Jesus and his apostles make it abundantly clear that it is not possible to be right with God or to please God without a personal commitment to follow Jesus Christ. This is what ‘belief’ in the Bible means. It is much more than a cerebral acceptance of certain doctrines or even belonging to a church that teaches God’s word. All people are sinful and fall short of God’s righteousness, so we cannot hope to be acceptable to him unless it is a status we have been given. God gives us his righteousness when we turn to follow his Son. Therefore, anything people do that is not rooted in faith in Jesus is considered sinful.
All humans are naturally sinful.
In God’s eyes, none of us comes anywhere near his quality of life. This is a foundational teaching of Scripture.
“But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.” Isaiah 59:2
“All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” Isaiah 64:6
“There is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.” Romans 3:10-11
“There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” Romans 3:22-24
2. Without faith in Jesus, it is impossible to please God
The Bible is clear that the only way to be acceptable to God is to be a genuine follower of Jesus Christ.
“. . . everything that does not come from faith is sin.” Romans 14:23
“And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.” Hebrews 11:6
Faith means faith in Jesus:
“Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” John 1:12
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16
“Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life.” John 5:24
When we turn to Christ, we are given his status of righteousness. God sees us as being pure because we are in Christ, and we are clothed with His righteousness. Those who reject Jesus remain responsible for this rejection and will face God’s wrath,
“To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted.” Titus 1:15
Turning to Christ for forgiveness and to be given the status of being a child of God is just the beginning. Christians live to please their Lord both in the way they behave and in their longing that others should find that Jesus is the answer to life. A completely new life begins. If there is no change, then it is questionable whether there really is ‘belief’
What excuses are given for rejecting Christ?
1. There is so much evil in the world; how can there be a powerful God?
This is an old chestnut, but the presence of the argument reveals that we have at root values that can only come from our creator. We recognise evil acts, and we recognise good acts. Unless there is a real, eternal judge who is just and has moral standards, what are good and evil? The good and evil as real values can only come logically from our creator.
There is a widespread sense of dis-ease when human rights are abused and we read of cruelty and persecutions and holocausts. This sense that is universal also can only come form God. It cannot be derived from an accidental aggregation of atoms in a primordial soup. The atheist historian Yuval Noah Harari wonders where these stories come from:
“Most legal systems in the world today are based on the belief in human rights. But what are human rights? Human rights... like God and heaven, are just stories that we've invented. They are not objective reality. They're not a biological fact about Homo Sapiens. Take a human being, cut him open, look inside; you will find a heart, the kidneys, neurons, hormones, and DNA. But you won't find any rights. The only place you find rights is in the story that we have invented and spread over the last few centuries.”
If evil, right, and wrong are just human inventions, then on what basis were those accused of atrocities at the Nuremberg trials after World War II condemned? The basis is that there is a higher moral law that is absolute. If there is no God, then moral rules can be made by the most powerful. Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Putin have all seen themselves above God’s moral law with disastrous consequences. Hitler claimed:
“All of nature is a violent struggle between strength and weakness, and eternal victory of the strong over the weak.”
He had overlooked that the God of the Bible has ultimate power and that he will bring all actions that do not stem from faith in Christ to account.
This argument is similar to that used to reject God because they dislike the violence and atrocities described in the Old Testament by both God’s enemies and at times his own people. This judgment has come because we instinctively believe that people should act with integrity and kindness. This moral sense can only be derived from God.
There are some who reject the Christian message because many of those involved in the slave trade and abuse of slaves claimed to be Christians. Again, this notion of freedom and equality of all people comes from the teaching of the Bible. It is significant that the abolition of slavery was brought about largely because of the pressure from Christians.
A current problem has been the sexual abuses perpetrated by leading churchmen and women. How can these have been covered up for so long? At the root of this justified complaint is that there is a loving God who recognises these abuses to be evil. Just because humanity, even those claiming to be followers of Christ, have behaved in deplorable ways, does not mean that God will not bring the perpetrators to account. Jesus had some strong words to say to the religious.
Among those with no faith, religious hypocrisy is the most cited driver of doubt (42%). The behaviour of Christians is undoubtedly a major problem, but surely what really matters is whether Jesus is who he claimed to be.
2. “I feel happy as I am”
Being self-satisfied is a very dangerous situation to be in. Many who claim to be religious are in this state. They believe in the doctrines of their organisation or church and consider themselves to be moderately moral. They don’t feel they need to be very different.
The Pharisees in Jesus’ time were much like this. They believed in the doctrines of God’s people, they did their best to be moral people and were highly respected. Yet Jesus is lovingly critical of them. They hadn’t realised how far short of God’s standards they had fallen.
“For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 5:20
Many do not realise how spiritually hungry they are because their lives are kept full of activities that blind them to their plight. Jesus taught that while activities and religious responsibilities are not inherently bad, they can be used to distract from or mask deeper spiritual needs, a condition he often identified as hypocrisy. Thus Jesus corrected Martha when she became ‘distracted by all the preparations’ and worried about serving (Luke 10:38–42). He noted that she was anxious about many things, but only ‘one thing is necessary - which was to sit at his feet to listen.
Jesus instructed people to :
”Seek first the kingdom of God," Matthew 6:33
This is saying that spiritual pursuits must take precedence over the ‘busyness’ of daily life and material worries.
C.S. Lewis states:
“We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition, when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea, we are far too easily pleased.”
3. Is it really true?
Doubts about the veracity of the message about Jesus continue to be given as reasons for rejecting Christ.. There can be no more important question than asking who Jesus is. Did he fulfil the prophecies about the coming Messiah, did he perform those miracles, was he crucified , did he really rise from the dead and were his followers genuinely convinced about the message they taught? That first generation of Christians must have been convinced for the message about Jesus to have spread so fast in spite of strong political and religious opposition.
The arguments used earlier are largely subjective and philosophical, but are nonetheless valid. Without God, it is hard to obtain a valid basis for morality that all are subject to or a valid purpose for life that holds even in old age and when facing death.
Jesus stands as another strong argument for the reality of God. The four records of the Gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, all major on the question ‘Who is Jesus’? This extraordinary person performed amazing, impossible miracles; the dead were raised and the chronically sick healed. Even his enemies admitted he was doing these miracles. His teaching was so profound, he stressed that God sees what is going on in our hearts and that outward religion is no protection from the judgment of God that is to come. He fulfilled the 330 prophecies about the Messiah who would be a Jew, a direct descendant of King David, who would be born in Bethlehem, would be crucified as the ultimate sacrifice for sin and would then rise from death. There were many witnesses to all this. This is what he said about himself:
“I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never go thirsty.” John 6:35
“If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” John 7:37-38
“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12
“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” John 10:11
“I and the Father are one.” John 10:30
“I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6
His closest disciples became convinced that Jesus’ claims about himself were true and committed their lives to telling the world that this Jesus is God’s Chosen King, the Messiah, who had come to be sacrificed and so carry the sins of the world and then rose again. Reject God, and you have to be able to explain away Jesus. Many sceptics who have investigated the evidence have had to change their minds. Books by the sceptics Simon Greenleaf, Frank Morrison, Josh McDowell and Lee Strobel are all very convincing. It was the evidence about Jesus that convinced them. Their stories are recounted in the article ‘I have my own opinions, so don’t bother me . . .’ , based on John 5, that is found on the website www.bvpalmer.com
The evidence concerning Jesus is historical as well as philosophical. Of concern is that relatively few people, who say they have rejected the Christian message, have really bothered to investigate the evidence about Jesus. I have tried to outline this in the books ‘Cure for Life’ and ‘Stepping Stones’ It was this evidence that convinced me to follow Christ and, since then, I have learned so much more about him.
4. It is too costly
When confronted with the idea that following him was too costly, Jesus did not apologise, lower the standard, or make the path sound easy. Instead, he challenged potential followers to ‘count the cost, emphasising that while the price of discipleship is high, the benefit is well worth it. In Matthew 13:44-46 Jesus tells the parables of the Hidden Treasure and the Pearl of Great Price. Both parables emphasise that the kingdom of God is of supreme value, demanding that individuals prioritise obtaining it above all else. A man finds a treasure hidden in a field. In his joy, he sells everything he has to buy that field. A merchant seeking fine pearls finds one of extraordinary value. He sells all that he has to buy it.
These parables remind us all that the kingdom of God, entered by becoming a follower of Jesus Christ, is worth more than all earthly possessions, relationships, or comforts. The surrender of worldly goods is not a painful loss but a joyful exchange for something far greater. The phrase ‘sold all that he had’ signifies that following Jesus is a total life commitment, not a casual hobby. These stories emphasise that while salvation is a gift, living in the kingdom of God may cost us our security, plans, or relationships, but that this is well worth it when considering eternity. The choice we all have to make is whether this life is all that matters or whether we will bend our knee to our creator and Saviour who gave us all rational minds, a world that works according to the Laws of God, and gives us both an eternal purpose to live for and an ethic to live by.
Jim Elliot (1927–1956),was an American Christian missionary who, along with four others, was martyred in 1956 by the Huaorani people in Ecuador. wrote these words in his personal journal on October 28, 1949, when he was 22 years old:
“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep in order to gain what he cannot lose.”
This is a paraphrase of Jesus' teaching in Luke 16:9 or Mark 8:35
“For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.”
Similar thoughts were recorded by the 17th-century Puritan preacher Thomas Adams, who wrote:
“To part with what we cannot keep, that we may get that we cannot lose, is a good bargain.”
Similarly, Philip Henry, father of the famous commentator Matthew Henry, wrote
“He is no fool who parts with that which he cannot keep, when he is sure to be recompensed with that which he cannot lose.”
These quotes highlight a trade-off between the temporary (life, wealth, time) and the eternal (spiritual gain, relationship with God, legacy).
For Elliot, sacrificing his physical life for the sake of the Gospel was not a "loss" because he had been promised by someone he loved dearly, his Saviour, the Lord Jesus, that he had an eternal reward which could never be taken away.
Those who make excuses for rejecting Jesus need to consider the facts and then decide whether he is who he claimed to be and whether they need what he offers. What better way to start this enquiry can there be than to read the biographies of Jesus by those who knew him best? These are the four gospels.- Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Each presents a distinct portrait of Jesus to different audiences. Matthew highlights Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and King, Mark portrays him as the active Servant, Luke emphasises his humanity and compassion for the outcast, and John focuses on his divinity as the Son of God.
BVP
