I am a christian, by that meaning a generic person who has faith in Jesus.
I went to many fundamentalist churches, however, I cannot recommend them.
To echo JRDelerious’s point, getting saved is not as simple as Chick makes it out to be. Believing in Jesus as the savior is not some simple “Get Out of Hell Free” card. Any in depth study of Paul’s epistles in the New Testament to the various Churches reveals this.
Chick seems to really hammer down the point of “Jesus is God,” but forgets the whole “Holy Spirit” end of things. The way I understand it (feel free to correct me, anyone), is that to be truly saved requires baptism in the Holy Spirit. In other words, to be a true Christian, one must embrace the teachings of Jesus and follow him because they honestly want to, not out of fear.
Those who become Christians just because they believe it to be “better than the alternative of eternal suffering in hell” are essentially blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, probably the single greatest sin any person can perform according to the Bible. God says he will forgive any sins and blasphemy against him, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is essentially unforgiveable. All those supposed converts in Chick’s stories are no doubt going to be in for a big surprise come “judgement day”.
I’ve seen the “fear as a motivation” argument used many times by non-Christians as a reason to why they would never become Christian, but it’s a false reason. Christianity should not be followed out of fear. This is made pretty clear numerous times in the Bible.
As far as how Christians should conduct themselves, once again Chick seems to get it wrong. Doing good works is very important. The Bible teaches us that we are all sinners, that we are destined to fall short of the ideal, but that is no reason to not try. As Paul said: a Christian does not need to be a good person to be saved, but is one really a Christian–a follower of Jesus baptized in the Holy Spirit–if one doesn’t try to do good works? Christianity is not meant to be a safety net. A Catholic on a board I frequent (who has very non-tradtional views on Christianity and Catholicism and concedes that he may be somewhat hypocritical in the fact that he’s Catholic and disagrees with many of Catholicisms tenants) once said: The essence of Christianity can basically be summarized in whole by Jesus’s “Sermon on the Mount.” Also, it is suggested multiple times over that doing good works will have rewards in heaven. Sure being saved won’t come as a result of good works, but God will still reward those who do them (provided there done out of a desire to honestly do good, not just for getting a reward).
One other point I’d like to make is that Chick also tends to take a very fundamentalist view on the concept of Hell. There are actually two kinds of Hell mentioned in the original Greek texts of the Bible. The King James and New King James translations tend to call them by the same name (Hell), but the more idiomatic translations (the NIV for instance) often make the distinction clearer. In the Old Testament, Hell is represented by the Hebrew word Sheol. Sheol is simply the grave. It is the physical death of the body and the “limbo” world of the spirit. It’s a rather boring and non-descript place, actually.
Then there is the other concept of Hell which shows up in the New Testament. This is called Gehenna and is named after a mountain where one of the Pagan religions regularly practiced by the nations surrounding ancient Israel would sacrifice babies in firey ceremonies. This is the more common concept of Hell as it is understood today.
However, contrary to popular belief, there is really no clear indication of what this Hell really is. The only thing explicitly mentioned is that it is a state of being separated from God. (Contrasted to Sheol, where God exists.) Although the whole fire and brimstone image has become commonplace, it is more a result of selective interpretation of texts, most commonly Revelations and Dante’s Inferno. However, Revelations was a dream of John, and he even makes this clear. Now I rarely understand any of my dreams, so why should I take anything in John’s dream at face value. There is also another mention in another book of the pit of fire, but it really doesn’t say what this is in reference to.
So basically the only thing explicitly said about Hell is that it is not a nice place to be. But if God really is as great as He is supposed to be, isn’t absolute separation from him one of the worst punishments one could have? Who needs fire and brimstone?
What’s really scary about Jack Chick is the statement of faith on the website… I’m a moderate Christian* and I actually agree with most of that there statement – but I disagree with nearly everything in the comics and on the rest of the site! It’s very disturbing to me, because he points to his statement of faith when people ask him what he believes, and I can see how it might give people the wrong idea – about him and/or other Christians!
*the trick with describing how conservative/liberal a Christian one is is this: in the Christian community, I would probably be described as a fairly liberal Christian (okay with homosexuality, don’t really care about the evolution/creation debate, wavering on the whole abortion thing, etc.), but in the non-Christian community, I’m definitely not seen as “liberal.” So it’s difficult to state one’s demographics and not have people assume that one fits in this box or that box. If anyone has a way I can get around this – on this board, at least – please feel free to let me know! 
photopat wrote:
Life? Pah. That’s just plain old Biocentrism talking. 99.99999% of the Universe appears to be inhospitable to life as we know it.
Obviously, the Creator’s favorite creation was interstellar Dark Matter, 'cause there’s so darn much of it.
As already demonstrated in this thread, there are those of us Christians who do not believe in the hell of Jack Chick and his type. For those who may be interested I’ve got a list of essays on my website explaining from Scripture why Eternal Torment is not an accurate doctrine. The essays are at http://drewcosten.tripod.com/salvation.html
The way Jack Chick presents his material looks very close to the way I understand Southern Baptist to be.
Getting stopped by someone trying to save you is pretty common in my parts. The line they always put out first is, “You are saved by the belief in Jesus Christ and no other way.” They detail how the evil person who believes will be saved, while the good person who doesn’t believe will burn.
I would not go so far to say it is a majority view down here, but it is a very common one.
**I would be interested in reading some
of the essays on your site, but the
formatting gives me a **big headache.
And who say’s Dark Matter isn’t alive?
As author Terry Pratchett wrote in one of his books (Reaper Man-check it out), about Azrael, the ultimate personification of death:
“Most of the universe is made of dark matter and only he knows who it is.”
By the way, just a quick plug, Terry Pratchett has said in interviews that he’s a huge fan of The Straight Dope.
