Several years ago, a friend of mine shared the gospel with a man he had just met. The man listened to him patiently as my friend taught him how to receive salvation through Jesus Christ. Then the man asked a classic question: "What about those in remote parts of the world who have never had a chance to hear the gospel? How will God judge them?"
My friend answered: "I believe that God is just, and that He will deal with those who have never had a chance to hear the gospel justly."
"But," my friend added, "you aren’t in that category. You’ve just had a chance to hear the gospel, and God will hold you responsible for that."
My friend had perceived that this gentleman was not primarily concerned about the salvation of those in the uttermost parts of the earth. Rather, he was trying to find out whether there was an alternative method of salvation that didn’t involve obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ. My friend answered him accordingly.
There are some outside the church who cling to the hope that if and when they have to stand before Almighty God to be judged, they can plead ignorance and perhaps receive some kind of break or second chance.
There are some within the church who cling to a similar hope. I remember hearing a sermon once in which the minister taught: "God will judge you on the basis of what you know, and what you did with what you know. The more of the word of God you learn, the more you are responsible to God for, and the more God will hold you responsible for."
I remember immediately toying with the idea that if I were careful to limit my intake of the word of God, I might be judged more leniently than those who had feasted long and hard on God’s word. However, I immediately recognized this as a Bad Idea, and banished it from my mind.
Not everyone gets rid of this idea so easily, though. There are those in the church who believe that they will not be held responsible by God for that which they do not know of God’s word.
There is a passage of scripture which should give pause to both these groups of people.
3 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,
4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
This passage warns that there will come a day when some will ridicule the idea of God’s judgment of the earth, and Christ’s return to the earth. The passage goes on to warn that these people are ignoring the fact that God has already judged the world in the past. This adds credibility to God’s warnings that He will judge the world in the future.
But I want to focus on the beginning of verse 5.
"For this they willingly are ignorant of…"
God, by way of the apostle Peter, points out that these scoffers are not only ignorant of this fact; they are ignorant by choice.
The point being made in the passage could have been made by simply observing the ignorance of the scoffers. But God a step further, raising the stakes. He made it clear that not only was He aware of what these people did not know; He also knew WHY they did not know it.
They did not know because they deliberately chose not to know.
God does not develop this point further here. He does not tell us how He will deal with those who choose not to know what He has said.
But what He does make clear here is this: "I know that trick. Try it at your own risk."
It is dangerous to know God’s word and refuse to obey it. However, the solution is not refusing to know God’s word. The solution is to be not merely a hearer of God’s word, but a doer.
22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass:
24 For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.
25 But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.