There Are Only TWO Religions

One man used to spend much of his time witnessing about Jesus on the streets of a California city and tells of having this question posed to him time and again: “How can you say that YOU have ‘the Truth’? There are hundreds of religions in the world, and all of them think that theirs is the only right one. How can I possibly know which of them IS the right one?”

The man would answer: “Hundreds of religions, you say? Why, that’s strange! I talk to so many different people every day, from different parts of the world, and I’ve heard of only TWO!” His listeners would retort, “Oh, but you MUST know that there are MANY more than that!” To which he would reply, “Not at all. I will admit that WITHIN these two different religions, there are many different sects and differences of opinion. But there are, after all, only TWO.

“The one religion consists of all those different faiths that believe that they can EARN their own righteousness by doing good deeds, by being “good enough” and by keeping different kinds of religious laws and commandments. Some try to meditate their way to goodness, others try to achieve holiness through piosity, yet others try to abide by a set of strict guidelines and disciplines to obtain sanctity, and yet others pray to many deities so as to be in good favor with them all. This, as you must realise, comprises most of the faiths of the World.

“But the other consists of those who know that they are INCAPABLE of obtaining righteousness on their own, and look to Jesus alone to save them!

“So you see, the whole question is really very simple! Do you think you can save yourself, or somehow earn your salvation by being ‘good’?–Or do you realise that you need a saviour to rescue you from your sin-nature and mistakes?”

“For by GRACE are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the GIFT of GOD. NOT of [good] WORKS, lest any man should boast.” (Ephesians 2:8,9). “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His MERCY He saved us.” (Titus 3:5). 

People make things very complicated when they refuse the truth. The grace of God is all around us. But if you reject God’s simple plan of grace through faith, you then have to come up with your own philosophy or some kind of religion to “yin and yang” your way through life. It’s pretty easy to draw a sharp distinction between believers, which worships the Creator, and paganism, which worships the creation, including ‘self’.

All false religions are alike. They all say: “Something in my hand I bring.” The only difference between them all, is in that ‘something’. But the true FAITH says: “Nothing in my hand I bring.” The one covers all who expect righteousness by doing; the other knows he has been made righteous by something already done.

Jesus told a graphic story to best explain the two religions in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican. The first is the doer, the man with “something” in his hand which he offers God, hoping to buy a seat in heaven. Note his prayer: “God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.” He is a representative man in the great “Church of the self-righteous”. What a handful he brings!—his character, his fasts, and his tithes.

In this story, he is called a Pharisee, but today, he actually has many other names. We find him in the robes of a Papist and Jew, Churchman and Dissenter, Unitarian and Evangelical, Theosophist and Spiritist, Buddhist and Brahmin, Mormon and Mohammedan, Christian Scientist and Confucian, Jezreelite and—what not? His robes are various; his prayers—the pith of them—are ever the same. Sometimes he quotes Scripture. Sometimes he rejects it.

The publican in the same parable—his prayer was different! He had no righteousness to plead. And his character, he is ashamed to bring up. “Me, the sinner,” he cries, and beats upon his breast. He cannot boast of fasting and tithes. He comes empty-handed before God, his only hope is that divine mercy may find a way for a guilty wretch to be saved instead of damned. He admits that he doesn’t deserve grace. He does not try to hide his pitiful condition.

God has not only imprinted His love and kindness all throughout His creation, but He’s also set in motion simple rules to live by and once anyone accepts His simple plan, it takes all the stress of trying to figure out life. He paid a VERY BIG price for you to be at peace forever. He gave His only Son as the One and ONLY sacrifice to redeem all of us and to put us back in charge of our true destiny through the empowerment of His Spirit in us.

Paul, the apostle, once a Pharisee himself, emptied himself of all his fancied goodness, counted all but dung. And he tells us how. “Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by Him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.” (Acts 13:38,39).

Here, he explains that no one can do even what the law of Moses demands. He tries and struggles, but all in vain. To wash out the stain of one sin is, all together, impossible.

So refuse to come up with your own interpretation and your own understanding of life, and accept the Creator’s answer. Then and only then, it will all make sense. “To him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” (Rom. 4:5).