It always amuses me how everyone, including so called bible scholars always tie themselves into knots when confronted with .. “What about all of the people who died before Jesus gave his life for all mankind?”
Either Jesus was necessary for salvation or he wasn’t.
What amuses me is how everyone scrambles to create a way to answer the question so as to give God a way out of an insurmountable situation.😁
The answer has always been in the scriptures but no one has ever bothered to try to find the answer on their own.
They have been taught, preached to by those who also don’t have a clue.
Preachers, scholars, evangelist ... all who do the same, create a way that sounds like a good answer.
None are right.
The answer is Right in front of them in the scriptures!
The answer would take me more time than I am willing to go into now.😟
I will leave some clues for anyone who really cares to do some research.
No one had gone to heaven before Jesus.
There will be a resurrection of the righteous And the Unrighteous, why?
Ask yourselves: How is it that an infallible God has started something, (paradise earth for man to live on forever) to have failed?
Clue: He hasn’t failed.
The bible is the roadmap, given to us on how his will, his original plan will be fulfilled!
Forget the “everyone goes to heaven” rhetoric, (that’s the Broad path or road to destruction).
The scriptures call Jesus what?
The second Adam.
The first man Adam became a living person.”
The first man is from the earth and made of dust; the second man is from heaven.
The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
I could go on but like I said, anyone with an ounce of curiosity should be willing to do their own research or maybe even ask someone who doesn’t use the same old, same old rhetoric as all the so called preachers and experts rely on.
Nobody is going to do any research based on what you said in your post.
And the problem, for the Bible believer, regarding the question: “Can people who have never heard the gospel be saved?” is not going to go away.
The traditional view is that God puts then into eternal Hell.
But that does not harmonize with “God is love.”
Or with common sense.
So?
So we have to find a solution to this problem and the OP is a good place to start.
Best
JAG
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PS
Is it not reasonable to believe that the person who responds favorably
to his limited knowledge of God revealed to him in natural law and
conscience in the absence of the gospel in his part of the world
and in his time in history, would also respond favorably to the gospel
preached in our world today?
My view: Yes it is reasonable to believe that.