What Makes Christianity Different

The foundation of Christianity is the very Person of Jesus Christ. Christianity is not a religion in the true sense of the word, as religion refers to man reaching out to God their way through their piety and works. Christianity is a system of grace. Even the very act of reaching out to God is an act of Grace, without which we would be helpless to achieve.

There is no one who understand, no one who seeks God. Romans 3:11

When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Romans 5:6

Other religions are founded by men who hold no uniqueness compared to other men. Their system could have been established by any man. They were not the power source of their religion nor, like Jesus, the creator of all things. Unlike Christ, they could be replaced by any man of equal ability.

Christ not only created the universe, but He is the very WORD of God. And by that, He is the one who Himself executes the plan of salvation and continually provides Himself as the one who consummates the plan. No other man can replace Jesus.

To understand how Jesus is different, the following is an excerpt from Systematic Theology, by Lewis Sperry Chafer. Chafer references Charles Gore in his exposition of the founders of Islam and Buddhism. I know the writing is formal and old school, but I didn’t want to take anything out of context.

Theologian Charles Gore (Systematic Theology, Chafer 1993) writes:

The place which Mohammed holds in Islam is not the place which Jesus Christ holds in Christianity. The religion of Mohammedanism lies simply in the message which the Koran contains. The person of the Prophet has its significance only so far as he is supposed to have certified the reality of the revelations which the book records.

Guatama, the founder of Buddhism, is only the discoverer or rediscovered of a method or way to win final emancipation from the weary chain of existence, and to attain Nirvana, or Parinirvana, the final blessed extinction. Having found this way, after many years of weary searching, he can teach it to others, but he is all the time, only a preeminent example of the success of his own method, one of a series of Buddhas or enlightened ones, who shed on other men the light of their superior knowledge. It was plainly the method of Buddha, not the person, which was to save his brethren.

Gore continues. We are touching on no disputed point when we assert that according to the Buddhist scriptures, the personal, conscious life of the founder of that religion was extinguished in death…

Jesus Christ taught no method by which men might attain the end of their being, whether He Himself, personally, existed or was annihilated: but as He offered Himself to men on earth as the satisfaction of their being- their master, their example, their redeemer - so when He left the earth, He promised to sustain them from the unseen world by His continued personal presence and to communicate to them His own life, and He assured them that at the last they would find themselves face to face with Him..

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. John 1:1-5

Christianity is uniquely different from any religion, just a Jesus Christ is uniquely different from any man whether a prophet, teacher, or common man. For Jesus Christ is not only the creator or the universe but also the sustainer. He is not only our Savior but the sustainer of our salvation. He is the only one in history who died and has been witnesses historically (by believers and unbelievers) to have risen from the dead. So much information is out there to help understand this difference. I hope this principle intrigues you enough to further research the uniqueness of Jesus Christ and Christianity.

Cheers to Jesus Christ!

Charles Gore, Systematic Theology, by Lewis Sperry Chafer, ©1993. vols 1&2 pg 349-350, Kregel Publications