I sat on the Redifer Commons lawn with Steph as we talked about life, God, and got in the word.  She talked about her week and then exclaimed, "My boyfriend's roommate is Jewish and he asked me if I thought he was going to hell.  I wasn't sure what to say."

 

How would you answer that?

 

Relativism plagues our society today.  Relativism- is a philosophical theory asserting that there is no absolute truth, only truth relative to the individual, or to a particular time or culture, or both. To put it another way, relativism may be defined as the radical denial of objectivity.

 

 

God doesn't make Jesus the only way to be mean or exclusive.  Someone has to pay for your sins, either you or Jesus.

 

I love this illustration...say you decide to kill someone (I know this is extreme, but hopefully you'll see the point) and you are caught and you go before a judge and you are sentenced to the electric chair.  The day comes when they take you to the chair, strap you in, and then count down 10..9..8..7..6..5..4..and then someone rushes into the room and says I want to take your place.  That's what Jesus did.  He ran in and took our place, but only if you let him.  You have to believe AND receive him to have eternal life.  There's no other way.

 

Of course, that brings up tons of other questions like, what about those who have never heard of Jesus, what if you believe and fall away, etc.  By God's grace, we help students wrestle through these questions.

 

If you struggle with how to answer a question like this, I think a great way to answer this pointed question is - would you like to read the bible and see what God says about that? God's word will not return to Him void, meaning it will accomplish all God desires.  Get people in His word and things change. One of the girls in my bible study and I are going to start doing this with students on her floor who don't know Jesus.  We will read the bible and ask them questions. We don't preach or give them answers, we let the word speak for itself.  Eric is also going to do this with 3 of his guys.  Pray God brings students to himself through this.

 

I'll share this story in more detail in a later encouragement, but I went through the book of John (good place to start with those who don't know Christ) with a girl awhile back.  She was vehemently against Christ, antagonist, and frustrating every time we met, but she wanted to keep reading.  Eventually, God brought her to himself.  She would be one of those 'the last person on earth you'd think would trust Christ' people.

 

I encourage you to start reading the bible with someone who doesn't know Jesus.  If you have questions on how to do this, email me at jamiestaveness@gmail.com. People need to hear the good  news that Jesus rose from the dead and now we can be saved from sin and hell and judgment in a way that is safe for them to ask questions and hear it from God's word.  It is powerful!