SAINT OR AIN’T, WHICH ARE YOU?

By Akin Ojumu

Broadly speaking, the world is made up of two categories of people. There are the Saints and the Ain’ts. These are the redeemed and the unredeemed, the saved and the lost.

Whether you like it or not, everybody falls into either one of these two categories. The ultimate eternal destiny of all mankind depends on which of the two classes a man belongs.

1. The Ain’ts

When you look at the Ain’ts, you’d find there are two kinds. The first are the irreligious Ain’ts (atheists, agnostics, etc.) who believe that God either doesn’t exist or that His existence is unknowable. These are people who are gods unto themselves. 

Then there are the religious Ain’ts who claim to believe in a god, but it’s a god that can only be known through human effort. To reach this god requires human toil and sweat.

1.1. Irreligious Ain’ts

These are those who believe there’s no God, no heaven, and no hell. Therefore, there’s no need for God’s favor or salvation. Sin, in their view, is non-existence; hence, the idea of no need for salvation. To the irreligious Ain’ts, truth is relative and subject to each person’s interpretation. Whatever it is a man considers to be true is true. A man’s reality determines his eternity.

1.2. Religious Ain’ts

Besides the irreligious Ain’ts, we also have Ain’ts who are the religious kind. To this sub-category of Ain’ts belong many in the Church who call themselves Christians.

The religious Ain’ts subscribe to a set of rules, rituals or actions that enable an individual to earn salvation or favor with God. According to the religious Ain’ts, a man is justified when the aggregate sum of his good deeds outweighs the bad. In this belief system, performance of religious activities and observance of ordinances pave the way to God’s kingdom.

2. The Saints

The Saints are followers of Christ. They are the true believers who believe in the inerrancy and the infallibility of the Bible. These are those who believe in and preach the unadulterated Gospel.

To the Saints, the true Gospel is simple. It’s the fact that man is more sinful and flawed in himself than he ever dares believe, yet at the very same time he is more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than he could ever dare to hope.

The Saints believe that man, left to himself and his devices, will always choose sin over righteousness. Without God reaching down in His infinite mercy and unending grace, man is of Himself incapable of seeking God or coming to Him. Salvation comes only by faith. And that faith is a gift given by a loving God to undeserving man by grace, and it’s not something man is capable of attaining of his own accord.

“Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14).

The Ain’ts are on a broad road that leads to destruction, and they have many fellow travelers going in the same direction. Because of the huge crowd traveling along the broad expressway, the Ain’ts are lured into a false sense of security about their spiritual condition. Seeing that there are many fellow travelers on the same wide road, they are beguiled into a false assurance of salvation.

In contrast, the Saints have chosen to take a different road, the very narrow road that very few dare to take. Yet, it’s this narrow road that leads to eternal life.

“But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.” (Matthew 25:31-33).

The Saints are the sheep and the Ain’ts the goats described in this passage. A great and terrible day is coming when the sheep will be separated from the goats. On that day of divine retribution, the sheep will be ushered into God’s kingdom while the goats are herded into hell fire where they belong.

The die is cast, and the destiny of all men is certain.