I have recently come back from two weeks on the road in Turkey: Denizli, Manisa, Afyon, Konya, Amasya, Samson. There is nothing amiss to report about these places. And certainly nothing amiss about the road system in Turkey. They are free of the dreaded cones and lane closures, but replete with clear easy to see white markings. They make many roads in the UK blush.
Konya has history – Paul preached there when it was Iconium (Acts 14), the Mehlevi Sufis originate from there – but what struck me was its size. Wherever you looked, there were endless blocks of flats marching into the horizon, homes for about two million people.
But not home to a Turkish speaking church.
Tourists come to see an old church associated with St Paul, but as for living Christians meeting to worship God, there are hardly any.
And so, according to one reading of the Bible, going to hell. That reading says ‘All have sinned’ (Romans 3:23), so that’s everyone living in Konya. The punishment for sin is death, eternal separation from God (that’s hell, Romans 6:23) unless there is repentance and faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:26). There is no faith in Jesus Christ among those thousands of apartment buildings. There is probably either ignorance, or indifference. So, most of the two million people in Konya are going to hell – which means either eternal punishment or eternal oblivion (that’s another discussion).
If true, this is rather an alarming situation, primarily for the people of Konya. Most of them are on the verge of hell where they will be joining their families and friends.
It is also disturbing for the church. Orthodoxy says that those who do not know Christ will go to hell; yet there seems to be very little concern about the fate of the people of Konya. From her pulpits the familiar verses are proclaimed – all have sinned, the wages of sin is death, God justifies the one who has faith in Christ Jesus. The congregations say ‘Amen’.
And Konya remains untouched.
It is too easy though to blame the lackadaisical attitude of Christians for the situation. with a simple equation: if Christians were truly on fire for God and believed the Bible, then places like Konya would have had thriving churches by now.
The problem with this response is that it does not help the people of Konya. They are still seemingly going to hell. And given that revivalist type preachers have been pacing the platforms of Christian meetings asking for missionaries to go to places like Konya for at least a hundred years it seems entirely possible that the children of Konya will also be going to hell.
There should be no drawing back from Plan A. Preaching the Gospel of Christ as the only Saviour is absolutely our duty and wherever this happens and people respond churches are born and life for everyone gets better. Drunks become sober; porn addicts become decent husbands; the greedy become generous; the lazy start working; liars start being honest; conversations dribbling in sentimental tittle tattle become serious; and hearts gravitating towards tired idols start to worship the living God. It is all good. It is indeed wonderful to be involved in the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
But what of all those people living in Konya, and the generations that have gone before them? Is there only this Plan A? Must they only hear and respond to Christ as Saviour – and if not – hell?
Yes, there are verses in the Bible that seem to underline that this is the case. Jesus said, ‘I am the way the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me’ (John 14:6). That’s clear. Peter declares, ‘This Jesus is the stone…and there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.’ (Acts 4:11-12). That’s blunt. And Paul says ‘There is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus’. (1 Timothy 2:5). No wriggle room here.
If Christian truth is like arithmetic, where two plus two equals four, then certainly these verses send most of the people of Konya to hell. The question is settled and this essay is a waste of time.
However Christian truth is not like arithmetic. Indeed it is impossible to be an orthodox Christian if you believe that her truth must add up neatly. The essence of Christian truth is that it is contradictory, or to quote the preacher and writer, A.W. Tozer, – ‘Truth has two wings’. This is not difficult to illustrate. If you are an orthodox Christian you believe that God is one, and that God has three persons; that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man; that the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit, but written by fallible men; that your salvation was both a work of grace, but you most definitely had to repent and stop sinning; that the resurrection has happened, and will happen.
If we are ready to live with contradictory truth when it comes to the Trinity, Christology, Soteriology, Eschatology and the Bible – then, surely, we should expect there to be a contradictory truth when it comes to Christian mission. We should expect a Plan A and a contradictory Plan B.
There is plenty of evidence in the Bible that there is more than just Plan A going on when it comes to mission. In the Old Testament Plan A is Israel. This where salvation is seen to reside. The mission paradigm is centrifugal – come and see what is going on in Jerusalem. Jesus underlines this to the woman of Samaria, ‘Salvation is from the Jews.’
Yet, contradicting this, there is a strong theme in the Old Testament where God is clearly involved – in a relational, and so salfivic way – with people who are wholly outside Israel’s orbit. Job – not a known Jew - in the midst of his suffering cries out, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and after my skin has been destroyed yet in my flesh I will see God.’ (Job 19:25). Here is full throttle salvation, complete with a physical resurrection, and not a slither of Israel in the picture. The pioneer of Israel, Abraham lies to Abimelech about Sarah his wife – and God speaks to Abimelech, with concern. God sends Jonah to pagan Nineveh, and her citizens repent. That is a whole book in the Bible. We have two pagan kings repenting and acknowledging God, not Judaism – Nebuchadnezzar and Darius. In Isaiah, where Israel and her salvation stands centre stage, we also have it emphatically stated that Egypt and Assyria are also God’s people (Isaiah 19:25).
Above all the Psalms tend to be universal. So Psalm 1 and the contrast not between the Jew and the Gentile, but the righteous and the wicked. And there is often mention of the blessings for those who fear God – Psalm 15:4, 25:12, 14; 33:18; 34:7, 9, 11; 103:13, 17. There is no limit to this invitation to fear God. It is for all. Perhaps most beautiful of all is Psalm 139 where we learn of God’s knowledge and love for us – knitting us together in our mother’s womb. There is nothing in the Psalm that indicates this divine attention is for the privileged few. It is for everyone. At the end, the Psalmist fulminates against the wicked – and then, poignantly turns to himself and famously says, ‘O Lord search me and know my heart and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.’ This is universal. Everyone can ask God to search them and lead then in the way everlasting.
It is clear. Salvation in the Old Testament does not just rest on people coming to Jerusalem. There is more. And there is certainly more in the New Testament, indeed here we can give this ‘more’, or Plan B, a name.
It is the Gospel of Repentance
While preaching Christ as mankind’s only saviour is very specific; repentance is a universal. Every human being who has ever lived has a conscience, a sense of right and wrong, and however skewered this has become because of sin, they are able to repent, to turn from what they know is wrong, to actively do what they know is right.
The New Testament pulsates with the message of repentance for salvation. The Gospel story starts with John the Baptist preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. There is no mention here of having to believe in Christ. When Christ begins his preaching ministry, his message was, ‘Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand.’ Again, no mention of having to believe in His name. And when Christ sent out the disciples, it is the same:‘They went out and proclaimed that all should repent’.
Repentance remains a strong theme in Christ’s teaching. He says he has come to call sinners – not to faith in Him, but to repentance. He says that the people of Nineveh will rise up (so they are alive) and condemn the cites where Jesus has preached – because they had repented when they heard Jonah. When told about the grim suffering of some at the hands of Pilate, Jesus drove home his main concern: ‘Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.’ There is not a whisper here that our salvation depends on having faith in Christ. It is all about repentance. It’s the same with rejoicing in heaven. It is over a sinner who repents, not the ninety-nine who do not need to repent. And the agony in hell. The rich man wants Lazarus to tell his brothers, but God tells him that they will still not repent.
One of Jesus’ most dramatic stories about heaven and hell is told in Matthew 25. All the nations are gathered before the Son of Man who sits on a throne of glory. The sheep on the right are ushered into the kingdom; the goats on the left are sent into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. The reason for this great division of humanity is not about faith in Christ’s name; it is all about how the poor and needy were served: ‘I was hungry and you gave me food, thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ The total silence about the name of Christ here is overwhelming. Jesus could easily have said to the sheep – ‘My name was preached to you, and you believed in Me. And to the goats, ‘My name was preached to you, and you rejected Me.’ He does not.
Has Jesus changed his mind after the cross and resurrection event? Not in Revelation. Here He speaks to the seven churches in Asia Minor and to every church, apart from the church in Smyrna, He asks them to repent, to change their life-style. And it is made clear that their eternal reward depends on this.
Peter, who so famously said there is no other name under heaven by which man must be saved, is also a believer in a message of repentance which every human being anywhere in the world can act out. He too lives in the territory of contradictory truth. Hear him as he enters Cornelius’ house:
‘Surely God shows no partiality but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to Him.’
These words can be easily glossed over, or tied to the fact that Peter is going to soon preach about Christ so the ‘acceptable to Him’ is pushed into meaning that those who believe in Christ are acceptable to him. That is not what Peter says. He says ‘in every nation’. That means people all over the world, people who have never heard of Judaism, let alone Jesus of Nazareth. If these people fear God and do ‘what is right’, they are acceptable to Him. To make this mean that people have to believe in Christ to be acceptable to God is to violate the ordinary meaning of the verse.
Peter’s emphasis on repentance and salvation is also seen in 2 Peter 3:9, a famous verse which states that God does not want any to perish[1]. God wants them to be saved – but how? Without hesitation Peter says by ‘reaching repentance’. He does not say they must believe in Christ.
And Paul, who wrote that there is only one mediator between God and man, the man Jesus Christ, like Peter, lives with contradictory truth. For in Romans 2 he sets out very clearly the basis for either a heavenly reward or hellish punishment. In verse 4 Paul says that God’s kindness is meant to lead us to repentance. He then talks about what will happen on the day of judgement. For people who think the Christian Gospel is about raising a hand in a meeting and booking a place in heaven by faith this does not make easy reading:
He will render to each one according to his works: 7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, he will give eternal life; 8 but for those who are self-seeking[a] 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.
It is also important to point out that while Paul beautifully outlines salvation by faith, especially in Romans and Galatians, he makes it very clear that unless there is repentance and godly living, the reader can kiss good-bye to any hope of heaven. This is bluntly put in Galatians. Paul lists the sins of the flesh, and ends by saying – if that’s how you are living, you won’t get into the kingdom of God. Full stop.
And then there is Paul before the pagans of Athens in Acts 17. He is taken to the Areopagus and invited to share his new teaching. What a wonderful opportunity to proclaim salvation in Christ’s name. Paul though does not mention Christ’s name. However he preaches repentance loud and clear.
In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
Why did Paul focus on repentance and not the name of Christ? Because – as Jesus and Peter also underlined – every human being, whether in Athens or Konya or Jerusalem can understand what they have to do to repent.
The insistence that the only way of salvation is for someone to hear the Gospel of Christ and then repent, or give their lives to Him is absolutely prominent in the Bible. Sadly it leaves the people in those apartment blocks in Konya rather doomed. And many other people in many other places. And it is not good enough to say: this is the fault of a lazy church.
Especially if there is more in the Bible about this matter.
As seen, there is.
Throughout the Bible there is the theme that salvation can be experienced through repentance outside the boundaries of Israel’s witness to Jehovah, or the church’s witness to Christ’s name. This is a wonderful universal, for all men in every nation of the world can repent and so, in Peter’s words, be acceptable to God.
A peaceful tension then settles over those apartment blocks in Konya. In all of us Christians there is a longing that everyone outside the church will hear and respond to the Gospel of Christ. We yearn for them to come and see the bread broken for them, the blood shed for them, and for us to say together, ‘The peace of Christ be with you.’ That is the tension, because that is not the case in Konya. It is a tension that will hopefully send more Christians to go and live and work and die in Konya.
However it is a peaceful tension. God sees everyone living in those flats. Indeed He saw them in their mother’s womb. He knit them together there, and loves them as His own. For they are made in his image. To the Christian glued to the one-winged truth that the name of Christ must be proclaimed for salvation, these people, and the generations that went before them seem to have been forsaken by God.
He has not forsaken them.
The Gospel has two wings[2] – and every person living in those flats can repent and seek God. Surely, He will answer them.
[1] Unlike some Calvinists who
say God has willed that most people should perish. And when you look at the
elect who are supposedly saved, most of them seem to be European, so making God
rather racist.
[2] It could be argued that if
the Gospel has two wings, then to fly, both wings must be active – the faith in
Christ’s name, and repentance. That is ideal. However when there is repentance
in the heart, surely there can be then be a leading to Christ, even if the
person repenting does not fully understand that this is Christ.
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