New Tough Questions 1

Tough Questions, Tougher Answers

3/7/18

Q: How can God send people to hell who have never heard the gospel?

A: First of all, let’s review what the Bible is about the character of God. It says,

He is fair and just, “Shall not the judge of all the earth do right” (Gen 18:25).

He is love, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love” (1 John 4:8).

He is holy, “But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct,” (1 Pet. 1:15)

He is perfect, “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect“ (Matt. 5:48).

He never changes, “For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed” (Mal. 3:6).

He is merciful, “To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him” (Dan 9:9).

Now, these passages should be enough to assure us that God will always do what is right and just with all people everywhere.

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So what about those who never hear the gospel? What will happen to them? Will they go to hell?

First, people don’t go to hell for rejecting the gospel; they go to hell for their sin.

Paul makes this clear in Ro 1:18, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”

Notice, God’s wrath is focused on the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men...at their sin, not at those who reject the gospel...The whole reason we have a gospel is due to the sin of mankind.

And it goes further to inform us that all sinners possess a level of truth and, “suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”

So according to the Bible, it’s not that men don’t know the truth about God; they know it and they suppress it! They push it down and try to avoid it.

Paul goes on to say that God has unfolded the knowledge of Himself to every human being on earth by the things He has made.

Vs. 19 “Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.”

There are two kinds of revelation given to men—GENERAL and SPECIAL.

General revelation speaks of how God has revealed Himself in Creation for all to see.

Special revelation is called "special" because it is not given to all people in all places. At certain times throughout biblical history, God chose to reveal Himself by miraculous means. Special revelation includes physical appearances of God, dreams, visions, angels, the prophets, the written Word of God, and most importantly—Jesus Christ.

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So general revelation is what verse 19-20 in Romans 1 is talking about—God has revealed Himself to all mankind by the things He made:

Ro. 1:20 “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.”

So first, it says that the knowledge of God is manifest in all people, on the inside of them, to their souls and to their understanding.

There is an instinctual knowledge of the reality of God within every human being.

Ecclesiastes says, “He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart;” (3:11)

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Yet sinful people, in their desire to live in sin, suppress that truth.

This is why Jesus said, “Their sentence (future judgment of mankind) is based on this fact: that the Light from heaven came into the world (Jesus), but they loved the darkness more than the Light, for their deeds were evil” (John 3:19).

So no matter who it is or where they live—from the crowded streets of New York City to the remotest jungles of Africa, God has revealed Himself to every person’s heart, but sinful man chooses the darkness of sin over the light.

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Therefore, the Scriptures suggest that those who never hear will be judged for not responding to what they DID know...

You see, the Bible reveals that, if you respond to general revelation, to the light that you DO have, God will get the special revelation of Jesus Christ to you.

There are many examples in the Bible.

We see Cornelius in the book of Acts, who was a Gentile that did not know about Jesus...

Yet the Bible says that Cornelius was “a devout man and one who feared God with all his household, who gave alms generously to the people, and prayed to God always” (Acts 10:2).

But hee was’t saved! He knew nothing of Jesus! But we see that he responded in faith to the light that he did have, primarily the OT knowledge of God.

And God saw to it that Cornelius heard the gospel of Christ by sending Peter himself to his house so that he could be saved.

In another example, we find the story of the Ethiopian eunuch, also in the book of Acts (8: 26-40), who is in a chariot reading the Prophet Isaiah where it talks about Jesus, “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and as a lamb before its shearer is silent, so He opened not his mouth.”

But this eunuch had no clue who Isaiah was talking about. So God spoke to Philip, who was in the midst of a city wide revival, and sent him into the wilderness straight to this man’s chariot, told him to join the eunuch, and explain Jesus Christ to him.

The eunuch was saved!

My point is, when a person responds to the light they have, God will move heaven and earth to get the gospel to them so they can be saved.

The fact is, the majority of the human race don’t do this...they don’t respond with a desire for more light.

Instead, they suppress the truth and remain in their sin.

Hence, Paul goes on in Romans 1 to spell the sad tale of most of mankind, “Because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened” (vs. 21).

So my answer to the question, “How can God send someone to hell who never heard the gospel?” is that they all receive a knowledge of God to which they either respond, or not.

If they don’t respond, they will die in their sins and face the judgment.

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Q: Why is the God of the Old Testament so mean?

A: I understand this question, especially if you don’t know the Bible well and happen to read some of the OT accounts of God’s judgments.

For instance, we read of His commands to Israel to wipe out whole cities, inducing the women and children of pagan nations, as they make their way through the conquest of Canaan.

We read of very tough laws like, if you curse your parents, or commit adultery, or worship a false god, you are to be stoned to death.

The OT God, to the unregenerate or un-renewed mind, seems unfair and harsh.

Probably no one expresses their distaste for the God of the OT more vociferously than militant atheist Richard Dawkins, who writes,

“The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”

And perhaps no one on earth is more ignorant of the truth of the God of the Bible than is atheist, Richard Dawkins.

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The fact is, the God of the OT and of the NT are one and the same!

The God of the Old Testament is anything but the relentlessly bad-tempered taskmaster people like Dawkins make Him out to be.

The Old Testament Scriptures are forever describing Him as "merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy."

They refer to Him as a God who "has not dealt with us according to our sins nor punished us according to our iniquities" (Psalm 103:8-10; Exodus 34:6, 7).

As a matter of fact, all of the biblical authors agree that God's love and God's judgment are actually two sides of the same coin.

Fire can burn. Fire can also provide warmth and comfort.

It all depends on where we stand in relationship to the flame!

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First, The God of the Old Testament is seen in relation to His revulsion to sin and anger toward it.

His unvarnished, full on response to sin and it’s dire consequences is revealed in all it’s terrible fullness.

But the fact is that sin deserves death, and God’s response to it in the OT confirms this over and over.

God is holy, and we’re not. The way He views sin is not the way we do. We marginalize sin, cover it up, make light of it, and revel in it.

God on the other hand is revolted by sin, maximizes its consequences, exposes the gravity of it, and must respond to it with judgment.

The Prophet Ezekiel states, “The soul that sins, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:20).

And God’s judgment of sin in the OT affirms this repeatedly!

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But He is also merciful to the max in the OT.

For instance, when we read of the cities God ordered His people to destroy in Canaan, we fail to take into account that God had given them over 400 years to repent!

One of the nations in the Promised Land God ordered His people to destroy was the Amorites.

In Genesis 15:13, 16 God says to Abraham, “Your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs (Egypt), where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years….Then in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”

So to understand what was happening when the people of Israel stormed the cities of Canaan and slaughtered their inhabitants, we need to go back over 400 years.

The return of Israel to the Promised Land from Egypt corresponded with the “completion” of the iniquity of the Amorites.

This is the meaning of the slaughter of the peoples of Canaan.

God timed the arrival of his judgment with the fullness of the sin to be judged. Not before. God did not jump the gun.

He was, in fact, longsuffering and endured the idolatry and sins of the nations for centuries, giving them “rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying [their] hearts with food and gladness” (Acts 14:17).

So God’s judgments in the OT were always tempered with mercy, long suffering, and multiple opportunities to repent.

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The incredibly good news is that, when Jesus hung on the Cross and died for our sins, died in our place, and took our judgment, God was essentially creating a firewall between His wrath against sin and the human race.

If you turn to Christ His Son for salvation, the wrath of God will never fall on you for your sin, for your sin is wiped away by the blood of Jesus!

ILLUS: Settlers and fire

LET’S PRAY