Automatic Transcript Generated
Speaker 1
Let’s get our next question up here. So Tracy is asking, did the thief actually repent on the cross or did Christ just accept him into heaven?
Speaker 2
So this is a great question, Tracy, and this is one of these amazing examples in the Bible of potentially how you can still get into heaven even if you’re not baptized. There’s a lot of debate sometimes within Christian world, how essential is baptism? Yes, we should be baptized. It’s an important thing. But sometimes people are not in a situation where they’re able to do it. So if we look, let’s start with the verse. First corinthians seven verse ten. One corinthians seven verse ten. And it says, actually weird, didn’t look right. It says, Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret. But worldly sorrow brings death. But again, going back, it was second Corinthians oh, weird. Okay, go ahead.
Speaker 1
Corinthians thank you for correcting that.
Speaker 2
Glad you found it. Good.
Speaker 1
No.
Speaker 2
So Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation. So it’s a repentance that brings salvation. If we go to Luke 23, starting at verse 39, we now hear the story of the thief on the cross. And it says, then one of the criminals who were hanged blasphemied him, referring to Jesus, saying, if you are the Christ, save yourself and us. So I mean, he’s mocking Jesus, right? If you’re God, you’ll just take yourself down. But the other, referring to the other criminal, he answered and rebuked him, rebuked the other thief, saying, do you not even fear God seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly so he’s recognizing he’s done wrong. He deserves the punishment. He deserves to be on the cross, for we receive the due reward for our deeds. But this man has done nothing wrong. He’s recognizing Jesus’s righteousness. And then verse 42 says, he said to Jesus, lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. So he’s recognizing Jesus is the Lord, he’s recognizing Jesus is the Messiah, that he’s going to establish the heavenly kingdom and that Christ has the ability to welcome him to heaven and asked to be there.
Speaker 2
To me, this is signs of repentance and desiring to be with God, with Christ. He wants to be there. And how does Christ respond? And Jesus said to him, assuredly. Assuredly. I say to you, actually. And by the way, there’s no comma in the Greek. We added the punctuation much later. So probably said, surely I tell you today you will be with me in paradise. So Jesus says this man is going to be saved, that he will be in heaven when Jesus establishes his kingdom, which we’re going to be talking about later today. When is that going to happen? What is the establishing of the kingdom? We talked about last week that the kingdom is here, but there’s also going to be another step of establishing the kingdom. And we can tell them from this verse from Luke itself that Jesus said, this man assuredly will be in the kingdom. So, yeah, I say he repented, and Jesus accepted him into heaven. And if that can happen to a thief on the cross who has no hope, not even baptized, what more can we hope can we have when we have entire life before us to get to know Christ and be transformed by him?
Speaker 2
Amen.
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In His Service
BibleAsk Team