here is another test I like to give :
a child named John is raised in a Baptist household by parents who were strong believers in the Baptist faith. they took John to church each week, read the Bible with him and taught him the Gospel.
when John was 15, he accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior and was baptized in front of the Baptist congregation as a public testimony of his being saved.
for the next three years, John was very zealous in his faith and thanked Jesus daily for dying for his sins.
When he turned 18, John went away to college and gradually his love for the Lord was replaced by booze, women and gambling. At 25, he stopped reading the Bible and going to church. At age 32, he lost his faith altogether and declared himself to be an atheist. a few years later, he divorced his wife and ran away and married his secretary.
at age 65, he died completely rejecting Jesus and his work on the cross.
according to the Scriptures, where will John soul spend eternity?
According to Calvinists he was never saved and is in Hell. According to Catholics, he walked away from the grace he once had and is in Hell. To most Lutherans, he was born again, and he may or may not go to heaven...not for us to question. According to Methodists, he just found another path to heaven.
The 2000+ years claim always seems like advertising or even attempted subliminal brainwashing when slipped into a sentence that way. And as for the claim itself, I won’t go into all the ways that the Catholic Church is different from the faith presented in Scripture, as I have before in posts, but will just say look at how the pope and bishops dress. And look at the Vatican, and even the grand churches. Modernism appealed to me as a teenager, and then after learning a lot of history in college, grand churches did in my 20’s. But once I grew deeper in my faith and read the whole Bible, I saw all of it for the religion it is. Religion weighs down, and those grand churches turn the actual church, the people, into slaves to the upkeep of them, and so into business enterprises. The Christian people in Europe are taxed for their upkeep. That is so very far from the New Testament. And faith is not an external building, but internal in a person.
On the dress of the pope and bishops, too, I went back to my impression as a child. I didn’t know much at all, but the very basics of the Gospel, which I believed, but just from seeing the Catholic pope, and observing how he appeared before the crowds, it seemed so out of place with the senses the Gospel gave me, that it was a little disturbing to me as a child. And with the much more I now know and understand, I can see why I got that impression. The dress of leaders and the grand buildings aren’t just superficial trappings, but reflect the Catholic Church’s drift from the Gospel.
On your questions, they are in many ways straw men. Where will Catholics like Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy go when they die?
The example of the killer who becomes a Catholic Christian due to the prison guard is far less common than those who become Christians due to evangelicals. Catholics feel far less of a need to share their faith, as studies have shown, and I know that personally as well. And if the man accepted Christ as his savior, then He was saved. On the answer you’re looking for, I’m not sure what Catholics would answer, but I imagine you will say either Heaven or purgatory, to work off his sins, although I know Catholics can believe people released from purgatory for different reasons.
On the other example, no one can say definitely that anyone else goes to Hell. But we are to discern things, and if that man did all that you said, he would be considered to, going on what’s known, not to have ever been born again to begin with. In a Baptist church there is no age for children to get baptized. They have to accept Jesus for themselves, and they are taught Scripture from an early age, and about giving their lives wholly and entirely to Him. Faith is not just in a corner of their lives. However, even here I see things changing in the U.S. because the church is accommodating itself to the world around it, and the world is getting further and further away from the Lord. But evangelicals are still behind on where mainline Protestants and Catholics are with that.
On the example of the second man, then, if had been saved, he would have persevered. The Bible has a lot to say on that. My question to you is what does Catholicism say about him if he’d been Catholic.
When one understands the commitment they make to Christ, and they choose to walk far from Him thereafter, I believe if one truly knows the Lord and is saved, he cannot walk that way for long without missing the savior they first loved.
Some people want it all....they want to claim their salvation and also continue to live life as they want with all it’s trappings...some can even justify themselves and still claim they are the Lords.
As for this man....I find what is missing is how many times was he approached about the path he was on...and how many times did he continue to choose the path he took.
I believe God seeks those sheep caught in the thickets when they’ve strayed. But some will struggle against the hand of the Lord to pull them out. They may in fact sufficate themselves in the process.
Where is He after death....not our call.
That's God's call.
It's not for us to know his heart. Only God can do that.
Unlike Catholics who like to ex-communicate and pronounce anathemas on everyone who doesn't agree lock step with them.
They think that they can judge people's eternal destiny on a minute by minute basis depending how whether they are adhering to Catholic teaching or not.
So it's rather ironic that you'd lay out a scenario and ask us to judge.
And besides, your hypothetical scenario is just that. Hypothetical and way too simplistic. But legalists are like that. They think everything is in black and white.
Hell