by Henry M. Morris from the book "Many Infallible Proofs".
Biblical Christianity is also absolutely unique in the nature of its central personage and founder, Jesus Christ. There is none other like Him in all of history or even in all of literature.
Some writers, of course, presume to place Christ as merely one in a list of great religious leaders, but this is grotesque and absurd. He stands in contrast to all others, not in line with them, not even at the head of the line. His uniqueness is illustrated in the following partial list of attributes.
Anticipation of His coming. His coming was prophesied in fine detail, as to lineage, birthplace, time, career purpose, nature of death, resurrection, and many other things, hundreds of years prior to His actual appearance. Of no other religious leader – indeed, of no other man – in all history was such a thing true.
The Virgin Birth. Although tales of demi-gods, the progeny of unions between men and the gods (actually demons) are common in the ancient mythology, the narrative of Christ’s virgin birth stands entirely alone; nothing like it was ever imagined elsewhere. God Himself took up residence in embryonic human form in a virgin’s womb, thence to be born in a fully natural human birth, with no actual genetic connection to human parents, even though legally the natural heir of a human father and embryologically the seed and fruit of a human mother. No other human birth was ever like this, in fact or fiction, yet it was uniquely and ideally appropriate and natural when God became man.
The Divine-Human Nature. Though men have often thought of themselves as children of God, Jesus Christ was the only begotten Son of God. Although there have been power-crazed dictators and fanatics who have claimed to be God, even these individuals recognized and acknowledged that their assumption of divinity was only relative –they hardly imagined that they had created the stars or even their own mothers! But Jesus Christ was God in the highest sense, the creator of all things (Col. 1:16), and he claimed to be God on many occasions and in many ways. He was also man in the fullest sense, except that he had no sin. He was not half-man and half-God, but rather all man and all God, in a perfect and indissoluble union. No other man was ever thus – indeed, no other man ever claimed to be thus.
Sinless Life. Of no one else in history could the claim ever be made in seriousness that he lived a whole lifetime without sin, in thought or word or deed. But this very thing was claimed by Jesus’ closest friends, by His worst enemies, by the greatest of the apostles, and by Jesus himself. Peter said, “[He] did no sin” (1 Pet. 2:22), and John said, “In him is no sin” (1 John 3:5). Judas said, “ I have betrayed the innocent blood” (Matt. 27:4), and Pilate said, “I find in him no fault at all” (John 18:38). Paul said, “[He] knew no sin” (Cor.5:21), and Jesus said concerning himself, “The Father hath not left me alone, for I do always those things that please him” (John 8:29). Jesus Christ was the only man who never sinned; he was the unique, representative Son of Man, man as God intend man to be.
Unique Teachings. Many non-Christians have acknowledged Christ to be the greatest teacher of all time. The Sermon on the Mount is without parallel, and the beauty and the power of the Upper Room discourse, the compelling majesty of the sermon on the Mount of Olives, the Power of His parables, and all His other teachings are separated by a great gulf from even the finest teaching of other men. And yet His teachings continually include both the claim and internal awareness that he was uniquely God’s Son, and that His teachings were absolutely true because of this. In no other religious writings does anyone find such a phenomenon as this.
His Unique Death. After a cruel mockery of a trial and a period of incomprehensible suffering in prison and on the cross, “ He said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost” (John 19:30). Literally, He “dismissed His spirit.” No one else can die like this. It is evidently quite a difficult task even to commit suicide, but certainly no one can simply decide to die and then, by his mere volition, proceed to die. But Jesus did! He said, “No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself” (John 10:18).
The Resurrection of Christ Not only did Christ die by his own power, but he rose again on the third day by His own power. “I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.”(John 10:18). The overwhelming proof of the bodily resurrection of Christ will be discussed later, but here it is merely noted that this constitutes the final and greatest proof of His absolute uniqueness. All other religious founders and leaders are dead. In most cases, their tombs are known and venerated. But the tomb of Christ was occupied only three days and there after became empty forever. Other men have been temporarily restored to life after dying, but only Christ is “alive forevermore” (Rev. 1:18). Death is man’s last and greatest enemy (1 Cor. 15:26), which conquers all alike, no matter how brilliant or powerful. Christ alone “the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25).
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Salvation by Grace The final proof of uniqueness to be offered in this section is that of the all important teaching concerning salvation. The Bible uniquely teaches salvation through faith alone. All other religions teach salvation through faith plus works.
Of course, the specific objects of faith and the specific list of works required for salvation vary widely from one religion to another. But the basic principal is universal.
Biblical Christianity alone, among all the religions of mankind, teaches that eternal salvation is the free gift of God’s grace, to be received by faith alone, apart from works of any kind. The watchword of other religions is “Believe and do”; of Christianity, the word is “Believe and live.”
This does not by any means imply that Christianity has a lower or easier standard than other religions. To the contrary, the standard of works in Christianity is so high as to be unattainable by the natural man, so that no man could ever earn salvation by his own good works. “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23). “For whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all” (James 2:10). “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Ez. 18:4).
Nor does it imply that Christian salvation by grace goes against the grain of human nature, since man’s pride is at stake here, it clearly must be of divine origin. Man would never invent a standard of righteousness which he could never hope to attain. It is s significant that every one of the standard of works required in the many religions of men is quite capable of accomplishment by human effort. This fact clearly indicates they were originated by human ingenuity. Only God would ever prescribe a standard which could be attained by God himself.
The uniqueness of salvation by grace through faith alone clearly stamps the Christian gospel as divine in origin.
