The Thief’s Beliefs About Christ
The eternal Son, who is fully God, assumed a human nature at the incarnation. He now has both natures. His humanity started with the immaculate conception of the virgin Mary. Though He is fully human, He is without a sin nature and is sinless. Furthermore, the Son is not two persons nor does He have two wills – one human and one divine. His two natures are unmingled. (For instance, His humanity is not omnipresent). As the second Person of the Trinity, who has ever held the universe together (Col 1:17), He continued to be all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-present even when, as to His humanity, He was newly born of Mary. In addition, God the Son is distinct from God the Father and from God the Holy Spirit. These are only a few orthodox beliefs about the Person of Christ.
Did you understand all this before you were saved? Doesn’t it seem very unlikely that the thief, who Jesus said would immediately be with Him in Paradise, understood all this? How much do we really have to believe about His Person to be saved?
I once had a friend who genuinely seemed to be saved. Yet, he thought that the Son, Father, and Spirit were not distinct Persons but one Person expressing Himself in three modes. Was he unsaved because he adhered to a technically heretical view of the Son? Other than this, he believed that salvation was a free gift, received by faith, on the basis of the substitutionary death of the Lord Jesus Christ for our sins. He believed Christ was resurrected. Indeed, he was far more orthodox than the thief or many others appear to have been. I believe my friend was saved.
Let’s be careful what orthodoxy we absolutely require of someone. God, who wants as many to be saved as is possible (1 Tim 2:4), does not require more than what is absolutely essential (Acts 15:28). Remember the thief (Lk 23:29-43).
Comforting others is costly but worth it.