Jesus, our salvation.

[Jonathan]

One of the hardest things I have grappled with in my faith, is the fact that the Gospels, while steaming forward on the internet like a lit fuse,, are not only universally available (at this time) but also were scant and hard to come by in centuries past.

What happens to the souls who never heard God's promise of forgiveness? Should they be damned on account of not accepting God's grace when they never even knew anything about it?

Here's the rub, which is really the heart of my question: The question is this:

I have witnessed several answers to this question. They essentially say that GOD is self-evident.

If God is Self-evident, why would anyone waste their time sharing the Gospel.. if it was SELF-EVIDENT?

It would seem to me to be a gross waste of time.

Assuming that sentiment is true, what happens to people who have never heard the name "Jesus?"

 

[Baby Yoda]

I have always been told it would not be counted against people who honestly never heard about Jesus. I hope they will be treated as innocent children.

 

[UntilTheWholeWorldHears]

One thing we will never know is how has God revealed Himself to those that have never heard the gospel?

 

[Salluz]

One one hand, we have Romans 10 which says

14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? 15 And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

But on the other hand, in Romans 1, Paul says

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 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 people are without excuse.

Given that I don't think any of the Bible contradicts itself, and on top of that both statements are from the same (human) author in the same book, both statements should logically work in tandem with each other. So belief in Jesus is absolutely necessary for a person to be saved as per that statement in Romans 10 (and myriad other places in Bible). But on the other hand, the beginning of Romans tells me that no one will have an excuse when it comes time for judgment.

The logical conclusion I come to based on both is that if someone comes to the correct conclusion about God based His qualities that are evident in creation, God will send someone to share the Gospel with that person so that they can believe and be justified.

To me, that says that if a mentally capable adult has gone his or her entire life without hearing the gospel, it is because he or she spent his or her entire life suppressing the evident truth about God.

If people only became unsaved upon hearing the gospel, we would basically be doing them a disservice by preaching it in the first place. That wouldn't exactly be good news. That's just my understanding of it now.

Shall not the judge of all the earth deal justly?

 

[Andy C]

WHAT ABOUT THOSE WHO’VE NEVER HEARD THE GOSPEL?​

A sound biblical answer to an age old question.

This question comes up when I teach about the only path to salvation—Jesus. The Bible says this clearly in John 14:6, where Jesus says, “No one comes to the Father but through Me.” It doesn’t seem fair to us that anyone would be excluded from the Kingdom simply because they never got a chance to hear about Jesus. Right on the heel of that question comes, “And what about the mentally handicapped who can’t understand the need for salvation? Are they condemned?” Let’s handle both of these questions once and for all.

Are You Out There God?​

First, those who have never heard. In Romans 1:20 the baseline is clearly established. Anyone able to look upon the creation is expected to understand that it couldn’t have just happened. Someone had to have made it. If our hypothetical person wonders who it could have been, a promise from Matthew will come true. Everyone who asks receives, everyone who seeks finds, to all who knock, the door is opened (Matt 7:7-8). The fact that we don’t happen to observe this happening, or even understand how it could have happened is irrelevant. The Lord promises that if you seek Him with all your heart you will find Him (Jer. 29:13). Period.

No one who couldn’t know will be condemned. But everyone is expected to at least know that there is a Creator. Interestingly, they do. Even pagan religions began with the premise that there is a god. How did they learn that? By looking around!

I am persuaded beyond reasonable doubt that once someone seeks Him, (even without knowing Who He is), God will move heaven and earth to reveal Himself to them. And He will reveal Himself sufficiently to permit an informed conclusion on the part of the seeker. Otherwise, He wouldn’t be just in condemning those who reject Him. Our God loves each of His children beyond measure and wants none to perish.

In Romans 1, Paul does write of condemnation. Not of those who couldn’t know, but of those who did know and then credited something else.

Responsibility and Privilege​

Now, what about the mentally handicapped? The principle in both these cases, by the way, is that responsibility is a function of privilege—where privilege means exposure to knowledge. The more you’ve been privileged to know, the more responsibility you have, and vice versa. Any limits on understanding serve to moderate the responsibility. The principle called “age of accountability” applies here. I think the reason this age is not clearly specified in the Bible is that it’s an intellectual age, not a chronological one.

Scripture teaches that only the Lord knows the thoughts and intents of the heart. He alone can tell if a person is capable of comprehending His offer of salvation. If so, the person is responsible for acting on it—if not, he’s not. The mentally handicapped are often intellectually immature, and like little children, they just can’t comprehend some things. All children, the Bible tells us, belong to the Lord. From their conception until they’re intellectually mature enough to comprehend and choose, they’re His. If they never reach that time, they are always His. Period.

Paul writes, “Once I was alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.”(Rom 7:9) He’s talking about belonging to the Lord as a child. When he reached the age of accountability, he became an adult. His “born saved” status expired and he had to consciously renew it (be born again) or be lost. Had he never gained the mental ability to comprehend this, he would never have lost his original status.

Consider the Bar Mitzvah, where a Jewish boy enters manhood and demonstrates his intellectual capability. At the ceremony, his father prays, “Lord thank you for giving me this son and thank you now for relieving me of any further responsibility for him. The boy is released from his father’s care and now becomes responsible for his own life as a man. Could this be one of the many examples of Jewish tradition illuminating God’s law?

God is Love​

Yes, God is love. But He’s also just and fair, and a ton of other qualities that make Him God. And because of this, He can’t be arbitrary or capricious. This means He can’t express any one of His qualities at the expense of any other. For instance, He had to die for us because He can’t just be love without also being just. His justice restrained Him from loving us as fully as He longed to because it required that someone first pay the penalty for our sins. We couldn’t, so He did, and in meeting the requirements of His justice he offered the greatest expression of His love. Love and Justice both satisfied.

If you’ve ever had an opportunity to hear His Gospel and are intellectually capable of understanding it, then you are responsible for accepting or rejecting it. That’s fair.

Holding people accountable for something they couldn’t know or comprehend wouldn’t be fair, it wouldn’t be just, and it wouldn’t be love. And God is all of those and more. Selah.

https://gracethrufaith.com/topical-...ns-answered/what-about-those-who-never-heard/

 

[Everlasting Life]

There was a lovely Chinese woman I met who'd grown up in China and not heard the Gospel nor the concept of a diety, the Chinese government was god.

As she was walking one day, she was particularly stunned by the beauty of creation and just as all inquistive humans do, began to ask herself if there was perhaps One who created this.

In her heart she called out to any possible creator asking to reveal himself. She didn't realize at the time it was a prayer in response to the light she perceived (and the Lord drawing her).

A few days later a missionary, who "happened" to be close by visited her town, shared the Gospel and many were saved, including her.

She came to the USA and later returned to be a missionary herself as she loved the lost people of China. I've never seen her again but pray for her often.

Beacause God does not want any to perish and is actively drawing and responding to hearts who need Christ, He works in such a way to make sure His Gospel gets to the remotest, most resistant places to His Gospel, despite the challenges. If He can part the Red Sea, raise Jesus from the dead, surely He can get His Good News out.

Our part is to respond to the light we have and then respond faithfully, as this missionary did, to preach the Gospel in season and out of season. And, let God be God in the sovereign power He has.

 

[Baby Yoda]

Scripture teaches that only the Lord knows the thoughts and intents of the heart. He alone can tell if a person is capable of comprehending His offer of salvation. If so, the person is responsible for acting on it—if not, he’s not. The mentally handicapped are often intellectually immature, and like little children, they just can’t comprehend some things. All children, the Bible tells us, belong to the Lord. From their conception until they’re intellectually mature enough to comprehend and choose, they’re His. If they never reach that time, they are always His. Period.