Three questions must be kept separate for the major sinner: whether faith remains, whether punishment is merited, and whether pardon is possible. A grave non-shirk offense can render a believer sinful without necessarily making him an unbeliever; Sunni theology therefore places his ultimate fate under divine will.
Possibility of pardon is not an acquittal or praise of the sin. Accountability and warning remain real. Yet eternal exclusion associated with unbelief is not imposed automatically on every gravely sinful believer.
This distinction provides the groundwork for the separate topic of intercession.