Recently I received this extended comment on my post 'Being Good Part 2':
Someone who isn't a Christian will not 'struggle' with sin. They'll just do it, without caring what God thinks.
Does this in some ways mean that they are not to blame for this sin, and thus can incur God's forgiveness, as it is not a struggle, since they in effect have nothing to struggle against?
I am having many, many problems with "No-one comes to the Father except through Me" at the moment, and I think this is related.
This, to me, implies that knowledge and acceptance of Jesus is a prerequisite to salvation. This brings up the problem, however, of those who do not 'know' (I find know very limiting in English!- it's the French distinction that I need!) Jesus being necessarily 'damned', although for want of a better word, as I understand that this should not be passive, but active, as in someways damning is done to oneself with God. In my mind there are three groups of people that this affects: those pre-incarnation; those who, because of remoteness have no access; and those who are not exposed in the correct way to the Gospel (I think Gandhi is the best example, being turned away from a church). for the first group, I can see that this is filled by an "implicit" belief in Jesus through faith. The second and third groups, however, seem to be excluded from Salvation because of the exactness of this passage - "no-one".
I cannot reconcile this with my faith!
Hope you can convince me otherwise!
Loads of good questions raised here! And I think they are indeed closely related.
The book of Romans is a good place to turn to here. Romans 1 argues that all men are accountable for their rejection of God: 'For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities- His eternal power and divine nature- have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.' (v20) Paul argues that 'Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin' (Romans 3:9)- the Jews, because they had God's law and knew what was right and wrong and yet failed to obey; the Gentiles, because God's glory is evident through creation and they 'suppressed the truth by their wickedness' (Romans 1:18). Quoting Psalm 5, Paul writes 'There is no-one righteous, not even one' (Romans 3:10). And because God is holy and just He cannot tolerate sin. He must punish it because it would go against His nature to ignore it.
But God has made a way for us to be seen as righteous in His sight, through sending Jesus. With Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, if we trust in Him, we can come before God and God will see Christ's perfection, not our sin. This is what Paul means when he says 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood. He did this to demonstrate His justice, because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished- He did it to demonstrate His justice at the present time, so as to be just and the One who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.' (Romans 3:23-26)
Now there are still people out there who have never heard the good news about what Jesus has done. God will judge them and I cannot say what He will say to them. I do know that He is perfectly just, more just than our puny human souls can fathom or imagine. Jesus says that 'And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.' (Matthew 24:14) This means that God will wait until all people groups have been reached with the gospel before the Final Judgement. It also says that 'The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance' (2 Peter 3:9). The reason Jesus hasn't yet returned is because God wants more people to be saved. So we can safely trust that God is not rejoicing in the fact that people don't know the gospel. He desires more people to come to believe in Him. That is why it is so important for Christians to tell others about the good news of Jesus, and support mission work overseas too.
But on the 'pre-Incarnation' point, Jesus Himself made it clear that His death paid for sins past, present and future. He spoke of Abraham as alive, rebuking the Sadduccees' dismissal of the idea of resurrection of the dead. (Matthew 22:32) The only way Abraham could be with God was through Jesus' redemption for him on the cross. The writer of Hebrews also talks about the great people of faith in the Old Testament. They were saved because of their faith that God would justify them... which would happen on the cross in the future.
I hope that helps slightly. Keep seeking and you will find! Although perhaps sometimes we should not simply seek answers to our questions, but a peace of trusting that God knows what's best and accepting that sometimes we don't understand everything. Thank you for your comments!
