Your Sincerity Will Save You!

The gospel of “inclusivism” would have us believe that, and it’s spreading. Whether it comes from cowardly “Christians” who appear on the Larry King show and won’t take a stand for salvation through Christ alone, or from those who term ’sincere’ god-seekers ‘anonymous’ Christians, it’s the same song. “If you are ’sincere’ in seeking God and your ‘good works’ give evidence to your sincerity, somehow you will end up in Heaven.

I’m not sure the one who bore His Father’s wrath for the sins of His people would agree with that warm and comfy sentiment:

“Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” John 3:18

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6

Inclusivists might tell you that you don’t need to have been presented with Christ as Savior in order to believe in Him. Or, they might tell you that non-christian religions have in the end the same goal of finding God that Christian religions do, so we are all in the same family of God.

The Apostle Paul provides some clarity on the issue:

“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!” – Romans 10:14-15

Since no one is “good” or seeks God on his/her own (Romans 3:10-11), unless God begins a work of regeneration in a person, there is no “sincere” seeking after the God of the Bible. If there is sincere seeking after God present in a person’s heart, God will send the Gospel of Christ, somehow, someway. It might be someone preaching. It might be someone finding a Bible, or a even a piece of a page from a Bible. God has innumerable ways of ’sending the Gospel’.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” – Ephesians 2:8-9

No matter how sincerely a person seeks after God, it is not that sincerity, or any amount of ‘good works’ that saves. It is God who saves! Ask Jonah.