I do hope that no-one will take offense as this is simply my point of view and I respect other people’s religious beliefs and opinions as being equally valid.
Today is a very special day in the Christian calendar, central to Christians religious beliefs; their entire philosophy in fact. Without Good Friday the Christian Faith as it stands today would not exist. I was brought up in the Church of England, migrated to the Baptist Church for a while following which, over the past few years, I have developed my view of faith, existence, the after-life and so forth which does not exactly tick traditional boxes however I am sure it fits in somewhere!
For this reason I will say that I believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God and accept all that it stands for however, I do not believe that God only provided the one approved way to heaven for a small group of people at the expense of the majority. God created so much diversity in this world that He must have ‘inclusion’ and not ‘exclusion’ policies in place, metaphorically speaking!
There are so many religions within our world and every true follower of each religion genuinely believes that theirs is the only God given religion, effectively meaning that some believe everyone else needs to convert to their religion or they will not be saved - resulting in eternal damnation.
Here are a couple of the issues I have difficulty understanding, leading to my reasoning:
- How can a God who is love possibly comprise Himself by condemning billions of righteous people to hell simply because they followed the ‘wrong’ religion?
- Every religion has converts. Surely if one religion really was the prime God given religion, people would not convert elsewhere. I imagine that if people were practicing the one and only true religion, God would ensure they stayed there and not allow them to compromise themselves. God created many races, each race comprised of a myriad personalities that have individual requirements including the way that they view God, life and the afterlife. I think that God, having a generous nature, provided for all through creating different ways to reach Him.
How many times is there really only one correct way to do something? There are even different ways of approaching the same mathematical calculations. One and one make two however you can choose whether to line up the bricks horizontally, vertically or on top or one another in order to do the calculation! Later on we don’t even need to use objects, we learn a whole new method called mental calculations. The point is, the end result remains the same although the method used is subject to variation.
Let’s give thanks for today and for the way God blesses us on a regular basis regardless of what we may actually deserve. Grace is an incredible gift and worthy of the deepest appreciation. Have a very blessed Good Friday.
Jaz McKenzie
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