…The fact that Jeffrey Dahmer's victims are in hell and he is in heaven demonstrates a problem with your dogma; any theology that punishes victims and rewards the criminal is flawed.—Facebook user FK [abbreviated]
One of the major themes of this blog is to point out the religious beliefs of those who claim to be “nonreligious.” Atheists and agnostics will often try to condemn Christianity, or ultimately, condemn the Most High God of the Bible by using their warped standard of right and wrong. The fact that they applying their own standard of right and wrong shows that they are looking to the god of self to judge right and wrong…and where there is a god, there is religion.
FK’s comment was on another one of Ray Comfort’s Facebook posts. His comment intrigued me, even though I did not initially know who Jeffrey Dahmer was. I curiously looked him up on Wikipedia and found that Jeffrey Dahmer murdered 17 people between 1978 and 1991. According to Wiki, he later became a born-again Christian. FK understands enough about the Gospel to realize that Jeffrey would be in heaven if he was indeed born-again. FK is reasoning that God is unjust to forgive Jeffrey, especially if some or all of his victims were not born-again, and therefore, would end up in hell. Here is how I replied:
FK, in your worldview, what is a flawless dogma/theology then? By what ultimate standard do you judge a dogma/theology to be flawed or flawless? And by what ultimate standard do you define "victim" and "criminal"?
I waited several minutes for a response and did not get one. Only a few other people were replying to his comment, so I have little doubt that he saw my questions. I followed up with a more detailed response:
I don’t know if you are formulating a response, but I will show you where I’m going with this.
For the Christian worldview, we have an ultimate standard, God’s Word, to judge right and wrong theology. For the Christian worldview, we also have an ultimate standard to define “victim” and “criminal.”
Setting aside the manmade laws, every human being (except the God-Man, Jesus) is ultimately a “criminal.” The ultimate standard of judgment is the Ten Commandments. Jesus said that even if you hate somebody in your heart, you are committing murder in your heart (Matthew 5:21-22). Who on earth has never committed the sin of murder, at least in their own heart? I wonder how many people might carry out the physical act of murder if it were not for human laws. I believe many would. If person A desires to murder people, but only refuses to do it because he/she does not want to go to jail, and if person B actually carries out several murders despite the potential for jail time, how is person A any better than person B?
Based on the ultimate standard in God’s Word, we are all “criminals” and even “murderers.” Nobody is righteous, not even one (Psalm 14:3). However, God is willing to grant mercy to anyone who repents and puts their trust in the person and work of Jesus Christ. This includes you, FK.
Over the next several hours I kept checking for a response but never got one. When I checked the next day, it turned out that FK deleted the comment thread! I hope and pray that he took my comments (and comments from other believers) to heart.