Why did God judge Tyre, Sidon and Sodom, if he had not given them the light needed to repent (Matthew 11:21–23)?
This text is from a letter written by David Gooding in 2003.
Since the question you ask is a knotty question indeed, I think that the best I can do by way of reply is to make a number of suggestions.
In dealing with our Lord's remarks about Tyre and Sidon in Matthew 11:21—and similarly about Sodom in Matthew 11:23—we should observe that the judgments that came on Tyre and Sidon, and upon Sodom in the ancient world, were temporal judgments; that is to say, the judgment was the physical destruction of the cities and of their inhabitants. It was not the Final Judgment. The inhabitants of those ancient cities will still have to appear before the great white throne; there they shall be dealt with individually, and not judged as communities.
It is true that some translations render Jude 7, '. . . are set forth as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire' (ASV). If this translation were correct, it would mean that the judgment that fell on the citizens of these ancient cities was the eternal judgment to which the unconverted will be consigned at the great white throne. But surely the verse should not be translated in this fashion; rather, in suffering punishment they are set forth as an example of eternal fire, or 'as a pointer to eternal fire'. In other words, just like the flood was an example or a pointer towards the judgment that will happen when the Lord comes, so the judgment that befell Tyre, Sidon, Sodom and Gomorrah is an example and a warning of the eternal judgment that will take place at the great white throne.
It seems to me that we should distinguish very clearly in our minds the temporal judgments of God, both in past ages and in this present age, and the Final Judgment. Take, for example, the judgments of God that befell the cities of Canaan through the military campaigns of Joshua. Whole cities with all their inhabitants, men, women, and little children were destroyed because they were sinful communities, and they were destroyed as communities. In a similar way, whole cities like Dresden were flattened under the Allied bombing, and thousands of men, women, and innocent children were simultaneously destroyed by the Allies as a result of the unrepentance of their political leaders. The fact that comparatively innocent children were destroyed by Allied bombing does not mean, surely, that those same innocent children were thereby automatically consigned to the lake of fire eternally.
Similarly, we may take the example of Nineveh. God threatened judgment on the whole city; and, when the city as such temporarily repented, God spared the city, having regard to 'more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand' (Jonah 4:11). When subsequently the city of Nineveh returned to its evil ways, God allowed the city to be destroyed. In other words, what I am trying to say is this: we must distinguish between God's temporal judgments on whole cities and whole nations, when they refuse to repent as nations, and the Final Judgment, at which people shall be dealt with individually and not as whole nations or whole cities.
My next point would be this. If we ask why God did not give the people of Tyre and Sidon the light they needed to repent, then our answer must take into account the contrast that our Lord is making between the light given to Tyre and Sidon and Nineveh, compared with the light given to Capernaum and Chorazin. Our Lord says, 'if the mighty works that had been done in Capernaum and Chorazin had been done in Tyre and Sidon, the latter would have repented' (see Matthew 11:21). In other words, our Lord is referring to the evidence supplied by his own incarnation and ministry here on earth. To ask, therefore, 'Why were the people of Tyre and Sidon not given this evidence?' is to ask, 'Why did God not send the Lord Jesus in those earlier centuries?'. Why did he wait, and not send his Son into our world until many centuries later?
Now, that is a bigger problem than the problem of the people of Tyre and Sidon, Sodom and Gomorrah, and it remains a problem to this very present day, when there are still multitudes of people on earth who have never really heard of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. And many more millions still who have never witnessed his miraculous, mighty works, such as he did when he was here on earth.
We are not told the answers to many questions that we naturally would like to raise; nevertheless, it seems to me that we are told that there were reasons why God did not send his Son before he did. He was sent 'in the fullness of time' (Galatians 4:4); or 'in the end of these days'. Galatians chapters 3 and 4 give their reasons why God spent centuries training Israel by his law before they were ready for the incarnation of the Saviour. It would appear, therefore, that God could not have given to the people of Tyre and Sidon the evidences of the mighty miracles of Christ that he gave to Capernaum and Chorazin.
In this situation, therefore, it is a comfort to me to notice that our Lord cites two other instances from the Old Testament, namely the people of Nineveh and the Queen of Sheba (Matthew 12:41–42). The case of Nineveh shows that the men of Nineveh did have enough evidence to cause them to repent; for when Jonah preached, they did repent. And, therefore, if the men of Nineveh at that time had refused to repent, they would have been condemned for not responding to the evidence that they were given. Similarly, the case with the Queen of Sheba shows us that the Queen of Sheba was so interested in discovering truth and wisdom that, although she had only a rumour of the existence of Solomon and his wisdom, she made use of it and took the long journey in order to hear his wisdom.
Therefore, says Christ, the men of Nineveh and the Queen of Sheba will be summoned as witnesses at the Final Judgment against the people of Capernaum and Chorazin. The issue at stake will be: did the men of Capernaum and Chorazin have enough evidence to lead them to repentance and faith, if they had been willing to repent? And the answer is, most certainly yes, they did have enough evidence; for with the meagre evidence of Jonah's preaching and the mere rumour of Solomon's wisdom, the Ninevites repented and the Queen of Sheba came all the way to find the wisdom of Solomon. Whereas, with the vastly greater witness of the Saviour's miracles, the men of Capernaum did not repent, and very often they did not bother to cross the road to listen to our Lord's preaching.
These two examples, then, seem to show that at the Final Judgment the question will be raised: did people have enough evidence to lead them to repentance, if they had been willing to repent? And if they had enough evidence, and yet refused to repent, or if they refused to seek the truth that was available to them, if only they made an effort to find it, they will be rightly condemned on that ground.
Finally, it seems to me we must take seriously what our Lord solemnly declares, for he, according to John 5:22, is to be the judge at the great white throne. When, therefore, he says that he knows that the people of Tyre and Sidon would have repented if they had witnessed his mighty works, his judgment at the great white throne will surely take this into consideration and he will act accordingly.
Hitherto, then, my thoughts at this present moment on the question that you raise. I do not suppose that I have satisfied you, or given a final, adequate explanation of the problem, though I trust that my remarks may have contributed a little to its solution.
With warmest Christian greetings,
