How to preach to Christians who argue that Jesus is the only way?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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So, when Christians say that anybody who is not coming from Jesus is coming from the devil, how to preach to them? Actually, sometimes the best way to preach to some people is by not preaching to them.
That means, if somebody is totally convinced about something, then there is not much scope for us to reach out to them. So, all that we can do is, we can give them some prasad or just be nice with them and leave them to their beliefs. That’s if a person is totally convinced about their ideas.
Now, actually speaking, there are a few Christians who are totally overtly fanatical. But there are others who are open to reason. So, basically, many Christians may start with this just to test us.
What is our response? And the standard argument we can give is that is God limited or unlimited? Obviously, they say God is unlimited. If God is unlimited, then why are you limiting me? What do you mean? How am I limiting you? By saying that there is only one way to God, are you not limiting God? That means you are saying that God is not merciful to all those people who don’t get connected with this way. So, it raises many, many serious philosophical questions.
Now, what about all the people in the world who existed before Jesus existed? For them, was Jesus the only way? Obviously not. That means they’re all going, just born and going to go to hell. That means before Jesus, other ways were open.
And after Jesus, there are no other ways open. That means God was more open before Jesus. And Jesus was supposed to be the manifestation of God’s love.
He actually closed most of the doors to God and kept only one door open. Is that a matter of life? Is that a sign of love? That means you decrease the access to God. Secondly, what about all the, I had a discussion with a Christian pastor about this.
He says, what about all the people who are born and who never come to know about Jesus? He said, so he answered that, okay, that is actually their misfortune. And the responsibility of Jesus that everybody comes to know about, it is the responsibility of the followers of Jesus that everybody comes to know about them, about him while they’re living. And that’s why we evangelize so vigorously.
I said, okay. But what about those who have no chance of coming to know? What about children who are aborted? He said, oh, actually they’re innocent. So because they’re innocent, they will all be delivered.
They will all be taken to God. I said, okay. Are you against abortion? He said, obviously abortion is killing, it’s murder.
Should we stop? I said, see, if people are born, then they may or may not hear about Jesus. They may or may not hear about, they may not accept Jesus as the Savior. So if they are born, then there is a great chance that they may not accept Jesus and they will go to hell.
If they are aborted, then they will be delivered. So they directly go to heaven. So if you want to save everyone, let us abort everyone.
Everyone will be delivered. No risk-free deliverance. If they are born, there is a risk they will not be delivered.
If they are not born, there is no risk they will be surely delivered. He said, no, no, no. How can you abort everyone? I told him, see, you want to deliver everyone.
There’s a guarantee of deliverance if they’re aborted. But there’s no guarantee if they’re born. No, no, no.
This is not right. We should not abort. Eventually, he had no answer.
So actually, we have to help those people see their narrow-mindedness. See the folly of their narrow-mindedness. It is not that we have to see that as a, we have to not necessarily come off as that their narrow-mindedness is, that they are wrong in the sense of being so narrow-minded or they are being fanatical.
We basically help them to see the irrationality of their own narrow-mindedness, of their own belief. And if they are, if they are objective, they will accept it. And then they will at least start thinking.
And generally speaking, if people see others of others’ faith, other faith, following their faith diligently, initially because of their program, because of their programming, because of their indoctrination, they may say these are all the ways to, these are actually, from these religions are from the devil. But over a period of time, they will see that actually these people are also virtual. These people are also pious.
These people are also devoted. So it’s like, say there is, say there is an allopathic treatment and that is the mainstream treatment. And the allopaths say that, oh, all other treatments are bogus.
Ayurveda, bogus. And they say Ayurveda is actually bogus. But then a patient goes to Ayurvedic treatment.
And I’m not saying allopathic, I’m not making any value judgment about allopathy and Ayurveda. This is a simple example. So if allopathic treatment, allopathic doctors says to all the allopathic patients, you know, Ayurveda is bogus, Ayurveda is dangerous, Ayurveda is going to cause you to suffer.
Don’t go to Ayurvedic doctors. And suppose a patient goes to Ayurvedic doctor and gets cured. Now, say there is a patient A who is allopathic patient, who is patient taking allopathic treatment.
And there is a person B who is taking Ayurvedic treatment. Now the allopathic, the A may tell B, Ayurveda is bad, don’t take Ayurveda, don’t take Ayurveda. But over a period of time, if A keeps interacting with B, you will see actually B is getting cured.
So how is this? So it’s a case, I have explained this elaborately in my book, Ideal Worship or Ideal Worship. It’s a case of basically like prescription wrong, patient cured. So the doctor is saying this prescription is wrong, this prescription is wrong.
But the patient is cured. So that means the statement that the prescription is wrong is wrong. So like that, if people, even hardline Christians, if they see, see devotees, Hare Krishna devotees, see people of other paths who are following their path and who actually become elevated in their consciousness, who have developed authentic love for God, then their paradigms will also change.
So if it’s occasional interaction which you are just having on the streets, if they are just fanatical, just leave them. If they are reasonable, then rather than, rather than fighting with them, we just help them see the irrationality of their own narrow-mindedness. And if we are having a regular interaction with them, say if they are colleagues in office or if they are neighbors, then just if they interact regularly with us, they will see.
Actually, you know, what I was taught and what is the reality is different. These are not people who have come from the devil. These people are not people by the devil.
They are actually nice people. They are as devoted to God as I am. And gradually their paradigms will change by that.
Does that answer your question, Mukherjee? Yes, Swamiji. Thank you so much.