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Transcript 645B
Witnessing to a Person of Another Religion
HC: Good evening. Welcome to Open Forum.
CALLER: Hello, Brother Camping. Today I was witnessing to my employer, and I ran into somewhat of a problem in that after relating to him personal experiences of what it was like to be a Christian, and he was responding by saying, "Yes, I have the same thing in my religion," finally I pinned him down and asked him, "What exactly is your religion? What is it that you believe in? What's your salvation program?" He related to me that he believes in the Jain religion, which is an Eastern belief. And so I asked him, "What is the program for salvation? Is there a man? According to my religion, the only way to get to Heaven, the only way to gain entrance, is through Jesus Christ." And he said, "Jesus Christ was one of many." He said that there were fifty-six, according to his religion. This is a form of reincarnation that he's relating and which he believes in. And he says that there were fifty-six Christs who came to the earth. Now immediately there was a conflict, and I told him that I didn't want to argue; that wasn't my point. The only thing I was trying to do was to make sure that he heard the Word, that according to the scripture that there was only the one way to get into Heaven, and that was through Jesus Christ.
And he said, "Well, I have everything that you have." And I know of said, "Well, I think you're missing one thing I have," and I just kind of left it at that. And then I couldn't really argue with him. So the last thing that I said was, "I guess the way that we'll really find out which one of us is right, the turning point will be when the Rapture comes," because we have discussed the Rapture and he believes in the Rapture. And I said, "Now when that comes one of us is going to be gone and one is still going to be here. And when that happens I feel that it's going to be me that's gone and I believe it's going to be you that is left here because of what you related to me. And I want you to remember what I've told you here." And I said, "I'm saying this, feeling that we are in the end times and that time is very near, and there's no way for me to argue to try to persuade you any different. This is your religion and you seem very entrenched in it." He said, "Yes." He's spent a long time, he's familiar with the Bible.
At one time he was telling me about this book that's about the teachings of the Lord Krishna. And he said he would like to give me this book. And I finally said, "Yes, I would be interested in reading it, because possibly I feel I might be able to find some scripture to maybe discredit." I said this totally on faith because I'm not a Bible scholar, near as much as you are. I find the Lord leads me to things all the time, and He's constantly showing me new things. But my command of it is not nearly great enough to be able to sit down and disprove another man's religion, which is what this would lead into.
HC: Let me make some suggestions to you. I appreciate what you're trying to do, and you're not doing it a lot differently than I would have done it many, many years ago when I was fairly young. I got into these same situations, these same debates, and so on.
But the more I study the Bible, I am convinced that there are some things that you are doing that are moving down a wrong path. And let me see if we can find out what would be a more Biblical path.
First of all, we do not come with the scriptures to argue or to coerce or by rhetoric to convince somebody that they should become saved. We come with the scriptures as the sword of the Spirit. The Bible is the Word of God, and it is the Word of God that God uses to convict men to salvation. We do not do the saving. We have to be very conscious of this. We do not do the saving. It is Christ who does the saving. And we want to bring the Word of God as faithfully as we can bring it, even though the person that we're speaking to may argue or protest and say, "Well, I do not believe it is the Word of God." Well, that's his problem before the Lord. But we are faithfully to declare, "This is what God has stated."
Now insofar as what the other person believes, we are not to have them bring their doctrine to us. II John 10 (that little epistle near the end of the Bible) declares, "If someone does not bring you this doctrine, give him no greeting." We do not have to know what the false religions teach in order to counter point for point what they teach. We can be ignorant of what they teach. All we know is that they are not the Gospel of the Bible, And that's sufficient. We don't knock down argument after argument. We simply present the Word of God as best we can. All of us have a different understanding or a different ability in the Word of God. I may know more verses than you and may be able to explain it in a little different way than you, but God can work through your personality, as you explain it as best you can and as you share the Word as best you can, and God can bring salvation to an individual just as readily as He can through the testimony that I might give.
We are witnesses and we're witnessing concerning the Word of God. And so if I were witnessing to your boss, I would probably do it this way. I would probably say something like this, "You know, as I read the Bible, I discover that the whole human race is under the wrath of God and is subject to eternal damnation." And really underscore this, that this is what the Bible teaches, and that there is no way that I or anyone else can escape that damnation by what we do. But God has provided a wonderful way of escape through the Lord Jesus Christ. And then explain that Christ came as our substitute, as the God-man, to satisfy the justice of God in paying for our sins. That is why the Bible says in John 3:16 that God gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish. And if we trust in Him as our substitute, then God's wrath has been taken care of by Him, and on that basis we can be saved. And this is what you desire for the one that you're speaking to.
But then we have to leave it up to the Holy Spirit at that point to, convict, because we can't force anyone or argue anyone into the Kingdom of God.
CALLER: All right. That's exactly what we both avoided. We didn't let it get to that. When it got to the point where he said, "I believe that there is not just one Christ; I believe that there are fifty-six of them," then the only thing I could think to say to him was, "Well, the Rapture will be the telling..."
HC: Yes, but you see, you can say that to him, but actually, it's not the Rapture that finally we want to look at. We want to look at the Word of God. All you can say is (very humbly, and very meekly), "Well, you know, I have put my trust in the Bible, and the Bible does not teach fifty-six Christs. The Bible teaches one Christ and that is the Christ that I've placed my trust in. And I know of no other way of salvation than through Him." And just leave it there. Let the Bible be the testimony, you see.
CALLER: All right. Thank you very much. You've been a big help.
HC: Thank you for calling. Good night.