[Bill,
May 15, 2007]
Asking the question we're not supposed to ask
Will many be saved? You remember Jesus' answer to that -- enter by the narrow gate, for the way that leads to destruction is wide.
But no, really, will many be saved? I've wondered about this, and know that I'm not getting an answer this side of the grave. Perhaps pointless to speculate.
Some people point the number somewhere around the middle of the bell curve -- if fewer people in this life choose God, then the Devil would have some glory over God. Nonsense, I reply. It could be my personality, but I suspect the answer is somewhere on one side of the bell curve or another -- that is, almost everyone will be saved, or very few.
I even read of a near-death experience where the individual said he was told about three percent are saved. Ninety-seven percent of the population doesn't make it. Only those who sincerely put God first in their lives, who walk the talk about confessing Christ, actually make it. The rest get stuck in a dark place.
I've also read of near-death experiences that seem to indicate there is a place after death where you have an opportunity to be purified -- that is, to choose love. You stay there, in the dark, alone with your thoughts, until you choose love and God. At which point, other beings help you grow up. Call it time-out. This coincides more with my Catholic faith -- that all who seek God may have a shot at it.
But I also know enough about the attractiveness of sin in my own life, and its stubborn refusal to go away, to recognize that this dark place could be home for many for a long, long time. Perhaps salvation would be possible, but the purification process may be so difficult that many are ensnared for eons, and others, forever. Plus, the Catholics talk about final impenitence, and this view of the afterlife kind of discounts this life, which seems to be about learning to trust God.
Lastly, the bottom line is whichever of these is true, or whatever is true, is actually true.
I dunno. Which do you think?
But no, really, will many be saved? I've wondered about this, and know that I'm not getting an answer this side of the grave. Perhaps pointless to speculate.
Some people point the number somewhere around the middle of the bell curve -- if fewer people in this life choose God, then the Devil would have some glory over God. Nonsense, I reply. It could be my personality, but I suspect the answer is somewhere on one side of the bell curve or another -- that is, almost everyone will be saved, or very few.
I even read of a near-death experience where the individual said he was told about three percent are saved. Ninety-seven percent of the population doesn't make it. Only those who sincerely put God first in their lives, who walk the talk about confessing Christ, actually make it. The rest get stuck in a dark place.
I've also read of near-death experiences that seem to indicate there is a place after death where you have an opportunity to be purified -- that is, to choose love. You stay there, in the dark, alone with your thoughts, until you choose love and God. At which point, other beings help you grow up. Call it time-out. This coincides more with my Catholic faith -- that all who seek God may have a shot at it.
But I also know enough about the attractiveness of sin in my own life, and its stubborn refusal to go away, to recognize that this dark place could be home for many for a long, long time. Perhaps salvation would be possible, but the purification process may be so difficult that many are ensnared for eons, and others, forever. Plus, the Catholics talk about final impenitence, and this view of the afterlife kind of discounts this life, which seems to be about learning to trust God.
Lastly, the bottom line is whichever of these is true, or whatever is true, is actually true.
I dunno. Which do you think?
Because I doubt that I'm one of the ones who will make it directly there.
On the other hand, the older I get, the more powerfully I find myself tending to the opposite end of the spectrum: namely, that many will be saved. God "desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth." (1 Timothy 2:4). God's will is that all be saved. It may be possible, as regards one's own salvation, to resist God's will, impenitently and in perpetuity. Possible, but not easy.
I mean, think what it is to resist the will of God: "Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend to heaven, thou art there! If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there!... If I say, 'Let only darkness cover me, and the light about me be night,' even the darkness is not dark to thee, the night is bright as the day; for darkness is as light with thee." (Psalm 139:7-8,11-12) Where any possibility remains, God continues to pursue us, with a will to our salvation; even into the heart of darkness, God continues to pursue us. I think my awareness of this has grown and deepened as I've grown older, precisely in those times in my life when I was in the heart of darkness, and yet found that God was with me there in the darkness.
Like I say, it may well be possible eternally to resist God's salvific will. Possible. But not something easily or accidentally or trivially to be accomplished.
To put it paradoxically, the possibility of embracing such an impossibility ought to make us shudder.
Though, like I say, the older I get the more I'm content to leave such final matters to God and to his Christ. To whom could we more confidently leave such matters, trusting in perfect mercy and perfect justice?
1) God does not make junk;
2) One damns oneself; therefore, given time, one can save oneself.
3) Eternity is one Hell of a long time.
But that does raise an interesting consequence-question: once saved, can a man become damned? Again?
Memo to me: less Jack Daniel's on the pulled pork next time.