Final Judgments and False Gospels

Will the judgment be like many modern Christians describe it?

Or will it be like Jesus describes it?

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. Before him, all the nations will be gathered, and he shall separate them from one another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

Then the King will say to the ones on his right, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father; inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me food; I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in, naked, and you clothed me. I was sick, and you visited me; I was in prison, and you came to me.

Then the righteous will answer him, saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty, and give you something to drink? When did we see you as a stranger and take you in? Or naked and clothe you? Or when did we see you sick or in prison and come to you?

And the King shall answer and and tell them, "Truly I tell you, when you have done it to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you have done it to me."

Then he will tell those at his left, "Depart from me, you cursed ones, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave me no food; I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink;
I was a stranger, and you did not take me in; naked, and you did not clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit me.

Then they too will answer him, saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, sick, or in prison, and did not serve you?"

Then he will answer them, saying, "Truly I tell you, when you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me."

And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.

I ask you, could there be a greater difference between the two descriptions?

In one, kindness and compassion don’t matter at all. In the other, they’re the only things that matter.

Heresy?

When we come up a with a doctrine that produces that much difference with Jesus, should we not consider it heresy?

Is it possible that our modern teachings about the atonement and salvation are false gospels? (Actually, it’s not possible; we’ve just seen that it’s certain.)

Or would we rather go on thinking that Jesus didn’t know what he was talking about?

About Paul Pavao

I am married, the father of six, and currently the grandfather of five. I teach, and I am always trying to learn to disciple others better than I have before. I believe God has gifted me to restore proper theological foundations to the Christian faith. In order to ensure that I do not become a heretic, I read the early church fathers from the second and third centuries. They were around when all the churches founded by the apostles were in unity. My philosophy for Bible reading is to understand each verse for exactly what it says in its local context. Only after accepting the verse for what it says do I compare it with other verses to develop my theology. If other verses seem to contradict a verse I just read, I will wait to say anything about those verses until I have an explanation that allows me to accept all the verses for what they say. This takes time, sometimes years, but eventually I have always been able to find something that does not require explaining verses away. The early church fathers have helped a lot with this. I argue and discuss these foundational doctrines with others to make sure my teaching really lines up with Scripture. I am encouraged by the fact that the several missionaries and pastors that I know well and admire as holy men love the things I teach. I hope you will be encouraged too. I am indeed tearing up old foundations created by tradition in order to re-establish the foundations found in Scripture and lived on by the churches during their 300 years of unity.

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3 Responses to Final Judgments and False Gospels

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Mark says:

01/29/2011 at 6:59 pm

If you were to summarize the real gospel (e.g. for a stranger you got talking to) how would you put it?

- Shammah says:
  
  01/29/2011 at 7:43 pm
  
  If the stranger were western and therefore had heard of Jesus Christ and knew his story, then I would tell him (or her), in so many words, that Jesus is the Son of God and that if he became Jesus’ disciple, then Jesus would reconcile him to God.
  
  If the stranger were eastern and thus had possible not heard of Jesus Christ, then I’d just tell the story of his life, death, and resurrection. That should take care of the person knowing that they could be reconciled to God by following Jesus.