I had the opportunity to discuss my faith with a co-worker the other day in an exchange of ideas and beliefs. I wasn't selling my faith but simply talking about different beliefs. My co-worker voiced an opinion that I hear a lot in one of two flavors:
1) There is an ultimate truth but there are many paths/religions/beliefs to get you there.
2) If Jesus died for the sins of mankind, then why aren't we all just forgiven?
If you squint a bit these are really the same idea I label universal forgiveness. Why can't God just forgive us all? I thought about this a good while and am convinced there is a principled reason why this can't work.
On the face of it it's entirely possible God himself might find the idea of universal forgiveness as attractive as anyone else. Why not? It's pretty loving, isn't it? The problem is that each of us has committed grievous offences against God and someone has to pay for it. If God simply wiped the slate arbitrarilly clean or didn't worry too much how we reached "enlightenment" (i.e. reached out to Him) then all His God-ness disappears. It'd be like a country with laws but nobody ever enforced them. It wouldn't be long before everyone totally ignored the laws, right?
So how can God fully satisfy the law while extending full loving pardon to us? The idea of sending Jesus, God himself, to die and pay for our sins and have such a simple act of decision to receive eternal life and forgiveness, is in fact the easiest, most inclusive thing God could have done without compromising who He is.
The great thing about understanding this principle is that it doesn't require blind faith, but a rational faith in God's way of salvation.
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