" And then there is the
infamous crucified thief! He was (is) certainly a Christian, yet the
resurrection happened after he had shuffled off to the next level."
Why do we say that the theif is a Christian? I say this in a retorical
sense, for the simple reason that we say that any of the people who
truely believed that Jesus was the son of God. I think the theif relized
that Jesus was underserving of the same punishment he was receiving
because he knew who Jesus was. Because of that, Jesus (i.e. God) forgave
him and he became a Christian.
What is a Christian? Today we say one who believes Christ is God who
came to earth as a man and although perfect was crucified for our sins.
This person should also believe Christ rose again, concurring sin and
death.
Now we can argue special cases of people who may or may not have the
capacity of understanding all this, but I do believe in a just God who
"'will give to each person according to what he has done.'" (Romans 2:6).
And that this means that those who have some sort of mental imparement or
are too young to understand the gospel fully will be judged seperately
from those of us who are capable of reading and understanding the gospels
and epistles.
If one is to include 'exception' or 'what about ...' in the discussion,
hten it must be stated straight out. In fact, i don't even think we can
or even should be debating this subject, and simply except that we know
God is just and will treat people according to their faculty (i.e. he
will treat each of us differerntly). Paul makes this point when he is
speaking to the Roman Jews in Chapter 2/3 when he says the Jews are more
accountable than the Gentiles, because they have the law and should know
of God and Christ. Similarly, we as fully faculative people are more
accountable than those who are with less faculty (by this i do not mean
IQ but normal mental ability). I have said more than i have intended to.
John M.
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Email: jmisasi@engc.bu.edu
@bu.edu
@darwin.bu.edu
Center For Advanced Biotechnology at BU Home Page
http://eng.bu.edu/CAB
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