Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
3. By that point they'd already been recopied so many times there's no way to make a list of generations of copies circulating from 1st to 4th Centuries.
4. By the 5th Century, pagan influences, along with personal biases on the parts of the copyists, had already so infiltrated and so polluted the scriptures that the three opposing views were already coming into sight.
5. The view that best served the emerging Roman Catholicism was ET, as it enabled the various bishops, archbishops, and Popes to put a gun to the heads of the ignorant masses and demand that the rabble obey them or be forever dammed.
6. ET thus took hold out of political expediency and is still the predominant view of most Christians, although the other two are slowly starting to come out of the shadows.
Conclusion: the scriptures surrounding these three doctrines, along with salvation by faith/salvation by faith-works, have been damaged beyond repair, which is why all five camps are convinced they have the answer and have every right to believe so. Except that it is utterly impossible to prove any one view, as for every verse you produce to support one, I can produce five to support the second, and the guy after me can produce ten to support the third. And every view has at least ten solid scriptures to back their "pet 'dog'ma......." (crickets chirping.....sigh nobody gets my jokes)---- EXCEPT that every scripture the three of us produce has been monkeyed with by those $%^& copyists who tweaked a word or two to change the text just enough to produce a conflicting verse.
1. who "wants"...
2. who "desires"....
3. who "wills"....
4. who "will"
5. who "would"
not to mention
6. "whose" desire...
7. "whose" will...
Here are the corkers. Two translations of the exact same verse that set up diametrically opposing POV's:
1 "....who will have all men to be saved" (supports UR)
2 "....who wants all men to be saved" (supports the Two Wills of God-Divine Election vs What God Desires)
As one can plainly see, this particular scripture--far from being inerring, is so riddled with inconsistencies and contradictions that what Paul was trying to say will never be established until judgment day. Isn't it interesting that the only scriptures that were subjected to such manipulation are the ones that would serve the political purposes of certain camps if they were to read a certain way?
You take it from there. I'm going to for now.
Good point, that is why I reject religion and simply realize that God is love and if that's not good enough then everyone is screwed anyway.
I think that one of the reasons ETers and URers will never agree is the concept of justice. Some people believed that people should get what they deserve. If they are evil they should be punished. If they refuse to accept Jesus they are evil. If they've never heard of Jesus they are evil. If they die in sin they deserve what they get-Hell.
I know it upsets some people that someone can lead a corrupt life and still end up in heaven with God. They don't understand that the person will not be accept in heaven till they have repented and been changed into the image of God. This will take some longer than other( some beat with many stripes some with few stripes). Some are not satisfied unless "those people" get what they deserve. Would it not be better if they repent and are saved? In some people minds this means they got away with it and to them that is not fair.
Bur remember what God said, My ways are high than yours. Also in Romans 4:17 it says that God " calls though things that are not as though they were." God see us for what we will become not what we are now.
God is a loving Father and what father would punish his child by burning them for ever in literal fire. What justice is infinite punishment for a finite crime. God's way is to save all his children by having them repent and be changed into his image. God does not desire anyone to be lost and they will not be.
sschulz, I believe everyone will get what they deserve - everyone will reap what they sow.
I just don't believe anyone could do anything in this finite life that is possibly deserving of infinite torment.
I think that one of the reasons ETers and URers will never agree is the concept of justice.
True, but the biggest reason, I think, and (surprise!) the thesis of my original post was that all three views are equally supported by scripture. Now when such a fact is in evidence, naturally each group is going to believe that the other two are not letting the Holy Spirit lead them to the truth.
My theological question: obviously two are wrong and only one is right--unless God, in His infinite wisdom and spectacular way, is going to make all three to be correct--so why isn't the Holy Spirit speaking to the two wrong groups and opening their eyes to the truth of the one group that is correct? Surely God sees the chaos, the pain, the frustration and disunity that this very complex and puzzling issue is causing, and not just among this crowd but the divisiveness among millions of Christians around the world, so why doesn't God put the issue to rest and give us a revelation of some sort. God clearly is not the author of confusion---He did not cause this, evil men did---but He allows confusion to reign supreme on this matter. Anyone have any ideas why?
True, but the biggest reason, I think, and (surprise!) the thesis of my original post was that all three views are equally supported by scripture. Now when such a fact is in evidence, naturally each group is going to believe that the other two are not letting the Holy Spirit lead them to the truth.
My theological question: obviously two are wrong and only one is right--unless God, in His infinite wisdom and spectacular way, is going to make all three to be correct--so why isn't the Holy Spirit speaking to the two wrong groups and opening their eyes to the truth of the one group that is correct? Surely God sees the chaos, the pain, the frustration and disunity that this very complex and puzzling issue is causing, and not just among this crowd but the divisiveness among millions of Christians around the world, so why doesn't God put the issue to rest and give us a revelation of some sort. God clearly is not the author of confusion---He did not cause this, evil men did---but He allows confusion to reign supreme on this matter. Anyone have any ideas why?
What if Universal Reconciliation is true, but Universal Salvation isn't. What if Eternal Torment is true, ONLY for those who KNEW Christ's Salvation but fell into apostasy thereby falling away from the presense of the Lamb. And what if Annihilation is reserved ONLY for those who didn't know the way of righteousness, and were just evil beasts?
True, but the biggest reason, I think, and (surprise!) the thesis of my original post was that all three views are equally supported by scripture. Now when such a fact is in evidence, naturally each group is going to believe that the other two are not letting the Holy Spirit lead them to the truth.
My theological question: obviously two are wrong and only one is right--unless God, in His infinite wisdom and spectacular way, is going to make all three to be correct--so why isn't the Holy Spirit speaking to the two wrong groups and opening their eyes to the truth of the one group that is correct? Surely God sees the chaos, the pain, the frustration and disunity that this very complex and puzzling issue is causing, and not just among this crowd but the divisiveness among millions of Christians around the world, so why doesn't God put the issue to rest and give us a revelation of some sort. God clearly is not the author of confusion---He did not cause this, evil men did---but He allows confusion to reign supreme on this matter. Anyone have any ideas why?
To the bold: YES!!!!!!!!!
I have to go... (boo hoo) but will be back later.
The short answer.. because we HAVE to walk through this. Truth must unfold in order for it to be understood. We have to STEP back and WORK through our dark understandings, we see through the glass darkly NOW. For a REASON. TO LEARN. If we didn't go THROUGH it, we wouldn't learn.
We MUST walk through the contrasts of light and dark in order to understand what the light is.
Confusion will not always reign supreme, but it MUST now as we each "work out our salvation." As we (individually and as a WHOLE) slowly unravel who HE is. In the unraveling, we are going to have to UNDO the knots we come across. The knots are confusion. But these knots have a supreme PURPOSE. In working them out, we can better understand. We have to STOP and work on them. WE have to examine. The toughter the knot, the more the confusion, the more you have to EXAMINE it to unravel it.
Knots are the confusions.
God wants us to LOOK and EXAMINE.
He wants us to really SEE something.
Think of understanding on a scale from 0 to 100 where 100 is where you know everything (ie. you know as much as God does - if that is possible ie. infinity), and zero is where you understand nothing. The zero would be absolute confusion.
When we are born, we are pretty much in absolute confusion, but we very quickly learn. We learn that these 2 older people (our parents) provide warmth when they hug us. We learn they feed us once in a while and that makes us feel better. And we learn when we cry that they come and do something for us. We are now slightly less confused because these 2 older people do things for us and love us. And so on it goes, slowly learning.
If we start out at zero on the scale of understanding, I imagine we as humanity are maybe at a 2.6 right now. ie. even though we can pretend and think we know a lot, we are still very confused.
God's plan is not for us to be confused. God's plan is to bring us to a full understanding of the truth. Thus God is bringing us all the way from zero (the initial state - absolute confusion) up to 100. We just can't get ahead of ourselves and expect to get to 100 without first going through everything else - which by definition involves being at least somewhat confused.
What the heck is this stuff?? A B C D E F G H I...
C-A-T --huh??
C-A-T... hmmm.
C-A-T...
CAT. oh. OH!!!! C-A-T, CAT!!
If we weren't first confused, we wouldn't try to figure something out and learn. Confusion is a stepping stone to knowledge. The principal is the same whether we are talking about learning to read, or whether we are talking about the mysteries of God.
Confusion is the first step.
Blessed are the confused...
If you don't think you're "confused" then you won't start to unravel those knots.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
nobody gets my jokes)---- EXCEPT that every scripture the three of us produce has been monkeyed with by those $%^& copyists who tweaked a word or two to change the text just enough to produce a conflicting verse. 
for now.
