The world’s religions have certain traits in common, but until the gospel of Jesus Christ burst upon the Mediterranean world, no one in the history of human imagination had conceived of such a thing as the worship of a crucified man.
—Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion, p. 1
A lot of people think that all religion is the same. There is nothing unique to any of it. It’s all just a melting pot of man-made ideas meant to get people to be nice to one another.
But if you take one good look at Christianity, you’ll begin to see that nothing could be further from the truth. Christianity is unique—it's one of a kind.
It boasts of a crucified God.
It proclaims a message that rejects self-help and self-improvement.
It tells us that true leadership does not demand and take, but true leadership serves and gives.
Jesus Christ saves by dying and he rules by serving.
As Michael Horton writes:
What King is this who rules not by demanding the life of his subjects for the extension of his empire but by giving his own life for them? Very odd, isn’t it? To say that Jesus is Lord is to say that he is sovereign—in charge of everything in heaven and on earth. And yet it is to say so much more.
He, not death, is Lord over us. He, not condemnation, has the last word over our destiny. He is Lord not only over Satan and his demonic minions in heavenly places, but over CEOs and dictators, popes and presidents, celebrities and tech gurus. And he is spreading his empire of grace to the ends of the earth, barely noticed by a world distracted by the trivial bells and whistles of this passing age.
—Core Christianity, p. 137
Jesus redefines leadership. The greatest leaders are those who serve. The way to the top is to be a servant of everyone.
In a sense, Christianity is the end of religion and the beginning of something completely different. Something new. The gospel is so radically different from anything and everything religion is all about.
Religion is about what I can do (or not do) for God.
The gospel is about what God has done for this God-forsaken world.
If you’re interested in hearing more about what makes Christianity so unique and you live in San Diego, I'd like to invite you to attend our Sunday services. We meet Sunday's at EB Elementary School in Scripps Ranch and worship at 10 am. Visit redemptionsd.com for more info.
If you don't live nearby, find a church that preaches Jesus Christ crucified for you every Sunday in your local area.
I'm a pastor serving in the PCA, so I'll recommend that you visit our church directory to find a church near you. But there are plenty of other churches and denominations that have the gospel too, you'll know it when you hear it. It's radically different from what you regularly hear from religious people and from Disney.
The gospel is something completely different.
