Jan 3 2019 John 10: 7-17

I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved. . . I know my own and my own know me.

In my experience, this passage and others from John have been used to support the notion that the only way to God is through Jesus Christ. Jesus is the ONLY gate that matters. If you don’t come through the Jesus gate, woe to you. Woe to you, you loving Hindus, Baha’i’s Taoists, deists of all sorts. Woe to you for picking the wrong gate. Even fellow children of Abraham – Jews & Muslims – woe to you. You should have picked the Gate marked Jesus.

To be clear, I am a Christian, so I believe the gate marked Jesus is a good gate. I believe it leads to God. And I’ve never conducted a world religion survey to know about any of the other gates. And I haven’t conducted Christian theological analysis to understand context or language to affirm what this section is saying. But in my heart, I believe God is bigger than my religion, than my understanding of religion. Even bigger than the incarnation of God through Jesus Christ. Rather, I tend to see it more like John Spong, retired Episcopal Bishop, who wrote:

“God is not a Christian, God is not a Jew, or a Muslim, or a Hindu, or a Buddhist. All of those are human systems which human beings have created to try to help us walk into the mystery of God. I honor my tradition, I walk through my tradition, but I don't think my tradition defines God, I think it only points me to God.”

Maybe this is heresy. But I don’t think so. This morning’s passage continues with these lines from Jesus:
I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock.

I believe we are all children of one God. At the end of the day, I care that there is one flock, not which pen they’re in.