Posted on 01/01/2006 4:48:03 PM PST by HarleyD
You aren't the only one!
Brother in Christ
Science isn't religion. It hasn't burned people at the stake for contrary theories. Nor cut out their tongues or chopped off their hands so they can't speak or write. Nor is there an official priesthood. Nor is there any process of excommunication.
You are free to use any analogy you choose. But this reader finds the one you used unconvincing. If you like it, by all means continue to use it.
Oh, please. I guess that means Luther must have been sitting in a corner humming "A Mighty Fortess Is Our God" all to himself? It may help to read some history.
"So, I'll just ask, what is the deal with Jesus going down into Hades, and is Hades the same as Hell?"
Eastern Christianity speculates on three "places" for souls, the abode of the dead (Hades) Heaven which is a sort of noetic union with the energies but not the substance of God and Hell, which will be the place of eternal torment after the Final Judgment.
"Why does predestination imply a divine farce? I read your explanation, but it doesn't make sense to me. On temporal physics I think it was Kosta who gave us the image of God standing on a mountain top, looking down and around the mountain, and seeing all time occur simultaneously. I have no problem with this."
FK, you're confusing foreknowledge with predestination. If everything was "predestined" and we mortals have absolutely nothing to do with our own theosis, then indeed the Incarnation was just an unnecssary carnival show.
"I would agree that the sacrifice that Jesus made was sufficient to save all of mankind, but it was only efficacious to the elect."
Aside from Calvin and perhaps some remark by +Augustine, where does this idea come from?
That comment says a great deal about you as a human being.
"Timothy, my son, I give you this instruction in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by following them you may fight the good fight, holding on to faith and a good conscience. Some have rejected these and so have shipwrecked their faith." 1 Timothy 1:18-19
I don't see any inconsistency. "These" refers to faith and a good conscience. Many people "claim" to have "these", but in fact do not. Those who are shipwrecked have fallen away permanently, and are lost because they were never saved in the first place. Hymenaeus and Alexander must have been such, as they are both labeled as blasphemers in verse 20. Hymenaeus is also mentioned later as a blasphemer:
2 Tim. 2:17-18 : 17 Their teaching will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, 18 who have wandered away from the truth. They say that the resurrection has already taken place, and they destroy the faith of some.
It appears to me that in order to teach this error, that they could not have ever been truly saved. The footnote in my Bible suggests that they were akin with Gnostics.
If God stands on a mountain top looking down through the "corridors of time", why does our Lord Jesus need to die for all men? Doesn't God know who will and will not be saved? Thus the idea that God wants all men to be saved mean nothing because God already knows all men will not be saved.
OTOH, continuing under this view, God already knows who will continue to walk with Him. So aren't these people really predestined?
The trouble with all of this is it places salvation squarely upon man's shoulders.
"It appears to me that in order to teach this error, that they could not have ever been truly saved. The footnote in my Bible suggests that they were akin with Gnostics."
They certainly we not "saved". That's quite apparent. But then again, +Paul hadn't achieved theosis at that point either! :)
Mine says:
"What is the heresy of H and P? Perhaps a super-spiritual interpretation of the Resurrection (v. 18) as affecting only the soul and not the whole person (Greek philosophy thought bodily resurrection to be absurd); thus resurrection is thought to be already past, having occured at baptism. They use the language of baptism but in a non-Orthodox way. Let us not be naive; unchecked this sort of novel doctrine can spread through the community like cancer (v.17)."
Great article.
Eze 18:4 "Behold, all souls are Mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is Mine...."
In cooperation with God's grace.
God knows what choices you and I will make, but He doesn't necessarily make them for us. Hence, His foreknowledge is not the same as predestination.
Well, the key question is: Do you believe that Muslims worship the same God that we do? I thought to be a heretic, one had to, at least on the surface, be of the same general faith. Are Muslims errant Christians or are they something completely different? Or, in the alternative, is a heretic simply anyone who disagrees with Catholics or Orthodox?
BTW, and please forgive the weird detour, but is Ishmael the "Abraham" of Muslims, or is Mohammed considered the Father?
The fact that even the great St. Paul still had to fight against the temptations of the flesh - despite his regenerated status. In other words, God did not take control of St. Paul's will to desire the things of the spirit entirely. He had to battle, in fear and trembling. The path to Christ is a narrow one, FK.
Well, I don't have any problem with the idea that we struggle. I know I do. Of course we are all engaged in spiritual warfare against the evil one while we are on earth. My side doesn't think that God takes control of our will to be sinless after salvation. We couldn't defend that in a million years.
I agree that the path is indeed narrow. So, I like Paul's teachings in Romans 7 just fine. :) I don't agree with you that a true salvation can end in failure, but I don't see Paul arguing that it can either. Paul is describing sanctification and how it works.
In order to be a heretic, one has to be of the Apostolic faith to begin with and then develop an errant or un-orthodox teaching, such error being addressed by an ecumenical council and the heretic given a chance to recant his error and refuse to do so.
An Ecumenical Council is a college of Bishops of the entire Church, presided by the Pope (since the Second Council), and its decision is binding on the whole Church. A local Synod can excommunicate a heretical bishop but cannot call him a heretic but only schismatic.
To the best of my knowledge, Islam was never considered to be a Christian faith, not was it ever addressed as heresy by any of the seven E. Councils. Islam, like Judaism, is a different faith. They believe in one and the same God, the only God, but their revelation is considered defficient or false.
That's a new one, FK! I thought the theology of double predestination, that your friend Harley D preaches, and with whom you fully agree so far, states that God is always in control of everything and that we are just the way He made us.
Unless you presuppose free will, you will run into contradiction such as the one you made above. God is either in control or is not; He either allows free will an does not interfere with it (i.e. our will is really free), or He controls everything to the tiniest details.
The answer, of course, is that He allows free will because otherwise we are but simple puppets on a string, and the whole concept of sin, redemption and prayer becomes meaningless..
What He "sees" is each and every human being that was, is and will be, and what each will decide and where each will end up.
Some will be saved because they will, for one reason or another, attain the likeness of Christ, while others won't. Those who are saved will most likely ask God for help and cooperate with God's will to varying degrees to which we are fallible. Our decisions affect only our salvation; they do not affect God's plan. Those who reject God will perish because they refuse God -- for whatever reason! Those who turn to God will ask Him for mercy and forgiveness and He will be merciful and forgiving to them.
To suppose that God has made a universe-or even a single being-the control of which he renounces, is to accuse him of similar immorality. What right has he to make it, if he cannot or will not control it? It is not a moral act to perpetrate chaos. We have not only dethroned God; we have demoralized him.""...If a man should manufacture a quantity of an unstable high-explosive in the corridors of an orphan asylum, and when the stuff went off should seek to excuse himself by saying that he could not control it, no one would count his excuse valid. What right had he to manufacture it, we should say, unless he could control it? He relieves himself of none of the responsibility for the havoc wrought, by pleading inability to control his creation.
What, are you kidding? What do we need, a measly 63,000 more posts to set an all time record? Peanuts! I'm just getting warmed up! :)
Correct, that is the teaching of the Greek Church and the Latin Church, the details of which are a source of one of the major theological disagreements between us and the Latins and its roots are in +Augustine's concept of the "original sin."
OK, thanks. Kosta, if you do not believe in original sin, then I actually have more respect for your position, because it seems to me to be more consistent. I do agree with the Catholics about the existence of original sin, but I see no pass for Mary in scripture over this hurdle. If there is no original sin, then I suppose anyone COULD go through life and never choose to sin.
2) If a person is draw by the Father will Christ raise him up?
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