Today’s Grace Talk included the following question…

If someone fully believes that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and rose again, yet they are a murderer and kill a ton of people, will they still go to Heaven? Why is there Judgment Day if it is black and white – People who believe in Jesus go to heaven and people who do not go to Hell? What is Judgment Day when we stand before the Lord for then?

Who Goes to Heaven and Why

There is a lot going on in this question. We’ll start by taking a look at the questions raised in the first sentence.

If someone fully believes that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and rose again, yet they are a murderer and kill a ton of people, will they still go to Heaven?

Strictly speaking, people do not go to heaven because they believe that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and rose again. Heaven is the eternal destination of all righteous people. Everyone who is without sin is going there. Of course, no one but Jesus Christ is righteous. That’s bad news.

Fortunately, there is good news! Christ has made his righteousness available to his followers. Anyone who has faith in him will be saved from their just punishment. This saving faith is sometimes referred to as “belief in Christ.” When the Bible uses that phrase, it is another way of saying faith in Christ. Simple belief in historical events or theological truths do not constitute saving faith (see James 2:14-26).

Assuming that our questioner means saving faith, we still have the question about our hypothetical convert being a murderer and still going to heaven. There are two ways to understand the question. Perhaps the believer in question was a murderer before coming to faith. Or perhaps the person in question is a professing believer who kills “tons of people.”

In the case of the murderer who is converted after killing many people, I think of Romans 5:6, which says “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” I also think of I Corinthians 6:9-11…

9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Here, Paul could not be more clear that God saves some pretty terrible people. No one is beyond God’s ability to redeem. The fact that we even think that some people are too far gone to be saved betrays our own lack of understanding of how far we were gone when God saved us. We may not have a stack of dead bodies, but our sin is just as heinous to a righteous, holy God.

Now let’s consider the case where the believing person goes on murdering, thinking he will go to heaven because he has his ticket punched, so to speak. Our I Corinthians 6 passage speaks pretty directly to this. While no redeemed person will live a perfect life of obedience, Paul warns us not to be deceived into believing that a life that is characterized by a continued lack of remorse over sin is a sign of one who will inherit the kingdom of God.

Judgment Day

Our questioner goes on to ask…

Why is there Judgment Day if it is black and white – People who believe in Jesus go to heaven and people who do not go to Hell? What is Judgment Day when we stand before the Lord for then?

To answer these questions, we need to clear up some details about the final judgment. While there will be separating of believers and unbelievers, this is only the beginning of the judgment–not the end. The judgment is more about our works than our beliefs.

Here are three critical aspects of the final judgement that Wayne Grudem points out in his Systematic Theology.

1. Jesus will be the judge. This is clear from 2 Timothy 4:1, Acts 10:42, and John 5:26-27.  

2. Unbelievers will be judged. Unbelievers will be held to account for their deeds.

Look at Romans 2:5-11.

5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

6 He will render to each one according to his works: 7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; 8 but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. 9 There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, 10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. 11 For God shows no partiality.

Notice that each person is being judged “according to his works,” not for failing to believe in Jesus Christ.

3. Believers will be judged. See Romans 14:10-12…

10 Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; 11 for it is written,

     “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me,
     and every tongue shall confess to God.”

12 So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.

The difference between judgment of unbelievers and judgment of believers is that believers stand in Christ’s righteousness and will not be condemned for their sin. When the chaff is burned away, what will be left are the deeds that were done in faithfulness to Christ. These works will be the evidence of our faith. For much more on this, see this message by John Piper.

A Final Note

It is important to remember that no one goes to hell for not believing in Jesus. People go to hell because they have transgressed God’s law.

Imagine a killer who is sentenced to death for murder. His family then appeals to the state governor for mercy, asking for a pardon. If the governor refuses to grant the pardon and the sentence is carried out, we would not say that he was executed because he failed to get a pardon. He was executed because he committed the crime.

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4 Comments

1. guiroo : July 9th, 2009 at 4:45 pm

   Be aware that many churches don’t teach what Eric pointed out in the Final Note section.

   If you end up discussing this with someone that has an evangelical background then be prepared to have an in-depth discussion about the details of the atonement of sin.

2. Judgment Day Follow-Up :: Grace Fellowship of South Forsyth : July 12th, 2009 at 1:25 pm

   [...] a previous post, I dealt with a question about the final judgment. One aspect of the question had to do with why [...]

3. Jeff Jarrett : July 15th, 2009 at 10:45 pm

   Above, in regards to 1Cor 6:9-11, you stated “. . . Paul warns us not to be deceived into believing that a life that is characterized by a continued lack of remorse over sin is a sign of one who will inherit the kingdom of God.” Paul doesn’t specifically state anything about remorse, however. Can you explain where you get that a bit more?

4. Eric Farr : July 16th, 2009 at 10:42 pm

   Jeff, you make a great point. Paul doesn’t refer to remorse over sin in that passage. I added that in there to avoid being misunderstood as to say that believers will not sin at all. Paul didn’t seem to be afraid that his words would be taken that way; so, I probably should have let his words speak for themselves.

   However, I do think that remorse over sin is often a better gauge of whether or not we are indwelt by Christ’s Spirit. People have widely varying natural capacities to avoid outward sins. Some lost people look much holier than many believers. I am more likely to believe that someone who sins more but is broken-hearted toward God is a follower of Christ than I am to believe that someone who is a “good person” but has no sense of remorse about that sin that they do commit is indwelt by the Spirit.

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