There is so much that divides us. While the world operates in the gentle gradient between two opposite, the media only stuff their nosy cameras in the extremes to create some noise. In Jesus’s day he had the Pharisees and Sadducees to contend with, while the intellectual apostle Paul debated with the Epicureans and Stoics. Twentieth century philosophy introduced us to Deontologists and Consequentialists until it crashed into this century with the mayhem of left and right, Liberals and Conservatives, Republicans and Democrats.

All that aside, for me the most disconcerting divide has always been the friction between believer and unbeliever. For good reason. For they are matters of the soul. The difference between life everlasting and death. What exacerbates this divide between believer and unbeliever is the threat that if you believe in Jesus, eternal life awaits, but if not, you will go to hell.

I would like to offer a moment of clarity, to clear up something gleaned from the same scriptures that you read.

Hear me out.

There are three destinies at play in this world of ours. One is a blissful afterlife promised by the Maker of the universe for those who love Him and accept His Son as having paid the price on the cross for their sins. The second is hell for those who are hostile to God and his Son Jesus Christ and as a consequence of their hostility perpetuate evil deeds. The third destiny is just plain death. A total loss of consciousness for those who have never encountered a Saviour. No soul, no heaven and no hell. These are not three hypothesis, but three realities.

Of course I have a reason for making these three distinctions. One of those reasons is that Jesus told us to go and make disciples, not bludgeon others into believing. He gave specific instructions to his disciples to look for “worthy people” and “deserving homes”, but if they are non-receptive, to leave immediately with the same peace they had when they started their evangelizing mission. Let’s read that again. Worthy people, deserving homes, same peace. As such we put too much pressure on non-believers to believe and issue too many threats if they don’t. Not to mention the pressure we place on ourselves. Of course this does not negate that the stakes are high, but anyone who proposes marriage on a first date and in the same breath threatens death if they don’t acquiesce, is a psycho. 

Another reason is that we should be more gracious to those who will never be called by God. If they are destined, pre-destined if you will, to live the best life they can in the here and now, because they will have no other, then allow them to have all the joy and happiness that they can fit into this life. Give them all their ‘rights’ and privileges, and if that means allowing them to destroy themselves through their depravities, then so be it. If this life is all they will get, let them live it to the best and to the full.

The book of Genesis opens with the creation of Adam and Eve more or less six thousand years ago. They had two sons Cain and Abel. Cain eventually killed Abel and had to flee. Before he did he bemoaned his predicament to God that he would be killed out there in the real world by other people. Where did all these ‘other people’ come from? Either Eve was a baby-making factory and God miraculously sped up her children’s growth, which was unlikely, or other humans were already living on earth when God stepped in to make Adam and Eve. Evidence suggests that God put the evolutionary train in motion billions of years ago, before picking up passengers A and E along the way. This means we’ve always had two timelines in the world, one from amphibians and or apes, the other from Adam.

This story should immediately place the Bible in its proper context, that it is a book which follows the genealogy of Adam and Eve, two humans who received “God’s breath” in addition to the freely available air already circulating to everyone in the old lineage around them. Adam’s line flows all the way through scripture to God’s own Son Jesus Christ born into the world and the tremendous impact of his death and resurrection, and then onto the lives of his billions of adopted brothers and sisters, sons and daughters throughout the centuries.

Needless to say there are so many peoples and cultures who have lived and continue to live in our world who will never hear the name of Jesus, the Saviour of the world. Knowing that God is fair, just, loving and merciful, makes it impossible to believe for a second that He would send people to hell for not embracing and believing in this Saviour that they’ve never heard of. This makes the destiny of life, decay and death, without the knowledge of God and His Son and therefore no prospect of torment, an absolute reality.

When the Bible speaks about those who are hostile to God going to eternal torment, it is still within the context of that lineage, especially those who have been called into Christianity, been adopted into the family so to speak, but who after having believed and tasted the fruit, rejected those benefits in favor of short terms gains, wandering from the truth and following lies told by others, who will go to torment. Jesus describes in his parables about the wheat and the tares that both had been ‘churched’, but the rotten in heart, the fakers will be thrown into the fire. Torment is reserved for those who have seen the light but preferred to live in the darkness. Those who have blasphemed against the Spirit, something Jesus has already told us, can never be forgiven. What else is there to be done for the rebellious? It’s a supremely valid question.

The Bible is a book which lays out a plan for salvation for the world, and indeed it is a book for the world, for anyone who is willing to listen. When God says that He is “not willing that anyone should perish”, He is of course speaking to the entire world who has heard the name Jesus Christ, because it is still in context of the Adam and Eve narrative buried inside the Holy scriptures. For those who know, love and want that salvation plan, there is eternal love, growth and opportunity, but for those who know about Christ and salvation and still reject it for any reason whatsoever, there awaits only torment. For those who have never heard that plan, their destiny ended, and will end, the day they die, even though ignorance about God is growing less likely by the day, if not already, as the gospel is preached in almost every corner of the world. In this life the listening world gets a hundred opportunities to make right with the Lord. If they reject him, what else is there to do?

If an unbeliever says that death is not a fair outcome for those with no knowledge of eternal life, then they would have to believe in that salvation destiny to assert that claim. Not so? But for believers who make this claim of unfairness should surely consider their part in their personal evangelism. In other words, if you think it is unfair, why aren’t you doing anything about it?

Jesus writes in the final book of the Bible that he has rescued a portion of people from every nation, peoples, language and tribe who have lived on the earth. This is a significant claim because it speaks of His absolute fairness and justice, that even in the face of so many who will not enter eternal life, a remnant of every living culture will be preserved by Him. Wow.

This begs a few final questions. Why would any unbeliever in their right mind, ho’s heard of Jesus Christ, be satisfied with a lifespan of seventy years, when they could have eternal life? Why would they be hostile to this amazing, once in a lifetime offer? And why would any sacrifice to that end not seem so insignificant? By the same token why would any believer who knows this already and have accepted this as their destiny, be compelled to keep this good news all to themselves? You can see the dilemma right?

Finally, the Bible teaches that God calls. We can advertise, speak, tease, cajole, threaten, beg, plead and die, but if God doesn’t call another, our efforts are futile. What do we do? I would think it obvious. Ask for God’s breath, for His calling on those we encounter. Ask Him to graft our family and friends into the living vine Jesus Christ. Ask it for yourself if you’re reading this and don’t understand what this divine romance is all about. Offer up silent prayers for those who stand beside you at the bus stop, who you work alongside at work, walking in front of you on the busy streets, the young men and women at the coffee shops and restaurants you frequent, the musicians you listen to, the politicians who frustrate you and the celebrities who entertain you. Pray without ceasing for their calling so we may share in their joy in the coming and most glorious kingdom.