Anyway Steve Dr MCClymond isn’t quite identifying universalism with pantheism (or with panentheism). He’d be silly if he did because Karl Barth’s emphasis on the absolute transcendence of God - which was a direct critique of certain tendencies in nineteenth century German liberal theology - was not one bit panentheistic. Indeed his discounting of any place for a ‘natural theology’ was a point of contention between him and Emile Brunner.
I understand that Rob Bell’s idea about the necessity of doubt in a life of faith may go back to his book Velvet Elvis which attacks evangelical Christian’s too certain use of the Bible to justify their settled worldview when the Bible has been used to justify Slavery, racism, the Suppression of women etc in a very certain way in the past (and by some conservative American evangelicals too).
I’m not sure that asking questions out loud about certain assumptions is such a bad thing.
I’ve never really been bothered about Robin Parry publishing pseudonymously at first – I understand he had his reasons. I find Mel Gibson as a referent for good religious emotions and imagination far more disturbing in the light of his capacity to hate and his ant-Semitic statements and his refusal to criticise his father who is a holocaust denier. The most violent forms of beliefs/emotions/imaginings in PSA do seem to fit in with a double think - although we contemplate Jesus being the subject of God’s wrath for our sins we still need to exonerate ourselves of the murder of Christ by blaming the Jews. This was seen as more of a big issue regarding The Passion of the Christ with many Christians and Jews (including evangelicals). Bonheoffer would have seen it as a big issue.
Finally on this discussion let me note that I’m not competent to declare on universalism and missiology. I understand Carl Henry was a critic of Barth regarding mission (and these videos al scone from the Carl Henry theological centre). Whether Carl Henry or Dr McClymond were capable of representing Barth fairly I doubt - and there are obviously things that are proper to criticise in Western missions of the past; they did not always hold the great commission in proper tension with the great Commandment (and I can’t see that a renewed ‘hell driven’ missionary enterprise would do any better). Here’s a couple of articles I found on Barth and mission on the net (which is the best I can do)-
Steve I’ve looked at the Wiki article on Emergent churches and it is very informative about how the Emergents dovetail into a post modern ethos and have a post modern idea of Christian mission, uses of scripture etc. See -
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerging_c … nversation
It’s the sort of thing that needs a thread of it’s own. 
James’ vicar was the author of ‘The Post Evangelical’ which is the primer for the UK version of the Emergent thing. James may have some interesting things to say on this.
Here’s something that Jason said on another thread that might be relevant to a discussion of faith and ambiguity/uncertainty -
I have seen negative theology appealed to by some Emergents and would be interested some day in hearing more from Jason about what he sees as the right uses of negative theology and the wrong uses. All these things appear to be interconnected 
For general information see -
As to God’s love meaning that He thumps my enemies…that’d be comforting in ancient times, when you never knew when your neighbour might raid your livestock and worse.
i think we have a less concrete idea of enemies now, and certainly Christ said to love our enemies. So i think it’s a really odd interpretation, and really me-centric…and what if i’m somebody else’s enemy? would God then have to choose to show His love to them by thumping me? take that as far as you like…if we’re both Christians, but i hurt someone, and they pray, and God then has to thump me to show He loves me, and thumping = eternal destruction…well where does my salvation in? it’s circular to assume that because we’re both Christians, somehow i’ll never deserve thumping. Clearly many Christians behave in awful ways, and we can’t just say for all of them that they aren’t “real Christians” as God knows their hearts and we don’t.
to me this is just appalling logic.
And to bring up the Patriot…a film about a guy that really gets off on killing English people…a film full of horrible inaccuracies, etc etc…
ok, let’s ignore that and simply look at the ferocity of his love for his children.
if my father killed people viciously to save me…i’d be terrified of him. i might develop some horrible smug feeling towards my enemies too, if i was a bad person. i don’t believe this would make me love him. i think deep down i’d really struggle to trust him, unless i had some awful inflated idea of my own importance.
it doesn’t wash for me, and the violent actions some have to do to survive or protect in extreme and desperate circumstances don’t really reglect God. God knows no fear, and knows how to reverse death…and i think a damn good case can be made that God shows the ferocity of His protective love for ALL His children by allowing them to grow up without a huge amount of His divine interference…at least not on a direct level. in no way does God ever resemble Mel Gibson’s character in that film. Like him or loathe him, Gibson was portraying humans (in this and Braveheart, his other anti-English rant) in terrifying circumstances with no foreknowledge and only pain, anger and fear to act upon, and some idea that things weren’t right.
God has no fear, and God’s anger is always for a purpose beyond pure destruction. to appeal to a human character as a reflection of God’s character when the human character is so deeply flawed is to me madness. it’s like saying God’s ways are our ways, and His thoughts our thoughts…and we know that isn’t true because this same group of ECT-affirmers quotes that back at US, saying we’re getting it wrong because of that verse…and yet context holds our opinion up and casts theirs down. you can’t have it both wyys, ECT/Annihilationist people. God’s thoughts and ways are higher than ours because God knows how to restore and show mercy and reconcile. We don’t, because we haven’t learned that painful, costly lesson yet. But God is helping us.
Will come back with more thoughts soon.
Agreed James –
In between the imprecatory Psalms and the Book of Revelation Jesus isn’t given the play dough treatment here – he simply doesn’t appear. The only time he does seem to appear is in the implication that when the slaughtered Lamb of God comes back from treading the winepress of God’s wrath in Revelation stained with blood he has been/will be engaged in mass slaughter of the bad guys like Mel Gibson in the Patriot. Well it doesn’t make sense to me.
What’s humourous to me is that much of the wrath of God in the Bible is not directed at “those bad guys over there” but at the readers, who are ostensibly His people. There are exceptions, but whoever God gets “mad” at, it’s always people who are mistreating the poor…idolatry is mentioned, but to my mind it’s less emphasised than oppressive powers that persecute scapegoats and live in luxury in the arrogant assumption they are safe.
Western society mimics this behaviour, and the Christian middle to upper classes behave like this a LOT (maybe some of us are waking up to this, but it really appears to mostly by emerging church people that care most about social justice…there are exceptions like John Piper, who donates proceeds to charity and hates the lie of prosperity gospel. but in most cases it seems to be progressive post modernist types that seem to REALLY be pushing social justice as an important thing). So the wrath of God could easily be aimed at the church, where it has been just as repugnantly oppressive as the ruling powers in Israel and their neighbours when God got REALLY irked at them.
so if Universalism isn’t true, than the real targets of God’s wrath that should fear Him most are members of the illustrious church, where those members haven’t fed the poor etc.
how does that fit into their theology of wrath? given that by siding with the traditionalist view, they’re sort of siding with the bit of church God is likely to get smash-happy with?! shouldn’t this be ringing alarm bells? the wrath isn’t aimed at “those unbelievers over there” but at US.
am i stretching this too far? post modernists are questioning the concrete nature of truth and the traditional explanation…and the fruit of this is that they are (at least from what i’ve seen) leading the way in social justice, which Jesus and the Prophets and Apostles were so vocal about! traditionalist views seem to lead people into a complacency where they they don’t have to question, and thus nothing changes…and that’s fine cause God will sort it all out
there are, as i said, exceptions. the traditionalist church my uncle heads may believe in ECT, and may have given me groundless stress over some of my interests and activities, but they have cared for people and welcomed those in distress and done a heck of a lot for social justice…so i am not attempting to tar traditionalists with the same brush. but the fact remains that huge swathes of the church throughout the years has not only ignored social justice, but added to the problems.
oh as for Robin Parry, my understanding is that he wrote tEU for himself, and published under a pseudonym because the publishing company he worked with publishing his worship themed books was traditional in their views, and they might have objected to his universalism, or been associated unfairly with his views. he sought to protect them with that pseudonym, but also to protect his worship books, as he felt they were more important.
eventually that danger passed, and he felt able to publish under his real name. that’s a rather simplistic explanation, but it’s what i remember.
Dave Tomlinson of course gave a lot of validation to post modernist Christians. his book was partially intended to provide some pastoring to people feeling like that. i read it 10 years late (if not more?) and felt i resonated with SO much of it. i now feel i am more ex evangelical than post, but of course it’s my background, and i haven’t dropped it all (only the bits i’m really sure are wrong for me). IMO, post modernism encourages investigation and thinking, because it says you can’t just sit on your laurels. you may not ever understand all the truth, but that’s no reason not to try. mystery is a very motivational force for us humans, we love unanswered questions…the notion that we keep going from mystery to mystery is very attractive, at least to me!
I’ve heard somewhere that the first half of the tribulation, the “wrath” is actually caused by the Anti-Christ and his foes (i.e. four horseman, the 7 Seals, the 7 trumpets, etc) that is not really God’s wrath yet, at least not until Revelation 15 & 16. (there are a lot of parenthical and parallel passages from Rev 6 through Rev 14 during this time). Much of what is done in these chapters are in the “permissable” will of God that allows Satan and his goons the levity to cause all these things to happen (much like God gave Satan permission during Job’s dilemma). Maybe it is God’s wrath indirectly, but it seems that He isn’t the main instigator of what’s happening.
Rev 15 gives the plagues of God and Rev 16 gives the vial judgments, which is really the start of the Wrath of God sections, culminating to the victory of Christ on a white horse in chapter 19 (again, there is some parenthical talk in chaps. 17 & 18). So it seems that the judgement of God doesn’t really come until the end of the tribulation, according to this view.
And Revelation isn’t all about wrath, either. Rev 14 has an angel preaching the gospel to everyone still left in the world. Apparently there is still time to repent in the middle of all of it.
Dondi and James 
–
You might find these interesting:
Here’s a couple of links giving an interpretation of Revelation that is actually informed by the Gospels IMHO
liferemixed.net/2011/06/29/qr-je … evelation/
youtube.com/watch?v=1cH3H14AL90
Steve you might find this interesting -
Here’s N.T. Wright saying positive things about post-modernity (by showing that he understand the concept of ‘modernity’ which is helpful of him )
And I reflect – as far as the mote and the beam goes – obviously rapture theology and end times prophecy based on the Scoefield Reference Bible is massive amongst ECT believing Christians – especially in the USA. The rapture is not found in the book of revelations and transgressively deranges its narrative if you import it there (indeed I understand that Cyril O’Reagan –who Dr McClymond cites against Boehme seems Apocalypticsim as being of the same order as Boehmenism). Pre-millennial futurist speculation is a much based in methods of interpretation such as the Joachite three Trinitarian ages/dispensations as anything Jane Lead composed – and it’s influence is vast unlike Jane Leads marginal influence (I have found that in recent times one Southern evangelical preacher Larry Hodges of ‘God fire’ was directly influenced by her and one small sect of the Latter Rain Pentecostal movement was, while the missionary Norman P. Grubb was influenced by Boehme via William Law – which does not suggest influence on he scale of the ‘Left Behind’ movies, books. computer games etc). So there are big double standards going on here.
Any comments on this one - it’s mercifully brief?
Pastoral reflections on Hell
GF We’ve agreed that hell is the orthodox position in theology how do we counsel people grieving for those who have died outside to the faith?
G.H. Even in Churches where there is not a rejection of hell there is a silence on it. That’s a hard thing. It’s easy to talk about Hell in an abstract philosophical discussion. I did a funeral of a person who died an atheist recently who was the brother of a friend of mine . How do you navigate that and what do I say to my friend who knows his brother for whom he had affection died an atheist and has now slipped under the judgement of God. This is the ultimate question of theodicy.
The Book of Job offers us resources here. Job found himself in a situation where he didn’t have a lot of information about and was not completely aware of what was going on.
Job is a righteous man by God’s standards and God who says – ‘I bless righteousness and I bring judgement upon wickedness’ – and he had every reason to expect that he would continue to be blessed. What he did not reckon in his theological calculus – and neither did his friends – was wickedness.
He doesn’t have a theological category for wickedness and the answer that comes in the end is a theophany of God – not explanation. When the issue of hell gets personal when it’s someone I know silence is the best response and finding peace in God himself (that God himself has it figured out) – instead of our theological explanations and rationalisations.
If hell doesn’t; make sees to us it is not for us to judge God for the decisions he made – I’ve met him and seen him in Christ and that is enough. Perhaps there is other stuff for God to reveal that will make sense of Hell.
MM. IN Psalm 19 there is an affirmation that the judgments of God are true and righteous. This is echoed in Revelation 19 where the saints in heaven having seen God’s judgement on Babylon rejoice in this - with the benefit of the information that informs a heavenly view. Our problem is that we are on the ground. Jonathan Edwards had a fascinating analogy for this. He spoke of how from the ground if we point to view the tributaries of a river may seem to be going nowhere. However, from above we can see that they all ultimately join the river that flows into the sea - and this it is like God’s providence.
GH: Hell is the one doctrine today that challenges us to trust God judgment over our own, Maybe that wasn’t true two hundred years ago. Keller in his book ‘The reason for God’ makes the point that in past times and other cultures people would be offended if you did not believe in hell rather than if you did believe in it.
Hell is the most important doctrine regarding our discipleship because it forces us to come to grips with the fact that we are not God
“Hell is the most important doctrine regarding our discipleship because it forces us to come to grips with the fact that we are not God”
That is a load of crap. That’s all I have to say about that.
Yes Dave - it is an extraordinary thing to say; absolutely gobsmackingly so. I thought it was meant to be the resurrection that brought us to this realisation. Also I take issue with the use of the word ‘discipleship’ here because in the lecture and in the discussion this is connected with Bonheoffer who believed in God as one who suffers with us and allows himself to be pushed to the margins, and believed in Jesus as ‘the man for others’ (as a corrective to Luther’s emphasis that Jesus is primarily ‘for me’).
One of the really depressing things about pastor Hieston’s thoughts here is the way in which the death of someone who one has felt affection for but died a non believer and then goes to judgement and eternal conscious torment is only worried about in terms of how tough it is for him and fellow ECT believers at these times (and how it is necessary to be silent and seek peace in God who will explain all one day). I remember Michelle Arimault, who is Gary Arimault’s wife and a Jewish Christian, reflecting on the holocaust and saying - quite rightly - is God just going to resurrect millions of people who died under torture just to torture them some more and this time for eternity? That seems to me a perfectly valid question to ask - and I wouldn’t want to seek peace in God at my disquiet for having thought about the question if Jesus’ is 'as Bonheoffer would have it 'the man for others. (Yes I do feel angry at the misappropriation of Bonheoffer btw 
)
Is it just me or is this a very strange interpretation/ use of the Book of Job in any one else’s view?
I’m trying to understand this one as someone who is not a Calvinist. Job and his friends certainly don’t see the bigger picture but the bigger story in the book of Job is not human wickedness or depravity (unless we rightly see that Job’s so called friends are being cruel in their comforting). What they don’t see is that God has allowed the Satan to test Job’s faith surely? Obviously the idea of eternal conscious torment doesn’t get a look in – this is not what is testing Job’s faith. Also Job is not a Jew, and so he his strictly outside of the Mosaic covenant – so this is in many ways a universalist text. And Job’s repentance at this end is not repentance at wickedness but turning away from his doubt that God is his redeemer. It’s not a book that can be fitted into any simple scheme of doctrine – and that’s the whole point. But I guess it’s use here must imply the following interpretation of Job through the lens of a proof text from Paul -
See
jwwartick.com/2011/08/24/poe-job-answer/
Well Romans 9:22-23 does not necessarily yield this interpretation (unless you are already looking at it through a Calvinist lens). And Pauls’ thoughts on vessels of wrath is nowhere implied in the Book of Job. So I find Pastor Hieston’s use of Job perplexing (even with some help from Francis Chan) .
That nice restful, comforting image from Jonathan Edwards proffered by Dr McClymond almost seems Universalist – but we know different in the light of ‘Sinners in the hands of an Angry God’.
The article brings up some excellent points, especially that the Judgement Jesus brings is through the sword in His mouth. Of course, we know that the “sword” is the Word of God. Jesus even said so in the Gospels:
"And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.
He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: ***the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.***" - John 12:47-48
The difference, however, is that Jesus is not going to come back as a meek, lowly servant that will merely teach the Word from the Father. Those words will be backed up with action. The power of His Word will be fully manifest in all His glory. That doesn’t sound very pacifistic to me, even if the language is symbolic. In fact, it sounds very discomforting, if you ask me. What was it that Jesus warned? “…fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”
Nothing about the last day promises to be pleasant.
Besides all that, I don’t just merely consider the Gospels. There are promises to Israel that I believe are yet to be fulfilled which I believe the coming of Christ as described in Rev 19 will be a part of. He will rule Israel as King.
I only see Job as a demonstration of the sovereignty of God in situations we don’t understand, yet a patient Job in the midst of calamity. Job had no control over the events he suffered. He just took it all in. But while he suffered, he was careful not to put an accusation on God. “Though He slay me, yet will I serve Him”. His wife wanted him to curse God, but he just sat in sackcloth and ashes because he recognized himself as dust of God’s creation. It was simply submitting himself to God and whatever situation God willed him to be in.
His friends, of course, thought that Job sinned in some way, and gave him sore advice along those lines. But in the end, Job had done nothing to deserve his suffering. And all God did was show Job that He was the Creator and Master of the universe, and in control of everything, despite temporal appearances.
Did it seem to Job that God controlled everything? Probably not, since all these things happened to him. But remember, this was all a challenge by Satan to see if Job would curse God if bad things happened to him. And evidently, Satan lost the challenge, because God not only restored Job, but gave him double blessings in the end. It was all about preserverance in an evil and corrupt world. It had very little to do with salvation.
If anyone was lost, it was Job’s friends. But even then, Job accepted their sacrifices and prayed for them on their behalf.
I don’t want to get into an extensive discussion on Romans 9, except to say that I fail to see any correlation between Job and this passage. And also, I don’t see why Calvinists insist on using Romans 9 as a general relevation of the state of humanity as a whole when the passage is speaking specifically of Israel vs those who oppose her. It speaks nothing of individual salvation. Nor of individual damnation, for that matter. It doesn’t even speak of national damnation in the case of Egypt, except that in Egypt’s case they were thwarted from taking Israel back again and gave God the opportunity at that time to demonstrate His power in favor of Israel, whom He redeemed from captivity in Egypt. That is the mercy shown here, not salvation in Calvary’s sense.
The phrase, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion” comes from Exodus 33 (well after the events in Egypt) and is in context of Israel being in favor with God as God’s people whom He called out. It had more to do with God’s care for His servant Israel than His distaste for anyone else. It is not used in a negative context, as the Calvinists seem need to use it.
Hi Dondi
I quote here from Sherman on another thread -
The last judgment is not the final act for Universalists – the restoration of all things in Christ is the final act after the purification of all creatures and all creation. Some Christians think that what Christ the slaughtered lamb does in Revelation – as he did on the cross is to uncover human violence that is already in the hearts of men when unconditional love appears. God hands us over to our violence as Christ was handed over to our violence (and not to God’s violence) but the outcome of this in the end is healing and reconciliation. (This idea obviously informs Gregory of Nyssa’s homily on the plagues of Egypt for example)This does not mean the judgement is pleasant or wishy washy in any way – but it is saving love doing the judging rather than the wrath of the infinitely offended one who demands infinite punishment of those who have not been justified by faith in Christ’s substitution. I know we don’t’ agree about these things here – some of us stress God’s violence at our sins in a more active way than I would - but people who believe in ‘hell’ don’t agree either. C.S. Lewis who believed in the possibility that we may chose final separation from God (and for this reason is quoted by DR McClymond at the close of this dialogue) would have been horrified at the ideas of Jonathan Edwards for whom God actually tortures people for eternity and delights in this (as do the elect of God). A lot of the thoughts behind the ‘abominable fancy’ that anticipates the blessed enjoying the torments of the damned and God laughing with them seems to come from de-contextualised bits from the imprecatory Psalms which again C.S. Lewis found very problematic in his Reflections on the Psalms (so he’s not really an ally for Dr McClymond here)
(I think the word ‘pacifist’ was used in the article purely concerning Bonheoffer’s reluctance to be associated with killing – a reluctance which he(rightly IMHO) overcame but still felt he was involving himself in the lesser of two evils rather than glorying in killing as a positive good (again a proper and Christian response to necessary uses of violence IMHO)
Regarding ‘the restored Israel’ – again that’s something on which there will be divergences of opinion here. My point in raising the issue of dispensationalism is that it most often goes hand in hand with belief in eternal damnation but from a Calvinist perspective it must be seen as a derangement of the biblical narrative. A universalist movement that Dr McClymond does not consider that grows up from inside conservative dispensationalist Christianity is A.E. Koch and the Concordant Publishing concern (and has no connection to the Philadelphians or Boehmenists that I know of)
One thing I do know is that as far as the Jews go, universalists have an excellent record of philo-Semitism going back to Origen. If you are interested in Origen’s attitude towards the Jews here is a scholarly article
I’m at one with you on Job .
All good wishes
Dick
During the time of the first Great Awakening big segments of American society were offended by the hellfire preaching - it was normal within a certain a subculture but by no means normal to all Americans. There was a lot of questioning of Hell among Christians in the early modern period that began roughly five hundred years ago - the questions started as soon as people were allowed to asks those questions without fearing death or imprisonment.
Regarding other cultures believing wholesale in eternal hell - it’s never been a mainstream idea in rabbinical Judaism and the merciful texts of the Talmud date back to at least the time of Augustine. In Zoroastrianism there is a universalist tradition which may well have been the dominant one at the time of Christ and the Magi. The issue of the eternity of hells torments and who actually goes to hell has always been a contested issue in Islam. Are there any other religions that speak of hell as a final destination?