With thousands of religions and belief systems throughout history[1] why should one choose Christianity? While many religions contain moral truths and attempt to answer life's big questions, Christianity offers several unique advantages:
• Historical verifiability: Jesus of Nazareth is a historical figure with multiple attestations from both Christian and non-Christian sources[2]
• Fulfilled prophecies: Scholars identify approximately 100-300 specific prophecies about the Messiah fulfilled in Jesus[3]
• Resurrection evidence: Strong historical evidence for Jesus' resurrection from the dead accepted by the majority of New Testament scholars[4]
• Grace over works: Salvation by faith alone (Ephesians 2:8-9), not by human effort or merit
• Personal relationship: Jesus declared "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6)
• Moral foundation: Provides absolute moral standards based on God's unchanging character[5]
While we should respectfully engage with other faiths and learn from their insights, Christianity provides the most compelling answers to humanity's deepest questions about meaning, morality and eternal destiny.
Respectful Assessment: Islam contains much truth about God's unity and moral demands, reflecting humanity's deep spiritual longing. Muslims often demonstrate admirable devotion, generosity, and commitment to prayer. However, several fundamental issues prevent Islam from providing the complete revelation found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While respecting our Muslim neighbors and acknowledging Islam's moral insights, the evidence points to Christianity as providing the more complete and historically reliable revelation of God's nature and salvation plan.
Respectful Assessment: Judaism represents the foundational revelation from which Christianity emerged. Christians deeply respect the Hebrew Scriptures, the moral law, and the Jewish people as God's chosen nation. Many Jewish practices and principles are admirable and God-honoring. However, from a Christian perspective, Judaism remains incomplete without recognizing Jesus as the promised Messiah:
Conclusion: While honoring Judaism as the root from which Christianity grew (Romans 11:17-18), we believe Jesus is the completion and fulfillment of God's promises to Israel and the world.
Respectful Assessment: Hinduism contains profound spiritual insights and demonstrates humanity's deep longing for the divine. Its emphasis on righteousness, meditation, and seeking ultimate reality reflects the image of God in humanity. However, several fundamental issues prevent it from providing the complete truth found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While appreciating Hinduism's spiritual depth and cultural richness, Christianity provides clearer revelation of God's nature, assured salvation, and ultimate hope beyond the cycles of karma and rebirth.
Respectful Assessment: Greek polytheism made significant contributions to Western civilization and demonstrated humanity's search for the divine. However, its fundamental flaws point to the need for a more complete revelation:
Conclusion: While Greek polytheism enriched human culture, it ultimately pointed beyond itself to the need for true divine revelation found in Christianity.
Respectful Assessment: Roman polytheism provided social structure and cultural unity for a vast empire. However, its fundamental weaknesses reveal the need for authentic divine revelation:
Conclusion: While Roman religion served administrative purposes, it ultimately lacked the spiritual authenticity and historical foundation found in Christianity.
Respectful Assessment: Buddhism offers valuable insights into human suffering and the importance of compassion. However, several fundamental issues prevent it from providing the complete solution found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While Buddhism correctly identifies human suffering as a central problem, Christianity provides the superior solution through personal relationship with God and assured salvation through Christ.
Respectful Assessment: Modern spiritual movements reflect genuine human spiritual hunger and desire for meaning. However, their fundamental flaws reveal the need for authentic divine revelation:
Conclusion: While modern spiritual movements correctly identify human spiritual needs, Christianity provides the historically grounded, logically coherent, and divinely revealed solution.
Respectful Assessment: Sikhism contains admirable moral teachings and demonstrates sincere seeking after God. However, several key issues prevent it from providing the complete revelation found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While respecting Sikhism's emphasis on equality and service, Christianity provides clearer revelation of God's nature and assured salvation through Christ's work rather than human effort.
Respectful Assessment: Jainism demonstrates remarkable commitment to ethical principles and reverence for life. However, its extreme approach reveals fundamental misunderstandings about the nature of salvation and human responsibility:
Conclusion: While appreciating Jainism's ethical seriousness, Christianity provides a balanced approach to morality with assured salvation through divine grace rather than impossible human perfection.
Respectful Assessment: The Bahá'í Faith promotes many admirable social goals and reflects genuine spiritual seeking. However, its fundamental premise undermines its own claims to truth:
Conclusion: While appreciating Bahá'í social ideals, Christianity provides a historically grounded, logically consistent revelation that doesn't compromise the uniqueness of God's truth for the sake of artificial unity.
Respectful Assessment: Confucianism offers valuable insights into social relationships and moral cultivation. However, as a complete worldview, it lacks essential elements found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While Confucian ethics can complement Christian living in areas like family relationships and education, Christianity provides the transcendent foundation and spiritual salvation that Confucianism lacks.
Respectful Assessment: Taoism offers valuable insights about balance and harmony that can complement Christian living. However, as a complete worldview, it lacks essential elements for human flourishing:
Conclusion: While appreciating Taoist wisdom about simplicity and balance, Christianity provides the personal God, moral framework, and call to action that human beings ultimately need.
Respectful Assessment: Shintoism demonstrates admirable reverence for nature and community values. However, several fundamental issues prevent it from providing complete spiritual truth:
Conclusion: While respecting Shinto's cultural significance and environmental consciousness, Christianity offers the personal relationship with the one true God and inner transformation that ritual purification cannot provide.
Respectful Assessment: Rastafarianism demonstrates genuine spiritual seeking and admirable commitment to social justice. However, several fundamental theological issues prevent it from providing authentic Christian truth:
Conclusion: While respecting Rastafarian commitment to justice and biblical engagement, orthodox Christianity provides the true Messiah and authentic interpretation of Scripture without the theological errors found in Rastafarian doctrine.
Respectful Assessment: Zoroastrianism contains remarkable insights that prefigure Christian truth, including monotheism, final judgment, and resurrection. However, several issues prevent it from providing the complete revelation found in Christianity:
Conclusion: While respecting Zoroastrianism's early monotheistic insights, Christianity provides the complete revelation of God's nature and assured salvation that Zoroastrian dualism and works-righteousness cannot offer.
Respectful Assessment: Vodou demonstrates remarkable cultural resilience and addresses real human needs for healing and community. However, its syncretistic nature creates fundamental theological problems:
Conclusion: While understanding Vodou's historical importance and community functions, Christianity offers authentic spiritual power through relationship with Jesus Christ without the theological confusion and spiritual dangers of syncretistic practices.
Respectful Assessment: Norse paganism demonstrated remarkable cultural creativity and contained admirable values like honor and courage. However, its fundamental limitations point to the need for divine revelation:
Conclusion: While appreciating Norse cultural contributions and moral insights, Christianity provides historical foundation, ultimate hope, and divine grace that Germanic paganism could not offer.
Respectful Assessment: Celtic paganism demonstrated sophisticated spiritual awareness and environmental wisdom. However, several fundamental issues prevented it from providing complete spiritual truth:
Conclusion: While appreciating Celtic spiritual sensitivity and environmental wisdom, Christianity provides historical foundation, moral clarity, and universal access to divine truth that Celtic paganism could not offer.
Respectful Assessment: Wicca attracts people seeking authentic spirituality, connection with nature, and personal empowerment. However, several fundamental issues prevent it from providing genuine spiritual truth:
Conclusion: While appreciating Wiccan environmental concerns and gender equality, Christianity provides authentic spiritual power, historical reliability, and moral clarity that modern witchcraft cannot offer.
Respectful Assessment: Mormons exhibit great dedication to family, community, and service. However, the fundamental differences in the nature of God and salvation place Mormonism outside of orthodox Christianity:
Conclusion: While respecting LDS moral tenets, Christianity cannot accept Mormonism as an extension of the faith due to core doctrinal conflicts regarding the nature of God, Christ, and salvation.
Respectful Assessment: Jehovah's Witnesses are highly committed to their faith and often display remarkable moral conviction. However, their doctrine fundamentally separates them from orthodox Christianity:
Conclusion: While commending their zeal, their Christology (doctrine of Christ) and reliance on altered scripture means they teach a different gospel and a different Christ, making them incompatible with historic Christianity.
Respectful Assessment: Alevism showcases a deep spiritual hunger and admirable commitment to equality. However, its esoteric and syncretic nature presents fundamental theological challenges:
Conclusion: While respecting their cultural and mystical approach, Christianity affirms that true revelation must be public, historically verified, and centered on the unique, divine person of Jesus Christ.
Respectful Assessment: Sufism embodies a noble quest for deep, heartfelt union with the Divine, reflecting the innate human desire for true spiritual intimacy. However, their methods and theological conclusions are problematic from an orthodox Christian viewpoint:
Conclusion: While commending the Sufi search for a deeper connection with God, Christianity provides that connection not through self-annihilation or human-led mysticism, but through the objective, atoning work of Jesus Christ.
Respectful Assessment: While Scientology appeals to the desire for self-improvement, it is fundamentally incompatible with Christianity. It replaces God with the human self ("thetan") and salvation by grace with a costly system of works ("auditing").
Conclusion: Scientology offers a technological path to self-deification that stands in direct opposition to the Christian path of humble submission to a loving Savior.
Respectful Assessment: Christian Science uses Christian terminology but redefines almost every major doctrine. While their focus on God's love is admirable, their denial of physical reality creates a theological chasm:
Conclusion: Christian Science is neither scientific nor historically Christian. It offers a gnostic-style escape from reality rather than the redemption of reality found in Jesus Christ.