341. If people who lived good lives and believed the right things were not saved, and God could freely save or condemn on a whim anyone he wanted to, people who perished could justly accuse God of lacking mercy and compassion or even of being vicious. Indeed they could deny that God is God. Furthermore they could argue that God said pointless things in his Word and gave principles that were worthless and ridiculous. For another thing, if people who lived good lives and believed the right things were not saved, they could accuse God of violating the covenant that he made on Mount Sinai and wrote with his own finger on the two tablets.

From the Lord's words in John 14:21-24 it is clear that God cannot avoid saving people who live by his principles and have faith in him. Everyone who has religion and sound reason can provide arguments to support this by considering that God, who is constantly with us and gives us life and the faculties of understanding and loving, cannot help loving us and being united to us in love if we live good lives and believe the right things. God has built this into every human being and every creature. Can a father and mother reject their babies? Can a bird reject its chicks? Can an animal reject its young? Not even tigers, panthers, or snakes are able to do this. Doing otherwise would be going against the design in which God exists and through which he acts, and going against the design he built into us at creation.

Now, as it is impossible on the one hand for God to condemn anyone who has lived a good life and has believed the right things, it is impossible on the other hand for God to save anyone who has lived an evil life and has therefore believed the wrong things. This too would go against the divine design and therefore against God's omnipotence, which cannot follow any other path than the path of justice. The laws of justice are truths that cannot be changed, for the Lord says, "It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for the tip of one letter of the law to fall" (Luke 16:17).

Everyone who knows anything about the essence of God and human free choice is able to perceive this. For example, Adam had the freedom to eat fruit from the tree of life and fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If he had eaten fruit only from the tree (or trees) of life, would it have been possible for God to expel him from the garden? I think not. On the other hand, after he ate fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, would it have been possible for God to keep him in the garden? Again, I think not. Likewise, once an angel has been accepted into heaven, God cannot throw that angel into hell; and once a devil has been judged, God cannot move him to heaven. For God's inability to do either of these things despite his omnipotence, see the part on the divine omnipotence in the first chapter, 49-70.