Death and Suffering

A major challenge to the Christian faith is how a good God could allow death. That is a difficult question, and while there are answers, none are sufficient to neutralize the pain of losing a loved one. However, in the Bible, God does not shy away from this question or sweep it under the rug. He tackles it head on and invites us to trust His goodness even in our pain and confusion. Let’s explore a bit of what God says about this topic.

Secular naturalism teaches that death is a normal part of life and that, because we are all merely highly organized organic matter, death has no greater significance than how it makes us feel according to evolutionarily developed psychological processes. When we turn from God to atheism and secular naturalism in times of grief, we thereby unwittingly proclaim that the deaths of our loved ones didn’t actually matter or weren’t “bad” in any cosmic sense.

By contrast, in the Bible, death is introduced only through man’s violation of God’s intended order (Genesis 2:15-17). People are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27) and are therefore inherently valuable, and it was God’s original desire to bless mankind in a world without corruption, suffering, and death. But Adam and Eve broke God’s Law, thereby bringing death into the world as a just consequence of their sin. Death has therefore become God’s ultimate enemy (1 Corinthians 15:26), the final obstacle to be overcome in the plan of redemption (Revelation 20:14). Note that Jesus died to save us from our sins (Matthew 1:21), and death entered the world through sin (Romans 5:12).

Therefore, according to the Bible, death is unnatural. When we experience the loss of a loved one before they’ve lived a full life, it just feels wrong, which is exactly how the Bible depicts death. Furthermore, the Bible does not call us to stoicism in times of loss, minimizing the impact of our emotions and the pain of grief so we can soldier on nobly. By contrast, we are to acknowledge the way a premature death rends the fabric of our lives, and the only healthy way to deal with such a loss is to mourn (which involves weeping, getting angry, crying out to God, etc.) until we’ve fully processed the loss. And even when we’ve “healed,” that healing is like the healing of a broken bone – it will never again be the way it was before it was broken.

Indeed, the Bible is very pro-grieving. For example, Abraham mourned and wept for Sarah (Genesis 23:2), and the Jews had very specific grieving customs by the time Jesus came along that were designed to honor the dead and help the living process their loss. Acting like everything is hunky-dory after a tragic death is not Biblical. Even if we know the person was a Christian and has gone to live with God in a place without suffering, we should at least mourn the pain everyone who loved them will now experience in their absence. No matter how blessed the eternal state of the departed loved one, it is not just OK but necessary to be upset and angry, because their death was still tragic and a sign of the corruption of creation, not a natural part of life.

Continuing in the same vein, how can a good God allow suffering?

Well, first of all, non-Christians have no cosmic right to experience either a life without suffering or longevity. As nonbelievers, they are not merely sinning, but either denying God’s very existence or, even if they admit His existence, rejecting His right as Creator to make demands upon them concerning how they live their lives.

Nonbelievers are thus vulnerable to disaster and destruction at any moment. God only prevents this for two reasons: common grace (Matthew 5:45) and the ways God tries to use blessings to call the faithless back to the faith. At the end of the day, though, God is not required to protect someone from the consequences of their own evil and ungodly behavior. People bring suffering on themselves through their willful sin. For anyone who finds this offensive, the gospel stands ready to provide an escape from these consequences through faith in Jesus Christ. 

Regarding believers, because a Christian follows God’s commandments and avoids foolish and self-destructive behavior, he should experience great blessings over time, such as family stability, prosperity, and freedom from addiction. Unlike in the prosperity theology model, “prosperity” doesn’t mean “becoming rich,” but rather developing a stable financial situation that allows for enough to survive and usually thrive on. Also unlike in prosperity theology, these are not guarantees for all faithful Christians in all times and circumstances, but rather a general mode God operates in when structuring the lives of His followers who follow His commandments faithfully.

According to the Bible, in the life of a Christian, suffering caused externally is always for a specific purpose of advancing God’s kingdom (I would characterize medical conditions, including mental illnesses, as “external” factors, since they are coming from outside a person’s life choices). Moreover, God will lead His people to healing from suffering caused by their own sin or inflicted upon them by the sin of others. Hence, if most Christians faithfully following the Gospel experienced unending external and internal suffering (other than to drive forward an extremely productive ministry, as in Paul’s case – 2 Corinthians 11:23-28), it would raise doubts about the truth of the Bible.

In fact, as sanctification progresses sufficiently, following God’s commandments to the letter should be expected to produce maximum possible happiness and sense of personal fulfillment. By contrast, going after any “sinful” pleasure would be gratifying in the short term but eventually lead to decreasing excitement and pleasure, increasing discontent and eventually misery, an increasing feeling of emptiness and lack of purpose, and eventually spiritual death (the falling apart of one’s life and accomplishments) or even physical death.

Now, even though God loves to bless His children, He will (as mentioned) allow them to suffer strategically to advance His goals. He might give them a ministry of comfort after they suffer (2 Corinthians 1:3-4) or allow the righteous to be slaughtered like sheep to build up the guilt of the wicked (Romans 8:36; Revelation 6:9-11). He also allows the righteous to be afflicted so that He can deliver them and show His power and love for His people (Psalm 34:19).

Ultimately, God allows death and suffering (for both believers and nonbelievers) for His glory. He cannot heal without sickness, nor deliver without oppression, nor triumph without enemies, nor save without sin, nor resurrect without death. Jesus states this baldly in John 9:3.

If that seems unfair, it is critical to recognize that all injustices and sufferings that weren’t self-inflicted will be made right in eternity (Revelation 21:4), which will last forever, vs. the max 120 years we have in this life. After the first billion years, do you think you will care anymore about the pain you may have felt in the first 100? Will the mother of a cancer patient child really care anymore when she and her child have been in Heaven together for a trillion years? Or, really, even after the first minute? Won’t the pain fade instantly?

Indeed, God has dictated that this life has two contradictory qualities: It is so important that it determines your eternal destiny, yet it is so temporary and fleeting that all the evil that happens in it will seem of no consequence in the next life. When we embrace this tension, we understand why suffering can co-exist with a good God who predestines everything.

In the meantime, God understands how hard it can be to trust His goodness in light of suffering and injustice. Psalm 37 and 73, for example, show how difficult it is to trust God’s plan in light of the seeming prosperity of the wicked and the hardships of the righteous. Moreover, the entire book of Job is about the seemingly senseless suffering of a highly righteous man. By including this book in the Bible, God not only allows but encourages us to wrestle with the challenge of understanding suffering.

In the book, Job is a highly righteous man with significant material blessings who loses all his wealth, his children, and his health in a very short period of time. His wife repudiates him, and his best friends accuse him of earning his sufferings. He suffers greatly for no apparent reason, and even what’s happening behind the scenes (God was trying to win a bet with Satan about how Job would respond to personal tragedy) doesn’t seem at first glance to justify the immense pain and sorrow Job experiences.

After an entire book in which Job cries out and accuses God of dealing unfairly with him, God appears to Job in a whirlwind and, surprisingly, meets Job’s misery with indignation. His response: how dare Job challenge His will?  What follows is a back-and-forth where God challenges Job’s right to question how God runs the world, while Job is mortified, apologizes, and promises to shut his mouth for good. God accepts his repentance, and Job is restored to even greater material abundance than before. 

What is the point? Well, by divine inspiration, Solomon (the author of the book) was allowed to pull back the curtain and see God’s reasoning for allowing Job’s suffering, the bet with Satan. As it turns out, the entire episode wasn’t pointless or arbitrary. God was actually proud of Job, and He wanted to prove to His enemy that Job was as faithful as God knew he was. Moreover, He wished to stamp out Job’s natural sense of prosperity theology and mature his faith in the process.

The ending of the book, however, provides a somber warning. While God has His reasons for our suffering, we are not allowed to demand them. God’s will is unquestionable. We are to accept it, no matter how hard that may be.  Christians like to believe that from time to time they can understand in retrospect why something bad happened. I don’t doubt it, and I’ve had that experience myself. But if it weren’t for Solomon and his role in preparing God’s future followers for a life of service, would Job’s suffering have ever been explained? Probably not. God doesn’t consider himself responsible for revealing His reasons in every circumstance. But we know two things: there is always a reason, and all things work together for good for those who love God (Romans 8:28).

Difficult as it may be, we can find some comfort there. But we must never cry foul as Job did, demanding an audience with God. He loves us, but He is still too glorious for that. We must simply trust that when we get to Heaven, all will be explained.

Importantly, though, we must also remember that the Bible is pro-emotion. The Psalms alone are an outpouring of all kinds of pain, grief, anger at God, mistrust of God’s goodness, panic, and a number of other emotions that modern American Christians consider scandalous. Our culture’s refusal to feel and express emotions, especially ones that involve even temporary negativity toward God, comes from stoicism, not the Bible.

We are allowed to feel and express all our anger, hurt, and frustration when we suffer, because our suffering is evil. God does not cause our suffering, nor does He like it, but He does sometimes allow it for our good and His glory. We can and should seek God for comfort in such times.

Original Sin

As long as we’re exploring the question of how God could allow death and suffering, we should explore the Fall, where all of it started.

In the beginning, God created Adam and Eve, blessed them with paradise, and gave them a single commandment to follow. Satan, however, lied and told Eve that God was lying to them about the forbidden fruit and that they would prosper by breaking God’s Law. Eve instantly believed Satan and broke God’s one and only rule. Adam then willingly joined her in her rule-breaking.

Now, at the time Adam and Eve sinned, the only thing we know about them is that they were made in the image of God. They couldn’t have been created with a “sin nature,” so this raises a very difficult question: if Adam and Eve were made perfect and in the image of God, why did they sin? Is there something sinful in God’s nature? Obviously not, so what happened?

Looking at things this way reveals that a sin nature is not necessary to sin. Moreover, Adam and Eve’s sin is not portrayed as fundamentally different in nature than the sin of anyone else in the Bible, so the whole idea of a sin nature or a “covenant of grace” replacing a “covenant of works” is suspect. Something else is happening here.

My proposed solution is that God is inherently innocent. He has a Peter Pan heart: ever youthful and always trusting. Because He is the highest being in the universe, this presents no problem for Him. However, when we who are made in the image of God are placed under the authority of someone who decides to pursue evil, such as Lucifer, this innocence that we inherit from God becomes gullibility and naivety. We become like senseless sheep, trusting too easily and quickly being led astray.

Wisdom in life comes from recognizing this inherent gullibility. We must learn to recognize and follow the voice of the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-29), who will protect us with His guidance. Otherwise, we will be inevitably led astray, for we are herd animals, not predators. If Jesus is not our Shepherd, one who wishes to exploit us will become our shepherd.

God’s innocence explains how despite being in control of history and knowing the future, He can be sorry that He created man (Genesis 6:6), regret making Saul king (1 Samuel 15:11), or hold out hope that the Judahites would repent (Jeremiah 26:3). Even though He knows what will happen, He hopes and even expects that people will do the right thing, simply because it is the right thing to do. He is perfectly innocent.

We therefore do not have a sin nature. Instead, because we are under the influence of evil authorities, we are easily convinced that sinning will lead us to prosperity and blessing. And, as Genesis 3-6 demonstrates, what starts out as simple naivety quickly devolves into extraordinary wickedness, violence, and perversion. We can only be saved from this by being brought under the care and guidance of Jesus. Fortunately, in Heaven, there is nothing accursed for us to be led astray by (Revelation 22:3), so we will be perfectly righteous for all eternity.

Predestination

This leads us to the topic of predestination, the idea that God chose those who would be saved before the foundation of the world. Predestination is not only a word taken directly from the Bible (Romans 8:29-30; Ephesians 1:5, 11), but the concept is referenced many times in Scripture, such as Ephesians 1:4 and Acts 13:48, as well as every use of the phrase “the elect.” Moreover, it is very obviously the way things have to work, because the idea that God is not in complete control of history is clearly inconsistent with the Bible’s portrayal of God (see, for example, Deuteronomy 31:16-21). If God were not sovereign, He would have to depend on chance and human decisions to execute His plans, and He would not necessarily be able to enact His purposes in every situation.

The difficult question then comes up: how could a good God choose some people to be predestined to damnation? (Note: the technical term for such people in Christian theology is “reprobates.”) Romans 9 addresses this topic directly, once again proving the Bible does not shy away from difficult questions.

Romans 9:14-18 indicates that God has mercy and compassion on whom He has mercy and compassion, and the rest He hardens. Romans 9:19-21 explains that God is not unrighteous to do so, even though people cannot resist God’s will, because as our Creator, God has the moral right to dictate our purpose, much as we can choose to do what we want with the things we own.

Romans 9:22-24 indicates why God predestined some to be reprobates: contrast. Much as with the question of why God allows suffering and death (so He can heal and save), God needs some to be damned to truly demonstrate His grace toward His elect. As much as this might offend us, God is our Creator and can justly do with us what He wills.

But how does God harden without committing sin or engaging in evil? This goes back to the issue of our senseless naivety. People sin by following their own foolish desires, to their destruction (James 1:14-15). God can intervene and assist man through changing external circumstances or overwhelming the heart with the Holy Spirit. When He neglects to do so, that is what hardening is.

Why is this not evil? Well, if a parent continually warns two children not to fight, lest they hurt each other, and they refuse to listen, then end up hurting each other, is the hurt the fault of the parent for not physically restraining them indefinitely? Indeed not. Likewise, it is not God’s fault when a person follows their own desires, no matter how much God tries to warn them of the consequences.

In fact, God always warns in abundance, because He is longsuffering (Exodus 34:6) and slow to anger (Nahum 1:3). That is what the prophets were for. Consider 1 Kings 22, 2 Kings 17:13-23, 2 Chronicles 36:15-21, and the various references to “rising early” in Jeremiah. Is it His fault if we persistently ignore His warnings and entreaties to return to the old ways that bring healing and prosperity (Jeremiah 6:16)? God is not morally required to force us to listen to His warnings – He is proven graceful merely for giving us fair warning. Remember, even if God pronounces judgment on a nation, and the nation repents, God will always relent of the disaster He planned to bring upon it (Jeremiah 18:7-8). Even Zedekiah was given a chance to repent right before the destruction of Jerusalem (Jeremiah 38:17).

Note that because of our naivety, God is always the last resort for the natural man, who will try anything and everything else first. God merely takes advantage of that to allow some to go to destruction, but He shows His love and grace to others by opening the eyes of their hearts in such a way that when their foolish attempts to live outside of God’s Law finally fail (as God had repeatedly warned them they would), they cry out for deliverance in crisis and are saved.

Now, importantly, God does not want anyone to go to Hell. He “desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). He takes “no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live” (Ezekiel 33:11). That is what God wants, but not what He wills. Will is not about desire but rather making your intentions reality. That’s why a “Last Will and Testament” makes your final wishes reality.

Romans 9 indicates that God’s will is to predestine some to salvation and some to damnation. But why would God will something that He does not want? Because as the sovereign of history, God must make decisions for His glory and the glory of His beloved Son. He chooses to allow things He doesn’t want to happen to become reality, as in the garden of Eden, because without sin, Jesus could never have been a savior. Hence God permitted sin, although He hates it. And Jesus could not be the kind of savior He is in our reality without enemies and reprobates, so God permitted those to become reality as well.

Similarly, God sometimes allows His followers to sin and fail, as a consequence of our choosing to ignore His commandments, so as to bring about a greater overall situation that works all things together for the good of those who love God (Romans 8:28). As previously mentioned, God pointed out to Job at the end of his trial that He has a lot of moving pieces to manage at any one point in time, and He cannot always ensure perfection for each of His children in every single moment. Thus, God does not always protect believers from themselves when allowing small failings would advance His plans.

Hell

Probably the biggest sticking point for any nonbeliever when assessing Biblically literal Christianity is the issue of Hell. “I just don’t see how a loving God could send people to eternal torment.” “No one deserves Hell.” Et cetera.

How do Christians defend against this? How do we reconcile a loving God with the eternal conscious torment that is described as the final destination for the wicked?

First, we must recognize that no one would object to predestination if everyone were predestined to Heaven. The only challenging question is how being predestined to Hell can be considered fair and reasonable.

Second, let’s be very clear that Hell is completely off the table for Christians. If you are “in Christ,” you have escaped condemnation (Romans 8:1) and have an advocate in Heaven who intercedes for us before the Father, Jesus Christ, the propitiation for our sins (1 John 2:1-2). While I will address the confusion around eternal security shortly (whether we can “lose our salvation”), the Christian who is walking in faith is not going to “slip into Hell” if he sins. His sin is accounted for and forgiven, and any failures to keep God’s commandments are covered by the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

There is therefore no need to be anxious about Hell. If you desire to be in right standing with God, all you have to do is believe in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, repent of your evil ways, and proclaim Jesus as your Lord and Savior (Romans 10:8-10). If you do these things, you cannot be denied salvation (Romans 10:11). And if you have salvation, you are at no risk of Hell. Any preacher who preaches fire and brimstone at his saved flock is therefore abusive and wrongheaded.

Third, Hell is not a punishment specifically for rejecting Jesus as the Messiah. Rather, it is a just punishment for your sins. Jesus is simply a “get out of jail free” card that allows you to avoid the punishment you rightly deserve (John 3:17). Rejecting Him does have the seeming effect of sending you to Hell (John 3:18), but only because literally every person in the world is headed to Hell without Jesus to save them (Romans 3:10-18). The only way Jesus’ offer of salvation affects your eternal state is that by becoming aware of God’s Law, you will receive a greater punishment in the afterlife if you do not repent, because you should have known better (Luke 12:47-48).

Fourth, people are generally OK with the idea of some kind of punishment in the afterlife. Would you be OK with Hitler receiving a firm slap in the face upon death, then being annihilated and having no further consciousness? Most of us would. How about a mild eternal punishment for Hitler, such as being allowed into Heaven but denied chocolate for all eternity? Most of us would not only be comfortable with that but consider it generous, considering the mass murder and destruction he inflicted upon the world.

That means the real issue is eternal conscious torment (ECT) for nonbelievers. I have already explained how predestination of reprobates to damnation is just. How about the idea of being in flame forever?

Before I explain that, let’s be clear that ECT is what the Bible literally teaches (Matthew 3:12; Matthew 26:24; Luke 16:22-24; Revelation 14:11). I have never seen an argument put forward for an alternative to ECT that wasn’t based on some attempt to work around the issue of the seeming horror and injustice of ECT, rather than an honest attempt to take the Bible literally and seriously. This is little different than what I’ve previously discussed concerning alternatives to creationism.

Challenges to ECT don’t hold up. For example, it is pointed out that the body and soul are destroyed in Hell (Matthew 10:28). However, the word for “soul” is “psyche,” which does not include the mind. Thus, the body and the part of the consciousness that connects the mind to the body are destroyed, but the conscious part of the damned person that can experience pain is preserved.

So how is ECT fair? Simple: a sinner is by definition a spiritual criminal. You are a spiritual criminal. Therefore, in evaluating a fair and just punishment for your crimes, you are partial and biased and cannot be trusted to assess them objectively. God, on the other hand, is perfect, holy, righteous, and just, having never done anything wrong ever in the history of creation. Therefore, only He is qualified to say what a fair punishment for sin is.

Ever heard a story where a criminal attempted to murder a judge who passed down a perfectly fair sentence on him? Ever wondered how the criminal could not clearly see that his own lawbreaking was the reason for his incarceration, not the judge? If you have an issue with ECT, you are that criminal. You are the one who is angry at the Judge for His righteous sentencing, not yourself for your many acts of lawbreaking and wickedness. That is why ECT doesn’t make sense to you – as one who has justified lawbreaking in his own eyes, you resist or even abhor true accountability.

Thus, ECT won’t make sense to us, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong. It means we either trust that God knows better than us or we don’t.

A few notes:

• As far as unreached people groups go (people who never hear about Jesus before dying):
  • There is nothing in the Bible stating that God cannot find a way to directly connect Himself to unreached groups before Christian missionaries reach them, if He wants to.
• • According to the Bible, all men alive today descend from Noah, so faithfulness to Yahweh is at the root of every human culture. Therefore, there’s no such thing as a 100% unreached people group.
  • According to Romans 1:18-21, the truth of God is obvious to all men, and according to Romans 2:14-15, we all have the Law written on our hearts. Therefore, from the Christian perspective, it is not unreasonable to, for example, expect a man not to murder, steal, and commit adultery. That is reasonable even if the man was never offered the escape route from accountability for sin that Jesus’ substitutionary atonement represents. If you deny this, then you don’t believe people are fundamentally responsible for any sin. You believe someone cannot know murder and torture are wrong, for example, unless they’re forced by God to realize it and obey. But the average person experiences sensations upon committing such acts that clearly communicate to him that these acts are wrong, even if he chooses to suppress those sensations and thereby “sear his conscience” (1 Timothy 4:2).
• God originally designed Hell for Satan and his demons, not mankind (Matthew 25:41). Men only go to Hell because they join Satan’s side.

Age of Accountability

As long as we’re discussing Hell, it would be worthwhile to clear up the confusion around the so-called “age of accountability.” This phrase refers to the age at which some Christians believe God begins holding children accountable for their sins. Before this point, children supposedly cannot go to Hell.

The term “age of accountability” is not used in the Bible, nor is the concept discussed explicitly. In fact, there is only one instance I am aware of where age is used to determine whether a person should be punished for sin, and that is with the curse on Israel to wander in the wilderness for an additional 38 years in Numbers 14. However, while most Christians who believe in an age of accountability place it somewhere between the age of, say, 8 and 14, the Bible uses the age of 20 as the line between “little one” and responsible adult in Numbers 14:29-31.

Furthermore, we can very easily imagine that the “little ones” in this story supported their parents in wanting to return to Egypt, but if they were below the age of 20, they were not judged for their sin. This is as straightforwardly an “age of accountability” as one could hope for. I am not aware of any lower age ever being used in such a manner in Scripture.

The problem, of course, is that 19-year-olds were included as “little ones” in this chapter. If we adopt this as the age of accountability in the church, believing that those beneath the age of accountability cannot understand sin and thus cannot be punished by God for their sin, then we have a simple choice: either one-year-olds go to Hell, or the Columbine shooters went to Heaven.

In our society, our age of adulthood is 18, which means 18- and 19-year-olds go to jail all the time. We even sometimes try those younger than 18 as adults. Therefore, we straightforwardly accept that before the age of 20, people can understand lawbreaking well enough to be punished.

If you’re starting to feel uncomfortable, it is because God’s age of accountability clearly cannot excuse young adults under 20 from all moral accountability, which means that children under 20 can go to Hell, which means that the idea of the age of accountability as it is commonly understood is flawed. Instead, willful sin deserves Hell at any age, because children violate the commands of God and their parents of their own free will.

If they’re not acting of their own free will, then what force is driving them to sin? Is a demon or some other force compelling them? Obviously not – any parent can clearly see that a six-year-old child knows disobeying his parents is wrong. Even if the child doesn’t understand authority in all its complexity, he makes willful decisions to disobey his parent’s instructions. There is therefore no reasonable age of accountability that would remove a child’s need for faith in Jesus in order to be saved at any age.

Of course, a child does not need a rational understanding of the nature of salvation to be saved. A child of Christian parents is born Christian, because he is in his parents’ covenant with God and is clean and holy by extension (1 Corinthians 7:14). While some may choose to walk away from the faith as they become adults, a child of two faithful parents does not need to be born again at any age to go to heaven. God’s love for his parents extends to him.

As for the eternal punishment due a godless child, it’s critical to remember that not all reprobates are judged equally (Luke 12:47-48). I imagine a reprobate child would have much less to be punished for in Hell than an adult who progressed to more and more mature forms of sin. But to deny that young children can go to Hell is to go back to the notion that God predestining some to Hell is “unfair,” which I have already endeavored to show is false. The simple question would be: why is it any more unfair to judge a child for his sin than to wait until he is an adult and then send him to Hell? Either predestination is fair or unfair, regardless of age.

In fact, we know that even babies sin: throwing a tantrum and refusing to eat food your parents are feeding you is an act of rebellion. It’s willful as well – no one is co-opting the baby’s lungs and forcing him to scream. Psalm 58:3 confirms this. While the complexity of our sin and our understanding of salvation grows over time, they both start at birth.

On the other hand, if God chooses to love a child of non-Christian parents, He can also touch the child’s heart at a young age, before the child possesses the full rational capabilities to understand Christ’s sacrifice. A young child who does not know the gospel intellectually could thus be saved by grace as easily as he could be held accountable for his sin, especially if he is predestined to die at a young age.

When a child who did not have godly parents dies, we should simply say we don’t know where he went for sure, but we can lean on God’s goodness and hope for the best.

Eternal Security

Most Protestants believe in a concept called “eternal security,” “perseverance of the saints,” or “once saved always saved.” This is based on Scripture verses like John 10:27-29, which says that no one can snatch Jesus’ sheep out of His hand or His Father’s hand.

While it is certainly true that neither Satan nor any other force in creation can overpower God and take His children away from His protection against His will, the Bible speaks quite clearly about the concept of “falling away,” where those who are in God’s covenant appear to be able to leave it:

For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame. (Hebrews 6:4-6)

It seems absurd to think Paul would have included this statement if it were impossible to fall away. Indeed, Paul repeats the concept in Hebrews 10:26-31, and Peter says something very similar in 2 Peter 2:20-22.

These passages tie into the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:3-23), which states that there are four types of people who hear the gospel:

1. Those who do not understand the gospel, from whom Satan steals away what was sown in their hearts.
2. Those who have no root, and though they receive the Word of God immediately with joy, they stumble (or “fall away” – Luke 8:13) when faced with tribulation or persecution.
3. Those who hear the word but become unfruitful because of the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches.
4. Those who receive and understand the word, bearing fruit and producing a crop of righteousness.

In John 15:1-8, Jesus makes clear that true Christians bear fruit, and God takes away any that don’t. Therefore, according to the Parable of the Sower, there are two kinds of “Christians” (types #2 and #3) who can be in the Church, who can believe in Jesus, who can even have the indwelling Holy Spirit, but who are not predestined to be fruitful, mature believers. Tribulation and persecution will drive them away, or else the lure of sin will overcome God’s commandments in their life.

Moreover, in Luke 14:27-33, Jesus instructs His followers to count the cost of following Him, lest they not be prepared to do what is required of them. This indicates that a Christian who is unprepared for tribulation (which is promised to us in John 16:33) or for temptation could fail to be a true disciple.

Furthermore, Paul warned Timothy about a great falling away of Christians that would precede Jesus’ return (1 Timothy 4:1-3). John referred to these false Christians as “antichrists” and indicated this falling away was already occurring when he wrote his first letter (1 John 2:18). Importantly, John said “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us” (1 John 2:19). Jude’s entire letter is about these antichrists (Jude 1:3-4).

All this clearly indicates that not everyone who says a saving prayer and joins the Church will necessarily go to Heaven. However, this is not meant to provoke anxiety amongst believers. If you are nervous about whether or not you are a true Christian and are genuinely worried about losing your salvation, you won’t. False Christians fundamentally see God as a genie in a bottle or a lifestyle accessory, not a prize to be sought above all else. When God disciplines them in order to bring them to a more mature faith, they chafe and plunge willfully back into the pleasures of sin. If your heart yearns for God and you are willing to do whatever He calls you to do, then as previously mentioned, nothing can snatch you from God’s hand.

Note that your acceptance in God’s sight is not based on perfect obedience but rather your desire to belong to God’s family. As mentioned in How the Gospel Works, being part of a family means wanting to contribute to the success and unity of the family, which means obeying parents. “Falling away” is not about occasionally disobeying or struggling with the commands given to you, but rather being so disinterested in the welfare of the family that you essentially reject belonging to it altogether.

You should only be as anxious about “losing your salvation” as you are about being disowned by your parents. If you did something truly heinous without remorse or were absolutely incorrigible (see Deuteronomy 21:20), this would be a worst-case scenario your parents would be forced to consider. But most of us don’t wander around anxious about this because it is so extreme as to be outside of what one reasonably expects to experience.

Just remember, while we are supposed to fear God (i.e., respect Him and what He can do), God’s children are not supposed to be afraid of Him:

There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us. (1 John 4:18-19)

Do not be afraid of God rejecting you, because He will never leave you nor forsake you (Hebrews 13:5). Fear the evil heart of unbelief in your chest that urges you to abandon God (Hebrews 3:12), turning to God for help when your impulses to abandon God overwhelm you. If you trust in God, you will never be put to shame (Romans 10:11). Moreover, if you are predestined to salvation, warnings about Hell directed toward Christians in the epistles are meant to motivate you to protect your heart from being seduced away from Christ, and when you respond in faith, God ensures your efforts to remain faithful are successful.

Abortion

No attempt to apply the Bible to 21st century life would be complete without a discussion of abortion, so I shall lay it out for those who are unfamiliar with the Christian perspective, the “pro-life” position. The foundational principle of the pro-life position is that life begins at conception. A baby is a baby from the point of conception, even while it’s still a fetus. It is not the mother’s desire to birth the child that makes the child a child. Nor is it the point at which the fetus becomes viable and could survive outside the womb that makes it a child – from the pro-life perspective, that is no different than saying that a newborn is not a child because it couldn’t survive on its own without the constant intervention of adults. The fact that a fetus depends on the mother’s body for survival doesn’t empower the mother to destroy the fetus at will – on the contrary, the fact that the fetus depends on her completely makes her responsibility to protect and provide for it that much more serious.

As for why it’s believed that life begins at conception, one could argue secularly that it simply doesn’t make sense that a baby suddenly gets the right to life when it moves a foot from inside a mother’s body to just outside it. But the Bible also shows that a baby is made in the image of God while still inside the womb (Psalm 139:13-14). Furthermore, the textbook definition of biological life is a self-developing cellular structure, which is what a human is once it is conceived.

If a fetus is indeed a baby, then the destruction of a fetus would be a killing. A killing without justification is murder. Therefore, for an abortion to not be murder, one would have to have a justification. Arguments such as “I don’t want to grow it,” “I don’t want to raise it,” “I didn’t mean to get pregnant” and “It’s not fair” could apply just as easily to a newborn. If a mother is allowed to destroy a fetus because she doesn’t want the burden of bringing it to full term, then why shouldn’t she be allowed to destroy a newborn because she doesn’t want the burden of raising it? Of course, one could argue that you can give away a newborn immediately, whereas a fetus has to be developed. But if a fetus is a baby, as much a human being as the newborn that you cradle in your arms and sing to, then having to grow a fetus until it is ready to be born is a reasonable burden to bear in order to preserve that baby’s life.

Before we proceed any further, I want to clarify that, yes, I do believe abortion can be justified when the mother’s life is at risk. Not in every situation: if the risk to the mother is very slight, it might be worth it to preserve the baby’s life. But if the baby has no chance of survival, while an abortion would save the mother’s life, then an abortion would be justified. Such difficult and unusual cases are a question of medical ethics, no different than those that come into play when deciding whether to separate conjoined twins.

I do not, however, support abortion in the cases of rape and incest. After all, if life begins at conception, then a fetus is a human being, and killing a human being is murder, even if the human being came into existence under undesirable circumstances. It’s still alive. As much as a pro-choice person doesn’t understand the pro-life position, I don’t understand pro-lifers who support abortion for rape and incest. An unjustified killing is murder, and if a fetus is a baby, then abortion is murder. It follows naturally. And if murder is wrong and it’s the government’s job to outlaw it (something that we in the West generally accept as true), then abortion (except in cases of difficult medical decisions, as mentioned above) should be universally illegal.

One pro-choice argument is that a woman’s body is private, and that decisions about her body are to be solely hers. However, that argument could easily extend to the home as well. Homes are supposed to be private places where the government and society should not intrude. So, if the destruction of a fetus is a matter of privacy, then why isn’t drowning a two-year-old in a bathtub? If the government has the authority to override private decisions made in private homes to protect the welfare of a child, then that authority should extend to the womb as well.

Sometimes pro-choice people will object to pro-lifism on the grounds that “back alley” abortions are dangerous and unsanitary. Do pro-lifers really want abortions to be performed in back alleys, in underground locations, or with coat hangers?  If one accepts that life begins at conception, then yes. If a fetus is a baby, then abortions are an unsavory business. An abortionist is basically a hitman, hired to murder innocent children. Professional hits are supposed to be contracted in back alleys, not gleaming medical centers. Murder should be conducted in darkness in unsafe conditions, not in regulated, public locations.

Of course, this only applies if a fetus is a baby. If not, then it’s a medical procedure that absolutely should be conducted safely in a professional setting. If it is a baby, however, then an abortion is an execution, and concern about the conditions under which that execution is carried out should not justify its legalization.

On a final note, there is no question that pregnancy can pose a serious hardship. It is burdensome to every woman, but especially to the underage, the poor, etc. Being pro-life doesn’t mean being hardhearted towards the needs of pregnant women. It simply involves compassion towards the unborn baby as much as towards the mother. Genuine pro-lifism combines opposition to abortion with attempts to provide pregnant women with alternatives, including financial aid, parenting classes, community support, etc.