In a recent interview with Sally Quinn of The Washington Post, Rob Bell again muddied the waters over the question of the fate of those who’ve never heard about Jesus. In doing so he also greatly misrepresented the evangelical answer to this question. Here are his words:
“If, billions and billions and billions of people, God is going to torture them in hell forever – people who never heard about Jesus are going to suffer in eternal agony because they didn’t believe in the Jesus they never heard of – then at that point we will have far bigger problems than a book from a pastor from Grand Rapids.”
Bell is responding to evangelicals who purportedly believe that people “are going to suffer in eternal agony because they didn’t believe in the Jesus they never heard of.” Let me say this as clearly as I can: No one will ever suffer for any length of time in hell or anywhere else for not believing in the Jesus they never heard of. Should I say that again or is it enough to ask that you go back and read it again?
Bell and others who make this sort of outrageous claim have evidently failed to look closely at Romans 1:18ff. Here we read that the wrath of God revealed from heaven is grounded in the persistent repudiation by mankind of the revelation God has made of himself in the created order. In other words, there is a reason for God’s wrath. It is not capricious. God’s wrath has been deliberately and persistently provoked by man’s willful rejection of God as he has revealed himself.
The revelation is both from God and about God. Therefore, in this case if the pupil does not learn it is not because the teacher did not teach. The phrase “evident to them” (v. 19, NASB), is better rendered either in or among them, probably the latter; i.e., God has made himself known among people (and thus, in a manner of speaking, to them, in their minds and hearts) in his works of creation and providence.
Observe Paul’s paradoxical language in v. 20: he refers to God’s invisible attributes (1 Tim. 1:17) as clearly seen (oxymoron). Paul’s point is that the invisible is made visible via creation or nature. Divine wisdom, power, eternity and goodness, for example, are not in themselves visible, but their reality is undeniably affirmed and apprehended by the effects they produce in nature. That there is a God, supreme, eternal, infinite in power, personal, wise, independent, worthy of glory and gratitude, is clearly evident in the creation.
How are these truths about God made known and where may we see them? Paul’s answer is, “through what has been made” (v. 20). God has left the indelible mark of his fingerprints all across the vast face of the universe.
Theologian Robert Dabney put it this way: “They who have no Bible may still look up to the moon walking in brightness and the stars watching in obedient order; they may see in the joyous sunbeams the smile of God, and in the fruitful shower the manifestation of his bounty; they hear the rending thunder utter his wrath, and the jubilee of the birds sing his praise; the green hills are swelled with his goodness; the trees of the wood rejoice before him with every quiver of their foliage in the summer air.” Herman Bavinck put it succinctly in declaring that “there is not an atom of the universe in which God’s power and divinity are not revealed.”
Paul’s point here in Romans 1 is that this revelation is sufficiently clear and inescapable that it renders all without excuse (see Rom. 1:20). Consequently, there is no such thing as “an innocent native in Africa” any more than there is “an innocent pagan in America.”
What does Paul mean when he says that all humanity is without excuse? “The excuse that is banished,” notes R. C. Sproul, “the excuse every pagan hopes in vain to use, the excuse that is exploded by God’s self-revelation in nature is the pretended, vacuous, dishonest appeal to ignorance. No one will be able to approach the judgment seat of God justly pleading, ‘If only I had known you existed, I would surely have served you.’ That excuse is annihilated. No one can lightly claim ‘insufficient’ evidence for not believing in God” (Classical Apologetics, 46).
The problem is not a lack of evidence. The problem is the innate, natural, moral antipathy of mankind to God. The problem is not that the evidence is not open to mankind. The problem is that mankind is not open to the evidence.
Note well Paul’s words: “For even though they knew God” (v. 21a). Again, “that which is known about God is evident within them” (not hidden, obscure, uncertain, but disclosed, clear, and inescapable). There is no such thing as an honest atheist! All people know God. There is a distinction, of course, between, on the one hand, a cognitive apprehension of God, i.e., knowing that there is a God and that he is worthy of obedience, worship, gratitude, and, on the other, a saving or redemptive knowledge of God. All people experience the former whereas only the redeemed experience the latter. Thus the problem, again, “is not a failure to honor what was not known, but a refusal to honor what was clearly known” (Sproul, 51).
Paul believed the unbeliever’s knowledge of God was “real” though not “saving”. They have more than an “awareness” of God. They know both that he exists and that he is of a certain moral character and that they themselves are accountable to him. In other words, their knowledge of God brings “subjective” understanding, but not “saving” understanding. The God they truly and “really” know, they hate and refuse to honor. Their response, however, is not borne of ignorance but of willful rebellion and self-centered sinfulness.
But Paul is equally clear that all persistently suppress this knowledge (see vv. 21-32). He does not say they began in darkness and futility and are slowly but surely groping their way toward the light. Rather, they began with the clear, inescapable light of the knowledge of God and regressed into darkness. More on this below.
The reference to them as “futile” and “fools” (vv. 21-22) does not mean all pagans are stupid. It is not man’s intelligence that is in view but his disposition. The problem with the unsaved isn’t that he can’t think with his head. The problem is that he refuses to believe with his heart. The unsaved man is a fool not because he is of questionable intelligence. He is a fool because of his immoral refusal to acknowledge and bow to what he knows is true.
What is the response of the human heart to this revelatory activity of God? Paul describes it in vv. 21-23. What he has in mind involves a distortion or deliberate mutation when one substitutes something artificial or counterfeit for that which is genuine. Clearly, then, when man rejects God he does not cease to be religious. Indeed, he becomes religious in order to reject God. He substitutes for God a deity of his own making, often himself.
This leads to three important conclusions.
First, the revelation of God in creation and conscience is sufficient to render all men without excuse, sufficient to lead to their condemnation if they repudiate it, but not sufficient to save. No one will be saved solely because of their acknowledgment of God in nature, but many will be lost because of their refusal of him as revealed there. In other words, general revelation lacks redemptive content. It is epistemically adequate but soteriologically inadequate. It makes known that there is a God who punishes sin but not that he pardons it.
Second, and please note this well, the so-called heathen are not condemned for rejecting Jesus, about whom they have heard nothing, but for rejecting the Father, about whom they have heard and seen much. Whatever about God is included in Paul’s words, “his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature” (Rom. 1:20), the knowledge of such is universal and inescapable and renders all mankind without an excuse for their unbelief, without an excuse for their failure to honor God, without an excuse for their refusal to thank God, and without an excuse for turning from the one true God to the worship of idols.
Third, general revelation is the essential prerequisite to special revelation. And special revelation is that which redemptively supplements and interprets general revelation. Therefore, if by God’s gracious and sovereign enablement and enlightenment, any unbeliever responds positively to the revelation of God in nature (and conscience), God will take the necessary steps to reach him or her with the good news of Christ whereby they may be saved.
What we have seen from this brief look at Romans 1 is that God has made his existence and attributes known to all mankind in every age: people of every religion in every nation on earth. These people may never hear the name of Jesus. They may never hear the gospel proclaimed. They may never hear of the cross or the resurrection. They may never hold in their hands a Bible in their own language. But they are totally and justly and righteously “without excuse” before God for their failure to honor him as God and their subsequent idolatrous turn to created things as a substitute for the Creator.
They will not be judged for their rejection of Jesus, of whom they have heard nothing. For Rob Bell or anyone else to suggest that we believe people will suffer eternally in hell for not believing in a Jesus of whom they know nothing is a distortion of what we affirm, and worse still is a distortion of what Paul clearly taught. People will be held accountable and judged on the basis of the revelation that God has made of himself to them. And this revelation is unmistakable, unavoidable, and sufficiently pervasive and clear that the failure to respond as well as the turn to idolatry renders them “without excuse.” They will be righteously judged for rejecting the Father, not for rejecting the Son.
162 replies to "Bell’s Hell and the Destiny of Those Who’ve Never Heard of Jesus"
Dr Michael, the word is dia, and it means “by” or “through”. Though the NAS and NIV choose “through” the RSV and KJV (and others) choose “by”. In terms of the point you are trying to make, I see little difference.
As for your second point, there are numerous Scriptures which you likely do not take at face value. You understand them in term of what the whole of Scripture, and your own experience of God, tell you about his character. Are you suggesting we should not read the Scriptures through the lens of his revealed character?
Yes, dia can mean “by the means of”, which is quite different than the way Steve Martin used it. Christ is the means by which we get to the Father. Although Christ will be the judge, the judgment is not what’s in view in John 14:6. The context is “how do we get to the Father?” Jesus says it’s by Him, through Him.
Cliff, when a Scripture is difficult to understand, we turn to other Scriptures to help us determine its interpretation. What part of Romans 1:18ff is difficult and needs other Scriptures to help interpret it?
Indeed we do not jump to the whole of Scripture, we first look at what the sentence means in context of that passage. Then we go to the letter as a whole. Then Paul’s other writings. Then the whole of the NT. Then the whole of the Bible.
No, that is NOT different than the way I and my Bible (RSV) used it.
“but by me” means that He (Jesus) will be the One to decide.
@ Dr Michael
It’s not Paul’s logic I’m questioning, it’s the Calvinistic logic. It makes perfect sense that people are held accountable for refusing to acknowledge and glorify God, but it doesn’t make sense that they be rendered ‘without excuse’ when they have no choice but turn their backs on God since saving grace has been withheld from them.
I hope that’s a little clearer now.
I think it makes us all a little uncomfortable when we realize just how sovereign and big God really is and how small and bound man is to his sinful nature.
Perhaps these truths should spur us on to evangelism rather than debate?
Let us not make hold God accountable to what we think is “fair”. God is not subject to fallen man’s idea of fairness. There is nothing higher than God. He is the source of all truth, justice and mercy. Paul mentions this specifically in Romans 9:14-20:
14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” 20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?”
@ John from Down Under
I’ve tried to post a longer response several times with no luck. Please read Romans 9:14-20 (actually the whole chapter). Paul addresses your specific concern.
@Steve Martin
What support do you have that the judgment is in view here? Context? No. Greek semantical use? No. Not even lexical use, because you are not using the Greek word dia correctly. Here are some lexicons giving its top 3 meanings:
BDAG: via, through, throughout
Louw-Nida: by (agent); by (instrument); through (means)
@John Down Under,
Yes, somewhat clearer. I think it would be more helpful (and more biblical) to think in terms of “never wanting to choose”. They do not want to choose God (Romans 3:10ff) because their hearts are slaves to sin. How does a slave choose not to be a slave in the ancient world? Also there is the federal headship of Adam, who represented us in the first sin. Why are we held accountable for Adam? Because he is our representative. Could you or anyone else have done better than Adam and Eve, if put in the same situation?
Common reason tells me that’s what it means.
Don’t you think that Christ has that right? To be the
One who decides?
That is ALL that I am saying. Why any Christian would have a problem with that just blows my mind.
Dr Michael @ 26…”We should have a heart for the lost, but this should not be the foundation of our theology”…
Luke 19:10 For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost…
perhaps the foundation for our theology should not be the needs of the world and the lost but rather should be rooted in sound theological frameworks upon which which we can stand and boldly claim we are correct and true… because above all else Jesus died so that we might analyse its meaning and articulate it well in textbooks…
I love theology…but not when the love of thinking about God replaces the love of God to the point where we fall for the original sin of thinking that we too know good from evil…
I prefer to leave the fate of all who lived in the hands of the one who died for the world and begged forgiveness for those who were murdering Him… He will decide who the impentient and wicked are and who are deserving of punishment…
Given the extensive thought that Michael has devoted to understanding Christians who doubt or leave the faith, I wonder how he would respond to Sam’s assertion that there is no such thing as an honest atheist.
@Mike B
It is not Sam’s assertion it is Paul’s and therefore God’s.
What part of “Suppress the truth” is unclear. The whole point is that they we are all epistemological weasels!
The whole thing that raises God’s ire in this passage is not that men do not believe in Jesus, but what they do with the truth they have already received. They hold it down and suppress it, they distort it, and they trade it for a lie.
How is that not the obvious prima-facia reading of the passage? How many times does Paul have to say “they are without excuse” in this passage for people to get that he actually means it. And why are you surprised when you encounter people who say they do not believe in God when the whole point of this passage is that men are not honest about what they already know. You should expect exactly this to happen.
Look guys, either we submit our minds to the text and what God has said or we place ourselves and what seems right to us over the text.
Question: why is it that God doesn’t forgive everyone that makes him unjust? Isn’t it rather the fact that God has forgiven anyone at all that makes him unjust? Isn’t it also a “moral monster” who opens up the jails and lets all the murderers, drug dealers, theives, and rapists out on the streets? If we’re going to complain about injustice, shouldn’t we complain about our own salvation?
Just something that came to me.
@John
Exactly! It seems that all those opposed to this blog post are of the opinion that God is obliged to offer a means of salvation or else his judgement is not just.
But if that is true then our salvation would no longer be of grace since grace by definition cannot be owed or obligated. It God “aught” to do something or “must” do something then is ceases ot be grace whatever else it is.
The scriptural proof for this point is seen in these two verse from Romans
So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace. But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace. (Rom 11:5-6 ESV)
Grace and works are completely incompatible concepts the presence of the one nullifies the other. And at the heart of works is the notion of debt or obligation.
Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted (lit. ‘kata’: “according to”) as a gift (lit. “grace”) but as his due (lit. “debt”). (Rom 4:4 ESV)
Thus if…
Thus if God is indebted in any way to supply a means of salvation it cannot be by grace as it is not a free choice on his part. However, if our salvation is of grace (and it is!) then it can only be because we all truly deserve God’s wrath and judgment apart from any offer of salvation. And how is this not the consistent picture of unsaved man presented in Scripture? What gospel witness did the Amalekites get? Or the sons of Anek for that matter? God is not indebted to save (or offer to save) anyone!
Grace would not cease to be grace because God chose to offer it to everyone instead of only to a few.
And I will never understand what is just about punishing men for something that they do because they are born that way and have no choice in the matter. Now IF they have a choice and refuse it, that is different. But IF they have no choice in the matter but to sin because they were born sinners, (a fact that they had no choice in obviously), then why is it just to punish them for only being what they were born as? If they can not do otherwise, and are given no opportunity to do otherwise, how is it just to punish them for it?
I simply do not see any logic or justice in that whatsoever.
@Cheryl
I agree that God “could have” made sure that every living person was presented with the gospel and it still be by grace. But many here (and it would seem you yourself) are arguing that this is what God MUST do or else he cannot justly judge man. And I have argued that if God MUST do it then it cannot be an act of grace. Do you follow.
Cheryl, it sounds like you are stuggling with the issue of original sin (cf Rom 5:12ff: Ps 51:3-4) and coming down on the side of Pelagius (ie that man is born innocent and without sin).
If man is not born guilty and desrving judgment from conception (as David afirms) then how is it that infants can die? How has death spread to non-sinners?
I am NOT struggling with the idea of original sin. And I am NOT coming down on the side of Pelagius. And very frankly, Calvinists constantly accusing others of being Pelagians or coming down on his side just because they are not Calvinists and don’t agree with the Calvinist understanding of things is getting really old. In effect having a “heretic” card thrown at us for not agreeing with you.
I never said there was no original sin. My whole point is exactly that there is original sin–people can’t help being born that way and therefore people will sin–they can’t help it. Is it just to punish people for something they can not help but do? For being born the way they were and not having any choice? Is it just to give some a choice and say to the rest, “Tough luck. You were born that way and so can’t help but act that way. Now pay the eternal penalty for it?” Is that just??
@Cheryl
You seem to want to have it both ways. Either man is a sinner and thus guilty in the eyes of divine justince and deserving of wrath of he is not. How can man be born a sinner and not be guilty at the same time. This is a very strange deffenition of sin you seem to have.
I was not trying to slander you or call you a herretic, but honestly this is EXACTLY the issue Pelaguis wrestled with. I am just trying to point you to the historical context of this debate and identify some of the correlative of your position.
Original Sin as Taught By Paul in Romans 5:12ff follows htis logical argument:
1. Only sinners die thus If you can die then you are proved to be a sinner
2. If you are a sinner then you must first have been a law breaker
3. The only law those who died before Moses could have broken is the Edenic law.
4. Thus in Adam we all sinned and are thus truly guilty.
Only guily sinners (or those who take the sin of others upon themselves) can die. If a perosn can die they are a sinner and deserve wrath.
[…] Will people suffer in hell for not believing in the Jesus they never heard of? — Sam Storms gives a great answer to this question. (HT: Trevin Wax) […]
[…] Sam Storms, “Bell’s Hell and the Destiny of Those Who’ve Never Heard of Jesus“ […]
If I found a way to create little life-forms, and I predestined them to hate me, rebel against me, and then in my rage tortured them for that rebellion; and if I went on endlessly creating such creatures, condemning them with everlasting torture for their misdeeds, you would all call me a horrendous monster.
But, John, Jeremy and others continue to beat the drum that God is fully justified in condemning his creatures to everlasting torture because it is, after all, what we all deserve. Strange logic.
@Cliff,
Cliff I have not breathed a word about predestination.
The drum I beat is the plain and clear teaching of Romans 1:88ff and Romans 5:12ff. Until anyone here offers some alternate exegesis this entire discussion seams to boil down to a dispute between those who believe the Bible and those who don’t like what it says. If that is the case then leave me alone and take up your problem with God directly.
Let me be clear on this point. I have no other goal than to rightly understand what the Bible teaches and then to submit my whole person to it. If you are not reasoning with me FROM the text (and not TO it) then we have very little to talk about.
Jeremy,
If your conclusion is the only valid way to read those text, and your reading of them leads you to the inescapable conclusion that God is a monster, what exactly holds you to the Christian Faith?
My point had to do with earlier comments in which you were justifying God’s judgment based on the evil in the hearts of men. I have no argument with you on that count. But it demonstrates that even you feel the need to offer justification for God. That’s good! But the larger issue is not that God punishes rebellious creatures. It is that he goes on creating rebellious creatures, locked hopelessly in their rebellion, and then punishes them for it. If you want to come to God’s defense, please tell me how that is by any stretch of imagination justifiable.
@Cliff,
My conclusion is based on the evidence cited from the texts that I refferenced. I am persuaded by my view otherwise I would not hold it. But I am open to other arguments and evidences from the text put forward to explain the text.
If you or your friends would care to put forward an alternate exegesis (meaning you reason from the text and not from whatever happens to seem right or good in the sight of your own eyes) then I will be happy to interacts and think through it. So far this has not happened.
In Sam’s opening post he offered an exposition of the first chapter of Romans. No one has in any way responded to his exposition from the text he is citing. Until this happens nothing said in opposition has any credibility or relivance to this discussion becausae you are not interacting wiht his argument but simply saying you don’t like his conclusion. We must start with the text (I really don’t know how many times I must say this) and go where it leads us, even if where it leads us is not where we would initially like to go.
@Steve Martin, you said
“Why any Christian would have a problem with that just blows my mind.”
This is a straw man argument. The issue is not who will judge, but what basis they will be judged on. And to that, Scripture is very clear.
@ Barry, you said…
“I prefer to leave the fate of all who lived in the hands of the one who died for the world and begged forgiveness for those who were murdering Him… He will decide who the impentient and wicked are and who are deserving of punishment…”
This issue is not over who gets to judge and why. The issue is over what happens to those who’ve never heard of Christ. And to that, the Bible has made clear in Romans 1:18-32; 2:14-16; John 14:6; Acts 17:22-31 and more.
So yes, the judging is done by Christ. But he has not left anyone with an excuse, having revealed a natural (unsaving) knowledge of Himself to all men everywhere.
What is obvious from Scripture is that God will move heaven and earth to bring the gospel to those who are being saved through him, even those who’ve yet to hear the name of Jesus, as evidenced by the conversions of Cornelius and the Ethiopian dignitary. That’s why we go. God has children he is saving in the uttermost parts of the world, and we are his instruments to accomplish his great mission.
This sounds a lot like you want us to play by your rules or you’ll take the ball home with you! 🙂 To show what I mean, let me turn it around:
Why would you willingly allow the text to trump everything you know about what’s good and right? Why would you rather go with what seems to you the right way to treat the text – no matter what slander it puts against God’s character – rather than allow your conscience, hopefully informed by the Holy Spirit, to allow you to defend God’s character to whatever extent necessary, even against the “plain” reading of the text you hold so supreme?
i dont no why people h8in on Ron bell so much. I read Love Whins, and it totaly minstered to me.
Cliff, I so completely agree with you and JFDU. AS Michael has pointed out on different ocassions you don’t see many people going around with their eyes plucked out. Why is it that Non-calvinist always seem to go to that, Paul said it so you should believe it status. I believe in what Paul said , I just don’t think they(calvinist) are always correct with how they interpret. As you have mentioned how can one be without excuse if they aren’t enlightened or enabled. That’s not a mystery but a non-starter for me.
@Steve, I’m saying if we can’t agree on the rules there is no point in playing if I think it’s football and you’re playing baseball. It would be a fruitless conversation
Steve: Why would you willingly allow the text to trump everything you know about what’s good and right?
Jeremy: Becaue I am a finite sinner and my views on these things have changed over time. Also if the Bible is God’s Word then it has His authority. To quote from a little further in Romans 3:4″Let God be found true though every man a liar.”
Steve:Why would you rather go with what seems to you the right way to treat the text… … than allow your conscience, hopefully informed by the Holy Spirit, to allow you to defend God’s character to whatever extent necessary, even against the “plain” reading of the text you hold so supreme?
Jeremy: Because I would not pit the Holy SPirit against the Word He authored. Because I do not elivate my own sense of right higher than what God has said…
Is it just me or do those who dissagree with Sam pretty much agree that he is teaching the prima-facia meaning of the text?
How can you ask us to change our view of Romans 1 when you offer no coherent and viable exposition of the text?
I mean seriously, do you just ignore passages like this, or tear them our of your Bible completelly?
Jeremy: You said “Either man is a sinner and thus guilty in the eyes of divine justince and deserving of wrath or he is not. How can man be born a sinner and not be guilty at the same time.” You miss the point” We are all guilty, calvinist and everyone . God is not just when from this point on he picks(chooses) only certain ones only by his enablement or whatever and then there is no offer of salvation(or opportunity ) to the rest and yet you cry they are without excuse. That in my opinion, is not the God I know, love or worship.
Jim: “We are all guilty, calvinist and everyone . God is not just when from this point on he picks(chooses) only certain ones only by his enablement or whatever and then there is no offer of salvation(or opportunity ) to the rest and yet you cry they are without excuse.”
Jeremy: what you are saying is incoherant. How can we be both guilty in the law’s sight and yet have an excuse against our guilt? Or are you still holding to the belief that the final judgment will be in regards to what you did with Jesus? If that is the case you completelly miss the point of Sam’s post.
Man is judged for his sins. He has no excuse to avoid the judgment, especially he does not have the excuse of saying he did not know God existed, or that He would judge people (since they judge others) and he will hold them to the standard not of His Word but of the evidence of the law on their consciences. Against this he has no excuse.
How does the fact that not all hear the gospel change this?
[…] has been considerable response to my earlier post entitled, “Bell’s Hell and the Destiny of those who’ve never heard of Jesus.” One issue that came up repeatedly was my denial that there is any such thing as an “honest […]
Cliff,
You must have totally misunderstood me. I am not a Calvinist and I am an inclusivist. I don’t think it makes sense to say it’s just to judge men who by their nature can do nothing but sin, anymore than it is just to punish cats for not solving algebra problems. I believe in a God who is good – not ‘cuz he sez so but because he actually is.
I was just pointing out, pardoning the sins of anyone at all is a grave act of injustice – if we’re going to be offended about injustice, then we should start there. How dare God let us off the hook!? How dare he attribute our sin to the spotless Lamb!? This is injustice, and hundred of years ago people would have found THIS the morally repulsive part of the Gospel, not the punishment part. I think it’s important to keep that in mind – our sense of ‘justice’ changes with the culture.
Sam this is a great post.
I actually recently engaged over why people are in hell and what they are punished for. I boldly stated “for rejecting Christ” … however after further reflection and disussion with a friend, I realized my folly. Romans 1 speaks to an utter rejection of God. This post reminds me again of that truth, and to be more careful with my words when engaged in debate.
There appears to be a pre conceived “opinion” that we all deserve to go to heaven. That we can have real excuses . I too with my own understanding of right and wrong can not see the God I know and relate with ever condemnuing anyone to hell . But I can not see God dragging someone to heaven either if they did not want to . In our sould I believe we know who God is and inside we know if want to humble ourselves to Him or not . But I would never take the position of this writer in suggesting evangelizing and spreading the good news is just for clarification or education , no its done for eternity sake.
I am a Calvinist, but nothing I have argued demands a Calvinistic point of view. Wesley was an Arminian and he firmly believed that all men are lost without personal faith in the gospel and that this is the reason why we must make every effort to get the gospel to all men.
All that has been argued here is that natural revelation and original sin leave man guilty and without excuse.
To my understanding this is somehting that classicaly Arminians and Calvinists have agreed upon, only Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians would take issue with this.
@ Jeremy
You seem to be missing the main point of the counter argument, and without meaning any disrespect, you are responding with the sterile predictability of every other passionate Calvinist who has interacted in this blog.
It’s déjà vu for us, same-ol, same ol, round and round in circles we go. The reason (I believe) is why you and so many others can’t understand the counter argument, is because your theology is shaping your understanding of the scriptures (I’m yet to hear an honest admission to that). You are approaching the text loaded with presuppositions, hence EVERYTHING you read is distilled into a permanently fitted Calvinist filter. You’re locked into this theology. Bottom line, you are telling us what we’ve heard thousands of times.
And please stop saying “the text CLEARLY teaches”. If so many can’t see what you see, it can’t POSSIBLY be that clear can it? The fact that you have to go to such great lengths explaining it, means that it’s not THAT clear.
@John,
Until someone puts forward a viable alternate exposition of the passage I will feel quite comfortable with my contention that the text does indeed clearly teach this. In this entire discussion is is the only treatment of the text that has been offered, is has no competition.
After all, your whole argument seems to be simply “What you are saying this text says in my opinion makes God out to be a monster.” I mean am I missing something or is there any further argument that I have missed?
This means that we all do pretty much agree on what the prima-facia meaning is. It IS CLEAR, you just really, really, really, don’t like it. Your sense of justice has real problem with it. Correct? So then it simply comes down to the issue of what has more authority the text or your sense of right and wrong?
Read Romans 9 to see which side Paul comes down on that dispute.
I have said it before and I will say it again. The text of Romans is undisputable in its meaning.
@ John from down under
I’m waiting to hear a counter argument that actually interacts with Romans 1. Do you have one? If so, I’d love to hear it. If you don’t agree with what others say “the text clearly teaches”, then tell us where they are wrong. Tell us how Romans 1 fits in with a different understanding of scripture, one that isn’t loaded with Calvinist presuppositions. (By the way, see Jeremy’s previous post concerning non-Calvinists who would agree with his interpretation).
Looking forward to your reply.
@ Jeremy
Since this discussion is turning from linear to circular, here are my parting comments before I get off the bus.
No one is saying that wicked, unrepenting, rebellious sinners are not guilty or don’t deserve the judgment of God. That’s just plain unequivocal justice.
What WE ARE SAYING (and please try and understand this, it’s not science), you can’t claim on one hand that people are ‘without excuse’ whilst you simultaneously believe that people can’t respond positively to the revelation of God in nature unless they are
divinely enabled & enlightened (Sam’s words). You can’t have it both ways.
To a non-Calvinist it makes perfect sense to call people ‘without excuse’ because they COULD HAVE responded (given God’s general revelation in nature) but CHOSE NOT TO. You guys believe that even if they want to, THEY CAN’T, unless divinely enabled. So the question then becomes ‘how can they be without excuse since they are unable and HAVE NO OTHER CHOICE?’…
…Furthermore, even if they DID acknowledge God in nature, it makes no difference in the end because they are doomed to the fires of hell unless they are ‘elect’.
I hope it’s clearer now. Not looking for acquiescence, just understanding what we object to.
Thank you, John. Well said.
Jeremy, a 1000-word limited comment format is hardly the place to develop a “God-friendly” hermeneutic of Romans 1! You keep falling back to “the meaning of the Scripture is clear, all other lines of rational thought be damned”. I don’t get it. Do you really have no response to the rational thoughts presented here by fellow seekers of God? Or do you just choose not to respond?
@ HUGH
Sorry didn’t see your post before. Read my last response to Jeremy. My objection is not with how Romans has been interpreted (that people are justifiably condemned for refusing to acknowledge God through general revelation in nature).
What is contradictory to ‘the other side’ is how this fits within the Calvinistic framework. Once again, why are they ‘without excuse’ if in YOUR belief (not ours) they have no other choice unless they are granted saving grace? ‘No excuse’ becomes a non sequitur.
Just to clarify; the meaning of Romans 1 is as clear as daylight, what IS NOT CLEAR is how YOU believe they are rendered ‘without excuse’ since they have no choice BUT reject God since regeneration has been withheld from them.
I understand the Calvinist answer to this ‘tension’ (contradiction to me) is compatibilism. I get it but it doesn’t resolve the ‘mystery’. It seems like a theology of convenience to explain the unexplainable.
@Cliff,
Would you really have me abandon what I truly beleive the text says while no arguments from the text have been brought forward? Do you really think that would honor God?
@John,
Thanks for your afirmation about Romans 1. Many here do not agree with you and me on this point. Yet you have put words in my mouth (or more realistically put straw men it). I am a staunch Calvinist yet I would whole heartedly afirm the following:
1. All men are free to do whatever they want and can choose whatever they desire.
2. No one who wants to come to Jesus will be unable to, or turned away.
3. All men are truly and honestly bid and invited to come and will be permitted to come if they so desire.
4. Any man who does not suppress the truth about God or stops suppressing the truth about God and instead desires and thirsts for the righteousness of God will have it (through gospel means of course).
Now, given these assertions, please explain what your beef is.
[…] Bell’s Hell and the Destiny of Those Who’ve Never Heard of Jesus (tags: article reclaimingthemind samstorms hell soteriology theology paul romans) […]
Jeremy:
#3 But the article sam wrote has all men not being invited, only those enabled or enlightened.
We all understand the rest of your theology and I agree with alot of it, but again you can’t have it both ways …..if God is only offering Salvation through a special enabling which is offered to EVERYONE then man would be without excuse, but your suggesting that this enabling is NOT offered to all and that it is only through this enabling that salvation can come, then how do you reconcile this as being an truly and honestly bid and invitation to come and will be permitted to come?
quit the I have the real understanding of the text attitude. It is like me accusing you that you don’t belive in John 3:16 ….that Jesus came to die so ALL can have salvation trhough him.
[…] 2. Sam Storms: Bell’s Hell and the Destiny of Those Who’ve Never Heard of Jesus […]