{"id":15885,"date":"2025-07-31T11:04:01","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T16:04:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/?p=15885"},"modified":"2025-08-02T11:06:34","modified_gmt":"2025-08-02T16:06:34","slug":"question-the-thief-on-the-cross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/15885\/question-the-thief-on-the-cross\/","title":{"rendered":"Question: The thief on the cross"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hey, Pastor John!<\/span><\/p>\n

Had a quick question.\u00a0\u00a0I was thinking about the thief who was on the cross next to Jesus and how he was able to go to paradise.\u00a0\u00a0I know that \u201cYou must be born again,\u201d like it says in John, but does the thief being given the reward of going to paradise before Jesus sent back the Spirit mean that there are some cases where Jesus doesn\u2019t require this?\u00a0\u00a0Going off scripture that I\u2019ve read, I know this can\u2019t be, unless there\u2019s a scripture or something I\u2019ve missed.\u00a0\u00a0I also know this can\u2019t be right, because of another John scripture, \u201cUnless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0I know God can be right any way He wants to be, and do anything He wants to do, but going by scripture this doesn\u2019t seem like the reason.\u00a0\u00a0Logically, and what I think is the right option, is it because the thief who was in the cross died before Jesus was able to send back the Spirit; therefore, it wasn\u2019t required for him because it wasn\u2019t even yet available?\u00a0\u00a0Made me so thankful for His mercy, even for the thief in his last moments on a cross, for the punishment he deserved, and still Jesus showed mercy, wow!<\/span><\/p>\n

Jacob C.<\/span><\/p>\n

===========<\/span><\/p>\n

Hi Jacob.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

At the time the thief was on the cross, the Old Testament was still in effect, and everyone who was forgiven under the Old Testament went to Paradise when they died.\u00a0 (At that time, Paradise was in the heart of the earth).\u00a0 So, Jesus was telling the thief that he was forgiven and that he would enter into Paradise when he died instead of going into Torment (which was also in heart of the earth – Lk. 16:19\u201331).\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

When Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, he transferred Paradise out of the heart of the earth into heaven, where it is to this day.\u00a0 So, as always, when a faithful saint dies now, he enters into Paradise, but now, Paradise is in heaven, where the Lord is.\u00a0 It is no longer in the heart of the earth.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

The New Testament went into effect on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2.\u00a0 You are right to say that the coming of the Spirit was the turning point, but before the Spirit came, if God forgave someone (like the thief on the cross), he was taken by the angels into Paradise when he died, just as faithful believers are today.\u00a0 The only difference is where Paradise is now located.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I hope that clears things up for you.\u00a0 Thank you for the question.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Pastor John<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hey, Pastor John! Had a quick question.\u00a0\u00a0I was thinking about the thief who was on the cross next to Jesus and how he was able to go to paradise.\u00a0\u00a0I know that \u201cYou must be born again,\u201d like it says in John, but does the thief being given the reward of going to paradise before Jesus […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-qa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15885"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15885"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15885\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15886,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15885\/revisions\/15886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}