Is Jesus the Only Way? John 14:6 (Part II)

For Part I of "Is Jesus the Only Way?" click here.

Some people today believe that when Jesus said, "I am the Way", He is not saying "Me personally" or "Me alone", but rather He is speaking about His "inner Christ". He's talking about that aspect of divinity that was in Him and that is in every human being. In other words, He is speaking of his "Christ consciousness" and we all just need to come to that higher consciousness of realizing that God is in all of us and we are all gods.
The problem with this interpretation is that if this is indeed what Christ was saying, why didn't He just tell Thomas to "look inside" for the answer to his question. When Thomas said, "How do we know the way?", Jesus should have said, "Look to your inner self. The Way is in you". But that is not what Jesus says. Rather, He points to Himself most emphatically. More importantly, He went to the cross willingly to die for all mankind, which was totally unnecessary if all we have to do is "look inside".

When you look at this passage, look at the context, look at the question being asked, and then look at Christ's response. There is no way to explain this as anything other than Jesus Christ saying, "I am the only way to God and to heaven". You may not like it. You may struggle to accept it. But that is what Jesus is saying and you and I am forced to come to one of three conclusions (with apologies to C.S. Lewis because I'm altering his formula a bit here). Either Jesus is deliberately lying; that is, He knows He's not the only way to God and He's lying by saying He is. Or Jesus was delusional and He thought He was the only way to heaven, but in fact He was a lunatic, and He was totally deluded about Himself. Or He really is the only way to God and heaven. You have to make a choice between those three options. There are no others. You can not say that Jesus is a really good man if He is a liar. You cannot say that He is a great teacher if He is delusional. You cannot say He is a prophet of God if He says, "I am the only Way", and He is mistaken. So what do you believe about Jesus? All the fuzzy thinking about Jesus has to be set aside when you come to passages like this. You've got to make a decision. Who is He? Liar? Lunatic? Or the only Savior of all mankind?

Look for Part III of this series on Sunday, August 29.