A Fable

You know what a fable is, don't you? It's a brief allegory to illustrate a point. Well, here's a fable.

Four friends got into a boat and rowed out in the lake. This would be wholly unremarkable if it weren't for the fact that none of the four could swim. But they were safe enough. They had their life jackets on and were just fine. That is, until Timothy and Bob decided to throw off their jackets and jump in on a dare. Well, it quickly became ugly. Greg and Jeremy worked to save their friends. They grabbed lifesavers and threw them to Tim and Bob. Bob grabbed the ring thrown his way and held on, but Tim ignored the one that came to him and before anyone could do any more, Tim had drowned.

Once ashore, they bemoaned the loss of their friend. "Poor Tim," Jeremy said, "he died because he didn't grab the lifesaver." Later, this was nagging at Greg. Really? Tim died because he didn't grab the lifesaver? Greg was analytical, so he went to the local high school and asked the coach if he could do an experiment with the boys in the gym. So he took a lifesaver and went to work. The instructions were simple. Don't take the lifesaver. Nothing more. So Greg threw lifesavers to every boy in the junior gym class. None took the lifesaver. None died. Very odd. Was it possible that Tim had died of something else?
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Someone said the other day what I've heard multiple times. "People go to hell because they don't accept Christ." Really? Is that the reason? So I did an experiment. I looked through Scripture, and I didn't find it. I found that the wages of sin is death. I found that the soul that sins will surely die. But I didn't find anything that said that the cause of eternal punishment was the rejection of the remedy.

Tim didn't die from not taking the lifesaver. Tim died from inhaling water, or possibly a heart attack, but not from failing to grasp the thing that could have saved him from it. Indeed, at the root of it, Tim died from his own stupidity. No one made him jump in the water without a life jacket when he couldn't swim.

By the same token, let's not get confused about eternity. Some people will spend eternity in the presence of the King in wonderful bliss. Those who do will do so because they received the remedy prepared by God in the form of His Son's sacrifice on our behalf. Those who do not will not spend eternity outside the presence of God for failing to grab that remedy. They will spend eternity outside the presence of God because that was their choice. They chose to defy God. They refused to submit. They determined to be god in their own lives. It was their doing. Don't get that confused.