- The New Covenant was not yet in effect. It came into effect after Christ’s death (Heb. 9:15–17; Col. 2:14). The thief was forgiven under the Old Covenant, not the New Covenant of Christ. We now live under a different covenant with different conditions of forgiveness.
- The Great Commission had not yet begun. Jesus had not yet commanded belief and baptism for the salvation of all nations (Mt. 28:19–20; Mk. 16:15–16).
- Jesus still had authority on earth to forgive sins personally. He could directly pardon the thief just as He had the paralytic (Mk. 2:10; Lk. 5:20–24). Now men must obey His New Testament Law (Heb. 9:15–17; Jam. 1:22-25).
- The thief could not obey the Gospel or confess faith in the risen Lord. Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection—the very core of the Gospel message—had not yet occurred (1 Cor. 15:1–4); therefore, he could neither confess belief that “God has raised Him from the dead” (Rom. 10:9–10) nor be baptized into Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection, to become “free from sin” (Rom. 6:3–5, 16–18).
- After the cross, no one was told to be saved like the thief. The people in Acts 2 were neither saved at the point of faith alone nor told to pray for salvation. After believing, they were told to “repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins” (Acts 2:38; Acts 22:16). This remains the pattern for all nations until the end of the world (Mt. 28:19–20; Mk. 16:15–16; Acts 2, 8, 9, 10, 16, 18, 19, 22). Both blood and water were present in Christ’s death (Jn. 19:34), and both are in water baptism—the sinner is “buried with Him by baptism” into that death, contacting the saving blood of Christ (Rom. 6:3–5, 16–18). In that moment, God forgives sins and makes the sinner alive together with Christ—not by human merit, but through “faith in the working of God” (Col. 2:11–13; Acts 2:38; 22:16; Gal. 3:27; Eph. 2:8–9; 5:25–26; 1 Pet. 3:21).
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