Suicide

[ramar]

Well I certainly don't believe that suicide is a CERTAINTY to keeping one from heaven. However, I also find it hard to believe that anyone who could commit suicide is in the good graces of the Lord.

God never gives us more than we can handle, and He always gives us power enough to deal with whatever evil has thrust upon us. That is not to sat that evil cannot have its way with us for a time, or that whatever has overwhelmed us will be removed immediately or completely. It simply means that God always provides us with enough strength to overcome - to His will - what has knocked us down.

Which is why I find it hard to believe that someone who commits suicide is even near to God at the time. Call upon the name of the Lord and He will remove the very idea of suicide from your mind.

This is not to be judgemental, but just an observation. If you are nigh to God, and you LOVE Him, doesn't it follow that you would WANT TO live your life for Him?

We all have lapses in judgement, and nobody is perfect, so we cannot expect to live our lives FULLY and COMPLETELY as the Lord would wish us to. But suicide requires a thought process - rarely is it a spur of the moment thing - so committing suicide would seem to me, to be a purposeful disregard for God's wishes for you. It's also like you're saying that you don't have faith that He can help you in your time of need.

Does that keep you out of heaven? Probably not. Many suicidal people likely ARE very close to God, I cannot say (only He can). But it seems to be equal to saying, "I know murder (adultery, stealing, etc. ...take your pick) is a sin, but I am going to do it anyway".

A person who has truly accepted Christ just doesn't have this in him/her, in my opinion.

[Clio]

I do not disagree with you. But in even what you post, you are usurping the role of the Most High.

At the moment of suicide, we, finite beings that we are, do not KNOW what is in the heart of the sufferer. Only the Father, who knows all hearts, is capable of making that determination. And not only that, the role of Judge is reserved for Him alone. Who are we to judge? NO ONE.

We cannot speak to the eternal disposition of that soul, because WE HAVE NO WAY OF KNOWING. Only Abba can. And who will be standing on the Sea of Glass before the great, white Throne of the Most High is not our call to make.

Abba Father is in the business of healing. And if the pain, anguish, despair, and potentially mental illness, is so great as to drive one worthy of True Jesus death to the taking of their own life is so great surely there is sufficient mercy even for that.

We cannot know. We cannot even answer it from the Bible. We do not know the disposition of all the souls mentioned in the Bible who have died. We know the giants of faith, and we can be certain where they will be, but all the others? No clue. The Bible is silent on that.

Clio

[Kabowd]

Can anybody give me of anybody in the the bible who committed suicide and still made it to heaven?

By the way, just because I have been saved by the grace of God does not give me the liscence to sin because I believe that I am automatically forgiven. In order to get forgiveness of the sins that I committ I must repent of them.

2 Corinthians 7:10 For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.

I can't repent from sucide.

Anyway, we can't just do whatever we want with our bodies because they are not ours to do what we want.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.

1 Corinthians 3:17 If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.

My body is the temple of God and the Holy Ghost. I have no right to destroy it nor to defile it. If I do then I have to answer to God for that.

"Thus, if we have accepted Christ, no ammount of sin can seperate us from His eternal goodness, not even suicide."

This statment is very wrong.

Hebrews 6:4-6 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

If I leave God by living in my sins then it is IMPOSSIBLE to renew me again unto repentance.

The difference between a Christian and a sinner is a Christian falls in sin, repents from it and learns. A sinner is one who lives in his sins not wanting to repent.

Hebrews is saying that if after I have become a Christian I should fall away back into the sins that I left without wanting to repent then it is impossible to renew me to repentance.

When I as a Christian choose to committ suicide then I am choosing to end my life here as a Christian, destroy the temple of God, and show what a great lack of faith I have in God to help me through this. I take my life into my own hands instead of putting my life into God's hands.

If we truly are saved through faith and not of our own works, then put that faith in God instead of my own hands.

If you take Hebrews 6:4-6 as meaning you can lose your salvation, you must also take it to mean that once it's lost it cannot be regained. As it states it's impossible to be renewed unto repentance. So are you sure that's how you want to interpret that? Also, if failing to repent of a sin will send you to hell then Christ's sacrifice was absolutely worthless. This means if any of us die after committing any sin and do not have the opportunity to repent before we die, that we will go to hell. Absolute nonsense. I don't advocate suicide, I think it's an extremely selfish act and absolutely wrong. However, many people who attempt it (or succeed) suffer from mental illness which needs medical treatment and compassion, not spiritual condemnation. A person who has been purchased by the blood of Christ, who's identity has been changed by the Spirit of God, cannot do anything to change their eternal status with God. Sin will separate us, and it will cause us to be disciplined (Heb 12), but we are never disowned by our Abba Father.

[50_Cent's_dog]

This whole matter comes down to the question of whether or not God considers it murder to take your own life. I believe he does. 1 John 3:15 states, ..."ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him."

I do not care if the person that commits murder was saved or not. If he kills himself and has no chance to repent, he will wind up in hell. Unconditional security for the believer is simply not scriptural.

The scripture here says NO MURDERER hath eternal life. What part of "no" do you not understand? Let me give you another example. In 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 10 there are many sins Paul says will keep us from inheriting the Kingdom of God. He says that for instance, no thief SHALL inherit the kingdom of God. According to the thinking of many here, Paul would be found to be a liar since according to your beliefs, a thief that has at one time been saved and has never repented of their sin will reach heaven. What part of "shall" do you not understand? Either Paul and John are telling the truth or you are, and I choose to trust the writers of the Bible.

Dear Butero, It is impossible for anybody to get to heaven on their own. Everybody sins. Everybody has broken at least one of the ten commandments. We all deserve to go to hell because we have all sinned at least once. Have you repented of all of your sins? Paul is telling the truth in 1 Corinthinans 6:9 and 10. But you are taking the scripture out of context. What Paul is doing is showing that a thief is a sinner. A murderer is a sinner. Are you trying to repent your way to heaven? That sounds like works to me. What if you are laying on your death bed and forget about a sin and forget to repent. According to you that person is going to hell.

Jesus said,"I tell you the truth,no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is BORN AGAIN. John 3:3. You can not lose your salvation once you get saved. 1 John 5:13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. Where does it say in the bible that you can lose your salvation? May God bless you Butero.

[50_Cent's_dog]

In theory, it should be possible to repent in the last few miliseconds of your life as you die from a self inflicted wound.

I for one do not wish to test this theory.

Back in 1985, when I washed out of SEAL training(I was injured), I was send back to submarine duty.

I could have bounced back from this alone but submarine duty is ctually tougher than SEAL training. It is easy to do push ups whithout sleep but try assembling complex machinery without sleep for 3 days!

It was as though the SEAL instructors played tag team with the CO of the submarine I was on and after getting in trouble too many times, I took my .45, chambered a round, and put it to my head.

The ONLY reason I didn't pull the trigger was because at that moment, I knew, beyond all doubt, that the next thing I would see after pulling the trigger would be the Lord Jesus Christ himself and that I would have to explaim myself to him.

Awesome Bernie! I feel the same way you do. I don't want to die being ashamed and having to explain myself to God. I want to hear well done good and faithful servant when I meet Jesus for the first time. As Paul says, I want to run the race as worthy of the prize.

[chicagoburbite]

continue on though Butero..... the bible also says those that fornicate, commit adultry, gossip, on and on, will not inherit the kingdom of Heaven.

You can't honestly tell me that you haven't committed one of the above, even in your heart or mind? But the bible continues by saying "For the wages of sin (not just murder ANY sin) is death, but the GIFT of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord". You can NOT forget grace and the GIFT.

This is not free license to sin. We are still to continue to fight the good fight. A "nongrowing disciple" is an oxymoron.

Jenni

[Gerioke]

Be very careful about advocating suicide. It is better to assume it is wrong than to assume it is ok.

[Clio]

Nobody is advocating suicide is ok.

But we can't judge them or make the statement they're not going to be in Heaven either. Only Abba can make that determination based on their hearts.

Clio

[Smalcald]

Well the problem is looking from the outside and understanding mental illness.

Some people's brains are not working correctly, it is a disorder and a horrible one, thus I think in these cases of mental illness Christ will have compassion obviously, and understand that this Christian was not acting as themselves, but acting through their disease.

But can a Christian go to heaven without faith? If a person who called themselves a Christian, and was in their right mind (which we cannot tell from the outside mind you), but still felt that they wanted to intentionally kill themselves, how could they be said to have any faith at all in Christ? I would say that it is doubtful that they had faith. But that would apply to all people who call themselves Christian, which is why we have the passages which say that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom.

But once again, I don't think we can say anything about individual instances of suicide because we really don't understand mental illness very well and we don

[Clio]

Well the problem is looking from the outside and understanding mental illness..... *snip in the interest of brevity*

But once again, I don't think we can say anything about individual instances of suicide because we really don't understand mental illness very well and we don