No Other Name
Yesterday I posted the beginning of a quotation by John Henry Newman. Here's the rest of that quotation:Quote:
| The fashion of the day has been to attempt to convert by insisting on conversion; to exhort men to be converted; to tell them to be sure they look at Christ instead of simply holding up Christ; to tell them to have faith rather than to supply its object; to lead them to work up their minds, instead of impressing upon them the thought of Him who can savingly work in them; to bid them to be sure their faith is justifying, that it is not dead, formal, self-righteous, or merely moral, instead of delineating Him whose image, fully delineated, destroys deadness, formality, self-righteousness; to rely on words, vehemence, eloquence, and the like, rather than to aim at conveying the one great idea, whether in words or not. |
If you're not sure what he means by all of this, here's a simple test. The next time you hear a preacher preaching the Gospel, do a substitution test: every time the preacher mentions the name of Jesus Christ, substutite in "Mohammed" in it's place, and see if the message would still makes sense.
"You must believe in Mohammed. Only Mohammed can forgive your sins. Mohammed is the only way to heaven."
Oh. Okay.
You see, nothing has been said about Jesus, so you could substitute not just Mohammed, but George Washington, Gengis Khan, or any other name in there, and it would make just as much sense. (It wouldn't be true, but the listener would have no more nor no less reason to believe it.)On the other hand, if you're really teaching about Jesus, telling about how he was God in the flesh (John 1:14) born of a virgin (Matthew 1:23), lived a perfect sinless life (II Corinthians 5:21), completely fulfilling the righteous law of God (Matthew 5:17), suffered and died, bearing our sin in his own dying body (1 Peter 2:24), becoming the curse of sin on our behalf (Galatians 3:13), and then being resurrected from the dead to give us the hope of resurrection and eternal life...
...then no other name besides Jesus will make sense, no other name could possibly used.
Acts 4:12 tells us:
Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.
But what is it that makes this name so special? Is it a magic word like abra cadabra or hocus pocus? No, what makes the name special is the person behind it. And if we teach the Gospel, then we must tell of Jesus Christ, for He is the object of our faith.
Posted On Sep 23, 2005 at 4:16 AM
On Sep 23, 2005 Trent wrote: Here's a study you might enjoy (since you have nothing else to do, I am sure).
The phrase "for His name's sake" or any varitaion thereof. Follow it chronological through God's Word and see how it is applied.
It shines light on John 16:24
Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.
It is only by His Name that we can approach the Father. I think too often we use "in Jesus' name amen" as one word and we do not think about what we are saying. It is not a tag but a reference to the authority that His name stands for.
Great post,
Trent
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