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Originally Posted by galveston I Jn 5:10-12
10 He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.
11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.
12 He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.
(KJV) |
As Peter exclaimed when Cornelius had related to him how he was instructed to send men to Joppa:
"Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation, he that feareth him and worketh righteousness, is accepted of him."
It is a very odd-shaped Christian that looks for reasons to shut men out of heaven.
The idea that some men have formed about the nature of the justice, judgment, and mercy of God, is too foolish for an intelligent man to think of. for example, it is common for many Christians to believe that if a man is not what they call
converted, that is, if he dies not knowing Christ then he must remain eternally in hell without any hope. Infinite years in torment must he spend, and never, never, never have an end; and yet this eternal misery is made frequently to rest upon the merest casualty. The breaking of a shoe-string, the tearing of a coat of those officiating, or the peculiar location in which a person lives, may be the means, directly or indirectly of his damnation, or the cause of his not being saved.
Let us suppose a case which is not extraordinary: Two men, who have been equally wicked, who have neglected religion, are both of them taken sick at the same time; one of them has the good fortune to be visited by a preacher man, and is converted a few minutes before he dies. The other sends for three different praying men, a tailor, a shoemaker, and a tinman; the tinman has a handle to solder to a can, the tailor has a buttonhole to work on some coat that he needed in a hurry, and the shoemaker has a patch to put on somebody's boot, none of them can go in time, and the man dies and goes to hel;.
One of thisd pair of men is exalted to Abraham's bosom, sits down in the presence of God, and enjoys eternal, uninterrupted happiness, while the other, equally as good as the first, sinks to eternal damnation, irretrievable misery and hopeless despair, because a man had a boot mend, the button-hole of a coat to work, or a handle to solder on to a saucepan.
The plans of Almighty God are not so unjust, the statements of holy writ so lacking , nor the plan of salvation for the human family so incompatible with common sense as some would have us believe. At such proceedings God would frown with indignance, angels would hide their heads in shame, and every virtuous, intelligent man would recoil.
If human laws award to each man his deserts, and punish delinquents according to their several crimes, surely the Lord will not be more cruel than man, for He is a wise legislator, and His laws are more equitable, His enactment more just, and His decisions more perfect than those of man; and as man judges his fellow man by law, and punishes him according to the penalty of the law, so does God of heaven judge "according to the deed done in the body." To say that the heathens would be damned because they did not believe the gospel would be preposterous, and to say that the Jews would all be damned that do not believe in Jesus would be equally absurd; for
"how can they believe on him of whom they have not heard, and how can they hear without a preacher, and how can he preach except he be sent;"
Consequently, neither Jew nor heathen can be culpable for rejecting the conflicting opinions of Christian sectaries, or for rejecting any testimony but that which is sent of God, for as the preacher cannot preach except he be sent, so the hearer cannot believe without he hear a "sent" preacher, and cannot be condemned for what he has not heard, and being without law, will have to be judged without law.
It is shameful that some confessing to be Chritsian messengers are nothing more than ill-informed 'separators' who take delight in condeming people to Hell for no reason that is supported by God, Jesus, or the holy prophets and apostles whose writings we have when we take time and trouble to understand their messages.
Those who practice their Christianity by means of
Condemnation and Hell by Prooftext are shameful and devilish, and should repent, and remain silent until they understand the message of the teachings of Jesus.
Henry Ward Beecher, an influential nineteenth century American clergyman, delivered a lecture in Nashville, Tennessee, titled
"What Christianity Has Done to Civilize the World," in which he said:
"
What has Africa done for the world? She has never produced a sage, a philosopher, a poet nor a prophet, and why not? Because the name of Christ and the influence of Christianity are scarcely known in her dark regions. Millions of her children have lived and passed away without hearing the truth. What will become of them? Will they be forever damned? No, not if my God reigns, for they will hear the gospel in the spirit world."
Did Rev. Beecher know what the Bible taught? He did!
Was he stuck in a little backwater with a collection of two or three prooftexts that distorted his view of the whole of the scriptures? He was not!
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