SUNDAY: Bible Study - 9:00 AM | Worship - 10:00 AM | PM Worship - 6:00 PM WEDNESDAY: Bible Class - 7:00 PM ~ 8110 Signal Hill Road Manassas, Virginia | Office Phone: 703.368.2622

newyorker            Each New Yorker issue ends with a cartoon caption contest.  A strange situation is presented by one of the New Yorker’s duly famous cartoonists and readers are invited to write the caption.  This week (Nov 7, 2011) the drawing is of two crocodiles riding the subway – with one speaking to the other.  The three finalists for the caption are: “That lady’s shoes remind me of Joey”, “Anyone care to join us for lunch?”, and my favorite, “I still say the sewers are quicker.”  That third one is the winner, in my opinion.  Living in a metropolitan area where navigational skills are more important than on the High Seas, one is involved in such conversations on a daily (sometimes and hourly) basis – especially if one is a guy.
            There are options – endless options.  Many of these options (sometimes all of them) are undesirable, but one is not limited to a single path to any destination.  Do we take 66 all the way in, or get off on 50?  Is it best to take Constitution all the way to 7th, and then go north – or is it better to take the Beltway around?  Maybe we should just take the metro – unless the VRE is running at that time of day.  Do we catch the Metro at Vienna, or maybe drive to Arlington where we might find parking on the street near Ballston Station?  Maybe we’ll just stay home and Skype the meeting.
            Some guys feel quite proprietary about the superiority of their navigational skills.  They have short cuts that involve cutting through the Harris Teeter parking lot, and taking cobblestoned alleys in Arlington.  If they ever overhear you asking, quite innocently, the best way to get to point B, they will knock over expectant mothers, and hurdle grandmas to tell you that the ONLY way to get there is to make a u-turn on the George Washington Parkway.
            Most of us recoil from such certitude.  There is a tyranny in it – a tyranny which will require the aforementioned navigator to follow-up and make sure you took their route.
            I am guilty of such certitude - not as regards the best way to the National Arboretum.  But I am sure that there is only one way to God.
I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father but through me. John 14.6
            That is an absolute statement. It allows for acceptance or rejection, and nothing in between.  Buddhism may have something to teach us about wisdom and enlightenment.  Hinduism may have discovered strategies for dealing with pain and suffering.  But only Jesus provides us a way to connect with God.  Period.
            There is only one way that leads to eternal life (Matthew 7.13-14), and few find it.  We have fewer options than crocodiles on the subway.  Without Jesus, we wouldn’t have any options at all.  Let me repeat that: Without Jesus we wouldn’t have any options at all!  Without his atoning sacrifice there would be no redemption, no reconciliation (II Corinthians 5.14-6.2).  The response of some, I know, is to recoil from this certitude.  But there is no tyranny in this, only love.  A drowning man doesn’t have the luxury of shopping around between a life preserver, an inner-tube, or a rope – but grasps at whatever flotsam is within reach.  Jesus is our only option.  We have this option because He loved us - loves us yet.
            Rescue is offered from someone who has sacrificed himself because he loves us.  What better option can we even imagine?

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