Will people be lost who have never heard the gospel or
the name of Christ?
It is a fact that there are those in other parts of the
world who have never even heard of the Bible, much less
about Christ and His gospel. What is their condition? Are
they accountable to God? Are they amenable to the Gospel
of Christ? Does the Bible address this subject? Indeed it
does.
Jesus commanded, “Go ye into all the world, and preach
the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15). Why did Jesus
command to go into all the world and preach the gospel to
every creature if all people everywhere are not amenable to
the gospel? The fact is, people are lost without the gospel
and obedience to it. The fact that Jesus issued this
universal command implies that all men everywhere are
amenable to the gospel.
The Bible teaches that sin condemns. All have sinned,
and the wages of sin is spiritual death (Rom. 3:10, 23; 6:23).
To remedy the sin problem, man must obey the gospel of
Christ. In Acts 17:30, the record declares, “And the times of
this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every
where to repent:” The expression “all men every where”
leaves no one out. Every man is under divine obligation to
repent. Why? Note the next scripture: “Because he hath
appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in
righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he
hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from
the dead.” In view of the coming judgment, all men
everywhere must repent of sin. In 2 Thess. 1:8, the Bible
tells us that Jesus is coming back “in flaming fire taking
vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Some have argued that those who have never heard the
gospel or the name of Christ are safe in their condition. If
this were true, then we had better not do as Jesus
commanded and go into all the world and preach the gospel
to every creature, for the moment they hear the gospel and if
they reject it, then they will be lost. So, we just better leave
them alone. My friends, this makes the gospel the means of
condemning rather than the means of saving. People must
hear and obey the gospel of Christ to get rid of the
condemning power of sin.