The first thing to know, God’s mercy is nearer than his punishment. God is merciful, and only the one who transgresses the limit is the one who is going to be punished.
Second thing is, no one can judge others or even him/her self and say “I am going to heaven and you going to hell”. Only God our creator knows who will be rewarded and who will be punished. Only God our creator judges, not human.
Quran 41:53
We will show them Our signs in the universe and within themselves until it becomes clear to them that this ˹Quran˺ is the truth. Is it not enough that your Lord is a Witness over all things?
God May punish a disbeliever if that person knows God is the truth and he/she denied the truth intentionally. Remember, God knows whether we disbelieved intentionally or not. We can not show arrogance or deny our creator, because he is the one who created us and sustained us all the time. Without him, we wouldn’t have existed forever. Once a person declares that he/she doesn’t want to accept his/her creator as the truth while it is clear for him/her, then he/she is becoming a sinner. Because, the person who denies God our creator is as if he/she is indirectly saying “God exists ok, but I don’t want to believe in him (or accept him)”. Some people normally announce it, and some do it secretly without telling anyone. God our creator, knows whatever we say verbally, by thoughts, or feel it in our hearts. Look at the following verse
Say, “In case you conceal whatever is in your breasts or display it, Allah [God The Creator] knows it, and He knows whatever is in the heavens and whatever is in the earth. And Allah is Ever-Determiner over everything.
There are two types of Disbelievers:
- The one who intentionally denies God our creator’s existence.
- The one who knows that God exists and associates with him false Gods and worship them. This happens Mostly with idol worshippers. And this is called “Shirk” which means “Associating”. And God can forgive everything except “Shirk”.
God does not forgive the joining of partners with Him: anything less than that He forgives to whoever He will, but anyone who joins partners with God has concocted a tremendous sin.
At the end of the day, whether a person is a believer in God Our Creator or not, he/she will eventually sin, right? So, when we sin, God, our creator ordered us to “Ask forgiveness to him” and follow the bad deed by good deed so that we might be forgiven. If someone says “I don’t want to know about God”, he/she may miss being forgiven and he/she will be responsible for the choice made.
You, as a reader, may wonder “even if the person has done good things his/her whole life, and the person chose to disbelieve in God, will God punish him/her for denying him or denying learning about him”, the answer is denying your creator is a major sin but whether that person will be punished or not is God’s decision, no one can judge except God, The Creator. Remember, A person can not be good while he/she knows that their creator exists and choose to deny him. The act of intentionally denying our creator can not be considered a good deed. Its negative deed by itself. Quran says
[In the day of judgment] the Day when neither wealth nor children can help,
Only those who come before Allah [God our creator] with a pure heart will be saved.”
A person who has a pure heart will never deny his/her creator, if God our creator existence is clear for him/her. This, however, doesn’t mean that all atheists have a bad heart. Many atheists are good people. I believe many of atheists don’t believe in God because it’s not clear for them yet that our creator exist. But, it means that all people who know God exists and intentionally deny and insist by saying “God doesn’t exist” can not be considered having a good heart.
There may be atheists who die without knowing the truth, only God judges them, not us.
Click here to read more about this topic “Can I be a Good Person While Not Believing in God”
Unfortunately, some people, when they get answers for their questions about the existence of God our creator, and when the existence of our creator is clear for them after the question gets answered, they want to deny God, therefore, they take it further by asking questions like “If God created everything, then who created God” but they ask that type of questions so that they block themselves from being religious. In other words, they hate to be religious. Maybe the media have affected them that religion is bad or they were in the wrong religion and when they found out that religion is false, their perspective toward religion changed. They may automatically think that all religions are the same. This way they don’t know the major purpose of life (which is to be tested who’s good doer and who’s bad doer) they forget that there is judgment day ( which cause them to fail that day).
In my opinion, the first step to know the truth is to have a willingness to know it and acceptance when you know it. Things will be much clearer for a person once he/she takes it positively. Islam is the only way guide to God The Creator. Please read the Quran to understand more.
High recommendation: Read Quran open-minded. Don’t let anyone tell you what it is especially the media, judge by your self by reading it. It will make for you clear the purpose of our existence and other mysteries of life. You will find it translated into English and other languages and please read it.