ, who claimed deity and oneness with his Father? And now somebody has arisen with a brand new insight. That's what you want me to believe? At the parliament, I spoke to someone of the Baha'i faith, and they said, "You know that children need this much truth and teenagers need truth, and then there are adults, and Baha'u'llah is the man for the final evolutionary stage of religion."

I said, "I want you to know today that I don't believe that God speaks through prophets like Baha'u'llah." And the person said to me, "Do you mean to say that you think God can't speak?" And I looked them in the eye very lovingly, I remember, and I said, "You know, the issue isn't whether God speaks; he can speak whenever he wishes to. But I don't believe that he would because after the sun comes out, there is no need for another star. All stars fade into oblivion. The sun has come. And now you want me to believe that somehow there's a star out there that we need for light."

You know, we live in a day and age when people say, "You have to get beyond Christianity to something really deep." Parliament of World Religions, people said, "You know, Christianity was good. It was what I needed to introduce me to the world of spirit, to the world of religion." One person said it's like a boat. You take the boat to the other side of the lake, but once you get to the other side of the lake and you get into all this lovely new territory, you don't need the boat anymore. You just transcend Christianity. That's nonsense.

Listen, when you transcend and go beyond rationality, you come to insanity. When you transcend or go beyond love, you come to lust. And when you transcend Christ, you end in error. There is no beyond. Furthermore, people who actually think that they are going beyond Christianity and building on it should recognize that logically they are leaving it. They're leaving it because it cannot be combined, it cannot be reconciled, it cannot be a part of a process. Christ stands alone, and all other religions and teachers fade into oblivion in his glorious presence.

So those are the implications. There are others, of course. The implication is, of course, that we can actually evaluate other religions now because we have a fixed reference point. In our witnessing, we can always point people to Jesus Christ. A long time ago, I told you this story about me being on a plane and sitting next to a man who seemed to think that he knew a lot about religion. And he said to me, "You know, I think that all that we need to do is to do the best we can, and that's all we need to get into heaven." And some of you will remember that I said, "Well, you know, if that is really true, we need to get that message out."

I said, "I write books, and we should write a book about it so that people get the message. We're on radio; we should preach it to as many people as we possibly can, to spread the word. I mean, this is eternal truth now. This actually establishes how a person can be right with God. You just do the best you can." He was getting pretty excited about the project until I said to him, "But there is, you know, one thing I do need to ask before we go that far, and that is, how do you know? How do you know?" And he said to me, "Well, it's just my opinion." And I remember I took my pen, which I had like this, and kind of flipped it like that and said, "Your opinion. Wow."

Opinions are a dime a dozen. Get twelve people together and you have fifteen opinions. Your opinion. You see, we can't get this message out unless you can actually claim and verify that you have received it from God because only God can know who's going to get into heaven and how we have to prepare for heaven. And you're claiming to have an inside track on knowledge that could belong only to the Almighty. Oh, he said to me, "Well, what about your opinion? You know, is it any better?" I said, "No, of course it's no better." But I said, "That's why we need to go to the opinion of someone who is qualified to speak for God and on his behalf, and that is Christ. Christ."

He who comes in the midst of all these different opinions and says, "Before Abraham was, I am," and "He who believes on me has eternal life." Pity poor Ingmar Bergman. He should not have been shouting at Christ in an empty cathedral. He should have been opening the pages of the New Testament and should have read the words of Pilate, who said, "What then shall we do with Jesus, who is called the Christ?" That is the question of the 20th century.

Lenin said on one occasion that when communism would take over the world, there would be bread in every kitchen. Yet he never had the nerve to say, "I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst." Hitler made outstanding claims for the role of Germany and the beginning of a thousand-year Reich, a thousand-year rule. And yet he never said, "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." He never said that.

Freud thought psychotherapy would actually heal the ills of the world. Can you imagine that? He actually thought that psychotherapy would heal the ills of the world. And yet he never said, "Peace I leave with you. My peace I give unto you. Not as the world gives, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." There are New Age gurus who think that we're going to be recycled, that we're going to be part of this karma process, reincarnation, and they've made some wonderful claims about what it's like to come up on the other side somewhere. Yet they never said, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never die."

Now what are you going to do with him? What are you going to do with him when your eternal destiny is determined by your relationship with him? And you will not be able to avoid him because he says that all judgment is committed unto the Son. Every single person listening to this message, personally someday being confronted by Christ either as Judge or Savior. Because he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and beside him there is no other. Ingmar Bergman could not hear the whisper of Christ from that picture in the cathedral. But if he had taken his Bible and opened it, he would have listened to Christ's megaphone, the megaphone of God shouting to all the earth, "This is my beloved Son, listen to him." And Jesus answered, as he did frequently, "He who has an ear, let him hear." God has spoken. God has spoken. Blessed are those who listen and respond. Let us pray.

Our Father, we know that there are many options out there. And we think of events such as the Parliament of World Religions, which was wholly inundated by religions who demeaned Christ in every session, either by ignoring him or classifying him along with everybody else. We know that you were insulted. But we also know, Father, that the day is going to come when all the truth is going to be revealed and not one single doubt will remain in the mind of any human being in the universe that Christ is Lord, King, God, and that no man can come to the Father but through him. Thank you. Give us the boldness and the courage to be able to share with men and women a Savior who is qualified to save.

Now before I close this prayer, what is your relationship to Christ? Those of you who pride yourself in your skepticism and whose skeptical pride stands in the way of receiving him as Savior, what are you going to tell him? That the issue wasn't clear, that he didn't speak clearly enough, his credentials were questionable? What will your excuse be? At this moment, reach out to him, embrace him as your Savior, and if you know him, would you worship him? You talk to him now because he's listening. Hear our prayer, O Lord, for we are needy. Our hearts are blinded except that you grant us light. Thank you that in your mercy you have saved many of us, and we pray for those who have not yet been confronted by Christ and changed by him. Grant them the grace to let him do that in their lives today. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Dave McCallister: My friend, today your greatest need is for Jesus Christ. There may be many other needs in your life, but the forgiveness of your sins, the acceptance by God the Father is the most important gift that you could possibly receive, and it's received by repentance and faith in all that Jesus did for us.

Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer: D.L. Moody founded the Moody Church and the Moody Bible Institute. He was a man who looked around and he saw need everywhere. And don't ever get the impression that all that he was interested in was the salvation of souls. He helped begin orphanages; he began schools. He worked with the poor in the city of Chicago and inspired others to do the same in their cities. His impact socially was enormous. Karl Marx looked at the same world, the same injustices, and had an entirely different idea as to how it could be fixed. But as a result of that, well, you know its history.

I mention all that because I want you to have a copy of a book entitled *Marx and Moody: Two Contemporaries, Two Gospels, Two Tombstones, and One Choice*. For a gift of any amount, we're making it available for you. I hope that you have time to write this down right now. Go to rtwoffer.com. Of course, rtwoffer is all one word. rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. I coauthored this book because we're interested also in our own legacies, our own tombstones. Meanwhile, you'll also be asked to make sure that our legacy is impactful for the gospel. The book will help you to understand our present culture and the option that we face. Go to rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337.

Dave McCallister: You can write to us at Running to Win, 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60614. Running to Win is all about helping you find God's roadmap for your race of life. Christ's defining moment was a cruel death on a cross. For those who believe, that death bought forgiveness of sins, and for that we must be eternally grateful. Next time on Running to Win, we explore the extraordinary death of Jesus, a death that has brought life to untold millions. Thanks for listening. For Pastor Erwin Lutzer, this is Dave McCallister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.