Is a person who commits suicide
beyond the hope of salvation?
It all
depends upon whether or not the person who commits suicide is a Christian.
Let us be
very clear at the outset: everyone who
dies outside of Christ—regardless of the manner of death (whether suicide,
murder, or death by natural causes)—is beyond the hope of salvation.
Jesus
said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn. 14:6). The
apostle John said, “Whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life” (1
Jn. 5:12b). And Paul made this point also when he said, “There is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus” (1
Tim. 2:5).
And of
course it is only in this life that we have the opportunity to embrace the Lord
Jesus Christ by faith, because our eternal destiny is fixed at death. In
Hebrews we’re told, “It is appointed to man to die once and after that comes
judgment” (Heb. 9:27).
So, if a
person departs this life outside of Christ, he has no hope of salvation. This
is true regardless of whether or not he died by his own hand.
But what
about a Christian who dies by his own
hand? What about a Christian who commits suicide?
Someone
might ask, “Is it even possible for a true Christian to commit suicide?”
Well of
course it is. A Christian is not immune to temptation. Some of God’s choicest
saints have fallen into some very grievous sins, but were not forsaken by God.
Think of
David. He betrayed Uriah, a very close friend, by committing adultery with his
wife. And when she became pregnant with his child, he attempted to cover it up
by arranging for Uriah’s death in battle. He committed adultery and an act that
was tantamount to murder. But he was not forsaken by God. God brought him to
repentance.
Or think
of Peter. Three times Peter denied the Lord Jesus Christ; but Christ did not
abandon him. Rather, our Lord labored to reclaim him, and brought him to
repentance.
There is
no temptation to which the people of God are immune just because they are the people of God. It’s quite possible that a
Christian might be tempted to suicide, and not only be tempted, but also fall
to the temptation.
Think of
a person who is overwhelmed with grief over the loss of a loved one, or someone
who is perhaps even partly responsible for the death of a loved one—say a
parent who backs the car out of the driveway and accidentally runs over a
child. It’s easy to understand how he might think the grief too unbearable to
continue to live. He could very well be tempted to suicide.
Or think
of a Christian who has a mental illness or some trauma to the brain or a
thyroid condition that leads to chemical imbalances in the brain. The moods of
depression that sometimes lead to desperate acts, like suicide, are not
entirely under their control
Or think of a person who lives day after day with extreme pain. It's easy to see that he might think of suicide as a relief.
Now please
understand that I’m not saying suicide is right. I’m not saying it’s excusable.
I’m not saying it’s not a sin. I’m saying it’s a temptation which would be
understandable even for a Christian under such circumstances.
And the
question is, if a Christian succumbs to the temptation and ends up taking his
own life, is he beyond the hope of salvation? Some would say “yes” because
there is no possibility of repentance in this life.
But are
you sure you want to travel down that road? Must a Christian depart this world with
all his sins properly confessed and repented of if he hopes to be saved? What
if there are some sins that you have forgotten about and have never properly confessed
before you die? Or what if you die suddenly, say in an accident, and you have
not had the opportunity to confess your sins? Does that mean that you have no
hope of salvation because you have died with some sins un-repented of? Is that
how God deals with us? I don’t think so. What matters is whether or not we are
united to Jesus Christ by a true and living faith.
Where
there is a true and living faith there is a desire to please the Lord, and the
mercy of God flows toward us in the forgiveness of sins when we stumble and
fall.
Let me
summarize. Suicide is a very grievous sin, to be sure. Only God has the right
to determine when a human life might be taken; and he has not given us the
right to take our own life. But a Christian who is overwhelmed by excessive
sorrow or fear, or who is moved by mental illness to take his own life, is more
an object of God’s compassion than of his condemnation.