And even if I were to go there - and I hope I get enough cleansing to make me fit for everlasting fellowship - then I will simply call out for the Lord that I’ve come to know. His mercy endures forever, amen.
Also, I’m being reminded of why people are so stuck in this belief about hell. Because they feel that if they begin to believe differently, then they are likely in danger of its fires. That helps me to be a little more merciful on them. Mercy before judgment, people!
Perhaps first we need to attack gnosticism. When people are free to realize that it’s not their beliefs in and of themselves that save or condemn them, then we’re on the road to discussing universal reconciliation much more peaceably (I hope… )
Is it just an ironic coincidence that Rob Bell’s and Mark Driscoll’s churches are both called Mars Hill? Or is there a story about that - anybody know?
I think I’ve read somewhere (from someone involved with Mark Driscoll’s church) that it’s just ironic coincidence, Rev. Both are naming the church after the pagan philosophical society that met on Mars Hill in Athens, where Paul reasoned with the philosophers.
You may now adduce some extra levels of irony, though.
I am no Driscoll fan and I will have to listen to the whole clip before I can pass “judgment” but I noticed this statement from you and I must say, that depends? How was it justice for God to punish Jesus physically and spiritually for our sins? You see you and other universalists have it backward, you make it about us when it really and ultimately it is about God. If you offend an eternal being then you will receive an eternal punishment.
Follow me here:
If I lie to my kids, I lose their respect
If I lie to my wife, she could divorce me
If I lie to my boss, I can be fired
If I lie to a police officer, I can go to court
If I lie to a judge, I can go to jail
If I lie to an eternal, infinite, holy, righteous God, I can receive an eternal, infinite, holy, righteous punishment
Same offense but the higher the authority that’s offended then the greater the punishment
Alot of things of God doesn’t entirely make sense to us including an eternal hell but we never, ever judge scripture based on our feelings and human experience. Scripture must only be interpreted by scripture. I know to some that may sound cold and stiff but sticking to scripture is the best possible way to stay on the right path. By the way. Your whole post was based on presupposition. You gave absolutely no scripture to back up your claim. God bless : )
haha. Yeah, that was me. I looked it up just to make sure, and when Rob Bell started his church Driscoll’s was two years in and relatively obscure.
Now that I’ve read the entire transcript (I guess I hadn’t watched the whole video) it kinda makes me feel sick. I understand that he’s completely sincere and truly believes that’s how it is so I imagine that the beatings will be less severe for him. But he’s right, he’ll be judged for what he’s taught.
You realize that from the boss through the judge, those are speaking of something other than an interpersonal interaction? What if your wife was a cop? You wouldn’t go to court if you were lying to her in an everyday, personal capacity. A police officer is no more privileged than any other person in that regard. You’re simply giving another context for lying, which can take all kinds of forms. I question whether we can even lie to God, though. He knows all and if we’re standing before Him we know that.
But let’s just go with the spirit of your argument here. Yes, God is timeless (the true meaning of eternity), and if you sin against God you receive a timeless judgment. That doesn’t mean that it endures for an infinite amount of time. The context is that you sinned against a God who has infinite depth and therefore offended him infinitely. But with an infinite payment (Christ’s death) you can be reprieved. The context is NOT that you offended God for an infinite amount of time. if so, then perhaps you would require an infinite length of punishment. But that’s inherent in the thing itself, and we’re back at Gregory MacDonald’s argument about a universalistic eternal conscious torment.
Isn’t to say that we could ever bear the full brunt of the consequences of our own sin heretical, if indeed those sins are infinite in degree? Wouldn’t only Jesus be able to bear that? Especially since we’re talking about infinite depth as opposed to merely infinite time.
But we already know from scripture, especially our Lord’s own sayings, that judgment is not absolutely the same for everyone - that is, infinitely big in both degree and duration. Even Driscoll admitted that. Jesus was constantly talking about how some would get a harsher judgment than others, to the extent that Sodom and Gomorrah, a wicked city demolished by fire and brimstone, would judge his own generation for being more wicked! He also said that those servants who did wrong and didn’t know it would get a lighter beating than those who did wrong and did know it.
So by Jesus’ own words your argument fails. See? I used scripture. God can’t judge sin by the extent of the offense - even human courts have a better sense of justice than that! God judges by motives, just as it is written in Romans 2:
(Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.) This will take place on the day when God judges people’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares.
Romans 2:14-16
Man looks at externals, but God looks at the heart.
Also, Jesus explicitly said that He wouldn’t judge His own generation but that Moses would, so Driscoll is wrong - though Jesus said that God gave Him power to judge, He said Himself that He wouldn’t judge everybody. He will obviously be presiding judge, though.
You have missed the point. One of the ways we understand God is through oursleves as fallen as that may be. Why do we have the sense of justice and why do we punish at different degrees based on authority? The point is eternal hell for rejecting an eternal God is not illogical.
I am sorry but that is your presupposition and outside mainstream orthox Christian teaching. You start with the presupposition that either there is no hell or that hell isn’t eternal and you interpret scripture to fit your presupposition, it doesn’t mean you are right but you have a different perception of scripture therefore you could be wrong.
I don’t see how I failed in my argument. I never said, God judged sin by the extent of the offense and yes human courts do that 1st, 2nd, 3rd degree murder. I said, the greater the authority offended the greater the punishment which is why only Jesus Christ-God Himself, the spotless lamb who takes away the sins of the world would be sufficient payment for all who believe (John 3:16). Only an infinite punishment would warrant an infinite sacrifice.
Again you are have misunderstood me. I haven’t stated anything about God judging the heart but that my argument is an eternal judgment is logical from a mainstream orthodox Christian understanding of scripture.
I am curious. You know yourself, your thoughts and your deeds. What do you deserve from a holy, righteous God? God Bless! : )
God, as Father and Creator, our infinite superior, owes us tiny creatures a duty of care.
Who created the Serpent? Who let it into the Garden? Who planted a Toxic Tree (a booby-trap?) powerful enough to poison the entire species? (Would you leave nerve gas on the kitchen table for your children to tamper with?) Who left the innocent Eve alone for the afternoon with a Cosmic Psychopath, God’s sworn enemy? Truly, truly, God has some explaining to do.
Have you ever considered the possibility that the cross was God taking responsibility for the mess?
Alright. Where does it say all the following in the scriptures?
Also, is not sin - sin in the sight of the Lord? Wouldn’t cheating on a math test in the 10th grade by your definition require, nay, demand that you be eternally sentenced to ceaseless, exponential, never-ending, irremedial torture just the same as offending the highest possible authority in your list?
Also, isn’t God One? Is he not One in that he is divine and unchanging, in eternal, perfectly-unanimous, inseparable, indivisible, communal-union in his infinite and infinitely omniessential nature? Such a nature that consists of being in perfect union - as One; with, in, and as - perfect Love, Grace, Mercy, Justice, Righteousness, Holiness, and Goodness; each in infinite supply and each in one accord being just as One as he is One?
His Love, Grace, Mercy, Justice, Righteousness, Holiness, and Goodness are each thoroughly as infinite as he is. And therefore, infinite overlaps infinite - and are as inseparable and indivisible from each other as God is indivisible in his triunity. Just as God is One, and so his attributes and his nature are One.
[size=85](something infinite in size will overlap something that is also infinite in size becoming practically inseparable and infinitely interlinked and mixed as one infinite union of two infinitely sized things; something infinite will not have borders, and especially not borders that prevent another infinite thing from being infinitely a part of and present in the other; lest both should cease to be infinite: think of a venn diagram with two infinitely large circles, these two circles would have no border and so you would have pictorally a single infinite circle)[/size]
His love and his justice are inseparable concepts, as they are infinite - and so his justice is loving, and his love is full of justice. Justice sets wrong things right, and wrong people right. Justice is Righteousness, and Righteousness is Rightness, and Rightness is being “right”.
Therefore, God gives us what we need (which is to be right with him) out of his Mercy and Grace (and his Love especially) which are One with his Justice and Righteousness, rather than what we “deserve” which will not satisfy his infinite nature, or his desires.
If it took the eternal burning of individuals to satisfy his justice - none would be saved.
Define care? Would this statement register to shivering, strip down, hungry persecuted North Korean Christians in concentration camps during the middle of winter? From scripture I don’t see that God owes us anything but death unless you can find different.
I don’t think theologically without scripture, that’s dangerous because using that logic I can apply absolutely anything to the cross from aliens to…anything. God Bless!
Interesting that you see my points as valid which raises a question if I may? My question to you is why embrace universalism? Why not just a Christian who doesn’t believe in hell? I assume you can see how universalism from an evangelical view of scripture changes the character and nature of God? God Bless!
The scriptures say that the debt has been paid. All of it. “It is finished” It would seem to me that God doesn’t owe Man anything because Man has no more debt to owe either. The clearing of the debt goes both ways, and why shouldn’t it go both ways?
If the debt of Man’s sin, which deserves Death is cleaned away by the cross then why does God owe Man nothing but Death? Is the debt still in effect? Did Christ the sinless actually lie?
To add my two cents on these points, even though it is directed at someone else - it may as well be directed at most of us anyway;
It is the only thing that makes sense.
Eternal Damnation = God lost
Annihilation = God lost
All mankind saved = God wins, Man wins, everyone wins.
Because most Christian Universalists do - we just don’t believe that it is “an eternal pit of torture, where evil lasts forever”.
Hell is remedial.
Yes, it makes him far, far, far better. He ceases to be a hateful despot playing favourites (or a feeble deity incapable of achieving his own will), and actually becomes acceptable to the heart as a loving, just, powerful, wonderful, and perfect deity - who actually cares, and loves everyone - including me.
Hi Lefein, I appreciate your answers. You are welcome.
I believe that it is what the whole counsel of scripture teaches.
I do believe in hell.
I’m not sure what your opinion of what you think an evangelical view of the character and nature of God is, but my view of the character and nature of God is exactly what is described in scripture and made manifest in the second person of the trinity. That is also my experience of Him.
Good to exchange views with you oxymoron. May God bless you too.
Since the discussion has long ago morphed into something rather different from the original topic (see thread title for a hint as to what the original topic was ), Nimblewill has rebooted the original discussion in a new thread here.
You asked where in scripture do I see these things? fair question so let’s break what I said down.
Alot of things of God doesn’t entirely make sense to us
(Isaiah 55:8-9)
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.
9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Scripture must only be interpreted by scripture. I know to some that may sound cold and stiff but sticking to scripture is the best possible way to stay on the right path
(2 Timothy 3:16)
16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
(1 John 4:1)
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
(1 Thessalonians 5:2)
But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good;
I don’t know about “Torture” as now you are making an emotional plea but yes it only takes one sin to sentence ourselves to death
Yes that is all so very true and wonderfully descriptive but God is also has wrath, anger, jealous etc…, all equal with the attributes you mentioned. These are scriptural as well and if He didn’t follow through on these then He wouldn’t be holy and He wouldn’t be God. God’s “love” encompasses all those attributes you and I gave.
I don’t understand what you mean by “infinite overalps infinite”, Yes I agree but again you are ignoring the rest of His scriptural attributes.
We have different views of justice based on scripture. I agree with what you said but because of your presupposition as I have stated earlier you have ignored His other attributes thus leaving an incomplete picture of who God is. The bible also says, that God’s anger remains on the wicked. The justice I am talking about is not some slap on the wrist and put in a corner. Using your logic, tell me how is God showing justice to a family whose daughter was tortured, raped, murdered and mutilated if he is slapping people on the wrist? Excuse me if I am taking you out of conext but that is how I am seeing it. If I am wrong then please explain this process of “justice” you talk about towards this unrepentant murderer? and what you say to the family of God’s justice toward the murderer?
Scripture says that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ is what satisfies God’s “justice” and we are saved only by the blood of Jesus Christ. God showed His mercy by making a way and sending His Son, giving us the gift of the gospel and His justice will also be served on those who reject that gift. It’s irrelevant if you and I cannot comprehend eternal damnation as being overkill or that it isn’t showing love. I can only go from scripture. God Bless!
None of that has anything to do with what you posted (the things I asked for scriptures on) I’m afraid.
Namely this;
Where does it say, specifically, that the higher the authority - the higher the crime, and hence the higher the punishment?
God is not “Anger”
God’s Justice is expressible through anger and wrath. But he is not “infinitely angry”, where as he is “infinitely loving” for example.
Isa 57:16 For I will not contend for ever, neither will I be always wroth: for the spirit should fail before me, and the souls which I have made. -KJV
Isa 57:16 I will not take vengeance on you for ever, neither will I be always angry with you: for my Spirit shall go forth from me, and I have created all breath. -The Septuagint
If an infinite thing (A) is in an infinite sized room with another infinite thing (B) where is the border of separation between infinite thing A, and infinite thing B in that infinite sized room?
And no dear friend, I am not ignoring any of his attributes. I am putting them in their proper context.
God is not Justice without Mercy, or Grace, or Love, he doesn’t express a single attribute without expressing them all; God is One.
When he expresses his righteous justice, it is out of Love - and Love is always for the benefit of the thing it loves, True Benefit, providing for the needs of the beloved, as well as satisfying the noble wants of that same beloved.
When you take Love out of the equation of Justice - you kill both Love and Justice. The same with Mercy, and Grace. You cannot have Justice without Mercy and Grace permanently involved and equally expressed.
You assume I have a presupposition. Please don’t assume.
I’ve not ignored his wrath, or his anger. I’ve only presented that they are not equivalent to a drunken father beating his child ceaselessly for breaking the family vase - even if it was done on purpose.
It is unloving to eternally torture the prodigal child, and not even leave eternal room for him to return Home.
Until the wicked are made righteous.
Rom 5:19 For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.
You assume that I believe his justice is a slap on the wrist? God forbid! A “thousand years” (a long time, but not eternity) of chastening with fire is more than enough, unless one has no concept of mercy, and grace, and justice - and are only interested in revenge, or using God as one’s hitman.
Chastening until one is righteous, and made right is no laughing matter, neither do I laugh at it. Jail is fearsome enough without capital punishment being used in sentencing what is for the most of mankind little more than petty thefts, or at worst grand theft. Not everyone rapes, and murders, and has little girls chained up in their basements for frightening orgies. And for those who do, a trillion years is still not an eternity - but a trillion years is definitely a long time to be in chastening pain faced with the holy God who is an all consuming fire.
It doesn’t tickle the sinner when he’s faced with his own wretched nature, and certainly not when faced with the humiliation of having to repent for it. It doesn’t make me giggle when I’m even convicted of sinning, it certainly will not tickle the sinner in fire when it is being burned right out of him with nowhere to run, or hide - and the deeper he goes in trying to bury himself under himself the more it will burn and the hotter the purifying flame will be.
But he will be purified, just as you and I - who are no less as wicked as Satan himself are being purified.
Using your logic, you deserve the same exact punishment as the rapist. Even without the “slap on the wrist” statement.
If the wicked man is made right, there is no call for continued chastening, or vengeance. Unless one’s only aim was not remedial justice, but was merely vindictive revenge. Now I am not saying that you are all about revenge, but I am just showing you to the best of my ability what this eternal form of “justice” is in its practical usage.
If there is no remedy, it is merely infliction, if it is merely infliction it is not justice - it is revenge without room for repayment. That is cruelty. And a cruelty that under your logic; we all deserve. And if this is God’s justice, then this is exactly what we’ll get - saved or not. Because if this is God’s Justice which is inseparable from his love - then his Love is expressed this way also…and we are in deep trouble.
He is chastened until he is made right and repents, the family is restored, and there is peace, blessedness, grace, forgiveness, and good will between them. That is God’s Justice.
In other words; When the sinner is made right, and the family is made right, and everything wrong has been made right - Justice has been fulfilled.
His Mercy and Justice are thoroughly inseparable.
Because it isn’t Loving, and it is indeed overkill - because it is irremediable infliction without room for Mercy or Grace or Justice - and therefore it is not Love at all.
As for scripture, in truth you go not from scripture solely - you go from an interpretation of a translation of a copy of a copy of a copy of lost autographs…of scripture. Just to remind you. Because I too go from scripture, I have not built my beliefs on a man-made Babel. I only want to address this because of three reasons, and though you are apologetic about it those reasons are still there;
You assume I believe Justice is a slap on the wrist wink at sin.
You assume I do not have scriptural backing.
You assume I have not fully considered the whole attributes of God as far as my finite abilities are able to comprehend his infinite nature.
All three of these are falsehoods, hopefully not on purpose, but I tell you they are falsehoods so you won’t repeat doing them.
Sorry this is so long, but I just couldn’t stop writing: I would love to talk to you a little bit because I too am a conservative Christian. But I have, over the past 2 years, been making a slow journey in the scriptures to believing the scriptures when they say, “I will reconcile all men to myself”, and “it his will that none should perish but all come to eternal life”, and “in Christ all will be made alive”. I know there are scriptures that are supposed to counter those, I am not ignorant of the debate, it’s just that when we let scripture interpret scripture we often let one scripture take the lead and make the others follow. For example, Thomas said of Jesus, “My Lord and my God.” Because of this, when we see scriptures that call Jesus a man, we temper it with the fact that he IS God. When we run into more difficult scriptures, like John 17:3, a verse that Jehovah’s Witnesses love so much, where Jesus says “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” We respond to the Jehovah’s Witness that scripture must interpret scripture. Taken by itself, we would agree that Jesus would be calling the Father the only true God while putting himself outside of that category, but taken with scripture as a whole, Jesus is obviously saying something else and not denying his own deity (for another discussion altogether). We give other scriptures priority to John 17:3 because they speak so directly to who Jesus is (whereas 17:3 is commenting primarily on who the Father is)
OK, getting back to the idea that Jesus will reconcile all men to himself. We need to take scriptures that speak the most directly to what God’s plan is for us and let others be “honed” by those. For example, when the scriptures say that in Adam all were lost and in Christ all were saved (paraphrase), we read quite clearly and unambiguously that God intends to redeem all mankind. Not only that, but we also see this same message preached, in the same manner many times over throughout scripture. Each time quite unambiguously. What are we to make of this conflict? Historically we have taken the “hell texts” and defined the “universal redemption texts” with them in mind. All will be saved, EXCEPT those who are lost. The problem here is that many of the hell texts, when truly looked at, in context, are MORE ambiguous than the UR texts. I’m not saying that they are ambiguous, mind you. Just more so than the UR ones. What I have been doing for the first time is asking myself, "How would the scriptures look if I interpret the partial salvation texts with the UR texts? What if I interpret the hell texts using the UR texts? I have been studying the scriptures with this in mind and it is not a one-time, sit-down and have a proof-text war session type bible study. It has been a long, complex and deeply rewarding study, regardless of where I end up. Every position has tough texts. The Calvinist has to deal with the “whosoever” texts and the “ALL MEN” texts. They have to re-define them using their “stronger” texts about predestination. The Arminian has to deal with the “those I have foreknown I have also predestined” texts and they use other “stronger” texts to redefine them. You see it with every major position – even the fundamentals-- there are difficult texts, as I have shown. We would like to think that the bible is like a jigsaw puzzle with each part having a perfect fit. Now, from God’s angle that would most likely be true, but even the most brilliant theologians/scholars have not been able to put it all together into one cohesive finished product.
I own an excellent book by Gleason Archer called, “The Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties” Gleason Archer was a brilliant conservative scholar who read over 20 different languages and had more respect for scripture than any other I have ever known. But even with that, his book was quite hefty. The bible is a difficult book and as much as we would like it to be a simple black and white, perfect fit for our doctrines, it isn’t quite that simple. There are highly respected conservative Christian scholars with different viewpoints on the rapture, the millennium, the kingdom of God, prophecy, the exact meaning of the atonement, etc. , and they all fall within the category of orthodox Christianity. Yes, there are non-negotiables, but even those have their difficult texts – some very difficult. The question here then, with the UR texts such as Collosians and Romans, what do the scriptures look like if you use these texts, and there are many of them, as the “stronger” text? What if, for example, I suppose that when the scriptures say:
Philippians 2:10-11 (New American Standard Bible)
so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
that it means That all of the tongues that are confessing are those of souls who have been drawn to Christ?What if the confession is from the heart? The scriptures do teach that no one can confess except by the Spirit of God. An unbeliever cannot truly confess Jesus as Lord and nothing in these passages indicate force. What if, when the scriptures say:
Romans 5:18
Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people.
that it means exactly what it says and that Paul thought that eventually all would be justified, exactly as it is written? Then I would need to look at the texts that seem to limit this and see if they can be seen any other way, **which is exactly what we do with every other doctrine when we run into difficult verses. ** We harmonize them. Sometimes it seems that we do some serious twisting to make things “orthodox”. I mean we really have to tweak a lot of the “works” passages spoken by Christ to tie them in with the justification by faith passages by Paul. If you took Christ at face value you would think that folks were saved by works. In fact, an oft used hell text, the sheep and the goats, says that the “eternal” state of those judged will be determined by whether or not the people fed, visited, and cared for other believers. It says nothing of justification by faith, or the resurrection, or the atonement. You would almost think that Jesus was talking about something else altogether!
This is what I am doing. I’m going to scripture the way I always have and shaping verses with other verses very carefully. My eyes have been opened up to many things. It’s fascinating how much you DON’T see when you think that the scriptures MUST say a certain thing i.e. I was raised during the Jesus movement and we always thought Jesus would return before we saw each other again at a camp or some other meeting. Heaven was always right around the corner. It was always about going to heaven. It’s amazing how many verses about earth that you miss when you think that earth is irrelevant in the afterlife. What is the new earth for anyway? I would encourage you to look at it in this manner and see if, perhaps, the bible might have something different to say about redemption. Something exciting and amazing. Something that shows that God actually DOES accomplish His will; where God actually DOES win; where the gospel DOES show itself to have greater power than sin and satan; where the blood of Christ has greater authority than the desires of Satan; where the wooing of the Holy Spirit is powerful; where God is sovereign & victorious rather than a guy who wishes that he could save all mankind but, after doing his best and putting together the ultimate plan of salvation can only get a tiny percentage to go His way because sin was more powerful than Him. The traditional view doesn’t harmonize with scripture very well to me.
His mercy endures forever, amen.
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