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YOU SAID: So it is my wish that I would have been taught the LOVE of God rather than the FEAR of Hell.... Then I could have shared that LOVE from a deep seated understanding of it rather than being asked to share the fear of hell and causing my own belief in God to waver due to the conflict between a loving god and a vengeful god.
NO EXCUSES......... Today you know better, yet you choose to believe a lie instead! Today you can pick up the Bible and study, not base on what someone else has to say, but the WORDS OF GOD SPEAKS VOLUME and needs no interpretation, NONE!!
Is that what you are going to stand in front of God and say? Is that your argument? Because I tell you friend, if that's the best you got, it won't wash! NONE!
Exactly my point... when I didn't know better I believed what I was taught... eternal torture for unbelievers...
However, in doing my own study of the scripture, I changed my view to that of God's love for ALL mankind. So the words of God (both in my spirit and the written bible) showed me that God is not a god of wrath but a god of love.
Had I known this as a child I can see that some of my actions of rebellion (against ET even when I did believe it) would have been avoided. Had I known that God simply wants us to love him and each other, I wouldn't have looked down on my JW friends or my family that rejected christianity...
However... you say I NOW believe a lie...
UR is not the lie. ET is the lie.
The truth is confirmed in my spirit and in my life.
You still hold onto the lie but you will soon come to the truth... either in front of God or before. Perhaps if you insist in front of God that hell exists.. he will oblige you by letting you spend some time there so that you can see what it is you condemned others too....
I will not be judged according to ET... I will be judged according to UR.....
For with what measure you judge others, you will be judged.
Another thing my friend, you can't separate one part of His nature for the one you PREFER! You can't do that! You want the loving side of God, but you don't want the side of justice! Guess what friend, you don't get to decide that! He is who He is!
You know, some people act like God is a puppet, and they've got control of His strings, you're only fooling yourselves.........
Exactly my point... when I didn't know better I believed what I was taught... eternal torture for unbelievers...
However, in doing my own study of the scripture, I changed my view to that of God's love for ALL mankind. So the words of God (both in my spirit and the written bible) showed me that God is not a god of wrath but a god of love.
Had I known this as a child I can see that some of my actions of rebellion (against ET even when I did believe it) would have been avoided. Had I known that God simply wants us to love him and each other, I wouldn't have looked down on my JW friends or my family that rejected christianity...
However... you say I NOW believe a lie...
UR is not the lie. ET is the lie.
The truth is confirmed in my spirit and in my life.
You still hold onto the lie but you will soon come to the truth... either in front of God or before. Perhaps if you insist in front of God that hell exists.. he will oblige you by letting you spend some time there so that you can see what it is you condemned others too....
I will not be judged according to ET... I will be judged according to UR.....
For with what measure you judge others, you will be judged.
Katjonjj, your argument's not with me, it's with yourself.....I'm quite content with however the Father Judges me. I know He's fair...........................Final Answer!!
I see what you are saying but the real point is that preaching salvation from an afterlife hell is NOT the gospel at all. The apostles never mention being saved from 'hell' in any record we have of their preaching/evangelizing. Why is that? Because salvation is not from hell.
Some are still looking through a skewed lens because of not understanding sozo. Sozo means to be liberated, free, healed, rescued, made whole. This refers to being freed from our manifest state of being before regeneration. Why would I tell someone whom I was rescuing from drowning about the fact that I was going to pull everyone else out too? It's irrelevant to the act of saving that person. Now, when that rescued person wants to know the full reality of the situation, it's great to discover that all their fellows will ultimately be rescued as well.
The deep mysteries of God don't necessarily come to a person overnight. I think that's why you see older believers (in most cases) finally getting it. I am one of the very few I know that came to UR almost immediately (within the first week) but again, it is a post regeneration revelation (even though many tell of initially doubting/rejecting the "gospel" because of a pre-conversion understanding of the absurdity of the doctrine of eternal hell).
So, preaching the gospel is preaching the good news of Jesus - that sin and death are defeated and the great news that God in His grace is not counting anyone's sin against them. My UR great Uncle was one of the most prolific soul winners this area has ever seen. He passed away before my conversion (I avoided him like the plague as an atheist) but I have met SCORES of people who were saved through his ministry and there are still (to this day) growing thriving fellowships which were founded by those he reached. My own stepmother is the fruit of his ministry - awesome.
So, just because UR is unpopular with mainstream evangelicals doesn't mean anything except that the lies of traditional eternal torment doctrine have a stranglehold on popular theology (for all the reasons we URs mention here on this forum).
Not to mention that many people who claim to be Christian in fact only "do what they are told" because they live in fear of hell and ET. Or because they seek a reward ... This is called double-mindedness and is not a fruit of the spirit. For the love of God casts out fear ... those who truly love god serve him for goodness sake without fear of punishment or desire of reward. Doing Good is its own reward, and not doing Good is destruction in its own right. The "turn or burn message" is a threat of spiritual violence and is tantamount to spiritual extortion and spiritual terrorism, as much on the lips of Christians as on the lips of Muslims. It is satanic, and that is all there is to it ...
Another thing my friend, you can't separate one part of His nature for the one you PREFER! You can't do that! You want the loving side of God, but you don't want the side of justice! Guess what friend, you don't get to decide that! He is who He is!
When you use the WRONG idea about the TRUE NATURE of God from the primitive veil of ignorance over reading the OT instead of the "mind of Christ" . . . you cannot possibly know what the nature of God is. Man needs vengeance in his weakness and lack of love. God does not . . . only correction and refinement.
Katjonjj, your argument's not with me, it's with yourself.....I'm quite content with however the Father Judges me. I know He's fair...........................Final Answer!!
Betsey,
Kat and all of us who believe in the ultimate reconciliation of all know that God is fair and a righteous judge so we know that there is no infinite torment of finite human beings.
NO, The question is still the same: Why share the gospel if all are going to be saved anyway?
WHAT IS THE POINT? WHY EVEN BOTHER? WE'RE ALL GOING TO HEAVEN ANYWAY! THERE"S OTHER THINGS WE COULD BE DOING WITH OUR PRECIOUS TIME THAN SHARING THAT OLD SILLY GOSPEL. Especially if it's the same for everybody, we're born, we do whatever the h--l we want to and stilllll get to go to heaven? WOW! What an awesome God!
Really people? Really? Is that how you want to be lied to?
Betsey,
You are not listening to us ---- there is judgment on actual deeds ----- what you sow you will reap.
When you use the WRONG idea about the TRUE NATURE of God from the primitive veil of ignorance over reading the OT instead of the "mind of Christ" . . . you cannot possibly know what the nature of God is. Man needs vengeance in his weakness and lack of love. God does not . . . only correction and refinement.
I know that I can't possibly know what the nature of God is.....BUT I CAN BELIEVE WHAT HE SAYS IT IS! AND HE SAY'S HE IS THE ONE AND ONLY WHO GIVES TO EACH, JUST-AS-WE-DESERVE, be it heaven, or hell!
there is no way it is fair to create a finite human being subject to being deceived and that are deceived, lost and confused and in darkness, and then raise it to infinite torment. That is not justice.
The bible is full of conflicting ideas that have been melded together based on interpretation, that is why there is so much theology and differing doctrines because all of those doctrines are in the bible and need to be interpreted and joined together right.
eternal hell for all unbelievers and heaven for all believers is opposed to ---- judgment based on works both good and bad but they are both in the bible.
You get believers who do wicked deeds example, calvin a believer was a murderer ---- you get unbelievers who live good lives.
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UR not paying attention!
