As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted

It's 6:00 p.m. on Doomsday, and I'm still here. As far as I know, the local cemetery is intact--no bodies missing or spilled messily on the ground. I checked the CTV news website around 5:00 p.m. just to see if we were the only time zone still standing. I was reassured to find that only Pastor Camping seems to be missing.

In the comments section that followed the CTV news article, two submissions in particular made me laugh:

1. Can someone explain this to me? [1] All of the religious fanatics disappear up into the sky. [2] The world then becomes... a WORSE place? I don't follow.

2. I guess it's safe for Sarah Palin to come out of her shelter now.

Well now that the distraction of the alleged Rapture has passed, and the 200 million of the world's inhabitants that were supposed to lift off are still with us (along with the six billion plus that God was presumably leaving behind for later punishment), I'll get back to the topic at hand.

As I have said in previous posts, I am no theologian. Not that there is a consensus among theologians about everything. It is said that where there are ten economists there are twelve opinions. The same could be said of theologians. And philosophers. And political pundits. But I digress.

I am taking the plain person's approach to all this. I posted earlier that I do theology from the ground up. So I am avoiding establishing some overarching ideology into which I must somehow fit all the loose ends. It is not clear to me that God's various revelations of himself are like puzzle pieces that all fit together into a nice rectangle with no pieces missing. If his thoughts are greater than our thoughts; if we look through a glass darkly; if God's ways are far beyond anything one could imagine; if we know in part; if what will be has not yet been made known--how in the world does anyone think that they can write a definitive theology on every point of Christian doctrine without there being room for discussion, if not debate.

So I'm going to push on with my evaluation of another view of salvation that does not assume a) that certain knowledge is necessary for salvation as Pastor Camping seems to believe; and b) that Hell is the default destination for the human race. And my plan is to appeal as best I can to Scripture, which I trust, not to the assured results of systematic theology (Which one?, I heard you say), which I don't trust.

So next we'll tackle the wonderful biblical subject of justice.

Why am I bothering to blog; after all, the world ends tomorrow

According to elderly evangelist and radio broadcaster Harold Camping, God is putting paid to the earth's existence tomorrow via the medium of a worldwide earthquake. Apparently this apocalyptic event will begin on the other side of the earth from us North Americans; therefore, Brother Camping will be keeping a close eye on CNN to watch the events unfold.

Camping's confidence in his prophecy is not shaken either by his mistaken previous prediction along similar lines in 1994, nor by Jesus' own words:

Mark 13:30-32

30 Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. 32 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

Camping and his followers have posted over 2000 billboards around the U.S., warning people of the end to come, presumably so that individuals can make peace with their Maker before being consigned to Hell along with at least two-thirds of the world who are not part of nominal Christianity. The last word in dissing this silly sort of seering (a new word I just made up for alliterative purposes) comes from the British comedy troupe Beyond the Fringe at http://www.youtube.co/watch?v=lSZ2by7M9NI.

Scaring the Hell out of people, as it were, is a long-time evangelistic approach to effecting conversions. Much of the Christian message has been fear-based, for reasons of both getting folks into the fold, and then keeping them on the straight and narrow once they're in. A speaker at neXus called this approach to spreading the Gospel, somewhat mockingly, 'sort of good news'.

Yet it is on this point more than any other (or at least that is my perception) that the emerging church gets called names by mainstream evangelicals--for suggesting that God does not intend to leave the vast majority of his creatures as company for Satan for all eternity. Why is this such a sore point with those who preach the God of love?

Putting the best possible complexion on it, I guess the emerging church critics believe that the Bible teaches that most people are going to end up in Hell because they have not made a conscious moral choice for Christianity. Therefore, to be faithful to Scripture, of which they hold a high view, they must believe and preach this.

But could they be wrong? Is it possible to hold just as high a view of the Bible and come to another conclusion that takes more of God's love and mercy, and less of his retributive justice, into account?

Stay tuned.

Am I into the cult yet?

Before I go on, I just want to check with the watchdogs as to whether I've strayed off orthodoxy yet. I'm saying that on even a very conservative basis one can argue that being a member of God's Kingdom and being a Christian are not identical.

Obviously any follower of God who died before Jesus' resurrection must be considered a Kingdom colleague. There are some who take a dispensational view of theology who would argue that God's way of dealing with human beings differs from dispensation to dispensation, and that in this dispensation of grace (as opposed to law, for instance) that the basis of salvation is different. This is a pretty suspect view (if still common enough in limited circles) and I'm not aware that it would be considered mainstream even in evangelicalism.

I suppose there are some people who think that babies who die in infancy, and people who are cognitively challenged are still tainted by original sin and must accept Christ or go to Hell, but again this is a minority view.

And the notion that people who have never heard the Gospel might still make it on the basis of attempting to live a life of godlines--based on their ability to apprehend and obey God's revelation of himself via creation, conscience or some other mean--has found support in the Roman Catholic church and other conservative circles.

I hope, then, that so far I've passed the litmus test.

But with the exception of children who die young, or the mentally challenged, the examples above represent people who have made some kind of effort or commitment to align themselves with God or godliness. It could be argued, then, that they all were destined for Hell first, and then made a decision to serve God (or conscience), thus passing over a threshold and entering the Kingdom at that point.

But what damage would it do to Scriptural principles if we were to alter this argument as follows?: What if human beings had to make the decision not to serve God (or conscience), rather than the decision to serve him.

Does being a member of God's Kingdom = Being a Christian?

Those who hold to the traditional view that Hell, rather than Heaven, is the default position for sinners (also known as human beings) would equate being a member of God's Kingdom with being a Christian. How could one possibly be in Jesus' "fold" without having first committed to him?

But this is not such an easy argument to make. It would eliminate Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, all the Jews who passed through the Red Sea, Rehab, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets. What is so special about these folks? They constitute the faithful of the Old Testament listed in Hebrews chap. 11 who are viewed as followers of God every bit as much as any New Testament character. My goodness, of Moses it is said, "He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt (v. 26).

Keep very much in mind that Moses never heard of Christ. Isaac was a coward. Jacob was, well, Jacob, a very mixed bag indeed. Rahab was a prostitute (but also an ancestor of Jesus), David an adulterer and murderer, and Noah a drunkard (at least once, and look what happened). Gideon made an idol that led his countrymen astray, and what can we say about Samson? Hebrews chap. 7 refers to Melchizadek, a Canaanite not a Jew, as the priest of God Most High and a prototype of Christ.

Even if we were to take the most conservative and traditional approach to the writing of the Bible and suggest that Moses produced the Pentateuch, a number of those listed above would not have had access to it as it would not have yet been written. For many there was no Temple in Jerusalem or its forerunner the Tabernacle, as they proceeded those centers of worship by centuries. For some there were not yet priests of God. It would be difficult to make the case that all of them had a concept of monotheism.

Yet all were members of God's Kingdom, as were New Testament characters whose death proceeded that of Jesus, such as his father Joseph, Simeon and Anna.

What about those who have not reached the age of accountability? I don't necessarily buy this concept, but let's say for the sake of argument that it is true. No one who falls into this category could be called a Christian in the sense of making a decision to turn their backs on sinfulness and to accept Christ as Saviour, for by definition they are not yet able to make a moral choice.

And those who are judged by the light they have? I guess I don't need to spell out that one.

Now if you truly believe that only those who hear Christ preached and accept him are candidates for salvation and for Kingdom membership, then I really have nothing to say to you. You have consigned to Hell every human who dies in infancy, every severely mentally delayed person, and every one who has never heard of Jesus. Presumably you have another way of dealing with those who proceeded Jesus, unless you've committed Abraham, Moses, Ezra, Nehemiah and all the prophets to eternal fire as well. At any rate, your vision of salvation is so narrow as to make God the least just and gracious of deities that one could imagine. Fill your boots.

But for those who are trying to understand salvation in light of God's ardent wish that all should be saved, and who would not place arbitrary blockages in people's way, at least accept that Christ's atonement allows God's love, justice, mercy, and grace to beam throughout his creation, and gives him the opportunity to accept those who couldn't possibly know about him for reasons that include that none of us Christians have taken the opportunity, or made the necessary sacrifices, to tell them.

Does God always get what he wants?

Departing from my stroll down soteriological street for a moment, I want to have a look at a contemporary Canadian music artist who recently performed in Vancouver BC, Ron Sexsmith.

Sexsmith wrote a song entitled "God Loves Everyone" that has almost become the theme song of neXus. Apparently his inspiration for the lyrics was the horrific murder of a gay Univ. of Wyoming student in 1998 named Matthew Shepard.

"The crime itself was horrible enough," says Sexsmith, "but I remember reading about the trial, where there were these folks standing outside with signs saying, 'God hates fags' or "Burn in hell fags.' I couldn't believe that people could actually have those kinds of thoughts. That's where the song started for me. From there, I got in to just trying to write a song about unconditional love, I guess."

Here are the lyrics. If you would like to hear it sung, YouTube has it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7Bs7Do8yAI.

God loves everyone
Like a mother loves her son
No strings at all
Unconditional
Never one to judge
Would never hold a grudge
'Bout what's been done
God loves everyone

There are no gates in heaven
Everyone gets in
Queer or straight
Souls of every faith
Hell is in our minds
Hell is in this life
But when it's gone
God takes everyone

Its love is like a womb
It's like the air from room to room
It surrounds us all
The living and the dead
May we never lose the thread
That bound us all

The killer in his cell
The atheist as well
The pure of heart
And the wild at heart
Are all worthy of its grace
It's written in the face
Of everyone
God loves everyone

There's no need to be saved
No need to be afraid
Cause when it's done
God takes everyone

God loves everyone


The words are true to the extent that that nothing is beyond the reach of God: not evil, not hardship, not death. As the lovely old George Beverly Shea hymn puts it:

The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell.
It goes beyond the highest star
And reaches to the lowest hell.

My difficulty with Sexsmith's song, which is the same problem I have with universalism, is that it suffers from the identical fundamental flaw as Calvinism/Lutheranism; i.e., it fails to account sufficiently for the doctrine of human choice, or free will.

If we were to accept the position that the Kingdom of God, rather than Hell, is the default position for all of humankind (the idea that I have been exploring in earlier posts), we still have to decide if one can opt out of the Kingdom as an exercise of free will. [Whether opting out means one is doomed to a literal Hell or to something else is not the main point here.]

Or to put it another way, while God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, does God always get what he wants? I invite your comments.

Billy Graham Denies Jesus!

.....or so they say.

There is no doubt that Billy Graham is THE iconic evangelist. There is no one in the latter half of the 20th century that could compare with him. I have met a few
important people in my life, including premiers, a prime minister, an Olympic gold medalist, Mr. Hockey, and so on, but I considered it a particular privilege when Billy Graham, on a crusade in Vancouver BC, came to Regent College (where I was employed at the time) and spent time with the faculty and staff. After shaking his hand, I didn't want to wash it for days.

Yet it is that self-same Billy Graham who stunned the evangelical world with televised broadcasts in his later years where he took the position that many would become members of the Kingdom of God who had never heard of Christ. To go further, he felt that there were people of other faiths, or no faith at all, who were called by God to be his children.

Apparently he, too, was troubled with the idea of a person having to have specific knowledge about Jesus and the Gospel to obtain eternal life.

The first of these two broadcasts occurred in May 31, 1997 on the Hour of Power
television program hosted by the well-known pastor Robert Schuller. View the interview at http://www.encyclopedia.com/video/TNCnxA91fHE-robert-schuller-billy-graham-speaking.aspx.

Here is a portion of the transcript:

Dr. Schuller: "Tell me, what is the future of Christianity?"

Dr. Graham: "Well, Christianity and being a true believer, you know, I think there's the body of Christ which comes from all the Christian groups around the world, or outside the Christian groups. I think that everybody that loves Christ or knows Christ, whether they're conscious of it or not, they're members of the body of Christ. And I don't think that we're going to see a great sweeping revival that will turn the whole world to Christ at any time."

"What God is doing today is calling people out of the world for His name. Whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world, or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they've been called by God. They may not even know the name of Jesus, but they know in their hearts they need something that they don't have and they turn to the only light they have and I think they're saved and they're going to be with us in heaven."

Dr. Schuller: "What I hear you saying is that it's possible for Jesus Christ to come into a human heart and soul and life even if they've been born in darkness and have never had exposure to the Bible. Is that a correct interpretation of what you're saying?"

Dr. Graham: "Yes it is...

Dr. Schuller: "This is fantastic. I'm so thrilled to hear you say that. There's a wideness in God's mercy.

Dr. Graham: There is. There definitely is."

Startling stuff. But it didn't stop there.

Dr. Graham appeared from time to time on the recently retired Larry King's interview program. No appearance was more memorable than the one on June 16, 2005 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YPKdbpVT6I&feature=related). First off, he appears to deny that people, even evil people, will go to Hell. Hell was created for one purpose, and it has nothing to do with humanity.

KING: And do you think he loves the people of 9/11, the people in the planes on 9/11 as much as he loves you?

GRAHAM: Yeah, he does. He does. I can't explain 9/11, except the evil of man. I think that there is a force in the world, a force of evil. There are two great forces, God's force of good and the devil's force of evil, and I believe Satan is alive and he is working, and he is working harder than ever, and we have many mysteries that we don't understand.

KING: Does God love him?

GRAHAM: Does God what?

KING: Satan. Does he love Satan?

GRAHAM: Well, he created him as Lucifer. In the 22nd of Ezekiel, it tells us about it, and he must love him, but the end of Satan is hell. Hell was created for the devil and his angels, or his demons, not for men.

Later in the interview he makes it clear that he loves people of all faiths. In fact, while not doubting their sincerity or motives, he refers to other preachers who lack his love for humankind generally as extremists.

KING: Are you forgiving of the infirmities of other people?

GRAHAM: Absolutely. I am. I mean, I...

KING: Isn't that hard?

GRAHAM: ... try to forgive. I never hold a grudge. In fact, many people say that I never get angry. I don't think I get angry. But maybe I do sometimes, but I keep it. I don't explode to anybody.

KING: Do you feel the same about other faiths?

GRAHAM: Absolutely.

KING: Do you feel the same about Judaism, Mormonism?

GRAHAM: Absolutely.

KING: Buddhism?

GRAHAM: I love them all, and welcome them all, and love to be with them, and friends with all of them. For example, I just talked to a man in New York City, he was a Mormon.

KING: My father-in-law.

GRAHAM: Your father-in-law. And I've loved the Mormons for years, and yet there is a big divide between the Mormons and some of the other groups. But I have great friends among the Mormons. And the same among the Catholics. Of course, I loved Pope John Paul II and watched the whole process of his suffering, his dying and the tremendous -- my daughter went to represent me ...

KING: I know. You were on with us the night he died.

GRAHAM: That's right. Thank you.

KING: But what about those faiths -- the Mormons and the others that you mentioned -- believe in Christ. They believe they will meet Christ. What about those like the Jews, the Muslims, who don't believe they ...

GRAHAM: That's in God's hands. I can't be the judge.

KING: You don't judge them?

GRAHAM: No.

KING: How do you feel...

(CROSSTALK)

GRAHAM: ... going to hell and all that.

KING: How do you feel when you see a lot of these strong Christian leaders go on television and say, you are condemned, you will live in hell if you do not accept Jesus Christ, and they are forceful and judgmental?

GRAHAM: Well, they have a right to say that, and they are true to a certain extent, but I don't -- that's not my calling. My calling is to preach the love of God and the forgiveness of God and the fact that he does forgive us. That's what the cross is all about, what the resurrection is all about, that's the gospel. And you can get off on all kinds of different side trends, and in my earlier ministry, I did the same, but as I got older, I guess I became more mellow and more forgiving and more loving. And the Jerry Falwells and people like that, I love them---I thank God for their ministry, he has a great university and two or three of my grandchildren have gone there, they have had a tremendous change in their lives for being there---and some of the other people are the same way, but at the other end of the extreme.

Graham's controversial views go back some time. In Nov. 1993 he was honoured by Time Magazine on his 75th birthday. At that time he made these comments about Hell:

The only thing I could say for sure is that hell means separation from God. We are separated from his light, from his fellowship. That is going to be hell. When it comes to a literal fire, I don't preach it because I'm not sure about it. When the Scripture uses fire concerning hell, that is possibly an illustration of how terrible it's going to be -- not fire but something worse, a thirst for God that cannot be quenched.

To conclude this rather lengthy look at one of my heroes, Billy Graham seems to believe that while Christ's death and resurrection made entry into the Kingdom of God possible--by satisfying God's justice and allowing his love to beam forth uninhibited--one doesn't have to know about Christ's work to benefit from it. Nor does Hell appear to be the default destination for the human race unless they consciously accept Christ as his fellow evangelists have typically taught.

Benedict and Billy

I mentioned in an earlier post that some of the preachers in my youth who did not automatically assign "the heathen", or more charitably, those who had no chance to hear the Gospel, to eternal punishment talked about such folks as being judged "according to the light they had."

These dear old Protestant fundamentalists would probably have had a heart attack if they knew that this is somewhat the Roman Catholic position. I quote from the Roman Catholic Universal Catechism (sorry, it's kind of long):

"Outside the Church there is no salvation"

846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers? Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body.

Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.

847 This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church.

Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience - those too may achieve eternal salvation.

848 "Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation and also the sacred right to evangelize all men."

There are two avenues to membership in the Kingdom posited by Catholic theologians, then. One is through the R.C. Church, the other through some mysterious process of following the dictates of one's conscience. That leaves us Protestant and Orthodox Christians on shaky ground, it would appear, but it's good news for the unevangelized.

Speaking of Protestants, certainly one of the best known persons of this persuasion in the world is Dr. Billy Graham. Over his long career his original evangelical views have become somewhat modified. We'll look at him next.

Mother Mary, Gengis Khan, and the love of God

I have been working through the issue of salvation based on sufficient knowledge versus some other means of finding entry into the Kingdom of God.

But I think that it is of first importance to distinguish between avenues of entrance with the ability to enter at all. As soon as anyone starts musing on a Muslim or atheist or Wiccan being viewed as a Kingdom sibling, that person will almost certainly be accused of denying the saving work of Christ, or declaring that Jesus is not the sole Way, the One Mediator between God and humanity, the only one through whom a person can come to the Father.

So, to utilize our current Prime Minister's favourite phrase, let's be perfectly clear on this: God's intention in creating humankind was to find an outlet for his creativity by shaping another being (besides his mighty angels in their various ranks) that would be his image-bearer, the object of his love, and the steward of the rest of this incredible world.

When that race of humans fell from grace and sullied the relationship with the triune God (and with one another), the Creator did not say, "Well, I blew that one. Let them salvage the mess as best they can with a few hints from me as to what their wisest course is from now on. Too bad that a lot of them will miss the hint."

Nor did he say, "Okay, Plan B. Instead of enjoying them all, lavishing love on them, bringing them back to the relationship I originally proposed, I'll arbitrarily choose some of them for gracious treatment and to Hell (literally) with the rest."

And I don't think that he said this either: "Gosh, things are a mess. Tell you what, I think I'll just sort of pretend that nothing's changed, that everything is like that Garden of Eden story they like to talk about, with no need to sweat all this raunchiness and pain--or sacrificial love either. Mother Teresa, Hitler, William Wilberforce, Pol Pot, my mom, Genghis Khan, what's the difference?"

In other words, it's hard to buy the positions of traditional evangelicalism (salvation by certain knowledge alone), Calvinism/Lutherism (salvation by arbitrary predestination), or universalism (salvation whether you want it or not--take that Christopher Hitchens).

I believe that to be true to what the Scriptures say about God's character (love, justice, grace, mercy, community, wisdom, etc.), his intentions for creation, the cosmic effect of Jesus' death and resurrection, God's consistent treatment of his creatures for all time, and human choice (or free will), another explanation must be found.

The trouble is, I'm not sure I have the mind to think it through. I was a business professor after all, not a philosopher, a theologian, and certainly not a genius.

I was smart enough to marry Sharon, move to Canada's west coast, and cheer for the Canucks. Is that enough?

The gates were open wide

I am moved to tears when I listen to the magnificent anthem The Holy City by Stephen Adams, particularly the portion of the third stanza which speaks of the wideness of God's mercy and grace:

I saw the Holy City
Beside the tideless sea;
The light of God was on its streets,
The gates were open wide,
And all who would might enter,
And no one was denied.

A beautiful arrangement of this grand hymn can be viewed on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nq7ZLofnpk or at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tld1MZ2F4GA.

Now these words quoted above in no way reflect the view of God's grace with which I was raised. Then, as now in many Christian circles, hell was seen as the default destination for the human race unless they repented of their sinful natures and carnal activities and asked God for forgiveness. I believed this with all my heart as a young person, but as I became more exposed to the realities of life in this sorry world of ours, the more restless I became with that interpretation of God's will.

These were some of the stumbling blocks I faced as I tried to hold onto my traditional view of life eternal.

1. The numerous references to God loving the whole world, John 3:16 being the best example.
2. God's emphatic statement that "he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked" (Ezekiel 18:23); rather, he is "delighted to show mercy" (Micah 7:18). In fact, says St. Paul, he is the God "who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:4).

If this is true, the logical part of my mind scolded the sentimental and conservative portion, why does God stack the deck against the same people he claims that he wants to live with him always?

Stack the deck?, I protested to myself. What could you possibly mean?

Just this, I replied. I grew up believing that I had to repent and exercise faith towards a God of whom I had sufficient knowledge ("a saving knowledge" as we often called it) to even realize that such repentance was necessary. In other words, I had to have God, Jesus, my lost state, my need of forgiveness, the atonement, and so on explained to me by someone else who was credible to me.

Those not fortunate enough to have all of this information given to them were doomed from the beginning. And whose fault was it that these doomed ones hadn't heard this news?--why, us Christians. We hadn't done the necessary evangelism.

How logical is that? God wants everyone to become his child. He takes absolutely no pleasure in any other result. Yet those who lack the knowledge to learn about him (and that is most people in the world) go to Hell, while we lucky few go to Heaven, even though we are the culprits who didn't spread the word.

God holds lack of knowledge against the unsaved, who couldn't have possibly known better. But he does not hold the failure to spread the knowledge against us who have it, and should have known better.

And we call this grace?

The Calvinists try to lift this responsibility off of Christians' shoulders with their doctrine of predestination. They say that while Jesus' death was sufficient for all, it was efficient only for some. The some for whom Christ's death has any lasting beneficial effect were chosen by God in advance on no other basis than that he decided to be merciful to a portion of the totally undeserving world, and the rest are doomed even though they are kept from even wanting God by God's choice.

And they call this grace.

Some people of the traditional mindset certainly struggled with this even if their fundamental view didn't change very much. With respect to children, for instance, some preachers talked about an "age of accountability" before which kids could not be expected to understand their need of repentance, and who were exempt from the necessary steps until they had crossed some threshold of moral understanding. But this was not really a consistent position for them, because it did suggest another avenue for salvation beyond the knowledge-based one.

Others would try to take a more generous view of "the heathen" as they generally called them, the ones who had never heard the gospel. I occasionally heard reference to these folks being "judged according to whatever light they had."

I actually thought that they were perhaps on a better track. There are those enigmatic references to people with no knowledge of God through the normal channels, as it were, but who were equally part of God's kingdom. These include Melchizedek (Genesis 14), to whom Abraham himself showed obeisance, and "the other sheep that are not of this sheep pen" (John 10) that Jesus saw as much his children as his Jewish disciples.

And St. Paul refers to the possibility of knowing God in his creation: ...since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made... (Romans 1:19-20).

Then I began to think of all the people who had the so-called knowledge about the traditional Christian teaching about salvation but who could not possibly take it seriously. I think of the prostitute in Vancouver who was convinced by the some well-meaning Christians to accompany them to a large evangelical church. She walked in and the first thing she saw was the man leading the service--one of her customers. Or the young woman who joined the working girls on the streets here in Abbotsford after she was raped by her youth pastor. Are they automatically consigned to the burner because of the sins of others? Does that go for children of Christian child molesters? Battered wives of Christian husbands? Customers of business people who, as the old song has it:

Mr. Business went to church;
He never missed a Sunday.
Mr. Business went to Hell
For what he did on Monday.

All right, I heard my traditional self saying, let's turn my old thinking on its head. Let us suppose (using the royal "us" here) that instead of some place called Hell being the default position, that it is Heaven, or the Kingdom of God, whatever name one wants to apply.

In other words, what if we were to say, "You're in before your out."

More on this as I puzzle it through.