I Have A Friend Who Thinks That All Religions Are The Same

LISTEN – you need to be ready to share with that first group AND –with that second group I suggest that you share just a little, enough to demonstrate to them that your faith DOES have it’s reasons – then dust off your feet and don’t play their game until they become an honest seeker… Does that make sense?

OKAY – today’s message is entitled – “I Have A Friend Who Thinks That All Religions Are The Same…” QUESTION – have you ever encountered anyone who thinks that way? (I have) Do you think there is a large and vocal part of our culture, who wants us to think that way? (you better believe there is, it’s called PC – and that doesn’t mean ‘personal computers’ it means ‘politically correct.’

GUYS – the topic we are going to try to tackle this morning is huge, - Thursday morning I went to my Thesaurus to find a few more words to describe the topic before us today; here are a few;

Our topic today IS: immense, enormous, gigantic, titanic, colossal, sizeable, monumental, massive, extensive, galactic, cosmic, monstrous, mammoth – in other words, our topic today, is really – really big!!!

I MEAN - Colleges have entire courses on this – there are tons of book and web sites about this subject. FRIENDS – my challenge this week as I sat before my computer… as I; read books, surfed the net and scribbled stuff down on paper was – HOW could I, in the brief time that we have this morning give you some practical stuff, some good stuff (that will enable you to answer questions and give the reasons for the hope that you have) - without completely overwhelming you – and causing you to scream, “STOP STEVE – my head hurts!”

WELL – all I can say is that was my goal… AND – the condition of your head when we are through we tell me if I met it…. BUT – if you listen up I will give some good stuff, some basic stuff, some summary statements that will help you see that the statement, “All Religions Are The Same” is not true… (AND – I have also included some books on the back of your outline - that I have spent some time in over the last few weeks, that I think are pretty good…)

NOW – there are a lot of different religions we could look at this morning BUT I have limited our discussion to just 4… Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Christianity… AND – the reason is because they represent over 76% of the world’s population…

CHECKOUT – the chart in your outline….

World-Wide (% of population) United States (growth rate from

1990 - 2001)

Christianity – 2 billion 33% 159 million 5%

Islam - 1.3 billion 22% 1.1 million 109%

Hinduism – 900 million 15% .766 million 237%

Non religious – 850 million 14% 27.5 million 110%

Buddhism – 360 million 6% 1.08 million 170%

Other - 600 million 10%

THE FIRST – point in your outline is;

Two Popular BUT False Statements

Statement #1;

“It Doesn’t Matter What You Believe As Long As You Are Sincere”

QUESTION - have you ever heard anyone say that? Have you ever said that?

Why would people make such a statement? I think for several reasons…

SOME people make it simply because they don’t want to get into an argument about religion. HEY – you believe what you want and I will believe what I want… and we’ll just join hands and sing cumbyya.