FREDRICK MISLEH
STAFF WRITER

Many of us at CSUSM have at least heard of the “You’re going to hell!” preachers who love to flock college campuses to tell students they’re sinners who will go to hell unless they repent. Our own school had one such preacher proclaim that very message during the week of March 5 – 9, causing quite a stir and a bout of mockery.

Let me start by confessing I am an ardent Christian. I believe Jesus is the Son of God. He was crucified for my sins, was buried, and rose on the third day; I believe He will come again. The aforementioned kind of preacher, however, makes me want to renounce my faith. Nonetheless, I found that many of the Christian teachings I believe in demonstrate that this preacher is completely wrong in his philosophy and approach.

I had a conversation with the preacher who was on campus this past week. He told me he was completely without sin once he was born again. Two verses in First John – 1 John 1:8 and 1:10 (English Standard Version)– read, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the Truth is not in us” and “If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His Word is not in us” respectively. Immediately, I could tell this guy didn’t know his doctrine.

He also told me that God was “angry with sinners, and Jesus came to condemn all sinners.” If this preacher understood the teachings in the Bible, he would know God is heartbroken, not angry, over our sins. John 3:16 ESV reads, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, and whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Does that sound like an “angry” God? Certainly not—1 John 4:8 ESV simply reads “God is love.”

Christianity in its purest, elemental form is about loving one another and being a good person as well as believing in Christ’s sacrifice, not hating those who you judge to be wrong.