Can one repent at the Judgement or after death?

  • Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.

    If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!

    To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#81
Well, a few things..

One, is that there was no Cross of Christ.
Also, the Holy Spirit does not convict dead people in Hades/Hell, of their sin. He only performs this "drawing all men" on Earth where the living can hear the Gospel and believe.
There is no Gospel being preached in Hell.
They are beyond this offer.
Interesting approach friend. Where in the Bible does it say there is no Cross available to those in the grave?
1 Peter 3:19
By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;

1 Peter 4:6
For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

Luke 16 The righteous did speak to the bad side of the tracks.

Matthew 7 maybe those whom Jesus never knew would know the Gospel and share it. If God wanted to, he could preach the gospel to the dead --- there is no proof that he will do that again. Angels could preach the gospel to the dead --- no proof that will happen. But, when you have human beings there with a memory of earth(martyrs in Rev comes to mind), they can share what they were told.

The Holy Spirit is Omnipresent, I would not limit God.

Where is the expiration date on the Gospel?

Take your approach and back it up with Scripture and exegesis. You may have the Apologetics needed.
 

Magenta

Senior Member
Jul 3, 2015
61,137
30,284
113
#82
The rich man was looking at his immediate discomfort first, then that of family.

In short, he was not asking the right questions about salvation. I am sure, they had to be some people on his side of the pit who heard people preach --- maybe some heard Noah preach or a Prophet?
The rich man asked that his family be warned so they did not suffer he same fate as he.

He understood there was no chance of a second chance for him.

He did not want the same for his loved ones.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#83
Once to die (απαξ αποθανειν). Once for all to die, as once for all to live here. No reincarnation here.

After this cometh judgement (μετα τουτο κρισις). Death is not all. Man has to meet Christ as Judge as Jesus himself graphically pictures (Matthew 25:31-46 (NAS)

https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/eng/rwp/hebrews-9.html

Not sure there is anything in the grammar to justify someone not being able to repent after death.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#84
If someone does not want to be with Jesus when they are alive, why would they want to be with Him after they die?
If one is given the chance of being in paradise why would they not want to?
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#85
Notice "according to men in the flesh"......so, there is the context.
Its the contrast.

Now who are the "dead" , that would be given the "Gospel", so that "faith comes by hearing"?
Can this be those who died as Christ rejectors and are waiting for "the Great White Throne" Rev 20:11, because their "name is not found in the Lamb's book of Life"?

A.) No.

So then, who are the "dead" that would need to HEAR : "the preaching of the Cross"?

Go to Genesis.
Find Adam.
Read.....>"you shall surely die".
This is, "spiritual separation" from God's Spirit.

This is to be "dead"....
And this is all of us until we hear the Gospel, and "faith comes by HEARING", and God accepts our faith as "faith is counted as Righteousness", and we are BORN AGAIN into the Spirit of God, by the Spirit of God.

See that "dead" being made "ALIVE" "In Christ" by Christ who is THE LIFE and THE Resurrection, and who is also ETERNAL LIFE?

You can't get all that in Hell.
You can only receive it on Earth by believing in Christ.., or you will go to Hell after you die.

See, "Justification by FAITH"< can't happen after you die.
The judgement is by men there, not God.

1 Peter 4:6
For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

1 Peter 4:6
Easy-to-Read Version
6 Some were told the Good News before they died. They were criticized by others in their life here on earth. But it was God’s plan that they hear the Good News so that they could have a new life through the Spirit.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#86
Yes.
He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still. Rev 22:11 (KJV)
Revelation 22:11

Easy-to-Read Version



11 Let anyone who is doing wrong continue to do wrong. Let anyone who is unclean continue to be unclean. Let anyone who is doing right continue to do right. Let anyone who is holy continue to be holy.”

The verbiage of your proof text shows they are making a choice. Repenting is a possible choice too.

Aside: this is the verse John Wesley came up with "cleanliness is next to godliness" It was in one of his sermons I read long ago.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#88
Example 1: someone that was born and died before Jesus (such as Abraham).
Example 2: someone that lived and died in an isolated community that had never heard of Christ.
Example 3: someone that struggled with Christian identity
1. Hebrews 11 By Faith
2. Somewhere in Romans 2:15 maybe
3. unsure of any text other than the Gospel itself Eph 2:8-10
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#89
This is the same word for "death" that is used to describe Jesus' resurrection from the dead. You could interpret the 1 Peter 4:6 instance to be a metaphor that describes spiritual death, and it would be consistent with scripture, but you could also interpret this with 1 Peter 3:18-19 as an example where Christ "preached to those in prison" meaning those in Hades, Sheol, the Sea, etc. Either interpretation is consistent with scripture but it would be incorrect to use this to conclude that the opportunity for salvation ends at bodily death.

The interpretation of salvation after bodily death resolves questions such as "What happened to those that died before Christ?" Abraham is an example of someone that saw Christ despite dying centuries before. If you believe that salvation cannot be attained after death, how was Abraham saved by Christ?



I assume you are talking about the Lake of Fire (not Hades)? I have not seen any scripture which expresses the position that the opportunity for salvation ends at bodily death. It's fine to interpret that bodily death disqualifies someone from attaining salvation, but if this is explicit in scripture where in scripture is it?
Historically, The text was taken literally, not spiritual death. About 5 or 6 hundreds years after Christ one of the church fathers took one of those texts as referring Analogically of Jesus preaching through Noah to the people of his day.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#90
Explain how example 1 works if salvation cannot be attained after death?
Faith is a gift of God and can be given anytime God chooses to. Eph 2:8-10
We are told in Hebrews 11 and somewhere in the book of Romans that Abraham became a friend of God by faith.

I think it is in Romans 2, God's laws are written on our hearts. By the doctrine of invincible ignorance. One can be in a case where sin is not imputed. One's conscious bears witness to what we have done.

Psalm 32:2
Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.

  1. Romans 4:6
    Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  2. Romans 4:8
    Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  3. Romans 4:11
    And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised: that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also:
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  4. Romans 4:22
    And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  5. Romans 4:23
    Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him;
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  6. Romans 4:24
    But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;
    In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations
  7. Romans 5:13
    (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

"Read Romans 4 & 5 for context, some texts speak of righteous being imputed to Abraham.


Romans 2:13-16

J.B. Phillips New Testament



God’s judgment is absolutely just
12-13 All who have sinned without knowledge of the Law will die without reference to the Law; and all who have sinned knowing the Law shall be judged according to the Law. It is not familiarity with the Law that justifies a man in the sight of God, but obedience to it.
14-15 When the Gentiles, who have no knowledge of the Law, act in accordance with it by the light of nature, they show that they have a law in themselves, for they demonstrate the effect of a law operating in their own hearts. Their own consciences endorse the existence of such a law, for there is something which condemns or commends their actions.
16 We may be sure that all this will be taken into account in the day of true judgment, when God will judge men’s secret lives by Jesus Christ, as my Gospel plainly states.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#91
And that verse continue

20 to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water,


Only happen for people that dead during float not every body and it is before judgement not after
Romans 14:10-12
Why, then, criticise your brother’s actions, why try to make him look small? We shall all be judged one day, not by each other’s standards or even our own, but by the standard of Christ. It is written: ‘As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God’. It is to God alone that we have to answer for our actions.

Philippians 2:5-11
Let Christ be your example of humility
Let Christ himself be your example as to what your attitude should be. For he, who had always been God by nature, did not cling to his prerogatives as God’s equal, but stripped himself of all privilege by consenting to be a slave by nature and being born as mortal man. And, having become man, he humbled himself by living a life of utter obedience, even to the extent of dying, and the death he died was the death of a common criminal. That is why God has now lifted him so high, and has given him the name beyond all names, so that at the name of Jesus “every knee shall bow”, whether in Heaven or earth or under the earth. And that is why, in the end, “every tongue shall confess” that Jesus Christ” is the Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

How can one confess that without repenting?
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#92
And that verse continue

20 to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water,


Only happen for people that dead during float not every body and it is before judgement not after
"2. After having said that Christ was put to death in the flesh, and quickened in the spirit, the apostle immediately went on to say: in which also He went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometime were unbelieving, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water; thereafter he added the words: which baptism also now by a like figure has saved you. 1 Peter 3:18-21 This, therefore, is felt by me to be difficult. If the Lord when He died preached in hell to spirits in prison, why were those who continued unbelieving while the ark was a preparing the only ones counted worthy of this favour, namely, the Lord's descending into hell? For in the ages between the time of Noah and the passion of Christ, there died many thousands of so many nations whom He might have found in hell. I do not, of course, speak here of those who in that period of time had believed in God, as, e.g. the prophets and patriarchs of Abraham's line, or, going farther back, Noah himself and his house, who had been saved by water (excepting perhaps the one son, who afterwards was rejected), and, in addition to these, all others outside of the posterity of Jacob who were believers in God, such as Job, the citizens of Nineveh, and any others, whether mentioned in Scripture or existing unknown to us in the vast human family at any time. I speak only of those many thousands of men who, ignorant of God and devoted to the worship of devils or of idols, had passed out of this life from the time of Noah to the passion of Christ. How was it that Christ, finding these in hell, did not preach to them, but preached only to those who were unbelieving in the days of Noah when the ark was a preparing? Or if he preached to all, why has Peter mentioned only these, and passed over the innumerable multitude of others? "
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102164.htm
 

Magenta

Senior Member
Jul 3, 2015
61,137
30,284
113
#94
If one is given the chance of being in paradise why would they not want to?
We are natural born enemies of God. Nothing in Scripture suggests that changes with death.

Those who die without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit of God are spiritually dead.

Spiritual rebirth is required to give one a heart capable of loving God, and seeing His kingdom.




 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#95
I never read about gospel being preach for the dead during modern time on the Bible
What I remember read is once die and face judgement
The idea of second chance is danger because encourage crime
I am poor let rob the bank now and repent when I die.
That is illogical friend. I do not know of any unitarians going out to rob banks or murder do you?

Fact is, Jesus did preach or Announce something to the dead. The safest bet would to be think he announced the good news to the righteous side of the grave. Resurrected them and led them to heaven, thus moving paradise to heaven. If you do a word study on the word paradise before the cross it is in the grave, after the resurrection it is in heaven. II cor 12 and Luke 16 comes to mind. The is a text in paul's letters that says something like "lead te captives free".
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#96
Need there be any?


It is for this that we labor and strive [often called to account], because we have fixed our [confident] hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe [in Him, recognize Him as the Son of God, and accept Him as Savior and Lord].
1 Timothy 4:10

People are able to repent during the great tribulation.
" It does not say one can not repent after death. "

Yes, the grammar of Hebrews 9:27 does not rule out the possibility of people repenting after death.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#97
Because Scripture declares it. It is appointed for a man once to die and then comes judgement.
We all know there is time between death and Judgement. The grammar does not rule out that fact.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#98
The gospel has been told throughout the modern world. There is no excuse.

Why do we still train missionaries if everyone in the world has heard the gospel? There are children too young to understand the gospel. They will not be the only ones who needs to hear it.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
#99
All of the saints who died in the old testament era were saved through faith before they died.
These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. Heb 11:13 (KJV)

faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Heb 11:1 (KJV)
But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Heb 11:6 (KJV)
How can you "seek Him" after you die, when you are face to face with Him?


God put them in those communities for the very purpose of them getting saved.
And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; 27 That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: Acts 17:26-27 (KJV)

One can fall on their knees and repent that is how.

Again, the apostles and many others I cor 15 saw the risen lord. And, many of them likely believed.

Seeing God does not rule out the possibility of repenting. If I fall upon a more concrete answer, I will share.

I don't know what "Christian identity" is, but it sounds self-focused, as opposed to Savior-focused.
 

TheLearner

Well-known member
Jan 14, 2019
8,221
1,584
113
68
Brighton, MI
Your lack of understanding is profound,
but if you're stuck on this heresy,
you'd fit right in with the Mormons.

There is no "the great tribulation".
Name calling is uncalled for. Take a chill pitt Huckleberry.


Revelation 7:14
And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

There are people who became Christians during that time.