Believers are willing to accept the concept of heaven, but they look the other way when they come to passages in the Bible about hell. Very few seem to believe that those who die without Christ are going to a place where they will be tormented forever and ever in a bottomless pit where the fire is not quenched and they are separated from God and His love for all eternity without any chance of return.
– K. P. Yohannan
Christ Alone Wyoming 
Yes, but what about those that never had the chance to hear about Christ, learn His gospel, and follow it? Will God cast them down to hell too? Probably less than 1% of the inhabitants of the earth have even heard the name Jesus in their lifetime.
I witness to you that He is a more charitable God than that, and no respecter of persons. He treats all equally. He has provided a way by which those who would have received the gospel in life, had they the opportunity, will receive it in the spirit world. Christ Himself organized the missionary effort there (John 5:25; 1 Pet. 3:18-20; 1 Pet. 4:6). But what good would the preaching of the gospel be to those in the spirit world if they could not partake of the ordinances of His gospel, such as baptism? God has restored the principle and priesthood authority of vicarious ordinance work for the dead, by which His saints can perform these ordinances for and in behalf of the dead who have gone before. It is the work of the temples of God, the House of the Lord.
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Bryce,
Those who never hear the gospel are, I’m sorry to say, condemned. Jesus said as much Himself. John 3:18–“He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” Paul wrote in 1st Thessalonians 2:16–The Judeans had “[forbidden] us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved…” And, Ephesians 2:1-3–We “were dead in trespasses and sins…were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.” Before we know salvation, we are dead to God, and He is dead to us. If we stand before Him apart from Christ–whether we heard of Him or not–we will still be standing there with our sins, and God cannot allow us to dwell with Him (Psalm 5:4-5).
The people in Africa or South America, or wherever they are, who do not hear the gospel will meet the same fate as those in America who do not hear the gospel. God is not concerned with our sense of “fairness.” It is appointed, reserved, laying in wait, that a man will die once, and then he is judged (Hebrews 9:27).
There is nothing a man can do after he dies to save himself. And there is certainly nothing another person can do to save them. The “vicarious” ordinances you speak of were not “restored”, because they never existed.
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fourpointer,
Do you realize that such unreasonable logic condemns probably more than 99% of the people who have ever lived on this earth since its creation? You think that God would send all those people to hell for eternity because they lived at a time or in a place where the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ did not exist and where they had no chance whatsoever of hearing and accepting it? Why did God place these people on the earth in the first place then if they would have no chance whatsoever of receiving salvation? Why would God do that? We believe in a much more loving, justifying, equitable, charitable, and merciful God than that.
We realize that we must account for our sins, that we must have faith in Christ, and that we must receive all receive a remission of those sins to be clean to dwell with God. Of course. Those that hear the gospel preached to them in the spirit world have all those opportunities. What is your explanation for Christ preaching his gospel to the spirits who were dead? (1 Pet. 3:18-20; 1 Pet. 4:6) Seems pretty futile if they had no chance to begin with and they were condemned to hell.
You say, “It is appointed, reserved, laying in wait, that a man will die once, and then he is judged (Hebrews 9:27).” What are they to be judged of? They couldn’t choose one way or the other. Where there is no law given, there can be no punishment.
We believe that God did provide a way for these people to hear and accept the gospel. Everyone who has lived on earth gets their fair chance to accept or reject Jesus Christ. If they have never heard of Him how can they accept or reject Him? Those spirits that accept the gospel in the spirit world receive the ordinances of the gospel here on earth in the Lord’s temple.
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Bryce,
(Just wondering–are you the same Bryce I had a dialog with on this site a while back?)
If you want to apply “reasonableness” to the judgment of God upon sinners, let’s look at it this way: If one stands before God, never hearing the name Jesus Christ, and God tells that person, “You have a choice now. You can believe on the Son of God and enter into rest, or deny Him and suffer in Hell for eternity.” What “reasonable” soul would not choose to enter into rest?
You are correct in saying the vast majority of people will perish and suffer everlasting destruction. The Bible is very clear on that (Matthew 7:13-14). To apply any type of “universal salvation” is to make God a liar. Besides, consider how many times He commanded the Israelites to destroy entire cities for their wickedness. Do you really think He will then give them the choice of Heaven or Hell?
If you want to talk about “fairness”, consider yourself. You have read your Book of Mormon, you may have taken part in the temple ordinances (I’m just guessing; if I’m wrong then please correct me), you have done all the things a “good Mormon” is supposed to do to gain exaltation. Yet another person who goes through their entire life never hearing the Mormon gospel dies, is judged, and sent to the Terrestrial Kingdom–they were a decent person, they just never heard. Someone gets baptized for them and they get to ride on up to the Celestial. They get the same reward–for doing nothing–that you do for devoting your life to the LDS church. Do you consider that “fair”?
See, this is what happens when we apply human standards to God’s righeousness. We get a belief system that skews His holiness and His righteousness and His judgment so that it makes us feel better about ourselves, and gives us a false sense of comfort about how we can maybe we can do something for someone that never heard of Jesus, rather than following Christ’s commands to go preach the gospel (Matthew 28:19). Besides, would it not be better for these people to never hear, and go to the terrestrial Kingdom, than to hear it and have the chance to reject it and be benished to the Telestial?
When we die, we stand before God and we are judged. There is then nothing we, or anybody else, can do for us.
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fourpointer,
Yes, I’m that same Bryce. 🙂
Yes, I believe that God has perfect reasonableness. He is a perfectly just God. I don’t believe for one minute that God will cast the vast majority of people into hell for never having the opportunity to hear His gospel. How unfair would that be? He will give all a chance. The justice of God requires that.
You say:
Well, isn’t that the same predicament that we are in here on earth? We have missionaries that go out into all the world and tell people that they can believe in Jesus Christ and be saved, and if they don’t they will be damned. Many of those people, while still in mortality, choose to deny Him. Many “reasonable” souls deny the Christ here every day, why wouldn’t they there? It will not be God who preaches the gospel directly to them there; it is missionaries, just like here on earth. Christ set up the missionary work there when he visited the spirits who were dead, called missionaries, and has sent them forth to preach the gospel to those spirits in prison.
Yes, there will be many people who will perish and suffer everlasting destruction in hell, but they will be those who have heard the gospel and have made the choice to deny it. Those that God talks about destroying in the Bible are those who could have heard the prophets, could have accepted the gospel as it was preached to them, could have been righteous, but did not. They had all the opportunity in mortality to make that choice. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” (Matt. 23:37). These people will not receive another chance, a “second chance”, in the spirit world to accept or reject the gospel. They rejected it here, and will be judged accordingly.
Yes, I believe it is entirely fair for a person that was completely ignorant of Jesus Christ to receive the same salvation as someone who hears it, accepts it, lives it, and performs the gospel ordinances here on earth. That person who never heard of Christ never had the chance to accept it and live it here on earth. If that person were to be cast into hell, they would stand at the judgment bar and say, “But you didn’t give me the chance!” They will have the chance to hear it in the spirit world and will have all the opportunity to accept or reject it there. If they accept it they will be able to partake in all the saving gospel ordinances vicariously by the saints on earth.
Just because we believe that God is just and He gives all a chance does not mean that we don’t strive to fulfill God’s command to preach the gospel throughout the earth. I think you would probably agree with me that the LDS Church has one of the largest missionary forces of any church in the world. Indeed, we are striving to give people the opportunity to accept the gospel while in the flesh so that they can live on earth with all the blessings that the gospel brings in mortality.
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Bryce,
The reason our ability to be saved by accepting the truth of the gospel ends when we take our last breath here on earth is this: We are to accept the gospel by faith (Ephesians 2:8). And if we only believe because we can see the destiny we will be able to enjoy by saying, “Yep, I believe it! Let me in!” That is not faith. After all, consider the words of the apostle Paul in Romans 8:24–“For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?” John 20:29-30–“Jesus saith unto him, ‘Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.’ ”
And it is true, many souls will reject the gospel here on earth, even though they have it shown plainly to them. That is because they have been blinded by the enemy, Satan (See 2nd Corinthians 4:4; ). It is only by the Holy Spirit opening their eyes that they may see and be saved. 1st Corinthians 12:4–“no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.” But it is also true that if people do not hear the gospel, they cannot be saved (See John 3:18 and 1st Thess. 2:16, both of which I quoted above).
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fourpointer,
How can someone have faith in something that they know nothing about? People can’t accept the gospel “by faith” if they have never heard it.
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Exactly. That is why we are commanded to go and tell the gospel. Because unless they hear, they cannot believe.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=rom%2010:14-18&version=9
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