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Love’s Goal
All that love is, God is, for God is love. As the negative side of love is unselfish - seeks not her own - so her positive side is concern for others, a deep, ardent, all consuming concern: dauntless, self-sacrificing, invincible. “Love never fails.” Such is the divine essence and this it is that is imparted to the creature.
There can be no self-complacency with God, neither could He provide a self-satisfied salvation. Divine joy is in the fullness of love, and love is all-embracing.
To speak of a happy shepherd with an incomplete flock, or even of a happy flock with comrades missing, would be to malign both sheep and shepherd.
Heaven’s joys will be full only when sin’s sorrow cease. “Tis of mine” will be the yearning cry of the Good Shepherd spirit in the bosom of both saint and Saviour until the last of all the lost has been gathered home. Love cannot omit; His soul travail was for all. Neither can love abandon or forget. His purpose, as His promise, is “until He find it”. Thus it is that He is yet to “see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied.” And surely we too shall be satisfied when conformed to this likeness. Oh, the fullness of heaven’s joy when sin’s sorrows shall have ceased! -D. Buchanan-
99 is NOT enough!
The 2nd Death & the restitution of all things -Andrew Jukes-
https://tentmaker.org/books/Restitut…utionindex.htm
Christ Triumphant -Thomas Allin-
“What I believe is so magnificent, so glorious, that it is beyond finite comprehension. To believe that the universe was created by a purposeful, benign Creator is one thing. To believe that this Creator took on human vesture, accepted death and mortality, was tempted, betrayed, broken, and all for love of us, defies reason. It is so wild that it terrifies some Christians who try to dogmatize their fear by lashing out at other Christians, because tidy Christianity with all answers given is easier than one which reaches out to the wild wonder of God’s love, a love we don’t even have to earn.” -Madeleine L’Engle-
apokastastasis=
Universalism: a historical survey by Richard Bauckham (Professor of New Testament Studies)
https://theologicalstudies.org.uk/ar…_bauckham.html
MORE: more than we can ask or even think.
Thank you for providing the Andrew Jukes: The 2nd Death & The Restitution Of All Things resource - LOVE reading through it now!! God bless you!
Makes my heart jump for joy!
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Dear Robot: Welcome to the E.U., you will find many wonderful resources here. The book by Andrew Jukes is a remarkable classic by a remarkable vessel of the Lord Jesus Christ. May you find enlargement of vision as you contemplate the glorious words of Restitution contained therein.
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The Scope Of Restitution=
"But (now) to each one of us was (is) given the Grace down from (in accord with) the measure of the undeserved gift of the Christ. For this reason He (it) is constantly saying, “Going up (stepping up; ascending) into a height (unto [the] summit) He led (leads) captive a captive multitude [or: He led “captivity” captive] He gave (gives) gifts to mankind (or: to/for the men).” Now (but) this “He went up (ascended),” what is it if not (except) that He also descended (stepped down) into the lower parts (the under regions) of the earth (land)? The One stepping down (descending) is Himself also the One stepping (going) up (ascending) far above (back up over) all of the heavens, to the end that He may make the Whole full [or: may fill up everything (the All)]. -Jonathan Mitchell N.T.-
Weymouth New Testament Bible
https://www.biblestudytools.com/wnt/
“There is but one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all, who rules over all, acts through all, and dwells in all. Yet to each of us individually grace was given, measured out with the munificence of Christ. For this reason Scripture says: ‘He re-ascended on high, He led captive a host of captives, and gave gifts to men.’ (Now this ‘re-ascended’ --what does it mean but that He had first descended into the lower regions of the earth? He who descended is the same as He who ascended again far above all the Heavens in order to fill the universe.”
Note
He will fill the Universe (everything)!
“For Christ also has once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was in preparation, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved thru water…Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead…for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.”
Where is Waldo?
Question=
Do you think the Master of Reconciliation thinks more highly of broken pieces of fish and bread that nothing be lost/apollumi, but the ones for whom He makes atonement shall be lost?
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes into Him shall not be apollumi…”
God’s Utter Extravagance=
![[IMG]](https://www.christianforums.com/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fpics3.city-data.com%2Ftrn.gif&hash=4bf56546a80ccf23907006fe863d62ba){kind=small}
"To say that sin, assuming it to be opposed to God, has the power of creating a world antagonistic to God as everlasting as He is, attributes to it a power equal at least to His; since according to this view, souls whom God willed to be saved, and for whom Christ died, are held in bondage under the power of sin for ever; and all this in opposition to the Word of God, which says that God’s Son was “manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil…” -Andrew Jukes (The Restitution of all Things)
“To go on punishing for ever, simply for punishment’s sake, shocks every sentiment of justice. And the case is so much worse when the punishment is really the prolongation of evil, when it is but making evil endless.” -Thomas Allin, Christ Triumphant-
"The almighty maker of souls has various methods of restoring them to the divine image; it is impossible his power can fail; it is impossible for his image to be entirely obliterated; it is impossible that misery, sin, and discord can be eternal! –Alison R. Cockburn-
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“This is the God of the gospel of grace. A God who, out of love for us, sent the only Son He ever had wrapped in our skin. He learned how to walk, stumbled and fell, cried for His milk, sweated blood in the night, was lashed with a whip and showered with spit, was fixed to a cross, and died whispering forgiveness on us all.”
- Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt out-
Sin vs Grace
"Sin disturbed relations with God in everything and everyone, but the extent of the disturbance was not clear until God spelled it out in detail to Moses. So death, this huge abyss separating us from God, dominated the landscape from Adam to Moses. Even those who didn’t sin precisely as Adam did by disobeying a specific command of God still had to experience this termination of life, this separation from God. But Adam, who got us into this, also points ahead to the One who will get us out of it.
Yet the rescuing gift is not exactly parallel to the death-dealing sin.
If one man’s sin put crowds of people at the dead-end abyss of separation from God, just think what God’s gift poured through one man, Jesus Christ, will do!
There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift.
The verdict on that one sin was the death sentence; the verdict on the many sins that followed was this wonderful life sentence. If death got the upper hand through one man’s wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, sovereign life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?
Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, another person did it right and got us out of it. But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life!
One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right.
All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down.
All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life - a life that goes on and on and on, world without end. " -The Message-
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Question=
Do you think the Master of Reconciliation thinks more highly of broken pieces of fish and bread that nothing be lost/apollumi, but the ones for whom He makes atonement shall be lost?
https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexi…/apollumi.html
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes into Him shall not be apollumi…"
"To say that sin, assuming it to be opposed to God, has the power of creating a world antagonistic to God as everlasting as He is, attributes to it a power equal at least to His; since according to this view, souls whom God willed to be saved, and for whom Christ died, are held in bondage under the power of sin for ever; and all this in opposition to the Word of God, which says that God’s Son was “manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil…” --Andrew Jukes, The Restitution of all Things-
"To go on punishing for ever, simply for punishment’s sake, shocks every sentiment of justice. And the case is so much worse when the punishment is really the prolongation of evil, when it is but making evil endless." -Thomas Allin, Christ Triumphant-
"The almighty maker of souls has various methods of restoring them to the divine image; it is impossible his power can fail; it is impossible for his image to be entirely obliterated; it is impossible that misery, sin, and discord can be eternal! –Alison R. Cockburn-
6The wolf will live with the lamb, and the leopard will lie down with the goat; the calf and young lion and fatling will be together, and a little child will lead them.
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P.T. Barnum Why I Am A Universalist
(http://www.pacificuu.org/publ/univ/writings/barnum_why.html)
“Millions choose evil; may they not always choose it? The reply is that this is the sinner’s will arrayed in battle against the Divine will. One must ultimately yield. I expect it will not be God. God will not coerce the sinner’s will by force. He faces it as a consuming fire, and the day comes when the sinner sinks down beaten and cries out: ‘God I yield.’ Terrible is God against sin, foolish the soul that contests against Him…the sinner is one who has courage to enter a contest of his will against God’s will. My orthodox friends tremble for God. I do not. I exhort them to 'have faith in God.” -P.T. Barnum-
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David, there can be no disagreement over the above statements. However, one could have some difficulty with the conclusions Paul reaches in the closing verses of Titus 2. Christians are a “peculiar people” - peculiar not in the sense of being strange, but peculiar in the sense of being special. In other words the verses you quote could be used to defend the belief that some are elected to eternal life and, by default, the vast remainder are not. (Not necessarily my own understanding).
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Dear Norm: There most assuredly is the aspect of :especially" in the sense of being special in Father’s great plan of reconciliation. He is the Saviour in a unique sense of those who trust in Him, or who believe in this present earthly dimension. Being elected in Him is not by default, but encompasses the aspect of being chosen In Him far beyond our choices of yea or nay and completely in His design from before the foundation of the world.
I behold many dwelling places in Father’s House, all unique habitations, and all fitting together in His tapestry. The process involves the operation of His might as He brings each of us to His desired purpose and our place as children of God, sons of God (like their Elder Brother) the Archegos & Prodromos, and for some the unique group of sons following the Lamb in the withersoever.
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“It is in Him, and through the shedding of His blood, that we have our deliverance–the forgiveness of our offences–so abundant was God’s grace, the grace which He, the possessor of all wisdom and understanding, lavished upon us, when He made known to us the secret of His will. And this is in harmony with God’s merciful purpose for the government of the world when the times are ripe for it–the purpose which He has cherished in His own mind of restoring the whole creation to find its one Head in Christ; yes, things in Heaven and things on earth, to find their one Head in Him. And you…”
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