Secular Salvation

Did you watch the video?  Please take 3 minutes and do so now.  You won't regret it.

Done?

Doesn't this video disturb you?

I mean after you get done being moved to tears because of the beauty of what is going on here.  You might be wondering what I am talking about.  When I see this man, I so clearly see Jesus in him, the way he cares for those outcasted by society, those who no one cares about.  In addition, he is going against the orthodox tradition of his family in associating with these "forgotten ones", so he is committing social suicide to do this.  Among Christians I hardly see the gospel so clearly, so beautifully displayed as in this man.  The only problem is, as far as I can tell, he is not a Christian.


Now why is this a huge problem for me?  If this man were to die tomorrow, never having been baptized, never having sang a worship song, never having praised the name of Jesus Christ and accepted Jesus into his heart, by all conventional means, he's going not going to heaven.  We say it is by faith and faith alone that a man can be saved, not by his works.  Can we honestly say that this man has faith in Christ?  More than likely he does not.  Salvation through Christ alone, no one can come to the father except through him.  But how do we explain Narayanan Krishnan's (the man in the video) Christ-like behavior?  Is not man depraved?  How is it that he captures the essence of the law and the prophets worlds away from the context and teaching?

But what if God has revealed himself apart from Scriptures and missionaries and churches?  What if God, seeing that old man eating his own human waste out of hunger, was so moved to compassion, he enacted his will on the nearest, most effective person who would be able to help his children suffering, a chef at a classy Hotel?  Perhaps God has written His law on his heart and has completely bypassed human action that he might be saved first before he could feed the hungry.  Is such a thing unheard of with God?

If God were limited to only using Christians to enact His will in the world, nothing would ever get done.  We do share a special recognition and partnership with the Lord, however God has never been dependent on us and He never will be.  It is for the best as otherwise every unsaved soul and every person left unreached by the gospel would be completely and utterly our fault.  It would introduce too much liability for such a  life and death matter.  It is not like we could use the additional guilt of breaking yet another covenant with God.  Besides, it is apparent that some areas of the world have more access to Jesus than others.  Someone born right in the middle of the Bible belt has more of a shot of being saved than someone born in the middle of Iran.   Is there then bias inherent in the current model of conversion, with some groups disproportionately represented in heaven than others?  Is heaven 55% white, 15% Hispanic, 15% African, 10% Asian, and 5% Arabic? Or do all peoples have equal access to God's grace?

There is no doubt in my mind this man in the video is filled with God's love and compassion for the poor, the hungry, and the destitute.  Could God have given him his Holy Spirit before he even knew who Jesus was?  Could God have acted without us in the partnership we share in the spread of the Gospel?

I think certainly so it is within God's power to do such a thing and at times completely necessary for God to intervene in areas which we find hard to penetrate, such as India (2.4% are Christian, though that is 24 million) especially when there is suffering.  Suffering occurs everywhere and so will be Christ's compassion regardless if there are Christians in the area or not.  It is conceivable God might fill someone with Christ's compassion to alleviate the pain of his people in his infinite mercy and common grace. But are they saved, or is the compassion but temporary?

Perhaps we must rethink entirely what it might mean to be saved (and for that matter who can be saved/is saved), if in fact God has the power to save without our first sowing the seeds.  In a sense we have a checklist that we like to run down:

1) Is he/she baptized?
2) Does he/she proclaim faith in Christ Jesus as his/her Lord and savior?
3) Does he/she act in accordance with that faith?
4) Has he/she confessed his/her sins?
etc.

But is not only one thing here that is truly important:  the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the guarantee of what's to come?  I don't know about you, but just because someone asks to receive Christ and prays that the Holy Spirit would indwell them doesn't necessarily mean the Holy Spirit would actually do it.  Prayers aren't magic, as if by some supernatural incantation you can invoke the power of the Holy Spirit to be infused into someone.  The Holy Spirit does what it wills in accordance with the Father and the Son.  I've met many a professing Christian who, Lord help them, show little evidence of the Holy Spirit working in their lives.  but the thing is, you cannot always tell someone's heart by being around them.  Only the Father knows those he has called and whom the Holy Spirit has indwelled.  Up until now, I wasn't sure it was possible for those who did not know Christ to be indwelled with the Holy Spirit, but now I am not so sure.

This man from India, as I said before, blew me away by how clearly he displayed the gospel in his life.  When I look at him I cannot help but see Jesus working in India through him although he does not know who it is who works through him.  I wish more Christians, myself included, were such beacons of light for the faith.  But there is one last crazy idea I would like to submit: although no one is guaranteed to know of Jesus in this lifetime on Earth, for whatever reason (political tensions, unreached, abortion, etc.) each and every single one of the will meet Jesus in the life hereafter, if only for a brief while.  If we can accept that

a) The Holy Spirit has free and active reign to work in whomever it wills apart from human intervention and
b) It matters not if you know who Jesus is (for even Satan and his devils know) but rather if Jesus knows you

then it is entirely plausible that Jesus will recognize those whom the Spirit has rested in and in turn those who secretly possess the Holy Spirit will immediately know and recognize the familiar essence of Jesus Christ despite not knowing him in their earthly lives.  Moreover, both will rejoice at the sight of the other.  Though someone may not display those marks typical of salvation (baptism, confession of faith, etc.), there may not be a reason to jump the gun in condemning such as unsaved.  Everything belongs to God, both sacred and secular, and he can do with it whatever He wills.  That is his choice, not ours for if it were our choice it would not be grace and therefore not salvation.

But again, this only really tells us what we already know

1) God is sovereign
2) God is mighty to save
3) Only God can judge a man's heart, for if we were judged by our actions there would be no hope.
4) A man's salvation is worked out between him and God alone with fear and trembling.  Others may lead him but he must walk.

Much in the same way the Jews were surprised grace could be extended to the Gentiles, perhaps God can extend this grace to non-Christians as well (in the sense that they do not know Christ/never got a chance to know him).  Now, I am also no arguing for universalism.  I believe there is a real hell that really burns when you go there and God has every right to send people there for their sins.  What I am questioning is our own definition of Christian.  There are Christians who more than likely Jesus will say, "Depart from me, I never knew you", so it's not so hard for me to believe they may be "secular" folk who do the work of God and so show that the law has been written in their hearts by God.  Of course, outright denial of God and the reality of his Son and the power of the Holy Spirit is unforgivable.  Although baptism is very much a part of Christian life, it is not what defines us.  It is the life that we experience through Christ that we live unto the world as a testimony to God's grace and righteousness and to his gospel of peace which defines us.  This Indian man has embodied the gospel like so few I've met, it's harder for me to believe that the Holy Spirit does NOT have something to do with this.

After all, the Bible contains many stories of people outside of the chosen people of God demonstrating great saving faith.  Jesus encountered many of them in his ministry and their stories have been written for us to read. They have been made examples for us to imitate.  We know that faith is a gift from God as well so we can infer that God has given these gentiles saving faith before the even met Jesus.  The Roman centurion, for example, didn't know Jesus at all yet still came to Him for help.  So too with the bleeding woman who touched his cloak.  But the key thing is that it wasn't until they met Jesus that their faith became realized.  As I mentioned before, everyone gets a chance to meet Jesus.  Who's to say it has to be during your lifetime?  I am not saying that this lifetime counts for nothing.  Not at all!  But for those not able to be exposed to Jesus, that is to meet Jesus in their lifetime, they will have their chance.

What I am also not saying is that we should quit evangelism.  By no means!  Just because God can work wonders of salvation apart from us does not means that he does so very frequently.  Actually, we might never know how frequently God might do such a thing, but who can know the full extent of what God is doing in the world?  We still have our role to play in finding our lost brothers and sisters that God has already started the process of drawing them closer to him.  We still get to delight in the joys of the harvest with him.  I'm just saying we might be harvesting way less than we think when compared to what God is bringing in.  With God, anything is possible, even the salvation of "non-Christians".