Questions and Answers

Q: I love my husband very much and want him to be saved and one day to be in heaven with me. But sometimes our marriage is absolute torture because of his behavior. He has no interest in being saved. Please pray for me and help me.
—Reader in the south of England

A:We have read your lengthy letter (summarized above) carefully and truly empathize with your plight. We believe one or two points of essential knowledge about salvation may help you in coping. First of all, God has a much better future in store for us than the common conception of heaven as the reward of the saved. Our free booklet Heaven and Hell: What Does the Bible Really Teach? may prove very enlightening.

Secondly, one of the most important things we should come to realize about spiritual salvation is that God is not calling everyone to be a Christian in this present age. Actually only a few, whom the Bible terms “firstfruits” (James 1:18; Romans 8:23; Hebrews 12:22-23), are being called to salvation today.

Although all will eventually have their opportunity, there is a time order built into the Creator’s plan of salvation for humankind. God’s annual Holy Days and festivals teach that vital principle, particularly the Day of Pentecost (or Festival of Firstfruits) and the Last Great Day. (Our free booklet God’s Holy Day Plan: The Promise of Hope for All Mankind will explain further.)

Jesus Christ said that none could come to Him unless the Father would draw that person (John 6:44,65). It is God’s responsibility, not ours, to call our loved ones to His truth. In His own wisdom and for His own reasons, sometimes God chooses to call a wife and not her husband during this age, or vice versa.

However, you need not worry about your husband’s salvation. God may choose to call him during the great resurrection of most of mankind—depicted by the White Throne Judgment of Revelation 20. This resurrection is not one of condemnation, but will be the first opportunity for the vast majority of humankind to obtain salvation. You may be assured that sooner or later your husband’s mind will be opened to God’s truth.

Even so, the apostle Peter gives people in your circumstances some very good advice. Please read carefully the first six verses of Peter’s first letter, chapter 3. He emphasizes the good conduct of a wife rather than her conversation. Usually trying to convert a marriage partner by mere talk or giving him or her religious literature does not work. Most of the time it causes unnecessary friction and tension in the marriage. It is our actions that are much more important. Regular prayer to God for divine assistance is also essential.

We have mailed several free booklets to further explain these principles and to assist you in coping with your personal situation: Making Life Work (including material about marriage), You Can Have Living Faith and God’s Holy Day Plan: The Promise of Hope for All Mankind. We will certainly keep you in our prayers!

Q: Is smoking a sin?
—D.R., Elyria, Ohio

A: There is a growing abundance of scientific and medical evidence that smoking seriously damages human health. In some countries the government requires tobacco companies to include health-warning messages on every cigarette pack.

Since smoking is a relatively modern practice, the Bible does not speak of it directly. Yet God’s Word certainly addresses smoking in principle. In 1Corinthians 6:19-20, for example, Paul goes right to the heart of the matter regarding actions that can harm us: “. . . Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit (which) is in you, (which) you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

God not only created us, but Jesus Christ paid for our sins with His life’s blood. Since we belong to God, why would we want to defile His property by smoking? This practice breaks the spirit of God’s law and certainly in principle falls into the category of sin. By no stretch of the imagination can smoking be construed as “glorify(ing) God in your body and in your spirit.”
The Ten Commandments express God’s way of love first toward our Creator and secondly our neighbor. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” says both Jesus Christ and the law (Matthew 22:39; Leviticus 19:18). The damaging effect of secondhand smoke is well-documented. So out of loving concern for our neighbors and family members, we should certainly avoid smoking. The apostle Paul tells us that “love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10).

For many, however, it is not simply a matter of deciding to quit. They face a difficult struggle with a stubborn physical addiction. Indeed, this fact magnifies the wrong of smoking. Some might argue that smoking every long once in a while is not harmful—that regularly eating hamburgers is much more damaging. But smoking can all too quickly become an addiction. It may begin
as something done every once in a while—but soon it becomes established as a regular routine that severely damages health.

And while harming oneself is a sin, the root sin here is the addiction itself—an enslaving habit. Paul wrote, “Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?” (Romans 6:16). Addiction is a covetous obsession—a “lust of the flesh” (1John 2:16). It is frankly idolatrous since it puts something before God in one’s life (compare Colossians 3:5; Ephesians 5:5). Gluttons are described in Scripture as those “whose god is their belly” (Philippians 3:19). A smoking addiction takes on the same character.

Yet we are to have “self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23)—“bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (2Corinthians 10:5). Knowing this, we should not engage in practices that can easily enslave us—as smoking certainly can.

For those who already smoke, quitting may not be easy—but it is a must. Making a personal commitment is essential to ultimate success. So is praying regularly for God’s help. It may also be necessary to seek advice and/or treatment from those who are professionally competent in dealing with nicotine addiction. No matter what your situation, you can quit—people do it all the time, even those who have smoked for decades.

Those struggling with a smoking addiction may wish to request or download our reprint article “Smoking and Health: The Often-Overlooked Key” from our Web site at www.churchofgodtwincities.org/lit/gn/gn043/smoking.html or from our office nearest you.

 

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