Make Friends!

Yesterday a report appeared on the NOS that all the important spiritual leaders of the world are calling on us to make friends with people of other religions.

Satan has his grip on the whole world and all religions, let's not forget that. On the one hand, he sows destruction and chaos, causing people to look for answers. At the same time, he scatters this kind of 'advice' over the lost world.

What struck me was that the Pope appears very humble. After all, he is the only one who says that for his own spiritual life he needs the insights of his neighbor (the Argentine rabbi). The others only give 'good advice', but the Pope involves himself in the story. This is just Roman marketing, but it is misleading. The clip was made by a Dutch marketing expert for a reason.

Furthermore, quite a bit of gnosticism and mysticism drips from those few minutes and that is no wonder, since that is the common identifier of all religions.

A few notes

Briefly some notes from the Bible.

• this whole event belongs to the world, and as a believer I am “well in the world, but not vto the world”. Only the truth of the word of God can keep us separate from it (see John 17:14b-17). 
• Religions don't take us to the mountain top, to a better world or to God. “(…) the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead, … salvation is in none other, for there is none other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved .” (Acts 4:12). That is the gospel we bring and the only thing that gives hope in a desperate world.
• For a believer, what Paul writes in Romans 12:17-21 applies: “Do not repay evil for evil to anyone. Be mindful of what is good for all people. Live, if possible, as far as it depends on you, in peace with all people.”  When others are hostile to us, then “Then if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him drink, for by doing so you will heap coals of fire on his head. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good."
• In the New Testament the believers in different places called each other 'friends(see Acts 3:3 and 3 John 1:15). If you have the same love for the Lord Jesus, the same love for God's Word, and love everyone who is born of God, then you cannot help butfriends' are apart.
• “Love not the world, nor what is in the world. If anyone loves the world, the Father's love is not in him.” (1 John 2:15)