Dear Editor – The existence of so many religions and the claim that all religions lead to God without question confuses many who are earnestly seeking the truth about God, with the end result sometimes being that some despair of ever reaching the absolute truth on the subject.
Or they end up embracing the Universalist’s claim that all religions lead to God.
Of course skeptic’s also point to the existence of so many religions as proof that either you cannot know God is that God simply does not exist.
Romans1:19-21 contains the biblical explanation for why there are so many religions.
The truth of God is seen and known by every human because God has made it so.
Instead of accepting the truth about and submitting to it, most human beings reject it and seek their own way to understand God.
But this leads not to enlightenment regarding God, but to futility of thinking.
Here is where we find the basis of the many religions.
Many people do not want to believe in a God who demands righteousness and morality, so they invent a God who makes no such requirements.
Many people do not want to believe in a God who declared it impossible for people to earn their own way to Heaven if they have completed certain steps, followed certain rules, and/ or obeyed certain laws, at least to the best of their ability.
Many people do not want a relationship with a God who is sovereign and omnipotent.
So they imagine God as being more of a mystical force than a personal and sovereign ruler.
Today the existence of so many religions in Solomon Islands is not an argument against God’s existence or an argument that truth about God is not clear.
Rather, the existence of so many religions is demonstration of humanity’s rejection of the one true God.
Mankind has replaced Him with gods that are more to their liking.
This is a dangerous enterprise.
The desire to recreate God in our own image comes from the sin nature within us – a nature that will eventually “reap destruction” Galatians 6; 7-8.
Do all religions lead to God? NO!
All people religious or otherwise – will stand before God someday. Hebrews 9;27, but religions affiliation’s is not what determines your eternal destiny.
Only faith in Jesus Christ will save. “Whoever has the son has life, whoever does not have the son of God does not have life (1 John’s 5; 12); it’s as simple as that.
Only Christianity-faith in the dead and resurrection of Jesus Christ – leads to God’s forgiveness and eternal life.
No one comes to the Father except through the son (John 14;6) it does make a difference what you believe.
The decision to embrace the truth about Jesus Christ is important.
Eternity is an awfully long time to be wrong.
George Aopuru
Kwaibala, Auki
Malaita province