Not all sins are the same — and some sinners will end up in “Hell’s lowest levels” if they fail to repent, a DesiringGod author has warned.
In an op-ed, DesiringGod.com editor Scott Hubbard writes that among today’s evangelicals, it has become “virtually commonplace for us to talk as if all sins render us equally guilty before God.”
But in Scripture, Jesus “turns over our assumptions,” Hubbard says, noting that while “Jesus warns us not to make hasty, simplistic conclusions about who the ‘worse sinners’ are,” He also warns us that “some sinners, if they do not repent, will face ‘the greater condemnation.’”
“He teaches that some will receive a comparatively ‘light beating’ on the last day while others will receive a ‘severe beating’ (Luke 12:47–48),” he continues. “He speaks of the final judgment being ‘more tolerable’ for some groups than for others, though both are heading to Hell. In short, He tells us that not all sins are the same, and that Hell will be worse for some.”
Hubbard contends that “greater knowledge brings greater accountability,” adding that “the more truth we have, the more damnable is our preference for lies.”
Thus, according to Scripture, the worst sinners in this world are not necessarily those who live in “rank debauchery, but those who go on sinning when they have every reason and opportunity to repent,” he explains.
“It won’t matter on the last day if we have lived near Jesus all our life,” he warns. “But if we have not repented, we will hear the same response: ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come from. Depart from me, all you workers of evil!’ (Luke 13:26–27).”
In these verses, Jesus is addressing those who, “though familiar with Christ and his Gospel, have not yet followed Jesus wholeheartedly, have not yet turned to hate their wickedness, have not yet forsaken their secret sins,” Hubbard emphasizes.
“Lukewarm, half-measure responses to Jesus will aggravate, not ease, the wrath of God on the last day,” he writes. “Better to have been lost in the fires of Sodom than to have heard, and watched, and repeated, and partaken of Christian things all your life, yet without repentance.”
SOURCE: Christian Post, Leah MarieAnn Klett
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