All men everywhere

Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead." – Acts 17.30-31

Something changed when Jesus came. Before that time God patiently and lovingly overlooked the ignorance of the world. God could long ago have destroyed Athens for her total commitment to idolatry, but He didn’t. His patience and long suffering endured until the time of Christ.

But now things are different. Now Christ has come and the gospel is clear and God commands that all men everywhere must repent.

That means that everyone I know must repent of their sin and turn to Christ. Everyone.  All of my family and friends and co-workers and neighbours and associates and people I meet on my morning walk and the window washer and my mechanic and the guy at the shop and the gal at the supermarket and my Facebook and Twitter contacts everyone else must repent in order to avoid God’s eventual judgement.

But the wonderful truth is that though everyone must repent everyone can. The shopkeeper in the marketplace in Isaiah 55 said ‘Hello! Everyone who is thirsty come and drink water freely.’ God is not willing that any would perish. God would have all men everywhere to turn to Him.

That’s why Jesus told His disciples before He left that they are to go into all the world and preach the gospel to everyone – because God commands all men everywhere to repent.

That truth hasn’t changed since Paul proclaimed it on Mars Hill. Our responsibility hasn’t changed since Jesus left.

What are we doing about the ‘all men everywhere’ who are in our lives?