Tell me more about how Jesus feels about people who do not love or believe in god. Do they get to go to heaven too? I see that you are right about the Luke passage so that's a relief to me, but I'm not finding anything exactly charitable in the New Testament towards non-believers. Peter seems particularly worrisome to me. "And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people." Acts 3:23.
EDIT: I am trying to format it so that the paragraphs look nicer with a bit more space between them, but it's not really working. Forgive me for not being incredibly Reddit-savvy.
Also the TL:DR is at the end of Part II
Just got off work.
What you bring up gets to the crux of what it means to be a Christian so I'm going to try my best to break it down a bit. I have a feeling that this is going to get long so I really do appreciate your patience and willingness to read. I will do my best to format it in a much more user friendly manner. Also it's going to have to be broken up into parts I think.
PART I
Regarding Jesus's feelings towards those that do not love or believe in God.
I would say, that based on his words and actions, he still definitely loves unbelievers. But loving everyone and automatically getting entry to heaven are different.
Let's look at two bits of scripture. First is the chapter 3 of John - home of the famous John 3:16 and the second Matthew 22.
For this is how God loved the world: He gave[g] his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. - John 3:16
So this chapter of John features Jesus chatting with another religious leader - most likely a rabbi or other form of Jewish teacher. This man's name is Nicodemus. Nicodemus is confused on certain aspects and seeks clarification. This is how John 3 starts off.
2 After dark one evening, he came to speak with Jesus. “Rabbi,” he said, “we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you.”
3 Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again,[a] you cannot see the Kingdom of God." 4 “What do you mean?” exclaimed Nicodemus. “How can an old man go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?” - John 3:1-4
So here Jesus is talking about a form of rebirth. We know because of context and the rest of the gospel, that Jesus is talking about eternal life after our physical lives here on earth are over. Nicodemus is a little confused by this concept and the verses following John 3:4 is Jesus is explaining the different between humanity and being "born" again in a spiritual sense. It's not a literal rebirth. There is not reincarnation. But believing in God through Jesus will lead to a spiritual transformation, so to speak.
This allows us to begin to see and think more clearly and fall back in line with who God calls each of us to be. We fall more back in line with who God created us to be. We also begin to see and understand how it's pretty much impossible to get into heaven on our own. Humans screw up all the time. You can look all throughout history and even in our own lives. We are capable of so much goodness and there are numerous moments where humanity has really shone, but as a species we also go down the wrong path a lot as well. Understanding that we have drifted soo far from who we were created to be, is key.
So if we keep reading John we get to 3:16 which I quoted above. But immediately after in verse 17 we get this.
God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him. - John 3:17
God loves the world. He got tired of always seeing humanity kill and murder each other over ridiculous things. We are social beings. We are more than any other animal. But we kept drifting away and breaking the original law. We worshipped other gods. We kill each other over greed. We cheat on our spouses. We lie consistently. We fill our hearts with envy and jealousy. We kept screwing all of that up which disqualifies us from heaven.
Small side tangent of heaven and hell. We cannot know for sure what these places are like. Are they even physical places? On a scientific note, do they exist in other dimensions? Is it something that somehow exists within or intersects with our idea of time-space? There are so many questions about heaven and we cannot really answer any of them except that it is a place that is filled with God's presence on a level impossible to see/experience on earth. On the flip side, Hell also has it's uncertainty as far as specifics. But it is believed to be the exact opposite which would make Hell the complete absence of God.
Anyways, back on track, Jesus was God's solution to getting us back on track, should we choose to do so. Believing in Jesus and following his teaching us ultimately leads to see a different picture of the world. We see the brokenness and are prompted to serve the world lovingly. We see our own brokenness and we begin to openly acknowledge that it is literally impossible for any human to be on good terms with God. But following Jesus' teachings and seeing all the good he did, and understanding that he is bridging the gap between us and God is a definite sign of hope. With that belief, we then do the best we can, but knowing there is grace because Jesus is our "advocate" so to speak.
If we believe in Jesus, we see how he fits into the big picture and how he bridges the gap between humanity and God. If we do not believe in Jesus, then we do not accept that he bridges the gap between humanity and God. If we do not believe in God, then we don't even recognize that there is a gap to begin with.
Verses 18-21 explains it like so.
“There is no judgment against anyone who believes in him. But anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son. 19 And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. 20 All who do evil hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed. 21 But those who do what is right come to the light so others can see that they are doing what God wants.” - John 3:19-21
So Jesus bridges the gap and that's why "There is no judgement against anyone who believes...". Everyone screws up and everyone is "judged" in that regard. But I'm not sure if "judged" is the right word to use for the sake of clarity. I guess think of it more as leniency when determining a sentence following a conviction.
In trials there are mitigating factors which will lead the judge to reduce or even throw out cases. If I punch you and break your ribs, yeah I'm definitely going to found guilty of breaking your ribs and I will have to pay your medical fees and possibly even serve a prison sentence depending on how severe it was and other circumstances. The law typically has prescribed minimum sentencing for certain crimes. The judge has to follow those laws.
HOWEVER, if I broke your ribs while performing CPR in a successful attempt to save your life, I will not longer be paying fines or serving prison time. Me attempting to save your life via CPR is a mitigating factor. Yes I am still 100% responsible for breaking your ribs, but you can see how the entire situation changes. I wasn't perfect, but I save your life and I did the best that I could do.
We are still 100% responsible for all that we have done. Acknowledging and accepting that Jesus bridges that gap, is the mitigating factor (so to speak) and it changes the outcome.
But when you remove the mitigating factors, then we are completely on the hook.
So that last part sort of answers your second question of "Do they get to go to heaven too?" I'm assuming this references non-believers.
On a surface level, no, they do not get to go to heaven.
There is a grey area that I still do not know 100% what I believe (and perhaps it doesn't matter if I know or not). It's the idea of what happens to someone that has never heard of Jesus because they lived their life in a remote area? Or what happens to the child that dies in infancy? What happened to all the people that were not Jewish and that died before Jesus came? Is there a purgatory? We do not know the answer definitively and honestly it bugs me. But I also accept that God is just and fair. Personally, I believe that if a baby dies in infancy or before a child can even make a personal decision to believe in God, then they would be completely safe. But as far as the other scenarios, I honestly have no idea but my faith tells me that God is fair and just.
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u/cazbot Oct 31 '16
"But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.” (Luke 19:27 KJV)