No One Left Behind
Is Universal Salvation Biblical?
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According to the story of Noah, God saw the destruction h-- caused in anger over sinful human behavior and resolved to “never again” permit the total destruction of sinners. In so doing, God rejected the totalitarian solution to the problem of sin. For one way of conquering sin would be to totally control human behavior through threats and punishment -- the totalitarian dream. Some have preferred to think of God as such a totalitarian ruler. No one, of course, not even God, has ever succeeded in totally controlling human behavior and every attempt has been demonic in the cruelty and suffering it has caused. In this new millennium, Christians will have to accept the logical implications of their own claim that the love of God is unconditional -- it has no conditions, not even repentance. God’s love falls like the rain on the just and the unjust alike. If sin cannot be conquered by punishment and control then perhaps what the gospel suggests should be taken seriously -- namely that God conquers sin through crucified love, that is, by forgiving those who reject h-- and are h-- enemies. To die for another human being, Paul argues, is never easy, but it is understandable that someone might do this in an attempt to protect someone who is good and lovable. However, “God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. . . . For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life” (Romans 5: 8&10). What is surprising about Paul’s theology is that there is virtually no discussion of repentance in it. This is, I think, because we are not justified by repentance but by the crucified love that God reveals in the death of Jesus. No love is more painful than loving someone who rejects you, perhaps even hates and despises you. Crucifixion is the appropriate description of such love. Crucified love rejects the natural impulse we all have to reject those who reject us. To say that Christ died for sinners and the ungodly (i.e., unbelievers) while they were still sinners and that they are reconciled to God by the cross is to say that no one, no matter how unrepentant, stands outside the saving love of God. God’s love falls like the rain on the just and the unjust alike (Matt 5:45). Sin and unbelief are conquered not through the fantasy of Babel, that is, through making everyone believe and act the same. Sin is conquered through crucified love. If we know who God is through the life story of Jesus, then we shall be required to replace the God of unforgiving judgment with the God revealed in the Sermon on the Mount. In the crucified love of Jesus, Christians ought to see the love of God. God turns the other cheek and walks the second mile. God loves h-- enemies and does good to those who persecute h--. Crucified love is love of those who do the rejecting. Crucified love is a love that embraces and reconciles itself with its enemies -- while they are still enemies. This means that contrary to those who would sacralize the gospel and turn it into a contest between the children of light and the children of darkness, no one is excluded from the love of God. God loves and embraces the stranger, even the enemy. So the young pastor, Timothy, is instructed in a Pauline letter, “. . . we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. These are the things you must insist on and teach (1 Tim 4:10-11).
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About the Book
1. You have heard it said that on the day of judgment only Christians will be saved and all others will be consigned to eternal damnation, but I say to you that the gospel proclaims salvation for the whole human race. 2. You have heard it said that non-Christians are strangers who will not enter the Kingdom of God, but I say to you that God enters our lives through the very presence of the stranger. 3. You have heard it said that heretics and sinners will have no place in the Kingdom of God, but I say to you that to reject even the least of these is to reject God and God’s messiah. 4. You have heard it said that human beings can be saved in no other name than that of Jesus, but I say to you that the name “Jesus” means we are saved in the name of a God who cannot be named or imaged. 5. You have heard it said that only a chosen remnant can be saved, but I say to you that a saving remnant saves not itself but the whole human race of which it is a part. 6. You have heard it said that in the final judgment many will be consigned to the eternal fires, but I say to you, God’s judgment is a refining fire which transforms and saves rather than destroys. The final truth is that our God is the savior of the whole human race and especially all believers (1Timothy 4:10).
About the Author
About the Author Darrell J. Fasching is Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at the University of South Florida, Tampa Florida, where he has served in the past as Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and as Chair of the Department of Religious Studies. Before coming to the University of South Florida he served as Assistant Dean of Hendricks Chapel at Syracuse University. He is the author of four books on theology and ethics and co-author of three text books on world religions and on global ethics. He is a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and lives with his wife Laura in Lutz Florida, where he worships at All Saints Lutheran Church. By the author: The Thought of Jacques Ellul (1981); Narrative Theology After Auschwitz: From Alienation to Ethics (1992); The Ethical Challenge of Auschwitz and Hiroshima: Apocalypse or Utopia? (1993);The Coming of the Millennium: Good News for the Whole Human Race (1996). Co-author of: Religion and Globalization (2008) with John Esposito and Todd Lewis; Comparative Religious Ethics: A Narrative Approach to Global Ethics (2011) 2nd edition,with Dell deChant and David Lantigua; World Religions Today, 4th edition (2011) with John Esposito and Todd Lewis.