Questions for Godಮಾದರಿ

What makes Christianity different from all the other religions?

One word: Jesus. 

Yep. That’s it. Nothing else to read today. Go ahead and move on to the next day … Just kidding. Sort of. 

I’m only sort of kidding because Jesus is the answer to that question. Let me explain. 

Christianity is the only falsifiable religion. 

What that means is that Christianity makes a claim that could be proved false, and if that claim were proved to be false, then all of Christianity would be proven false. 

What is that claim? The claim that Jesus Christ came back from the dead. Contrary to what some people may believe, Christianity isn’t based on a book. Christianity is based on an event. That event was the resurrection of Jesus. 

The Apostle Paul himself states that if Jesus didn’t actually come back from the dead then all of his preaching would have been wasted. That’s a strong statement. Paul is telling everyone, without the resurrection of Jesus there would be no Christianity. 

Thankfully for those of us who are Christians, the claim that Christianity makes is backed up by significant historical evidence. 

Once again, don’t just take my word for it. Take a look at just a handful of the facts that almost every single historian and scholar agree to be true: 

Minimal Facts: 

1. Jesus was a real person who died by crucifixion on a Roman cross.
2. Very soon afterwards, Jesus’s followers had experiences they believed were actual appearances of a resurrected Jesus. 
3. Because of those experiences, these followers went from cowering in fear to being willing to die for their belief in Jesus’s resurrection.
4. The message of Jesus and the Christian church started right after Jesus was killed, right where Jesus was killed: The city of Jerusalem.
5. James, Jesus’s own brother, who was not a Christian at first, became a Christian after the death of Jesus because he believed his brother really did come back from the dead.
6. Paul, who wrote the majority of the New Testament, went from killing Christians to starting churches because he had an experience he believed was with the risen Jesus.

When we look at these facts, that virtually every historian and scholar agree to be true, there is only one good explanation: Jesus did what He said He was going to do. He came back from the dead. 

What makes Christianity different? Jesus. Jesus is God in human form. Jesus is the perfect picture of God. The God revealed through suffering. The God who came for broken sinners like you and like me. Jesus is the foundation of our faith. 

If the resurrection did not happen, then Christianity would be false. But if Jesus did come back from the dead, then Christianity is true. And if Christianity is true, well, that changes everything.