Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: UnRuley
Here is a nice question. Suppose I was God, and I am looking down on my human race killing each others and behaving badly. Then I say to myself, self, why don't I send a messenger to these people to teach them ethical/moral behaviors. So I sent EVERY single messenger to one unpopulated area of the earth, and neglected the most populated areas, like China, and India. Do you think that would be fair to send ALL my messengers to one single area?
131 posted on 01/13/2003 12:18:02 PM PST by philosofy123
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 129 | View Replies ]


To: philosofy123
Politically Incorrect Salvation
Contemporary religious pluralism regards the traditional Christian doctrine of salvation through Christ alone as unconscionable. The problem seems to be that the existence of an all-loving and all-powerful God seems incompatible with the claim that persons who do not hear and embrace the gospel of salvation through Christ will be damned. Closer analysis reveals the problem to be counterfactual in nature: God could not condemn persons who, though freely rejecting God's sufficient grace for salvation revealed through nature and conscience, would have received His salvific grace mediated through the gospel. In response, it may be pointed out that God's being all-powerful does not guarantee that He can create a world in which all persons freely embrace His salvation and that His being all-loving does not entail that, even if such a world were feasible for Him, God would prefer such a world over a world in which some persons freely reject His salvation. Furthermore, it is possible that God has created a world having an optimal balance between saved and lost and that God has so providentially ordered the world that those who fail to hear the gospel and be saved would not have freely responded affirmatively to it even if they had heard it.

135 posted on 01/13/2003 12:39:21 PM PST by Remedy
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 131 | View Replies ]

To: philosofy123
The Gospel IS being spread throughout the entire world now. There are many people though, throughout the centuries prior to modern methods of communication and travel, who were never evangilized.
Is it fair for God to condemn them because missionaries didn't make it to their village during their lifetime?
138 posted on 01/13/2003 12:43:11 PM PST by UnRuley
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 131 | View Replies ]

To: philosofy123
"Do you think that would be fair to send ALL my messengers to one single area?"

Here is something to think about. Now mind you, I am not offering this as a theological doctrine, but merely as a "what if".

As I mentioned in a previous post, there were many generations of people who did not have the benefit of the written scriptures, yet God spoke to them. This was before the time of the Israelites as the chosen people. So why did God choose Israel? Was it because there was something special about them or because God only wanted certain people to be saved? Of course not. Maybe the only thing that made them special was that some of them were listening and nobody else was and because of that God set them apart and fulfilled His Word through them.In that respect it might even be said that many other peoples had rejected Christ even before the birth of Jesus.

Don't like that? Here's another more widely held view, though I don't think it is mutually exclusive. He taught us to go into all the world and preach the gospel, the great comission, and Christians have been doing exactly that since the beginning. That makes US His messengers and there is virtually no place in the world untouched by the gospel except by choice. Do I believe that someone is condemned to hell who lives under a tyrannical ruler but seeks the truth? No I don't, because God says that those who seek Him will find Him if they search for Him with all their heart. (Jer. 29:13) That's the key. There is a part of all of us that knows our Creator and we can either seek Him and His truth in which case He will reveal Himself in some way or through someone, or we can turn away from Him and seek our own way, continuing to follow the path of original sin by trying to be god of our own lives.

172 posted on 01/13/2003 5:55:04 PM PST by sweetliberty (Hopeless FR addict!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 131 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson