No Perfect People Allowed, Part 45: God's Fairness

God the Artist amazes me.  It rained and showered and blustered at intervals today (which I am getting a little sick of, truth be told), but all day long as we looked out our windows, we just saw rainbow after rainbow after rainbow.  We might get snow by week's end (sigh), but there's a brave, tiny daffodil that just bloomed two mornings ago in my flowerbed, whispering a tiny reminder that spring can't be far off.  I'm glad.

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Okay, back into what will probably be the last little discussion on this book that is rocking my brain.  Again, if you have any interest in helping people bridge the gap from the culture we live in to finding faith in Christ, I can't recommend it enough.  You guys know my story well enough to know that I've fought cynicism where the church is concerned, but I am finding hope and encouragement within these pages -- like there might just be a home for outsiders, a place where people can show up as-is and be embraced, just as Jesus would embrace them.

As I mentioned before, the mother-load question that people in our generation often ask of us is this: "How can you say Jesus is the only way to God?" which has a question buried just below its surface: "How can it be fair that Jesus is the only way?"  To ignore the question-beneath-the-question and simply enter into a debate with a person is risky at best, foolhardy at worst.  You might win the argument, but come off so arrogant that you lose the person (A cocky, know-it-all Christian?  Say it ain't so).

This question of what-happens-to-those-who-have-never-heard-of-Christ is one that I was never comfortable with, try as I might to come to terms with what I'd been taught.  It was so black and white -- you've either said the sinner's prayer or you haven't, you're either saved or you're not saved when you get into that car accident on your way home from church.

Now, please hear me, I'm not saying that there are no absolutes.  (I can hear people wondering if I've gone on some relativistic rampage).  I've just been challenged in recent weeks to believe that God and God alone determines those absolutes, and that maybe Christian tradition hasn't had it right all along after all, when we look at the Bible.

The measure that I was always taught for a person's faith was whether or not they had said the sinner's prayer and asked Jesus into their heart.  No prayer, no digs.

Here are some of the points from John Burke's sermon on God's fairness... I feel stupid for not considering these thoughts earlier, but here's to new perspective.  To be truthful, I'm still processing, still wrapping my head around what this is saying.  I'm not going to present it as gospel itself.  But I do know that it's challenging me to take another look at the Christian tradition I grew up with.  Some of the ideas that were presented as hard-and-fast Biblical truth -- ideas that I never questioned except quietly in the back of my mind -- well, they aren't holding up.

Ultimately, we don't know exactly how God will judge others.  We don't know their hearts.  But there are certain things we know and don't know from Scripture, according to Burke.

1.  Scripture claims that God is the God of all people, and that all people know about God simply through nature.  We also know when we're screwing it up -- our consciences tell us.  So no one has an excuse for outright ignoring or rejecting God.  God looks at the heart, not religion, of every person.  (2 Chronicles 16:9; Romans 1:16-2:16).

2.  There will be people in heaven made right with God, who never heard the name of Jesus.  (Why did this thought never cross my mind?  All the heroes of the faith who preceded Christ... are they S.O.L.?)  Abraham, Noah, Rahab the prostitute, were all made right with God by faith, which Jesus acknowledged (Hebrews 11 & Romans 4:16-17, John 8:56). If Jesus is the only way, then God took the faith they placed in the knowledge revealed to them (recognizing their need for God's forgiveness and leadership), and God looked ahead to Jesus' death on the cross on their behalf, applying Jesus' sacrifice to them.  (Again, it's not such a leap for me to believe that God can apply Jesus' sacrifice 2,000 years ago to my life.  Can he not apply it to others as well?)  Scripture tells us that people from every tribe, tongue and ethnic group will be in heaven -- not because they lived a good life or were sincere, but only because of God's gift of forgiveness and relationship made possible through Christ -- accessed by faith.  Burke says, "So I do not know exactly how God deals with those who have never heard of Jesus but are humbly seeking God, but I'm confident that everyone has an opportunity to choose life with God (Genesis 12:1-3, John 1:7-12, Acts 14:16-17, 17:30-31)."

3.  God cannot be unfair.  God looks at the heart and will not unfairly judge a person because of lack of knowledge or cultural or religious conditioning.  God will not send anyone to hell for these things -- it would have to be because they truly did not want God's leadership in their life.  God will let them have their way in this case.  Really, we shouldn't worry about God's fairness, since we can't accurately judge the heart of another, or play judge of the fairness of God.  Jesus continually talked about how surprised people will be when all is said and done (Matthew 7:21-23)... we should take that into account.  It may be that grace is much bigger than we've sometimes allowed ourselves to believe.

4.  Finally, God wants people to find confidence assurance that they are right with him, so he sent Christ.  As John wrote in Scripture, "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life (1 John 5:13)."  God wants everyone to know with confidence that they can approach him without fear of condemnation because of what he's done through Christ.  Scripture is clear -- that Jesus is the only provision God has made to justly forgive us for doing our will rather than his -- so if God sees the heart of a person who never heard of Jesus but is seeking to be forgiven and made right with God by faith, and God somehow does for her what he did for Abraham -- it is only through what Jesus did on the cross.

He closes with this thought: "Finally, the important question for you and me is not, 'What about other religions?' or 'How will God judge those who have never heard?'  We really don't know.  But I promise this, he cares more about them than you do.  Christ gave his life for them; I doubt any of us care for those people that much, so rest assured that God will be more than fair if he didn't spare his own Son for their sake.  The better question is 'What will I do with the claims of Jesus now that I've heard?' "

This is why we share our stories of finding grace... this is why we point people to Christ.  In Christ we have confident assurance that we are right with God.  Jesus did what we all demanded, that God show himself to us... and he revealed himself as God of the humble, broken, dependent soul.  The more we speak with authority on what we do know -- what God has done in our broken lives -- and admit our limitedness and God's sovereignty on the things we don't -- who exactly is right with God and who isn't -- the more we remove barriers to people finding that same grace and truth in their own lives.

I'm learning to be perfectly okay admitting to someone that there are things that I don't know.  I know enough about God -- through Scripture and through what he's done in my own life -- to trust him with the rest of it.  I'm sure he's got it under control, and I'm at peace with that.  I'd like to be a person who helps other people be at peace with it, too.

My job is done here.  Wrestle a little.  And shoot me a line with your thoughts if you're so inclined.