00:02:24.600 - 00:02:50.640

Let us pray. God of steadfast love, you sent your Son to be the light of the world, saving people everywhere from sin and death. As Anna gave thanks for the freedom he would bring, and Simeon saw in him the dawn of redemption, complete your purpose, once made known in him. Make us the vessels of his light, that all the world may glory in the splendor of your peace.

00:02:51.120 - 00:03:05.920

Amen. Please be seated. Welcome again. I am Jennifer Lord, and I teach homiletics here at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

00:03:06.960 - 00:03:29.240

I am always interested in the ways that humans keep time and our desire for rhythmicity. Tomorrow, in Pennsylvania, where I last lived and worked, many in that state will be turned out for the grand event of what happens to a groundhog. Yes.

00:03:30.560 - 00:03:59.120

And if you are really in tune with this particular rhythm, you know the competition between Punxsutawney Phil and competitors like Octorara Orphy. It is true. But some preachers, even in Pennsylvania, will struggle on tomorrow or Sunday to make plain a different sort of rhythm for their congregations. For we are almost 40 days past Christmas.

00:03:59.840 - 00:04:52.400

Many Christians count these days, and then on February 2nd, they mark the festival of the presentation, with the story from Luke chapter 2 of Jesus' dedication at the temple, and the presence of Anna and Simeon. Some Christians sing Simeon's song of the salvation of the world, of light for revelation to the Gentiles. some Christian assemblies even bless all of their candles for the coming year's liturgical use on tomorrow's Festival of Light. And so in the hours today, before the Festival of Presentation, this rhythmicity should not be lost on us, that you and I gather here to consider these very words, light,

00:04:53.040 - 00:05:29.840

revelation, salvation, the nations, the Gentiles. And this morning we engage these words a second time under the guidance of one who lives their interstices in her scholarship, in her teaching, in her institutional leadership. You and I, for this hour, this morning, keep company with Simeon and Anna as we consider again the wideness Of God's purpose and mercy, it is my privilege to present to you again Cynthia Campbell.

00:05:40.360 - 00:06:08.400

Thank you so much, Jennifer. What a wonderful introduction and setting for this lecture and a consideration of how we as Christians in a multi-faith world think about our confession of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Once again, my profound thanks to all of you at Austin Seminary for making this return visit possible. It is a great joy to be here and to be with all of you.

00:06:10.560 - 00:06:37.760

Without doubt, the most challenging aspect for Christians of living with religious diversity is the tension between the affirmation of God's love for all creation and all people and the confession that Jesus Christ is Savior and Lord. How do we make both of these claims at the same time? How do these two ideas hold together?

00:06:38.880 - 00:07:02.800

We see the tensions in our hymns. There's a wideness in God's mercy, like the wideness of the sea, but also, at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, Every tongue confess him, King of glory, now. I believe these two ideas must be affirmed together.

00:07:03.840 - 00:07:44.720

The fullness of Christian faith requires affirming both the universal range of God's love and the particular confession that it is through Jesus Christ that this love is fully known and experienced. Failure to hold these two ideas together leads to serious theological problems. To hold only the first view is to lose the insight and experience of relationship to God through Jesus Christ that makes us Christian. To hold the second view without the first

00:07:45.200 - 00:08:16.720

forecloses God's sovereign freedom to love and save whomever God chooses. The first idea alone ignores the claims of the New Testament about the nature and purpose and person of Jesus Christ. The second idea without the first is equally unfaithful to the sovereign freedom of God's grace and the indelibility of God's promises.

00:08:18.560 - 00:09:10.960

Only by holding universality and particularity of Christian faith together can Christians approach an adequate understanding of how to relate to other faith traditions and those who follow them. How it is possible to do this is the topic of this lecture. Then I hope I will have time to conclude with some thoughts about the practical implications of this for how we as Christians live in a multi-faith world. As we have been experiencing through the work that Luke Timothy Johnson is doing, we are more aware now of the fact that Christian faith has always been aware of the issue of making Christian confession in the context of other faith traditions.

00:09:11.200 - 00:09:37.520

This is not a new problem. It comes out of the warp and woof of Christian experience. Some early church theologians were open to the possibility that those who had lived before Christ and some who followed other paths could be saved. But the dominant theological view came to be what we have identified, or what I have been calling Christian exclusivism.

00:09:38.720 - 00:10:14.400

The view that eventually prevailed as orthodoxy can be summed up in the famous phrase of Cyprian Bishop of Carthage. Extra ecclesiam nulla salus, outside the church there is no salvation. Now the original context in which Cyprian spoke those words was in response to an internal conflict inside the church. And Cyprian leveled this as a warning to Christians who left the main body of Christianity for heretical groups or schismatic groups.

00:10:15.600 - 00:11:05.760

But after Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire under Constantine, this view became applied to Jews and pagans, that is, to those who followed the traditional Greco-Roman religions or the quasi-religious philosophical schools. Later, when the church had social approval with political power behind it, this exclusivist position became the way to enforce Christian orthodoxy on dissenters, as well as those outside. After Europe became an essentially Christian culture, those who followed other religious traditions either became an oppressed minority, such as the Jews, or were identified as foreign enemies, such as Muslims.

00:11:06.880 - 00:11:47.360

Only after the Age of Exploration did European Christians begin to encounter a wider diversity of religious traditions. Several eras of missionary activity followed, in which conversion was the foremost goal. In the modern period, in our world, three conditions have come together to make the fact of religious diversity a theological problem for us in a new way. First of all, established Christian churches now exist in nations where other religions are very strong or are the dominant traditions.

00:11:48.480 - 00:12:41.120

This experience of diversity has given rise to Christian theological reflection that is shaped by appreciation as well as critique of other religious traditions. Second, changes in American immigration laws have made possible large communities of non-Christians, notably Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists, possible in both Europe and North America. This means that those who follow other religions are no longer the objects of mission in lands far away, but are rather next-door neighbors, co-workers, friends, maybe even family members. Third, the era of instant communication means greater awareness for us of people

00:12:41.520 - 00:13:13.120

their cultures and situations, and the role that religion plays in conflicts in various parts of the world. It is the sum total of these various situations, then, that makes us ask the question of Christian faith and religious diversity in new ways. Our reality makes us wonder whether being Christian means claiming that we are right, and everyone else is wrong.

00:13:14.640 - 00:13:58.960

When diversity of religious life and practice is a part of our everyday experience, Christians are led to ask whether the traditional Christian claim that only we are saved and all others are condemned or damned is the only faithful alternative. At the heart of the matter is what we believe about the person and work of Jesus Christ, and how we believe God is revealed through his life, death, and resurrection. The best place, I think, to begin this consideration is with a couple of those New Testament texts that seem most clearly to present this exclusivist view.

00:14:00.320 - 00:14:28.560

The confession that Jesus is both Savior and Lord is at the heart of the New Testament. It is, in fact, the message. But there are a couple of passages that are lifted up most frequently when the topic of religious diversity is raised. I want to look at both quickly and attempt to determine whether considering them in their larger context might help broaden our understanding of their meanings.

00:14:30.000 - 00:14:46.720

The 1st and most frequently cited passage is John 14, 6. I am the way, the truth, and the life. no one comes to the Father except through me. The passage seems quite straightforward.

00:14:47.360 - 00:15:06.480

Jesus is the only point of access to God the Father. Jesus is the truth about God. Jesus is the one through whom all will come to have eternal life. Now the first thing that needs to be said about this passage is that it is a statement about who Jesus is.

00:15:07.440 - 00:15:33.000

and not necessarily about what others are not. Most often this statement is read to support the claim that if Jesus is the way, then there are no other ways. The logical form of that claim is, if A is true, then B must be false. This, it seems to me, is an extension of the statement.

00:15:33.000 - 00:15:49.760

It goes beyond the words themselves. The text says what Jesus is. It does not say what something else is not. The most important issue is to look at the context of this one very important verse.

00:15:51.200 - 00:16:27.760

The setting, as you all remember, is the meal that Jesus has with his disciples shortly before his betrayal and arrest. Chapters 14 to 17 of John's gospel are often called the farewell discourse. Jesus speaks almost without interruption and using a variety of metaphors and images is portrayed as giving his final instructions, his summative thoughts to the disciples. Chapter 14 begins with Jesus' statement that in my father's house there are many dwelling places.

00:16:28.720 - 00:16:49.120

He says that he is going. there to prepare a place for his disciples who will join him later. He concludes by saying, And you know the way to the place where I am going. Now the reader knows that Jesus is talking about his impending death.

00:16:49.840 - 00:17:26.080

The reader also knows that Jesus has come from God and is returning to God, John 13:3. Now the role of the disciples in John's gospel is often to misunderstand. So they say, we do not know where you are going, how can we know the way? Jesus' response is a classic example of how John portrays Jesus speaking on one level, usually the metaphorical, while his audience is hearing on another, namely the literal.

00:17:27.600 - 00:18:20.960

If you think Jesus is talking about a path or some literal form of journey, no wonder you are confused when he responds, I am the way. What the larger context indicates is that Jesus is speaking of his impending death and resurrection and announcing that he is returning to God from whom he has come. and that now he himself, as a result of death and resurrection, will be the way that the disciples must follow, by faith, if not also by imitation. In this sense, I think the passage is something like the familiar saying in the synoptic gospels, if any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me.

00:18:23.080 - 00:18:47.040

Another meaning of this passage involves Jesus' naming of God as My Father. This language is peculiar to John's gospel. Here, a new insight into the being of God is being formed as Jesus and God are called Son and Father. In this case, fatherhood language for God is not generic.

00:18:47.040 - 00:19:14.400

It's not that God is like a father. Rather, this language is employed to frame a radically new insight into the being of God. Eventually, this insight will develop into the doctrine of the Trinity. It is this view of God which makes Christianity what it is, the insight that God is one and also three.

00:19:15.600 - 00:19:48.800

In the phrase of Eberhard Jungel, God is a being structured as a relationship. Jesus is the way, in the specific sense of being the way into the triune nature of God. To shift the metaphor, Jesus is the window onto the Trinity. This powerful statement in John's gospel about the true nature of Jesus and what his life, death, and resurrection reveal about God.

00:19:50.000 - 00:20:28.400

But it is not the answer to the specific question, what is the status of other religions and those who follow them? It is an affirmation of how Christians are to understand the person of Jesus Christ and the way in which that fundamentally changes our understanding of God. But it is not the answer to the question of whether this is the only vision of God that humanity can have. Another text that receives a great deal of attention

00:20:28.920 - 00:21:03.680

Whenever the Christian understanding of religious diversity is raised is Acts 4.12. There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved. Once again, context is critical to appropriately understanding this text. In Acts 4, Peter and John have been arrested for continuing to preach about Jesus' resurrection and have now been brought before the high priest and other religious leaders.

00:21:04.800 - 00:21:37.640

In giving account of their faith, they are specifically defending the healing of a man unable to walk in 3, 1-10. Now here it's important to remember that in Greek the same word may be translated made whole or healed and saved. The physical and spiritual are two aspects of the one reality. And the name or authority by which this healing has taken place, Peter proclaims, is Jesus of Nazareth.

00:21:39.040 - 00:22:08.240

Beverly Gaventa points out that the phrase by which we must be saved sounds a bit strange in English. It is an attempt to render the Greek dei it is necessary. Luke, in particular, uses this word for things that happen in accordance with God's will. It is God's will, thus, that the name of Jesus brings healing or salvation.

00:22:09.360 - 00:22:46.320

That is Peter's claim. Geventa concludes, In context, the emphasis falls on God's gift of salvation rather than on the negation of other religious practices. the text does make a very powerful claim about the healing slash saving power of the name of Jesus. But it does not necessarily mean that God could not or would not or has not worked in the lives of other human beings by other means.

00:22:48.720 - 00:23:18.960

This brings us to the central question of Christian faith. We confess that Jesus is Savior and Lord, and that God intends to save humankind through him. What does this have to do with people who follow other religious traditions? How is our understanding and articulation of this confession to be shaped by our experience of living in a religiously diverse world?

00:23:21.040 - 00:23:43.440

The traditional way of asking this question is, can non-Christians be saved, and if so, how? Does God save only those who profess explicit faith in Christ as Savior and Lord? This leads to other questions. What about the people who lived and died before the time of Jesus?

00:23:44.160 - 00:24:07.760

What about those who have lived since but have never come in contact with the gospel? What about children who die before they are baptized or make a profession of faith? While none of these are completely new questions, I remember arguing about all of them when I was in high school, as a matter of fact. The contemporary situation has pressed them upon us with new urgency.

00:24:09.040 - 00:25:04.560

I spoke yesterday about approaches to this question taken by the Second Vatican Council, and in some Protestant evangelical circles, I referred to Clark Pennock, who put forward a case for being optimistic rather than pessimistic about the extent of God's will to save. More recently, evangelical theologian Terence Thiessen has attempted a long and careful argument that shifts the emphasis in the discussion of salvation from the individual who makes a profession of faith to God's desire that all should be saved, 1 Timothy 2.4. Each of these approaches has important light to shed on this topic. But I want to take a step back and ask the question, what do we mean by salvation?

00:25:06.640 - 00:25:32.160

Christians have understood this concept in a variety of ways. In fact, the idea and experience are so rich that no one formulation can really sum up all that we mean by salvation. But a good place to begin is Paul's use of the term reconciliation. In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself.

00:25:34.200 - 00:26:23.680

Embedded in this concept, or this view, is the claim that humanity is separated from God, that our relationship with God has been broken as a consequence of our sin, and that God has provided the means in Christ. for the restoration of that relationship. This suggests that salvation is not escape from punishment, but rather the restoration to the relationship of unity or communion that God has desired from the beginning. In this sense, atonement is at one-ment, bringing humanity and God back together.

00:26:24.800 - 00:27:03.040

Salvation is both individual and communal, as expressed in Jesus' prayer for his disciples, that they may all be one as we are one. The object of salvation in both John's gospel and Paul's letter is the whole world, indeed all of creation. It is not simply a question of whether you or I are saved, but of God's intention for the whole world. The role of Jesus in God's work of reconciliation or salvation is expressed in many different ways.

00:27:03.840 - 00:27:28.320

One way to say it is this. Jesus shows us that God's name is love. The life, teaching, ministry, and death and resurrection of Jesus show the world God's self-giving love, the love that empties itself for the healing of creation, love poured out for the sin of the world.

00:27:29.640 - 00:27:56.960

When you humanity acknowledges God as Creator, we confess that everything comes from God and belongs to God. All that is returns to the one source of life. In Jesus Christ, Christians believe that the Creator is also the Redeemer, the one who comes to transform us and call us home.

00:27:58.880 - 00:28:40.800

The God whose work is reconciliation is dramatically on display in the hospitality of Jesus, eating with outcasts and sinners, healing and restoring those outside the boundaries of society, welcoming his friends into a community of love. Salvation, then, is receiving the grace of God so that we are able to follow the way of Jesus. to live as he lived, full of love for God and neighbor. So, will only those who believe in Jesus be saved?

00:28:42.200 - 00:29:15.120

What about the others? Once again, Christian tradition has offered a variety of answers to this question. I want to characterize the approaches that Christian tradition has taken in three ways, what I'm calling subjectivist, participationist, and objectivist. Now clearly this is an oversimplification, but the categories are useful in looking at the range of responses based on different readings of scripture.

00:29:15.680 - 00:29:38.880

And I will argue that it is possible to find all three of these approaches in the Bible. First, the subjectivist view places the emphasis on faith or personal commitment of the individual. The question, when did you receive Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, comes out of this tradition.

00:29:40.320 - 00:30:09.360

The effects of God's saving work in Jesus Christ are valid only for those who accept it. In the same way, those who reject God's message through Christ will be condemned. According to this view, salvation depends on the act of faith of the believer, and it is possible to reject or refuse God's love. Support for this view can be found in passages such as John 3.18.

00:30:09.760 - 00:30:33.520

Those who believe in him are not condemned, But those who believe in him are not condemned. But those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. Now the effect of this view in relation to the question of religious diversity is rather straightforward.

00:30:34.720 - 00:31:16.880

If salvation depends on the response of the individual believer, then all who have lived before Christ, all who have never heard the gospel, all those who having heard have chosen to follow another religious practice, all of these are condemned and will not inherit eternal life. The zeal of many Christians to share the gospel and to convert others grows precisely out of their compassion for others, and a sincere desire, I think, that these others be spared certain death. Now, I think there are two problems with this point of view.

00:31:17.760 - 00:31:49.600

First, it is difficult to understand why God would have created humanity in God's own image and then condemned so much of humankind to eternal damnation. Bill Carl's joke about the presbytery being damned for the glory of God aside. And we all know that joke trades precisely on a theological idea that has a trajectory from Augustine through Calvin.

00:31:50.080 - 00:32:23.920

It's still hard to explain. Presuming that God created out of love and continues to love all that God has made, it is very hard to explain why God would leave so many of God's beloved without even the possibility of salvation. Second, this view suggests that human beings are able to resist God's will or intention and puts the individual at the center of the equation.

00:32:25.120 - 00:32:47.440

You see, it's all about me. It's up to me to decide rather than God. Second, the second view is what I call participationist. This view attempts to bring God's role in salvation and that of humanity into kind of a balance.

00:32:48.240 - 00:33:28.960

On this view, humans are justified by faith, but faith means trusting in the promise of God and accepting what God has already done for human. kind through the resurrection and death of Jesus Christ. Salvation is what God has already accomplished through Christ, but this salvation becomes effective in our lives when we accept it with faith and trust. This is made real to believers through baptism, in which we share or participate in the death of Christ so that we may share in new life with Him.

00:33:30.080 - 00:34:14.320

Some who articulate this view say that even saving faith is the work of God in the life of the believer. Now the impact of this understanding of salvation in relation to those who follow other faiths is a little more difficult to judge. On the one hand, to the extent that this view emphasizes personal faith, we encounter the same problems as we did above. On the other hand, to the extent that it emphasizes salvation as the work that God does through Christ, the question is rather more open as to who receives the effects of God's saving work.

00:34:15.840 - 00:35:00.320

In fact, Paul's argument about justification by faith, you will recall, is based on Abraham, who trusted in God's promise. Now, obviously, Abraham's faith was not in Jesus Christ, but in God who spoke directly to him and made a covenant with him. This would seem to leave open the question of whether God might be at work in the lives of others who similarly have faith in the sense of trusting the promises of God as they understand them.

00:35:02.960 - 00:35:30.720

The third way of understanding or thinking about salvation is what I'm calling the objectivist view. On this view, salvation is entirely the work of God. It is the work God has been engaged in since the foundation of the world. Redemption or salvation through Christ is not God's plan B, when plan A failed due to original sin.

00:35:31.760 - 00:35:57.040

Rather, redemption and creation are two manifestations of the same love, two sides of the same coin, 2 verses of the same song. Are we still teaching Barth down here, right? Creation, covenant, got that? The scope of redemption or salvation, it's amazing how useful some of these ideas become.

00:35:57.680 - 00:36:23.360

The scope of redemption or salvation is precisely the same as creation itself. Indeed, the goal of salvation in Christ is the transformation of the universe. The plan is to gather up all things into Christ, things in heaven and things on earth. Ephesians 1:10.

00:36:24.320 - 00:36:52.800

The whole creation is subject to futility, that is to the effects of human sin, but the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. Romans 8.21. Salvation is what God alone does. And whoever is saved, it is entirely

00:36:53.240 - 00:37:27.440

God's doing. Those who come to understand that this is what God is about in the world and trust in it by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us are thus enabled to live in accordance with God's purposes and experience the gifts of God's Spirit in our lives, the fruit of redemption. Thus, as Paul concludes, by grace you have been saved through faith, And this is not your own doing.

00:37:28.000 - 00:38:19.840

It is the gift of God, not the result of works, so that no one may boast. What does this view mean for those who follow other religious traditions? Because this approach affirms that the question of who is saved belongs finally and only to God, it leaves open the possibility of who is saved. Because creation and redemption are seen as two aspects of 1 plan or the overarching purpose of God, it is completely inappropriate for human beings to pretend to know how God will accomplish this work.

00:38:21.040 - 00:38:52.960

We cannot and we should not attempt to say whom God will save and how. What Christians can do and should do is bear witness to God's love and live so as to give evidence of God's work in us. Who then will be saved? The objectivist says that this is finally up to God.

00:38:54.720 - 00:39:20.720

This view is articulated succinctly and I think very nicely in the study catechism of the Presbyterian Church. It says, no one will be lost who can be saved. The limits of salvation, whatever they are, known to God. Three truths are certain.

00:39:22.480 - 00:39:41.920

God is a holy God who is not to be trifled with. No one will be saved except by grace alone. And no judge could possibly be more gracious than our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. A generous orthodoxy.

00:39:43.920 - 00:40:13.280

Each of these three ways of understanding the nature of salvation, the subjectivist, participationist, and objectivist, has different implications for how we understand religious diversity. Each of them has support in the Bible. Each of them makes one set of biblical passages the interpreter of others. The advantage of the objectivist,

00:40:13.760 - 00:40:46.400

view is, I think, twofold. First of all, it provides A Christian theological base for seeing God's work of salvation as inclusive of those who have followed and follow other religious traditions. Second, it keeps the emphasis in the matter of salvation in exactly the same place that it is with respect to creation. Both are the work of God.

00:40:48.000 - 00:41:26.560

It is God who is the center of this picture, not humanity. And all human beings, Christian and non-Christian, are on the same footing as creatures of 1 creator, whose plan is for the ultimate healing or renewal of creation. I began this lecture with a challenge. How can Christians confess Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, and at the same time affirm the universal love of God for all people, for all that God has made?

00:41:27.920 - 00:41:57.200

What I've argued here is that these two ideas are not intention, but rather two sides of the same coin. It is only in the context of God's universal love for all that the salvation in Jesus Christ can be understood. And it is God's work in Christ that makes God's universal love visible and known. For Christians, this can never be either or.

00:41:57.680 - 00:42:30.080

It must always be both and. In the remaining couple of minutes, I want to just sketch out a brief word about what the implications are for this theological trajectory as we live as Christians in a world of many faiths. Six very quick suggestions. First, live with humility with respect to the question of religious truth, who has it and who doesn't.

00:42:31.520 - 00:42:56.960

We might broaden the understanding of what truth means with respect to religious discourse, except the idea that there may be more than one thing that can be true at the same time. We have a wonderful example of this within Christian tradition. We talk about the imminence and the transcendence of God. It's not one or the other, it's both.

00:42:59.120 - 00:43:17.520

One is not right and the other wrong. They are different ways into the truth of God. Second, treat others with respect, which is more than tolerance. Tolerance is a civic virtue.

00:43:18.520 - 00:43:46.480

And it is often understood to mean, I don't care what you do or believe as long as it doesn't impinge on me. Respect is a form of neighbor love. And it is based on the theological conviction that all others are my brothers and sisters, fellow children of the Creator, all of us equally made in the image and likeness of God.

00:43:46.880 - 00:43:59.960

That's the basis of respect. Third, learn to practice the Christian faith. That's why I'm glad we have been in this context of lectures. Christianity is far more than...

00:44:00.080 - 00:44:21.640

set of ideas or a theological system, much as we Presbyterians love that piece of our tradition. Christianity is a religion. It is a way of living in the world with God. Rediscovering and cultivating Christian practices is needed for a renewal of our own faith.

00:44:21.880 - 00:44:45.920

It's really important for its own sake. But it is also a very important way of making connections with people of other faith traditions through their experiences and practices. Fourth, Bear witness to Jesus Christ and to the love of God that Jesus' life, death, and resurrection reveal.

00:44:47.600 - 00:45:00.400

To be a Christian is to witness. This is a core Christian practice. Not all faiths are called to do this. We are.

00:45:01.120 - 00:45:29.920

We cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard. Our witness may include an invitation to others to become Christians, but bearing witness as testimony is like praise. It is an end in itself. Finally, engage in dialogue with those from different traditions with the goal of learning.

00:45:31.360 - 00:46:10.560

And be open to being transformed in the process. Most of us who have engaged seriously in interfaith dialogue bear witness that not only have they learned something about God from other traditions and the experiences of others, but they have also gained A deeper appreciation of their own Christian faith at the same time. Religious dialogue, interreligious dialogue, like ecumenical dialogue, is a way of discovering not only the other, but one's own tradition in new and deeper ways.

00:46:13.920 - 00:46:56.640

A final conclusion. God has brought us to this time and this place as Christians in a multi-faith world. Perhaps the continuing vitality of the world's religions is part of God's way of relating to and caring for all of God's human family. Perhaps this is our time as Christians to learn how to be Christians and at the same time to be neighbors and partners with those of other faiths.

00:46:58.480 - 00:47:51.200

Perhaps what we call discipleship and what Judaism calls tikkun olan, the healing of the world, are deeply related and compatible. Perhaps truth about God and human life resides in us and at the same time in other traditions. because God is truly bigger than any one way of understanding God. Perhaps we have been brought into such closer relationships with people of other faiths in order to broaden our own understanding and deepen our appreciation for the mystery and majesty of God.

00:47:52.880 - 00:48:08.720

Perhaps This is our time as people of faith to respond to God's call for community and peace. Perhaps. Thank you very much.

00:48:24.280 - 00:48:44.960

Thank you so much. You set a table before us with urgent questions and precious words and some maps for the church's journey. Thank you for setting this table and making sure it is in our midst this day. We have time for the briefest of stand and stretch breaks.

00:48:45.200 - 00:48:49.680

Please be here again at 11.15 for our final lecture with Dr. Johnson.