Posted on 01/09/2014 9:09:07 AM PST by SeekAndFind
I agree, there is no reason for Christians to divide over this peripheral question. The truth of the matter is irrelevant to us. We're going to live eternally with Jesus.
That bears repeating. A doctrine such as this IS NOT a salvation-issue.
Christ and Him crucified IS.
Your analysis is 100% wrong, there is not one shread of truth in it.
It is apparent that you know exactly zero about translating NT Greek.
Still, I think we will still experience time as linear.
When we can avoid that and focus on the Gospel, hearts are opened.
I have explained hell to non-believers as eternal separation from God.
As a believer, I understand the implication of that separation. A typical non-believer will not fully understand that and it will not be a “roadblock” to further exploration of Christianity.
It is only AFTER they become a believer do they understand the full importance of that separation. That it is eternal torture - knowing that the source of all light and love in the universe wanted a relationship with you and you rejected Him. That you could have basked in the glory of the Creator and His love, but because of your own selfishness you rejected that prospect and now are eternally separated from all love, all light, everything that is good, for eternity. Worse, you know that YOU put yourself in that place.
Truly horrible, beyond description, almost beyond comprehension.
I understand your position, but that doesn’t exactly square up with passages like this, at the very end of Revelation:
Rev 22:14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
Rev 22:15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
The dichotomy is those inside the gates of heaven (verse 14), and those outside the gates of heaven (verse 15). Why would the Holy Spirit say anybody is outside the gates of heaven if they’ve been utterly destroyed, as you believe? If sentient beings aren’t there, why mention them? As it reads, it strongly indicates living souls both inside and outside heaven.
...almost beyond comprehension.
I confess that I get on a fair number of threads on other sites that are started by Christianity haters. Many of them start with the ol’ “you say your God is a God of love but he causes people to suffer for eternity”, blah, blah, blah. I will usually say something like, “I’m a Christian and I don’t believe He will do that. Where did you get that notion? It’s certainly not in the bible.
Very often, their response is to pull out all the stops using scripture (yes, a lot of them know more about the bible than most professed Christians) to prove that those that don’t accept Christ will be eternally tortured by what they consider a sadistic “god”. It’s interesting to see them fighting so hard to make that case. But some of them come around. They end up getting something to think about for the first time.
You’re giving the words meaning based on your inferences. What about those outside the Ark? What about those outside the Titanic lifeboats?
People try and try to construct a nice, safe god that acts more like the popular conception of Santa Claus. Something to put on the shelf and assure them they are going to get a pat on the head and a bowl of ice cream after death.
Except that God is not nice. Jesus was not nice. He said some rather not nice things to the authorities in Jerusalem, tore up the temple market, and called them a bunch of white washed tombs (not a nice thing to say).
God is Good. That means something much more than nice.
That’s simple to understand. Those who DO His Commandments have the right to the Tree of Life and MAY ENTER the gates into the Kingdom of God.
Those who will find themselves outside the gates and unable to enter are those who are wicked and unrepentant.
It’s simply stating who will and who will not be allowed to enter - not that both the Righteous and the wicked are living in eternity - one inside and one outside the gates. There is no Life outside the gates.
I personally do not subscribe to the doctrine of an eternal soul. I believe in the Resurrection and that Christ has my reward with HIM when He returns.
I don’t have a problem with God taking lives - the closing of the Red Sea, the death of the first-born of Egypt - but for Him to make his people kill children, babies, the unborn in their mothers?
I had a dream where the Angel of Death reached into me and lifted out my unborn baby (did not come to pass with that baby) and the Angel was impersonal, only doing the job he had been sent to do and no pain, no harm came to the dream baby - she went from my womb to heaven. So the Angel of Death and the first born I can accept.
But Ameleks hardened in sin? What was their eternal fate? If baby Ameleks were slaughtered did they go to heaven since their whole tribe was so evil it must be wiped out? A little two year old Amalek seeing his whole family bleeding on the floor before he was dashed against the wall?
What of virgin girls of other tribes given a few weeks to mourn their slain families before they became concubines. We hate the Muslims for that.
God fed the Israelites 40 years in the desert. Why didn’t He turn the desert into a land of milk and honey, instead of sending the Israeites into the lands of others?
Again, God can take my life any time He wants - it is His to take. But to send someone to destroy me? That wrongs the one sent.
Absolutely wicked people will burn there.
However scripture teaches that the wicked will burn up and die.
Mal_4:1 "For behold, the day is coming, Burning like an oven, And all the proud, yes, all who do wickedly will be stubble. And the day which is coming shall burn them up," Says the LORD of hosts, "That will leave them neither root nor branch.
The wicked will be burned up, fully destroyed. It's agree with what Christ said:
Joh 3:14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
Joh 3:15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.
Joh 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
The choices are: Perish OR Eternal Life. That's what Jesus Christ, God, says.
The word translated perish means that, to perish. To be destroyed fully. It agrees completely with the verse in Malachi.
The other choice is eternal life, to live forever without dying.
Eternal life IS a gift from God for believing through Christ. If we don't have eternal life, we perish, are fully destroyed.
Modern thought has it this way: We ALREADY have eternal life WITHOUT believing in Christ. That's just not right.
Because of this belief the message of John 3:16 has been changed to "I gave you eternal life. And if you believe in me i will give you eternal life. If you don't believe in me I will plunge you into fire and you will burn forever because I gave you eternal life."
That's not what God teaches.
I dont have a problem with God taking lives - the closing of the Red Sea, the death of the first-born of Egypt - but for Him to make his people kill children, babies, the unborn in their mothers?
And the movie “The Matrix” is a very good analogy as well. Christians took the Red Pill and see this world for what it is. We are still not to murder, but if God instructs us to, so be it. The context and perception of the Matrix makes it alright.
One of the overpowering messages of the New Testament is that this life on this world is infinitely brief and insignificant compared to eternity. What happens to the body is almost utterly irrelevant. Of course, it doesn’t mean I go around disemboweling pregnant women, but God’s wisdom is such that, for generations to come, it is a righteous path when he instructs it. Some Jews just might wish someone had done that to Hitler’s mother.
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