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If salvation comes from hearing and believing the gospel, what about those who have never heard it?

How would you, as a Christian, answer this question?

Since coming to the United States, I’ve heard this question discussed many times. Those who ask usually use African refugees or people living in North Korea or China as an example, because in the eyes of many Westerners, people there can’t access the gospel due to poverty or information censorship. In the U.S., no one has directly asked me this question. Because I’m from China, I heard and believed the gospel while still in China and began reading the Bible there. Asking me this would be somewhat self-defeating, as my personal experience disproves the assumption that people in poor or information-deprived areas cannot access the gospel. But overhearing others discussing this topic piqued my interest in writing about it.

People living in Africa, North Korea, and China can access the gospel. My high school foreign teacher in China was my first Bible study leader. Later, that teacher went to Africa as a missionary and has been serving there for over ten or twenty years now. Regarding North Korea, I once read a news report about Christians there that filled me with deep respect. In North Korea, the Bible is banned, so missionaries broadcast Scripture via radio. North Korean Christians would write down what they heard on scraps of paper. These scraps became their self-compiled Bible. Stories like these remind me of my own experiences attending underground Bible studies and churches in China from age 16 to 24. I witnessed firsthand that the greater the oppression, the stronger the drive to spread the gospel. Just as described in the book of Acts and Paul’s epistles, the apostles spread the gospel while under persecution.

“But I say, Have they not heard? Yes ver­i­ly, their(preachers’) sound went in­to all the earth, and their words un­to the ends of the world.”— Romans 10:18

However, I’ll stop here with storytelling. I can’t satisfy the questioners with stories. Firstly, the questioners are not interested in discussing current events in Africa, North Korea, or China. Secondly, their true intent lies elsewhere. This question is often the start of a rhetorical trap. Once you give a serious answer, you step into their sequence, and only then will they reveal what they truly want to say.

The questioner knows how Christians would respond. Christians would say those who haven’t heard and believed the gospel will go to hell after death. They are waiting for Christians to say exactly that, so they can then raise their real point.

They will argue that it’s not fair to send someone to hell simply because they haven’t heard the gospel. Had they heard it, they might have believed. Just because of external factors or circumstances beyond their control, they were denied the opportunity to encounter the gospel and thus the chance for salvation. This, they say, is unmerciful and unfair.

You see, the real issue here is that the questioners are not convinced of God’s judgment. They disagree with God’s judgment and consider it unjust.

Since what the questioner really wants to challenge is God’s justice, let me discuss how God is just. And I’ll even follow the questioner’s hypothetical premise—supposing someone truly never heard the gospel and ends up in hell after death. Even so, God’s judgment remains righteous.

First, please consider this: Does the God who created the world owe humans salvation?

Parents give birth to children, and God creates humans. Parents and God share a commonality that both give life. Therefore, I’ll use the relationship between parents and children to explain whether God owes humans salvation.

For example, if a young person commits a crime and is sentenced to death, and their parents accept the legal judgment, even affirming that the law is just, can we then condemn these parents as cold, heartless, and ignorant of justice? Can we say they owe their child redemption?

We cannot. There’s a Chinese idiom, “xùn sī wǎng fǎ”, which means to bend the law for personal gain. The parents believing the law is just shows they did not let personal feelings override the law. Moreover, claiming the parents owe their child redemption is a form of moral manipulation. If such manipulation were valid, we’d see wanted posters targeting the parents of criminals while the criminals themselves roam free. The young person committed the crime; responsibility and punishment should fall on his own shoulders.

If you agree that these parents don’t owe their child redemption, by the same logic, you should agree that God does not owe humans salvation. God created humans; then humans sinned, and the wages of sin is death. The Creator has no obligation to save humans from death. If the Creator does extend a helping hand, that is grace, not an obligation. As a Chinese saying goes, “helping you is not my duty, but a favor.”

The gracious God has given humans a favor. He has given humans the gospel of salvation. Originally, all were heading toward death. But now, we have an opportunity to overcome death by hearing and believing the gospel. The gospel is like the red envelopes (hóngbāo) children receive during the Chinese New Year, which are cash gifts from adults. If children get one, it’s a happy surprise; if not, they cannot blame the adults for not giving them one.

If someone ends up in hell after death, it is because of their sin, not because no one gave them a “red envelope”, that is, not because no one preached the gospel to them. Therefore, God can justly condemn someone who has never heard the gospel to hell.

I use sin to explain why people go to hell, and the questioners might ask further: People in poverty or information-blocked areas may not have even heard of God, let alone the gospel or the concept of sin, so… are you saying it’s okay that they end up in hell without even knowing why?

In fact, the Bible’s Book of Romans addresses this very question:

“For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.” — Romans 1:20-21

These verses point out that even if no one introduces God to people in poor or information-isolated regions, they can still perceive the existence of a supreme, intelligent, and omnipotent divine being through the creations, such as nature and humans themselves. Don’t assume that people in poverty, untouched by modern civilization, don’t know of divine power and are all atheists. On the contrary, not having been indoctrinated by atheism or evolution theory, driven by their innate nature, they often pursue a divine being. However, they often fall into superstition, as described in Romans, by crafting idols resembling humans, birds, four-footed animals, and creeping things.

“And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.” — Romans 1:23

Speaking of human nature, I have to bring up this verse:

“For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves:” — Romans 2:14

Gentiles here refers to those other than Jews. God gave the Jews the Law; acting in accordance with the Law is righteous, and acting contrary is sin. In the Old Testament, God did not reveal Himself to the Gentiles in the same way he did to the Jews, nor did He impart to the Gentiles the wisdom to discern right from wrong. The Gentiles did not know God or the Law, who is precisely the type of people the questioner describes as not knowing God or sin. There is nothing new under the sun. Such people live not only in Africa, North Korea, or China, but were already mentioned in the Old Testament. The verse says that those who have not learned God’s Law may still, by nature, do things that happen to align with the Law. What kind of nature is this?

“Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another” — Romans 2:15

This nature specifically refers to our conscience. God’s Law, such as the Ten Commandments, says not to kill, not to commit adultery, not to steal, not to bear false witness, not to covet… Even without learning God’s Law, our conscience alerts us that these things are sinful. Meanwhile, the latter part of Romans 2:15 points out that the influence of our conscience is limited. When we sin, our conscience acts as a witness, and our intentions contend with this witness; either accepting the accusation and acknowledging the sin, or making excuses and justifying ourselves. Thus, we can all recognize sin through our conscience. If someone feels they have no sin, it’s because they find excuses and create a false image of themselves being “not that bad”.

But God can read the human heart. He will justly judge the secrets of our hearts, including the excuses we make for ourselves:

“In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.” — Romans 2:16

Based on the analysis above, it’s clear that people can know God through creation, and their conscience can perceive sin. Therefore, people end up in hell after death, not because no one preached the gospel to them, but because of their own sin. God’s judgment is just, yet God is also merciful. He has given us the gospel, which is a turning point on our inevitable path toward death. If you have heard the gospel, believe it with the urgency of grabbing a red envelope like how you did as a child before.