OT: Bible Discussion (Split from Real World Sensitivities)

[capnq]

Originally Posted by Imp

This is a major sticking point for me though & if you look at the whole picture where you are born has a huge bearing on your chances.
Generalising but being born in the West say means you have a good chance of decent living conditions & are likely to adopt some faith involving Christ.
Being born in Asia possibly a worse standard of living & more likely to adopt another faith. So I would think its fair enough to say the odds have been stacked against you simply because of your place of birth.
If so for a God to be fair does he not have to judge you on your actions & the way you live your life with the fact that you believe him having little bearing on the outcome.

"Standard of living" not only has less relevance than you think it does, it has the opposite effect.

Originally Posted by Matthew 19:23 (Revised Standard Version)

And Jesus said to his disciples, "Truly, I say to you, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven."

(If you'd like more context, I recommend reading Matthew 19:16-30.)

Affluence makes it more difficult to recognize your own need for any form of spirituality. I was raised as a Lutheran, and can't consciously remember a time when I didn't believe in Jesus, but the closest I've ever felt to God was during a two-week period when I was homeless. (I'd rather not discuss my circumstances at that time in any detail.)

I tried to dig up a better answer to your question, but disagreed myself with the conclusions people came to in the first couple search results I looked at. The first piece I found that I thought worth linking to was this PDF from the Free Church of Scotland.There's an article in it titled "Cross-cultural Evangelism", written by a Hindu who converted to Christianity:

Originally Posted by Ram Gidoomal

What about those who live and die without
ever hearing the gospel? What about - to take
one people group at random - the Western
Gaisu people in China? [...] They practice
ancestor worship, and no Gaisu or indeed no-
body in the immediate area has ever been
known to become a Christian. The area is al-
most untouched by Christian witness. So what
will become of those Gaisu who have died and
will die without hearing the gospel?

The answer is, we just don’t know.

As frustrating as it is, this is the most honest answer I've found to your question. The people who are absolutely sure they know the answer are the ones whose arguments I find the most painful to read.