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24 -- THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT

  Luke 10:1-2, 8-15 After these things the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go. Then He said to them, "The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.

Whatever city you enter, and they receive you, eat such things as are set before you. And heal the sick there, and say to them, "The kingdom of God has come near to you.' But whatever city you enter, and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, "The very dust of your city which clings to us we wipe off against you. Nevertheless know this, that the kingdom of God has come near you.' But I say to you that it will be more tolerable in that Day for Sodom than for that city.

"Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades.

There is an old story about a missionary getting a flat tyre on his car and so arriving too late to baptize a dying Chines baby and so save it from perdition -- and even today, many Christians seem to believe that those of other religions are totally lost, hard as they find it to reconcile that view with their image of a loving God. What utter un-scriptural rubbish!

As Jesus himself makes clear in this section, there will be toleration, extreme mercy, love and kindness to all people on the day of judgment -- on the day when those now dead, and who in most cases never even heard the gospel of the Kingdom of God, such as the sinners of Sodom and Gomorrah and Tyre and Sidon, come out of their graves to be judged.

As already stressed, God is not trying to "save" the world at large at the present time -- and if he were, the work of Christ would be massively more powerful and there would be no shortage of laborers to bring in the harvest of souls.

The responsibility of those now called is to preach the gospel in all the world and pray for others to help them so that this phase of God's plan can be completed (Ephesians 1:9-12). See also Romans 11:5, and in particular Romans 11:26 which tells us that "All Israel shall be saved". As Jesus says in another place: "With God, nothing is impossible" -- and when the time is right, all mankind will be brought to repentance in sackcloth and ashes.

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