We know that only through the Gospel can we be saved from eternal judgment. And we can only know the Gospel when someone tells us about it or when we read it in the Bible. If we receive the Gospel and choose to reject it, we are rightly condemned because we reject Jesus who is our sin-bearer.
Can it therefore be fair that people who have never heard the Gospel be judged and condemned? They never had a chance! That’s how we think about this but God says that’s not true. He has given everyone enough witness about himself so that no one can claim it was unfair. In fact, God says the revelation of himself to everyone is enough to stop all mouths from protesting about unfairness. Specifically, he has left three witnesses about himself for all people.
God’s revelation in nature
God has not let himself without a witness in nature. The Bible says that when we examine nature, we can see the evidence that points us toward God. Marvelling at nature’s complexity, variety and size (both macro and micro) should lead us to realise God created all of this. Nature is not a cosmic accident but a divine act of creation. But men choose to suppress this truth.
Our conscience condemns us
They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
The second witness is that God has written his law into the hearts of all men. Where do people get a sense of right and wrong from? People in urban centres and people in tribal settings have such different cultures and yet we can find similarities: the notion that killing is wrong; that taking what is not yours is stealing and so on. Where do these notions come from? God says he put them into the hearts of all men. He plants his law in our hearts. So even if we’ve never heard of the Ten Commandments, we know them by instinct; they are in our hearts. And our conscience, the little voice in our head, tells us over and over again that we have violated God’s law. The little that we know of God, we choose to rebel against.
History of the Jewish people
Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
The third witness God gives us is the history of the Jewish people. Of all the peoples on earth, God chose to have a special relationship with them. He revealed himself to them, he gave them his oracles. The Jewish nation knew more about God than any other people on earth. They know his standards, they were given his law, they saw him in action.
Yet, despite all these special privileges, they failed to make themselves righteous. They took the law and tried to live up to its standards on their own strength. They failed. They could not make themselves righteous. Who are we then, to say we can keep God’s law? For this reason, the Bible says “every mouth may be stopped.” No one can claim that if given special revelation by God they can make themselves righteous. It can’t be done.
God judges you according to the standard you have
Not all will have the opportunity to hear the Gospel. Therefore God will judge those who have not heard by what little they know about him. From the three witnesses above, we see that everyone has some knowledge of God. A man may only understand one little thing about God. Maybe it’s the notion that stealing is wrong. Won’t it be possible therefore, that he keeps himself from stealing his entire life. Would God therefore judge him as righteous?
The Bible says such a man is only theoretical. No such person exists who can keep the little standard he knows about. Even if we know one thing that God demands from us, we will fail in keeping that one thing.
For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law.
This verse tells us that all will be judged according to the standard that they have. And guess what? No one will make it. The Gentiles will perish because of their sin (even though they do not have the formal law) and the Jews will perish because although they have the law, they have failed to keep it.
The only hope and the only way is therefore through Jesus. He is our substitute. He bears the punishment our sin deserves and he clothes us with his righteousness.
For our sake he made him [Jesus] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Our response after being saved by Jesus is therefore to go preach the Gospel to all whom we can reach.
How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”
All men stand condemned before God. No one can use the excuse that they know nothing about God because we all know something of God. We who believe, have the responsibility to go tell everyone how to be saved. The believer is the prisoner who has been set free from his cell and he has been given the key to go free the other prisoners. We need to take the key firmly in our hands and go back to the other cells. (cf. Romans 1:14)
