A gracEmail reader who is weighing the claims of Christ writes: “I cannot hold in scorn humans whom I know to be decent and caring, simply because they have a different belief about salvation. Is my Jewish friend a sinner because he practices his religion? He certainly does many of the very things we ascribe to Jesus as being virtuous.”
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I have discussed some of these points in more detail in several short articles and brief booklets on my website which I encourage you to read. Those would include “What Calvinists and Arminians Have in Common”; “The Saving Love of God”; One Life, Death & Judgment”; “Four Gospel Slogans”; and “The Grace of God.”
Some Christians are quick to say that everyone who does not know Christ now is certainly finally lost. I think they say more than Scripture says. Others who profess to be Christians are quick to say that everyone who lives a decent and generally moral life now is certainly finally saved. They, also, say more than Scripture says. I have tried to state in these four gracEmails what I believe Scripture does say, which turns out to be both less and more than some others might speculate.
May God bless you, guide you and teach you as you consider these things (John 6:44-45). Others are not responsible based on what you and I might know. We, however, are responsible for how we respond to the light that we personally have. Through no merit of our own, we have been blessed with much light, especially this — that “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
