Salvation through Suicide?
“How does God look on one who commits suicide? How does God view self-murder and how should we look on this contemporary sin?”
This is a question that has become more and more relevant as the years pass by.
According to the latest statistics, males commit suicide about 3.7 times higher than females. This is not to say that it is not a problem for women, but only that more men take their lives than women. Further, even men take their lives the older they live, especially those divorced. Let’s notice a few more figures:
Suicide was the second leading cause of death among those aged 10 to 34. Further, we discover that suicide rates were highest for American Indian, Non-Hispanic males, followed by White, Non-Hispanic males.
There are so many figures given in our sources that it is hard to narrow down the results. For instance, among people who are lesbian, homosexual, or bisexual, people are three times more likely to take their lives than more regular “straight” people. People are more likely to engage in “medically serious attempts” at suicide if they are LGBTQ young people. Also, we learn that 41% of transsexual adults have attempted suicide! If the family rejects their perversion, 8 times as many young people attempt to take their lives! This is a staggering statistic—and we wonder why people, including the government, refuse to see it!
When we look at the world in general, we learn that about 800,000 people commit suicide each year. Further, the older the more likely that someone will take his life and divorced men are particularly high among older people. Firearms and poisoning are leading causes of these deaths. (See https://ourworldindata.org/suicide).
If nearly a million people worldwide take their lives and if a large number of people in the Unites States do likewise, we wonder why? In the past, people were more likely to refrain from this sort of death. For example, generally, in the past, the Catholic Church has considered suicide to be a “mortal sin” which prevents one from entering heaven. Among Protestants, suicide was also frowned upon.
Today, things are much different. We’ve noticed that even preachers “preach a person into heaven” when they take their lives. They and society in general seem to think that suicide arises from a form of “mental illness” or depression (the leading cause), thus they say that a person is not really responsible for his (or her) behavior. We find it strange that in the past people were able to find other ways to expend their frustration and deal with depression, whereas today it would seem that many (some million a year) take their lives with impunity! Can you imagine the frustration, sense of loss, and confusion that this brings to families, to employers, to friends, and to others?
As we mentioned before, one reason for the rise in self-murders is that people have been told that if they take their lives, they will immediately be received by a gracious God in heaven! Instead of facing a wrathful God who alone has the right to take a life, they think that if their life becomes very painful, if depression won’t go away, if they just “can’t stand it anymore,” then all they need to do is to pull the trigger or consume the poison!
We thought of this just a day or two ago when a murderer wrote to his wife, “Going to see my Savior.” He went on to say, “This life on earth is a mere grain of sand compared to eternity.” Yes, it is. But this man wrote this apparently frustrated that his wife was committing adultery for a couple of years before he must have chosen to kill her! (Of course, he, himself was not guiltless in the relationship.) So will this person “go to see his Savior [Jesus Christ]”? Apparently not.
No, he will face this “Savior” directly but He won’t be a “savior” to him but a judge. As James says, “There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and to destroy” (James 4:12). God is able to “destroy” and apparently He will “destroy” the one who “destroys” his own life!
It is time that we renounce the current emphasis on rehabilitating the sinner or slapping the sinner on his wrist. Instead, it is time to speak the truth—but let it be done in love (cf. Ephesians 4:15). Let us share with the sinner that he must not destroy what God has not given him the right to destroy, but let us share with him or her that God loves him and wants to “save” him or her by His grace.
Will you join with me in speaking the truth and not continuing the modern form of unbelief and rebellion regarding suicide? Let us bless and help those who have found their lives to be sad and nearly “impossible” and point them to Jesus Christ, the “Savior” to whom they can go and find peace, forgiveness, and rest!
Please check this also:
https://truediscipleship.com/should-you-take-your-life-3/
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