Posted on 10/17/2012 5:32:20 PM PDT by ReligiousLibertyTV
Well... there were those Lamanites. They invaded Canada? Of course it helps if one can read the really old "Reformed Egyptian" texts (or be able to make it up on the spot...same difference).
Believe what you will about the Catholic Church, nevertheless there are thousands of Protestant sects each claiming to have the Truth. They vary theologically with each other from just a little, to quite a bit. These thousands of sects exist as the end result of the Reformation. I don’t think Martin Luther had that in mind, far from it, but it was inevitable as the break of day.
Now that would be the book of Mormon.
Martin Luther had no idea of setting up some kind of new denomination.
He wanted the Catholic church to get back to the truths of Scripture and they wouldn’t have anything to do with it so they very ungraciously uninvited him from membership in their church.
IOW, THEY ex-communicated him aka kicked him out.
While it is possible that some Protestant denominations do claim that they are the only way to God, by and large, if you read the statement of faith of virtually any of those churches, they all essentially say the same thing about salvation, that it is by grace, through faith in Christ. Not through membership in their church, not through baptism into it, not by works of righteousousness they have established must be done, not through jumpng through their ecclesiastical hoops, all as the Catholic church claims be done through it to earn salvation.
Precious few of those “Protestant sects” have the chutzpah to claim themsleves to be the sole means of salvation of mankind, as the Catholic church does.
Salvation is through a person, not a religion. It’s granted as a gift through forgiveness, not earned by works or suffering. Nothing can pay for sin but death, not religious duties, not acts of righteousness, not suffering.
The only thing that can pay for sin is death and Jesus paid that penalty for us so that through faith in His FINISHED work on the cross, by faith, we can partake in that forgivenss and eternal life. We are granted a pardon from the consequences of sin when we throw ourelves on the mercy of the court.
Suffering does not purify us from sin.
There is no payment for sin but death.
If you die with sin held to your account, you go to hell.
If that sin is forgiven, there is no sin held to your account and you go to heaven.
There is no purgatory.
Thanks for that enlightening bit of information. How deceitful interesting that that little tidbit on that connection was not mentioned until you exposed it.
I don’t kill loved ones.
Indeed. The notion of purgatory negates Christ’s sacrifice.
Who needs saving when everyone gets thoroughly scrubbed by spending 0% of eternity in a great washing machine for dirty souls?
So in the original line of thinking, you would rather your loved ones be tortured forever instead of being put out of their misery. Wow! Well, I don’t see that as love or mercy or honorable and definately not a characteristic of the God that I know.
Sin has consequences.
And yet I don’t encase my loved ones in bubble wrap.
I don,t know what Heaven or hell is and neither do any one else that is able to talk about it.
Oh, they have other fronts as well. Hope your health improves.
Suppose the person you love the most ends up in eternal torment. Could you be happy in Heaven knowing the suffering that lies ahead?
Absolutely, sin has consequences. I never said otherwise. You seem to be saying then, if God doesn’t torture the unbelievers forever, then the sinners get away scot free. I don’t buy that for an instant.
For one, Hell does exist for a while and I believe that our concept of time doesn’t exist in Hell. In other words a minute in Hell is probably like a thousand years. So, no one wants to be in Hell, even if just for a minute.
Two, imagine standing before God our Father and Creator, and seeing the hard proof of the glory that He is and the wonderful life you could have had with Him. Then seeing the proof of your life and where you rejected Christ. That moment, in and of itself will be crushing. THAT is what all courts here on Earth are actually working for, for the perpatrator to actually and fully realize what they have done and what they have lost. The Great White Throne Judgement will do that.
God is Just and God is Merciful. A just God has a complete and thorough judgement. A Merciful God doesn’t torture his creation forever.
You’re confusing consequences with retribution.
Feel free to explain to me what you mean. I’ll listen.
Consequences are natural.
Retribution is deliberate.
Ummm...ok. Now explain to me where those definitions show where I’ve gone off track.
The light of love burns and tortures those who have rejected love. God would be moved if He did anything other than love(’I am God, and I change not-Malachi 3:6.)
The hate comes from man’s free will to reject love ,not from God whom is perfection and love.
St. Isaac of Syria captures this so well along with many other Church Fathers
From St. Isaac of Syria
... those who find themselves in hell will be chastised by the scourge of love. How cruel and bitter this torment of love will be! For those who understand that they have sinned against love, undergo no greater suffering than those produced by the most fearful tortures. The sorrow which takes hold of the heart, which has sinned against love, is more piercing than any other pain. It is not right to say that the sinners in hell are deprived of the love of God ... But love acts in two ways, as suffering of the reproved, and as joy in the blessed! (St. Isaac of Syria, Mystic Treatises)
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