Titanic is my favorite movie! I cried and cried after watching that.
How about my top TWO scriptures that show that Jesus will save all people? They work in tandem as a one-two punch:
āThe Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand.ā (John 3:35)
and
āThis is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.ā (John 6:39)
Unfortunately, those who say they believe in Hell come along and asterisk these verses to death:
āWhen Christ says that the Father has given all things into His hand, He means that the Father has given some things into His hand. In biblical language, āallā = āsomeā. And when Christ said that He would lose nothing, He meant that He would lose something, and (in fact) a lot of somethings. In biblical language, ānothingā = āa lot of somethingsā. We can explicate these verses as: āThe Father loves the Son, and has given some things into His handā¦This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose quite a few somethings, but should raise the somethings I donāt lose at the last day.ā Just remember that āallā means āsomeā and ānothingā means āsomethingā, and youāll be OK. Arenāt you glad weāre here to explain the Bible to you? You might end up being a universalist if it wasnāt for us!ā
Wellā¦we need to be careful in portraying the position of those people as untenable. For there ARE passages where āallā clearly denotes āsomeā or āmany.ā For example:
(Mark 1:33 AV) And all the city was gathered together at the door.
So it seems that SOMETIMES āallā IS simply used for emphasis.
Youāre certainly right on that point, Paidion.
The problem is when those who say they believe in Hell think that they can interpret āallā to mean āsomeā whensoever they like. It will not do to interpret āallā as āsomeā when Christ is speaking of high and exalted matters, nor when Paul is speaking in precise theological terms. These are completely different circumstances than the colloquial saying, āAll the city was gatheredā. Even common sense regarding everyday language will distinguish between the literal use of āallā in important matters, and the non-literal use of āallā in careless speech:
Literal: āAll votes must be counted.ā (Who would dare to say that this really means āSome votes must be countedā? Surely Christās salvation of His creation is of more import than who is to be the next school board member?)
Non-literal: āAll Italians like pasta.ā (No comment required.)
I agree, Geoffrey. Good points!
God created man and gave man free will. It would seem to me that he wishes for us to make a decision to be with him, out of our own free will.
Granted you could take this all as conjecture, however when you remove the stigma of The lake of fire being a place where people suffer but do not die something changes. Suddenly God killing off the people who do not wish to do Gods will for them seems like a reasonable solution, it will be sad and painful, but for a moment, hen it will be over, and God and those who wish to do his will can mourn for a time, and then move on into eternity free from sin and death forever! How glorious!
Revelation 20:14-15
The lake of fire is the second death.
Those whose name was not written in the book of life were thrown into the lake of fire.
I encourage you to study Revelation 20 closely.
If you read the sections of Revelation regarding the second death and Satans punishment, you see that eternal hellfire is only reserved for Satan, the Beast, and the False Prophet, their torment shall last forever. When he speaks of the people who are not found in the book of life, they are thrown into the lake of fire, this is the second death. Not implying that they suffer forever, but that they die, and this punishment is eternalā¦ as in they are eternally dead/not conscious.
Regarding God getting what he wants, I believe that in his wisdom, he sees that the best way to achieve his will is to alow us to choose what we want, a life of sin or without sin. Those who love sin do not forward Gods will and therefore must be eliminated.
Regardless of how you look at it, you as a universalist must give me an explanation as to why God would reveal this to us in Revelation about the book of life if all peoples names were found in it! That would mean that nobody gets thrown into the lake of fire therefore making the verse null and void.
Eternal suffering for men makes no sense, and I could not go on in heaven gladly knowing that people I know and loved are suffering all along, I do suppose that after some time I could move on if they were simply dead and unconcious.
So Iām new to this site. I have been struggling for a long long time with connecting a God that loves me with the God of war and of eternal hell fire. This has been going on since my parents passed away five years ago and I started questioning everything and fell into a really horrible depression. So my first question is in the verse that talks about the lost sheep and leaving the 99 and going after the one till itās found why is the statement because he wishes none to perish even an issue if some arenāt going to perish? Believe me I want everyone to be saved as much as anyone else. Because if I donāt try to convince myself of that I donāt have much hope for myself or a lot of people I love.
Well itās Godās will that everyone be saved and come into a knowledge of the truth, and so God being the Creator of everything has the power and the moral right to persuade people to salvation, so why wouldnāt that happen? What do you think, why wouldnāt that happen?
Well iām not sure why that wouldnāt happen unless it has something to do with free will. Do you think there are some people that would be so against God that they would choose not to be in eternity with him? I canāt imagine that. I think the issue I have is with forgiveness. I know people say that Godās forgiveness is great and I try to understand his grace but itās hard for me. The Bible confuses me because to me it seems to preach forgiveness but then speaks about Gods wrath and hell fire. So which is it? I donāt know. I have been reading a website the last couple of years called Tentmaker.org and it lifts my spirit. When my father passed away I worried about him because he was an alcoholic and claimed to not believe. So I thought Iāve got to make some changes and try to be a better Christian so I started reading my Bible and it didnāt help. I started reading scriptures like how narrow the way is and sinning after having the full knowledge of salivation that there is no more forgiveness. So I believed as a child and Iāve made a lot of mistakes in my life so I felt very unsure of my salvation after that. So then I started searching online to try to get a greater picture of Gods love and everything I came across puts stipulations on his love. Then I finally ran into this concept of universal salvation and I hope so much that itās true but itās so hard to believe because all my life salvation has been conditional on our part.
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Also I have a son that has studied the Bible in-depth and he very much believes in an eternal hell. And in my opinion heās very smart. Iām not saying heās right but he makes some good points proving scriptures. I love my son very much and I feel sorry for him in a way because I know the thought of eternal hell scares him to however he is definitely more confident in his salvation then I am. But sometimes heāll say he doesnāt feel like heās doing enough for God. So he seems to have a works mentality however he says he knows that works arenāt going to get you to heaven only believing. And he loves God very much. God has done some major work in my son. It has been incredible to watch.
Itās really not so much a matter of intelligence , itās more like realizing and accepting the bible is a translation of ancient Greek and Hebrew manuscripts and how about a half dozen words are translated into english. Words like āaioniosā traditionally translated as āeternalā but much more likely refer to āpertaining to an ageā or āhadesā translated as āhellā but more likely means āgraveā or something akin to that. I suggest you check out āThe Three Views of Hellā at Thenarrowpath.com and "bibletruths.com by L.Ray Smith
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Thank you very much I will check them out.
Some people will perish, but not forever. The same Greek word translated āperishā is used of the prodigal son who was ālostā & called ādeadā but later found & said to be āaliveā again. The same Greek word is used of the ālostā sheep you refer to & the ālostā coins (Luke 15) that were later found. They werenāt lost forever, but only temporarily, for a time.
IMO both. Even Godās wrath & āhell fireā are for the good of those it is directed towards, to bring them to salvation:
Because I have sinned against him, I will bear the LORDās wrath, until he pleads my case and upholds my cause. He will bring me out into the light;I will see his righteousness. (Micah 7:9)
Isaiah 12:1
Then you will say on that day, "I will give thanks to You, O LORD; For although You were angry with me, Your anger is turned away, And You comfort me.
Mat 18:34 And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, 5 To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. (1 Cor.5:4-5)
Isa.57: 17 For the iniquity of his covetousness was I wroth, and smote him: I hid me, and was wroth, and he went on frowardly in the way of his heart.
18 I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to his mourners.
1 Cor.3:15 If any manās work is burned, he will suffer loss, but he himself will be saved, but as through fire.
With God continually working with them, attempting to correct them, I donāt think that is possible. If some people could hold out for eternity, while God intends to save all, that would imply that those people in this sense, are just as powerful as God.
Here is my take, If I truly TRULY believed that a family member was going to spend eternity in a fiery dungeon of a place called hell (a word put forth by our English translators,) in others words I was convinced that my family member was going to spend an eternity in a place where there would be torment all the time, with no let up. I would dedicate my life to doing everything I could to keep that from happening.
So why are you not doing that? If you have an alternative view of Godās plan, tell him and quit worrying about him. Heāll dis you but at the end of the day, at some point he may know you are right.
Wow iāve read the Tentmaker site a lot and never came across this. Thatās very comforting. I tried to respond to some of the messages through my email but they came back not delivered. Thank you for this information.
Well I have actually talked with him about my wanting to believe in universal salvation for all people and he in a gentle way rebukes me. So for me itās hard because I do see in scripture his points in believing in an eternal hell I also see in scriptures the promise of Gods salvation for all and my very spirit just canāt comprehend a God of eternal torment. It does not make sense to me. But I feel attacked when I try to share that view with others. It is hard because I canāt find the confidence in what I want to believe. Hints the name āconfused67ā lol I am very sensitive emotionally when it comes to God and any type of disapproval from someone I love is very hard on me and causes deep pain.
Sorry I replied to you earlier through my email but I donāt think it sent.
My question would be these things that influence these people are externally applied and thus Iād say forced. For the well being of His creation but to say it āinfluencesā is putting it mildly. If an atheist doesnāt wanna go through judgement or āaionis kolasisā and itās against their initial will then in no way can we say its not forced.
I always love your posts. And me and you are in agreement on many things. But free will to me doesnāt make sense. And saying God will put any sense of external pressure, to get them to accept against their initial supposed free will not to, is the definition of force.
I guess what Iām saying is you canāt say they make a free will decision, a decision made without external influence, if then we go on to say an external influence is applied which eventually bends their will against their initial will.
Either they make the choice freely without external coercion or they dont. Judgement is upon every man despite their will.
I for one am glad He forces this external influence for the eventual benefit of His creation.
I love you though buddy. I donāt think we will ever see eye to eye on this but Iām sure we will strengthen and sharpen our particular metal against one another.