"Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life? For the Son of Man will come with his angels in his Father’s glory, and then he will repay everyone according to his conduct.” (Mat. 16: 24-27 NASB)
In considering the above words of the Lord Jesus Christ, let us ask (especially of our Hardshell brothers):
1.What does it mean to "lose (or forfeit) one's life (or soul)" in the above words of Jesus?
2. What does it mean to "save" or to "find life" in the above words of Jesus?
All bible commentators, and nearly all Christians, believe that salvation and damnation are under consideration in this passage. In other words, to lose one's soul or life is to be eternally lost and to gain one's soul or life is to be eternally saved. But, there are a few who resist this teaching, such as the Hardshells and the Universalists. Why do they resist acknowledging the obvious teaching of the passage?
They resist it because it goes against their presupposition that affirms that final salvation is unconditional, that there is nothing a man does to be saved. If he gains life, it is not because of anything he did. It is not because he believed or repented or persevered. It is not because he made a choice to follow Christ and actually did so. However, the text is clear that gaining one's soul is the result of a man following Christ. The text says "whoever wishes to save his life" (eternally speaking) "finds it," that is, is saved, both now and forever, as a result of his "losing his life for my sake," of his choice and action in following Christ.
Further, they reject the idea that the questions asked of Christ are to ever be addressed to lost sinners. They think it foolish to put such questions to the spiritually dead.
Two great questions!
"For (1) what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or (2) what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matthew 16:26 NASB)
Why are these two questions great?
First, because they are asked by the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Savior of the world, yea, from God himself.
Second, because the nature of the questions are of the highest importance for every thinking human being to ponder and are in fact addressed to every thinking person.
How one answers these questions determines a person's eternal destiny.
Calling All
God, through Christ, is externally calling all his thinking creatures, yea, all those who have a human "soul," to give their mental attention to the questions posed.
This call is universal. It cannot be limited to the elect or to the regenerated.
Christ was on this occasion personally calling out to his hearers to give their attention to his great questions. He also surely desired that they
1) be able to correctly answer the questions themselves, and
2) be able to repeat the questions to others and be able to help them to answer the questions correctly.
The doctrine of total depravity does not forbid us from posing the questions to those who are spiritually dead. If people have both a "a darkened understanding" (being alienated from the life of God) and an "internal ignorance" (because of the blindness of their heart), as Paul describes (Eph. 4:18), it still does not alleviate the Christian duty to put such questions to the lost nor the duty of the lost to consider them.
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