The Hope of the Believer . . .

The Hope of (he Believer...No. 9 

WHO ARE THE LOST? 

He who believes and is baptized shall be saved. He who disbelieves shall be damned.— Mk. 16:16 

The point of this article is that we should allow the Bible to tell us who will be lost rather than to take that judgment upon ourselves. In approaching Scripture on this question there are two possible positions that we can take. We can point to the fact that the Bible tells us who will be saved and conclude that all others will be lost. This is the position that most people take. Or we can recognize that the Bible tells us who will be lost and conclude that all others will be saved. This is the position that I will take in this installment, which should strengthen our hope in the goodness and mercy of God.

Let's set the options clearly before us:

The Bible tells us who will be saved. All others will be lost.

The Bible tells us who will be lost. All others will be saved.

In the Scripture quoted above only two classes of people are referred to, believers and disbelievers. The believers will be saved, the disbelievers will be lost. But how about another very large class of people, the unbelievers? Unbelievers, those who have not heard or not rejected the gospel, are never condemned in the Bible. It is always the disbelievers, those who consistently and finally reject the gospel, that are condemned. I therefore conclude that believers are saved, disbelievers are lost, and unbelievers are non-lost (or saved by God's mercy). I use "non-lost" so as to distinguish between being in covenant relationship with God, being Christians and members of the Body of Christ, and receiving God's mercy because of an inability or lack of opportunity to believe. Unbelievers will not, of course, be saved as Christians but because they are non-lost, that is, they are not among those that the Bible says are lost.

The Bible nowhere says or implies that everyone is lost except those that the Bible says will be saved. In our missionary zeal we often assert that the multiplied millions on some vast continent are lost because they are not among those that the Bible says are saved. We do not stop to think what kind of God we are advocating when we say such things. Does the God of heaven, who is full of compassion and love, condemn untold millions to hell for not believing what they have had no opportunity to believe, or for not obeying what they did not know to obey? Does a just God exact of a person that which he has had no chance of doing?

It is a fact of Scripture: It is always the disbeliever who is condemned, never the unbeliever. It is the one who persistently and finally rejects the light of God who is lost, never the one who has had no chance to see the light.

Another way to look at this is in reference to these three rather neglected passages of Scripture:

Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men1 resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life.— Ro. 5:18

God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.— Ro. 11:32

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. -1 Cor. 15:22 

In the first passage the apostle Paul makes it clear that just as Adam's sin consigned all people to condemnation, so Christ's act of righteousness brought justification to all people. The second passage states plainly that God made everyone disobedient (in Adam) that he might have mercy on all (in Christ). Everyone dies in Adam, or are made sinners, according to the third passage, but in Christ they are all made alive.

There is no way to escape the "all" in these verses. In Adam all are condemned; in Christ all are made righteous. This means that because of Adam's sin those countless millions on that dark continent (along with all the rest of us) are lost, or were lost until Christ's righteous act of dying on the Cross saved them and saved us all.

So, because of these passages we can affirm two things. All people are sinners (because of Adam's sin). All people are saved from their sins (because of Christ's righteous act).

We could leave it that way and rejoice in the universal salvation of all mankind. But there are other truths in Scripture that force us to conclude that there are some who will be lost. These are the disbelievers, those who persistently and finally reject God's grace when it is offered to them. This is evident from Mk. 16:16: those who disbelieve will be condemned. There are numerous verses like Jn. 3:36: "He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." Such truths show that not everyone will be saved. Some will be lost, which means there is an exception to the "all" passages referred to above. Everyone will be saved except those who disbelieve.

This means that our missionary message to that dark continent can go this way: God has saved you through Jesus Christ. Will you accept it? Those who are the elect will accept it and confirm their salvation. Those who reject it confirm that they are not of the elect and will be lost. But the free choice is theirs to make. If they reject the gospel, which they could accept, they are lost.

This is a different message from the bad news that is often given: Everyone is lost and in sin, so you must believe and obey to escape God's wrath. But the gospel is good news, not bad news. The good news is that God has saved everyone through Christ. One only needs to accept it by believing and obeying. Only those who reject the message will be lost.

So a passage like Ro. 11:32 means that God will have mercy upon all— except those who persistently, repeatedly, and finally reject him. We put it that way because they may at first reject the gospel, as we know many do, but finally accept it. Only when one finally rejects the gospel is he lost. God is longsuffering. He is willing to wait, wait, and wait for one to accept him, for he is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to the truth. But some will not. Those who are persistently disobedient will be lost. Everyone else will be saved.

We may think of the saved and lost in reference to baptism. Mk. 16:16, quoted above, says that those who believe and are baptized shall be saved. We may conclude that those who are unbaptized are lost. But this does not follow. It is better to say that those who refuse to be baptized and thus reject the gospel are lost. There are millions that are unbaptized because they have never even heard of baptism. It is rejecting God that condemns people, not being ignorant of God, unless indeed it be a willful ignorance. Willful ignorance is a form of rebellion and rejection.

An immediate response to this thesis is that if it is only disbelievers that will be lost why take the gospel to the unbelievers of the world, for in preaching to them you only run the risk of making disbelievers of them? Leave them in their unbelief and they will be saved!

This is an understandable objection, but it implies an unacceptable view of the nature of God: that God is going to condemn people to hell for not believing when they had no chance to believe. So the one who raises this objection has the serious problem of believing in an unjust God. The objection also fails to recognize the gospel as God's means of calling those he has elected to be his children.

We are to preach the gospel to all nations and to all people not only because it is God's will that we do so but because this is how God calls his elect ones. Those who become believers are the elect; those who reject the gospel are the nonelect. Notice how Paul connects election (or calling) with the gospel. In 1 Thess 1:4 he says to the church, "knowing, beloved brethren, your election by God," and in the next verse refers to the gospel coming to them "in power and in the Holy Spin L" Then to the same church he says in 2 Thess. 2:13 that "God from the beginning chose you for salvation," and then in the next verse he says "God called you by our gospel."

God knew already (even from the beginning) who would be saved and who would be lost at Thessalonica. He sent them the gospel so as to confirm this. The elect heard the gospel and obeyed it and were saved; the nonelect heard but rejected and were lost. And yet each one was free to accept or reject. It is simply that God knew from the beginning what they would do. God calls or elects through the gospel. Anyone can become one of God's elect by believing and obeying the gospel. Those that reject the gospel confirm that they are not of the elect.

Another instance of this is when the Lord appeared to Paul while he was in Corinth in order to keep him in that city, telling him to "Speak and do not keep silent," and then told him "for I have many people in this city" (Acts 18:10). God had already elected them and they were already in a sense God's people, but this was to be confirmed by their believing and obeying the gospel. Those in Corinth who rejected Paul's preaching confirmed that they were the nonelect.

Too, we should not think of taking the gospel to people just to keep them out of hell, assuming that is their destiny. Even if I knew a man would escape hell in his unwillful ignorance of the gospel, I would want him to know our blessed Lord and to grow in the grace of God. The purpose of the gospel is not as much to keep people out of hell as it is to bring them into the fellowship of Christ and the joy of the Holy Spirit both in this world and the world to come. God has a plan for every person which will extend into all eternity, but it begins in this world with the good news of Jesus Christ.

We are also to realize that even when unbelievers have not heard the gospel they are not without some light from God. John 1:9 says he gives light to every person born into the world. Acts 14:17 shows that God never leaves himself without witness, and in Ro. 2:14 Paul refers to Gentiles "who do not have the law, by nature do the things contained in the law." He speaks of "the law written in their hearts," to which their consciences bear witness, "accusing or excusing them."

It appears that the apostle speaks of the light that is within each person and in nature—moral conscience, natural law, innate light, or however one might express it. There is therefore "the principle of available light" by which each person is judged. The gospel is the full radiance of God's light as revealed in Jesus Christ. But those who may never be exposed to gospel light nonetheless have some light. This is why Paul condemns those in Ro. 1:21 who "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." These are condemned not because they rejected the gospel (which they had not heard) but because they had rejected the knowledge of God that they had in nature and in their consciences. They knew better than to "worship and serve the creature rather than the Creator" (verse 25), but they did so anyway. This made them disobedient to the light they had and therefore lost.

But the apostle finds others who do in their hearts the things the law requires, and these will receive "glory, honor, and peace to everyone who works what is good" (Ro. 2:9). So, in a way we already have "believers" and "disbelievers" among those people who are unevangelized in that they have already received or rejected what light they have. This is another reason to take the gospel to them, for those who have responded to the lesser light of the law of nature will surely respond to the greater light of the gospel and thus be confirmed as God's elect. And there may be some, even among those whom "God gave up to uncleanness in the lusts of their hearts" (Ro. 1:24), who will be moved by the power of the Holy Spirit in the preaching of the gospel, and at last become God's elect. It is only those who persistently and finally reject the gospel (or whatever other light they have) that will be lost.

It should strengthen our hope to realize that our great and merciful God never leaves himself without witness in that he gives at least some light to every person born into this world. And he judges them on the basis of the light they have, "according to what a man hath, and not according to what he hath not." And our heavenly Father is abundant in mercy and longsuffering. His mercy is so overflowing that he saves everyone through his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ— everyone, that is, except those who persistently and finally reject him. Even for these he keeps on waiting.

"Because your mercy is better than life, my lips shall praise you" (Ps. 63:3). —the Editor