Why does God send people to hell just because they “don’t believe in Jesus”?
Short Answer
This is a common misconception. No one goes to hell for “not believing in Jesus”. What does the Bible say?
Romans 3:23 – for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 6:23 – and the wages of sin is death.
Romans 5:12 – and so death spread to all men because all sinned.
We are all deserving of hell for rebelling against God’s commands, what the Bible calls “sin”.
More Info
An important element of God’s standard of justice, which many people fail to acknowledge or perhaps even understand, is that He has written it on EACH OF OUR HEARTS. Essentially, we are ALL convicted by our own consciences for doing things that we KNOW are wrong. This doesn’t require having access to a Bible, or hearing the name of Jesus, going to church, or anything like that.
Romans 2:15 – They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.
A false accusation that is often leveled at God is that He is “unfair.” But the Bible clearly tells a different story. God created the heavens and the earth (ie, the whole universe). As the Creator, God is judge over His own creation; He gets to make the rules and decide the consequences. This is unquestionably “fair.” But He goes beyond that. The Bible describes that His rules are not arbitrary, but that they are FOR OUR GOOD, ALWAYS!
Deuteronomy 6:24 – And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day.
As the rightful judge, God has made his law clear to everyone by giving them an internal “rule book” within every heart. When we violate that rule book, we are fairly punished according to the consequences that God has established beforehand.
