Easter 2024 has passed. As someone who has been involved in missions in Southeast Asia since 2006, I have studied the beliefs of many in the region and have some thoughts.

Does the resurrection of Christ offer a unique hope to every soul on the earth?

Yes. Consider the following:

If you follow Hinduism, your future hope lies in having paid off enough of your karma debt to avoid the 28 hells ruled by Yama, the god of Death, and be reincarnated higher up the caste system.

If you follow Buddhism, your future hope lies in making enough good merit to offset the justice of your karma debt, avoid the 8 levels of tortuous hells, and their 128 subsidiary hell realms, and be reincarnated with less poverty, sickness and bad luck in your next life.

If you are a follower of Islam, your future hope lies in having done more good deeds than bad deeds, so that when Allah weighs you on the scales of cosmic justice, your good outweighs your bad, and you avoid the 7 levels of Islamic hell to enter paradise.

At the heart of these religious ideas about cosmic justice lies the idea of karma—you get what you deserve.

Only in Jesus Christ is the “law” of karmic justice broken. In fact, Jesus flips it on its head. Instead of us getting what we deserved, the Son of God took on human flesh to take upon himself the death we deserved in order to give us what we don’t deserve—grace, forgiveness and eternal life.

Therefore, if you are a follower of the way of Christ, your future hope lies in his finished work on the cross that set you free from the law of sin, and death and the grip of hell that was broken, when he defeated hell from the inside and rose again victorious, King of kings and Lord of lords.

If you are an atheist, you can only “hope like hell” you are just a bi-product of blind and purposeless evolution when you take your last breadth.

Lastly, if you are a follower of religious relativism that slanders all religions by mashing them together into a collective stew that appeals to your personal taste and denies their orthodox beliefs as wrong, your essential hope is that you got it right when they got it wrong. And now your only duty is to define good and evil for yourself and assume God was acting silly when he talked about repentance because he just wants you to do your best so he can reward you. But then you’re back to karma law.

Best to remember that “we all fall short of God’s glory” and humbly receive the pardon he offers us through the Son he sent to you and for you.