Moment of truth… your last post scares the crud out of me!!! I would have used stronger language as I feel much stronger about it, but I’m trying to come across like I sort of have it together, but I don’t. Would you or could you elaborate on your last post a little more please? I’m wanting so much more to believe what DaveF wrote and what RuthJ wrote. Does this mean I’m living the “high life?” No, not at all, it means truthfully, that your post, it sure TERRIFIES me and I have lived with THAT terror ALL my life… I am as sincere as I can be on paper here. My hands are actually sweating. Your post IS what I was brought up with and I had thought, maybe incorrectly now, that UR changed all that for me…
auggybendoggy,
I look forward to being judged. I have a lot a crap and flaws in me. I don’t like the person I am but I am not going to dwell on that anymore. I spent most of my 57 years doing that. I will look to what Jesus has accomplished for all of us (believer and nonbeliever alike) no matter how innately nice we may be or how utterly sociopathic. Seeing something of what Jesus has accomplished for us begins to liberate us from our self-concern so that we can begin to love God by loving others. But even the best of us aren’t able to do that with the consistency we would desire. The sin of the world is a web, we are all affected by it to one degree or another. We are deluding our selves, or have a very narrow definition of sin, if we think that we can transcend it completely in the here and now. Until the resurrection, when all things are made new, sin will be here and there is plenty of empirical evidence of that in the world.
What Jesus accomplished on Golgotha will be fully realized in the resurrection and rebirth of all of us directly from God. Jesus did not pay for the sins of the world He took them away; just as He took the disease or infirmity away from those he healed and in exchange he gave them a portion of his healing life. The resurrection hands each of us a clean slate, it is the eschatological Jubilee and all sins/debts have been wiped clean, forgiven. There is no penalty to be paid our sins are forgiven/canceled/blotted out, there is no one to pay. If the bank forgave your mortgage would you or someone else still have to write them a check on your behalf?
I don’t think there’s any need or reason to be afraid – but maybe that’s a function of what I’ve been through, too. God’s love is always just that – LOVE. Perfect love casts out all fear. To me that means that His perfect love illumines our hearts and we understand that, no matter what, He will always work for our good.
As George MacDonald is fond of having his fictional characters say (more or less), If hell is what I need, then that’s where God will send me, and it’s where I want to go. I think of ‘hell’ as a hospital, not a torture chamber. Yes, there is certainly torment, but no more than can be avoided. The illness must be destroyed.
Now you could say that God is too good to let people suffer in hospital. He will instantly cure them. And maybe He will. But if so, why hasn’t He done that, because there are certainly many, many suffering right now and right here. I personally conclude that God allows this because it is a necessary part of creating and finishing the daughters and sons He desires. We needn’t fear because anything we go through is ordained by Him, had to pass through His hands first, and would not be allowed if it would damage us or hurt us without far greater benefit TO us.
I’m not a child who has never suffered, btw. And yet I look back and realize that God has used the things I’ve gone through to develop things in me that could not have come about (as far as I know) in any other way. So I trust Him. I do NOT enjoy suffering, but I trust Him. I realize that certain things have to be for my benefit and the benefit of others and it will be worth it in the end. He will restore the years the locusts have eaten and so very much more.
So for me, who have learned to trust Him here, it seems easy to trust Him there (wherever ‘there’ is) when I will be that much closer to His Kingdom in my life. All will be well and all things will be well and all manner of things will be well.
Whether that happens instantaneously or takes some time is pretty much a moot point to me. Whatever it takes, that’s what’s going to happen, and our debating about it isn’t going to change anything. He is good. We can trust Him. That is enough for me. If the ultra-U’s are right, then HOORAY! If the purgatorial-U’s are right, then HOORAY! God is good.
I’m praying your post was for MY benefit as it did benefit me. You’ll have to forgive me please, sometimes I’m not quite all there/here (seriously, especially as of late). I misunderstand things and that is one reason I asked Auggy for some clarification. It’s NOT the writers fault, it’s me. Just ask Jason. Just wanted to say thank you for the words of encouragment even if they weren’t for me.
It seems to me that anyone suggesting that God does this doesn’t believe that Jesus is the image of God.
Everything that Jesus saw his Father do, he did.
Anything Jesus did not see his Father do, he didn’t do.
So that tells us, since we know that Jesus never inflicted “hell” or “torment” or made them suffer, when he was healing people (or any other time), then we know for sure that God doesn’t inflict “hell” or “torment” or make them suffer, when healing people (or any other time).
It’s so simple!
Jesus did all his healings immediately, he always took the pain instead of letting the “patient” be in pain, so we know that his Father also does all his healings immediately, taking the pain instead of letting us be in pain.
And as Jesus never told anyone to put up with their suffering because it was making them a better person, “finishing” them, then it’s clear that God doesn’t expect anyone to put up with their suffering because it is making them a better person, “finishing” them.
When Jesus was asked to heal he always did so, straight away, painlessly (for the other person, not for him). He never, never told them that suffering was for their own good. His inaugural speech was all about relieving suffering. There is nothing mysterious, obscure or ambiguous about this.
Bret,
I understand what your saying and I would say you don’t need to fear that God hates you (as your old tradition probably subtextually taught). But I would say to all men - practice evil and you’ll pay. I don’t think Paul referring people to inheriting eternal life for pursuing righteousness means those who dont will approach the judgement seat and be declared righteouss. I realize this is the Ultra’s position but for me it’s extremely weak. There’s far too many texts that seem to endorse that those who practice wickedness will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But with that said Bret, I believe God can unconditionally love us and, as Cindy so eloquently put it, give us hell to save us. But even though that’s true, I would disagree with Macdonald that hell is what we should want - for it’s better to obey than to sacrifice. Better to do what is right than to do evil and pay - even if God’s wrath is corrective, it’s better still to do what is right, it’s the nature of things.
Thank you for the reply and acknowleding ME and MY concerns. I don’t know if your reply made me feel better, but I guess IF I went on my feelings alone around such things, I’d be screwed. Maybe it’s off topic, but perhaps this IS where faith plays a role, I’m not sure. I’d hate to agree that there is a price to pay for our sinful ways (since I am under the impression that that HAS already been done), however since meeting up with UR, I have been under the impression (rightly or wrongly) that “hell,” punishment, and the likes, were for “corrective measures” so we ALL could be in heaven. Granted, that is just my simple understanding of UR. Maybe that’s just what I WANT to believe Auggy and I’m just fooling myself. Or maybe it’s the varying beliefs within UR Itself that has me confused. I don’t know. At any rate, thank you again for taking the time to speak with me, Bret Belko! I appreciate your time.
Your logic that having certitude of receiving no suffering from God’s hand requires that living righteously can’t be necessary IS in my experience the overwhelming pargdigm in evangelicalism (altho those who hold this rationale spurred by Luther are 99.9 % non-universalists). You and Ruth assert that the “Big Picture” supports this confidence. But the only way I know how to decipher what the ‘big picture’ is, is to look at the total narrative & how its’ pieces are fitted together.
Thus, the problem that I’ve tried to raise is that it appears to me that your logic leads to a conclusion that contradicts most of the Bible (which I tried to illustrate with texts from OT, Jesus, and Paul’s apparently consistent approach). Bottomline, when I see text after text, e.g. of things that Jesus and Paul explicitly said, utterly dismissed as incorrect, because they don’t fit someone’s conception of the “big picture,” it sounds to me like a strategy that could make the Bible support anything that a person might prefer.
I am very sympathetic to Bret and others not wanting to fear God. I don’t even think that we should in any ultimate sense be afraid of suffering God’s discipline. But of course, as I’ve said above, I see the Biblical analogy to be that God is an utterly loving Father who only would correct me in order to bless me. Thus I don’t feel that I need to have certitude that God will not put me through something painful (the eschatological nature of which I don’t feel I have any definitive knowledge). So if God perchance should know that I need to form a greater righteousness in order to embrace all that God’s love intends for me, and thus God might see fit to allow some form of correction for me, my sense of God’s character is that I am in utterly good hands and have no reason to fear Him.
The Bible is not the big picture, it is a witness to it but nothing short of the Parousia will reveal the big picture of God’s new creation to us. The best insight we have on this for now is the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Only to the extent that scripture bears witness to Him does it contribute to our our hope and vision of what the new creation of God becoming all in all is.
It is like a holographic image. If you take a holographic image plate and smash it into a 1000 pieces the whole image will still be there on each separate piece of glass but it will be greatly degraded and hard to see. That is what deciphering the Bible is to what the Parousia and unveiling of Jesus Christ is. The scriptures are the 1000 pieces, Jesus is the focused image of God in the world and the Parousia is the complete high definition reality of God’s new creation.
Not utterly dismissed as incorrect just a different interpretation of what they mean. Certainly you are aware of the complications involved in reading the Bible. Even a cursory study of some keywords in the Bible such as “righteous,” “eternal/everlasting,” and many others have not been accurately translated in many English translations. Couple that with all of the contextual, cultural and idiomatic issues coming to a universal consensus of about what it all means is close to impossible. Hence, hundreds of Christian denominations ranging from Roman Catholicism, to various flavors of Protestantism as well as fringe groups like Jehovah Witnesses and SDA. This seems like a whole lot of “making the Bible support anything a person might prefer” going on out there. Of course universalists are not only considered fringe by most Christians but heretical to boot.
Because I don’t come from a Protestant evangelical background I never really encountered this emphasis on individual chastisement, correct and punishment as the means by which nonbelievers, and in some cases believers, are saved until I began to frequent forums such as this one 15 years ago. I came to a universal understanding of the gospel some 15 odd years earlier reading Karl Barth and Jurgen Moltmann both of whom had a decidedly Christ-centered understanding of God’s salvation of the world. The salvation of the world is the singular accomplishment of Jesus on the cross and not a just an inspirational model for each individual to pick up their “cross” and carry it on their path to salvation
I don’t know if you believe that corrective punishment occurs post mortem or in the here and now or both. But the OT accounts of what are considered to be God’s wrathful punitive judgment on sinners; from the flood, to the destruction of the 10 tribes of Israel, to Nebuchadnezzar’s capture of Jerusalem, the long diaspora and finally the killing of six millions Jews in the Holocaust don’t seem to have resulted in the repentance of the Jews. One would think that the Holocaust would have resulted in the mass repentance conversion of the survivors to accepting Jesus as their Messiah if such an approach is so effective. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while getting the same failed results. God is not insane because He did do something utterly different. He sent Jesus into the world to save it and not to punish it.
Thanks so much, Bret – and yes, it was for you primarily, as you said you were struggling with fear (and no wonder, considering some of the things we’ve heard.) I’m so encouraged that it’s a blessing for you.
Forgive me, and thanks for clarifying that I wrongly associated you with Ruth’s approach (who shares your conclusions) when I referred to the discussion of specific texts wherein she claimed that Paul and Jesus’ views were just plain wrong.
Yes, of course we’re on common ground in being aware that "interpretations" are endlessly disputed. But, if you guys just keep repeating what you assert is the big picture, instead of engaging the admitted difficulties of interpreting specific texts, I’m left with nothing to evaluate.
I think that I grasp what you are claiming is the central or controlling conception. I just don’t see any reason to accept your theory, unless you present what should convince others of such an interpretation. I also dig Barth & Moltman. But just telling me what you think they think is the Bible’s controlling idea would not be at all decisive to me.
Your argument that God would be “insane” to continue the ineffective pattern He is presented as following all through Biblical history seems to prove too much. For it seems to me that the definition of insanity for an omniscent Being would be to expect us to believe that He would do in the first place for all of the Biblical story something that we must agree was ‘insane.’ Thus, it seems more sane to me to doubt your premise.
When you say that you don’t know at what point I assume God had a place for “corrective punishment,” (I’m open to multiple), I’m mystified by your pronouncement that using such measures would be insane. Are you implying that we should see that at no point is there a proper place for “correction” or “punishment,” and that if we really understood what the Bible is saying, we would recognize that it never conveys that God would punish or correct? Is it your perception that at least since the cross secured everyone’s reconciliation, no one has or will experience any suffering that God could have anything to do with**?**
You have not responded to my previous comments. What, for example do you think “finished” means in “It is finished”? And do you not consider Jesus to be both the Word of God and the very image of God?
That is a Greek concept, not a Hebrew one. For example, what do you make of lines like, “I heard a rumour about Sodom, so I’ve come down to check it out for myself.” Was it true, or was he just pretending not to have seen it all?
Since you don’t engage my own citations of comments where you seem to dismiss texts that I cite as contradictory to the big picture or spoken by those with false ideas, I’m skeptical on how it would help to give my guess on texts that you find decisive. Still, while I’m not sure what all telestai implied, (since I follow Wright in seeing that Jesus came to the conclusion that God’s purposes for Israel would come about in his martyrdom as the Suffering Servant) I’d guess that when Jesus referred to “it” being finished, he was expressing as he expired, that he had finished or completed the mission that God had given to him. Is that far-fetched?
I respect you and others (including some of my mentors) questioning the traditional view of God’s knowledge. On your question about God needing to “come down” in order to see what happens, yes, I would wonder if it’s an anthromorphism, and apparently interpret the Bible less literally than you. I guess, IF I thought of God as One who mistakenly had thought that creating a situation that allowed suffering could be redemptive, then it would make room to think that God will finally figure out his error, and instantly make everything as perfect as they should have been. If so, I do hope He knows what He’s doing next time .
Bob, what does telestai mean, please? - for me and the other readers.
No, it isn’t - though I wouldn’t choose the word “martyrdom”, as “martyr” literally means “witness”, and that is only a tiny part of what Jesus did/was.
So then the question becomes, what *was *that mission? You refer to the prophecies in the Old Testament: I see Jesus as being YHWH’s arm publicly, visibly, bringing life, justice and healing to the whole creation; in his resurrection, he arises to establish fairness to save all the oppressed of the earth; he bears our sicknesses, carries our pains, is wounded instead of us to heal us - the sort of liberator who makes the whole world want to throw a party, with all people, animals, sea creatures, and even inanimate objects like the sea and mountains come to life to celebrate.
(Isaiah, Psalms, etc.)
I just try to read what it says, instead of thinking it can’t really mean that because God is omni-this and omni-that. But what I find strange is that you say you interpret the Bible less literally than me, and yet you seem to want to appeal to individual texts a lot more than I do.
Remember Jonah? He (finally!) delivered God’s message to Nineveh (you’re going to be destroyed - no get-out clause) and then sat down to enjoy the fireworks. When they failed to appear he had a conversation with God that went something like this:
Jonah: I’m sick of this: even this plant has dried up - what do you think you’re doing?
YHWH: You want me to do the fire-and-brimstone thing I said I’d do, but I’m not going to - I feel sorry for those thousands of people and the children and all the animals; I can’t do it.
Jonah: Huh! I KNEW it! Why do you think I ran away and had that tangle with the fish? I know you better than you know yourself - I just *knew *you wouldn’t do it when it came to the crunch!
Of course, that wasn’t the only time he changed his mind, by any means.
But the big change was to bring life and justice directly himself: and so Jesus came.
Brett,
I can sympathize with you. It’s not as though your words don’t hold any weight. I too don’t believe we should fear God in some ultimate sense but I do believe we should fear God’s punishment when we do wrong. It’s not to see God as a monster but rather as a Father who disciplines his children and allows us to suffer in order to perfect us.
It seems to me that some here (often Ultras) are stuck on Penal Substitution, Jesus paid the price and now there’s no more suffering for anyone. Would that be true of you Brett?
Auggy,
No, I can’t say that I do believe in Penal Substitution when I really think about it. At least not in the way I’m reading what you wrote and as I’ve tried to communicate, my “thinker” isn’t thinking very well anymore so I’m easily confused Auggy. I guess what I was hoping for and it may be very selfish is that whatever judgement is to come for me, It would be from a place of love. I do NOT believe by any stretch of my imagination that I can achieve perfection on my own OR even with God’s help. It’s just not possible (well, anything IS possible in God’s world) because I was born a sinner, not by choice mind you, but that is where I find myself like it or not. And there are no amount of “good works” no matter how hard I try to be “good,” that that is going to save me. My understanding is very limited, but I was under the impression that GRACE, God’s grace, would be sufficient to see me through to the pearly gates. Again, maybe that’s just wishful thinking Auggy, but I pray that’s true or again, I’m screwed because in and of myself, no matter how badly I want to obtain or obey or do the right thing, I invariably do the opposite. My intentions are good, but my actions are way less than perfect (as my dear ol dad used to say, “the way to hell is paved with good intentions”). I am a sinner after all. So as I enter this stage of my life, I’m really wanting to believe in God’s perfect love and that He will make things right for me and that His judgement will be for MY benefit (and in that respect, for those I love and even don’t love). I realize writing this that I’m not making much sense and I don’t have a leg to stand on… thus my comment about faith in an earlier post. It’s hell on earth living in fear. It’s hell on earth to be suffering physcally. So no, God has not removed suffering etc. through penal substitution. Ok, I think I’m tying myself in knots here… A few months ago I believed that pain was the great leveler, but having suffered greatly now, I can say with assurance that FEAR is way, way worse than physical pain!! I don’t want to go to the grave in this fear Aug! Even annihilation (which I was brought up with being a SDA) seems better right now than living in fear. I guess I’m just putting it all right out there, being vulnerable like THIS is not easy, to admit that I’m scared by what you write. I do think your heart is in the right place however. And it’s NOT your job to make ME feel better, that’s for sure. Thanks Aug for getting back to me now that I’ve confused you and ME!
And Cindy, thank you for the lovely reply. Your kindness and graciousness is a blessing in and of itself. I appreciate your words of comfort. So thank you.
Ruth, hang in there, you make sense to me, but as you can read above, I’m pretty confused so that may not be a compliment after all.
I appreciate your response. Telestai is just Jn. 19:30’s single Greek word that is translated “it is finished” (and has much history and debate associated with it). By “martyr” I mostly meant dying innocently for a cause. So I quite agree with you that the pivotal debate then is on what Jesus saw that mission to be. I like you own sketch of that very much, although like Wright, I would also highlight more that Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, exaltation, and work in the Spirit, are interpreted as leading to the fulfillment of the OT promises to Israel (including to create by the Spirit the promised righteous people who show by their obedience to the great commandment that God’s ultimate law has become written on their hearts).
Some scholars would agree with you that God portrayed as coming down to see things was an image that the earliest Jews took literally. I’m afraid that I’m more hopelessly traditional on this, conceiving of God as being in both heaven, earth, and even sheol and hell. But based on Sodom, are you then literally convinced that the nature of God is that he can’t see anything unless he physically goes to a location? I don’t see that my placing greatervalue on engaging specific texts requires being a literalist. I think the question for those who see the Bible as vitally shaping Christian ideas should be first, what was the originally intended meaning, and then how do those ideas develop and fit in light of the whole storyline.
I love your reference to Jonah and God’s marvelous grace. But wow, I don’t get that the point is that Jonah knew God better than God knew Himself, or that God realized that He should flipflop on his approach (literalistically I might see that fitting better concerning God’s repentance following the flood). I’m inclined to think that the idea is that God sent Jonah to the pagans (a sort of precusor to Paul’s Gentile mission) because God had always had antipathy to “fire and brimstone” for anyone, and thus He was greatly pleased when they repented and made the logic of judgment unnecessary.
I think, Bob, that God knew the Ninevites would repent and that Moses would intercede for Israel and that Abraham would intercede for Sodom et al (and who knows how far Abe COULD have gone if he’d kept going?) But why would God do things this way?
I dunno. Why did Jesus ask – which one was it? Phillip? – what to do about the crowd’s being hungry? John clearly states Jesus knew what He was going to do. Maybe He just wanted to involve the disciples. John says He asked as a test, but I wonder whether a test isn’t more of a teaching tool than an examining tool for God?
God says to Moses, “I’m going to wipe them out and start over again with you,” and Moses gets to see what he’ll actually do, placed in a situation like that. God knew what Moses would do, imo, but Moses maybe didn’t – until he was tested. Likewise Jonah, aside from becoming a type of Christ, no doubt also learned something about himself. I don’t think God learned anything about Jonah or about Himself. But He had His reasons – quite good ones that we know of, and probably others besides.
I think maybe God (a Christophany?) was messing around with Abraham – talking on his level, figuratively. “I’ve come down to see what’s going on over there” – just as a manner of speaking, to get the conversation going and give Abraham a chance to try out his intercession skills whilst also learning something about God.
Anyway, just musing, Bro.
And Ruth, I’m not ignoring you, Sis. I’m reading all you say – it’s just that as I said, I don’t feel a need to persuade you and I don’t feel that anything I say WILL persuade you, so I don’t feel a need to bat it back and forth, you know? If you should convince me, I’ll fess up.
I see the the big picture as the homecoming of YHWH into the creation. What Paul’s describes as God becoming all in all. This is certainly one of the most compelling universalists text.
for even as in Adam all die, so also in the Christ all shall be made alive,23 and each in his proper order, a first-fruit Christ, afterwards those who are the Christ’s, in his presence,
24 then – the end, when he may deliver up the reign to God, even the Father, when he may have made useless all rule, and all authority and power –
25 for it behoveth him to reign till he may have put all the enemies under his feet –
26 the last enemy is done away – death;
27 for all things He did put under his feet, and, when one may say that all things have been subjected, [it is] evident that He is excepted who did subject the all things to him,
28 and when the all things may be subjected to him, then the Son also himself shall be subject to Him, who did subject to him the all things, that God may be the all in all. 1 Cor 15
Instead of using the conventional approach of starting at Genesis and working through a systematic scriptural path to this olam olam (beyond the far horizon) of God I find it less problematic to start from the end (which is really the new Genesis) and work backwards from there. Why? Because the conventional approach is filled with blind alleys, dead ends, detours, barricades and exegetical potholes that not only obscure the simple, profound clarity of the gospel, but
prevent many from seeing it at all. The plot is entirely lost in many of those interpretations of the biblical narratives. Certainly, all those who hope in the universal salvation of all, regardless of their understanding of the particulars of the “how”, hold the same hope for the overwhelming, radical implications of God become all in all.
Working back from Paul’s hope of God becoming all in all , what immediately precedes that is Christ overcoming death. This is something only He could do, it was His singular experience of at Golgotha that accomplished that. This echos back to what I think is Paul’s most inspired insight that we have a record of:
What, then, are we to say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare even his own Son, but gave him up on behalf of us all — is it possible that, having given us his Son, he would not give us everything else too? 33 So who will bring a charge against God’s chosen people? Certainly not God — he is the one who causes them to be considered righteous! 34 Who punishes them? Certainly not the Messiah Yeshua, who died and — more than that — has been raised, is at the right hand of God and is actually pleading on our behalf! 35 Who will separate us from the love of the Messiah? Trouble? Hardship? Persecution? Hunger? Poverty? Danger? War? 36 As the Tanakh puts it,
“For your sake we are being put to death all day long,
we are considered sheep to be slaughtered.”[a]
37 No, in all these things we are superconquerors, through the one who has loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers, neither what exists nor what is coming, neither powers above nor powers below, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God which comes to us through the Messiah Yeshua, our Lord. Romans 8
Who punishes and inflicts suffering on them? Not Yeshua, but instead all of the powers, authorities, laws (religious and secular)do ; the very enemies that Paul says Christ is putting down in 1Cor 15. Romans 8 is my scriptural template for seeing the scope of the agape of the Crucified God. I don’t see any limits to it and no obstacles that can thwart it. You can paraphrase and insert any condition or action, either done to us or by us, and it would be covered by the irresistible agape of God in Messiah Yeshua. For instance:
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers, neither what exists nor what is coming, neither powers above nor powers below, [nor unrepentance or unbelief,] nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God which comes to us through the Messiah Yeshua, our Lord.
Not the “tough love” of God’s chastisement of unrepentant sinners, but the self-emptying agape of Jesus on the cross–tough doesn’t even begin to describe the depths of pain of that love.
I only mentioned Barth and Moltmann to indicate where the seed of my hope for the universal salvation of all came from. I was raised Romanian Byzantine Catholic with only limited exposure to Roman Catholicism. So I never quite got the heavy dose of Catholic guilt that those who went through a thorough Catholic education got. However, even the Roman Catholics didn’t have the stark binary Heaven or Hell outcome that most evangelical Protestants had. They had Purgatory which gave the vast majority of Catholics a chance for Heaven.
I can see why many universalist evangelicals believe that corrective punishment of sinners is a positive thing. It is their version of purgatory. They have in that sense rediscovered something of their Roman Catholic roots and it seems to be a big improvement over the stark binary Heaven or Hell outcome of traditional evangelical Protestantism. But it is not the gospel. In simple terms, the Gospel is what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. It is not about what is done by us or to us (corrective punishment or whatever else).
Sadly, I see in this evangelical version of purgatory a marginalization of the significance of what Jesus has done for us. The locus of our salvation turns from Golgotha towards God’s judgment of each individual. No matter how much this is tempered with expressions that this punishment is for our own good–because we can trust that God loves us while he is doing it to us–it does not dispel anxiety for many who hear it. Bret’s distress expressed in this thread is a case in point.
I don’t see God in the conventional theistic “omni” sense that most Christians do. Those attributes are more informed by Greek abstract philosophy than the concrete real world Hebraic worldview that is present in the Bible. God knows all things because he empathetically experiences all things even the death of a sparrow. Are not two sparrows sold for an assar? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father; This is a translation that is true to the original Greek, there is no interpretive embellishment found in other translations that add “will” or “consent” which are intended to convey a sense of an omnipotent God who micromanages the creation. The original intent of Jesus is to say God knows all things because He feels all things, even the death of a sparrow. Would such a God act as an accomplice with the enemies of His creation: the powers and even death by inflicting suffering on His creation? I don’t see that in Jesus at all.
The OT says that no one can look at the face of God and live. Yet Jesus is the face of God made visible to the world and even unholy sinners looked upon that face and lived, and more than that, they were healed/forgiven and made whole. No pain was inflicted on them through that encounter. To the contrary, Jesus took their pain away.
The proper place for “correction” was at Golgotha, there the sin of the world was taken away by the life of Christ emptied into the world. There the pain, brokenness and debasement that has disfigured and brutalized His good creation was judged and undone. The iniquity (the crookedness) of the world was made straight/corrected by the tsedeq/justice of God fulfilled by the crucified Jesus.
This was not about penal substitution or payment for our sins. The sins of the world are too intertwined with the history of the world to be dealt with on an individual basis. They must be dealt with whole cloth. Jesus saves the world by taking away the sin of the world not by paying for sins. There is no legal or other transaction that can buy off the death-dealing harm done by sin. The sin of the world from the very beginning to the very end of the world needs to be taken away, the slate wiped clean and the way made open for the eschatological Jubilee of God.
God certainly has something do with the suffering experienced by the world, not as the inflicter of that suffering but rather as the one who empathetically feels the pain of the word as His own pain–just as with the dying sparrow. This stirs His wrath and passion against all that inflicts that suffering on His creation. He will not rest in his eschatological sabbath rest until all of that which inflicts pain on his creation is banished forever.
Bret, you’re not confusing, at least not to me. And I love your spirit of discussion on topics that often enrage people. Again, I would argue that those who persue love as you are will inherit God’s kingdom. If you sin, I don’t believe God hates you - that’s what EU is all about - the certainty that God is love. But if one believes he can hate his brother (murder) and claim the grace of God then I see scripture as annihilating such deceptions.
It seems so obvious to me that Jesus was not telling the hypocrites that there will be no suffering for such people. I agree with you that he never claims God hates them in some sense. But I also agree with traditionalists that God indeed will punish the wicked. So being I believe he loves those very people, the one’s he’ll punish for pursuit of wickedness, then it seems obvious that Universalism is tantamount in some larger scheme.
What does not seem reasonable is to believe that some people who practice wickedness will inherit the kingdom of God - which Ultras often argue (though not all do - such as Aaron). But most Ultras I meet usually make a similar move which is to get rid of hell altogether.
As Bob is saying, the text does not seem to say that. However, we’re not so blind to not listen - we know Ultras have an interpretation and we’re willing to wrestle with it and hear it from their perspective.
I would have used stronger language as I feel much stronger about it, but I’m trying to come across like I sort of have it together, but I don’t. Would you or could you elaborate on your last post a little more please? I’m wanting so much more to believe what DaveF wrote and what RuthJ wrote. Does this mean I’m living the “high life?” No, not at all, it means truthfully, that your post, it sure TERRIFIES me and I have lived with THAT terror ALL my life… I am as sincere as I can be on paper here. My hands are actually sweating. 
Your post IS what I was brought up with and I had thought, maybe incorrectly now, that UR changed all that for me… 
I appreciate your time.
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