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The question is whether the "torment" as you put it, is warranted. Is it torment to lock a murderer up for life? Perhaps...but it's justified.
Humans have very little resources to use when it come to correcting misbehavior in other humans. Thinking from a mortal standpoint there may be justification, but does god need to justify his actions? The bible says to love your enemies and do good to those who hate you. Is torment by god good simply because he's god? That's fairly hypocritical. IMO.
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Likewise, due to the infinite nature of God, whom our sin is against, He is justified in casting us into Hell for eternity.
What sins do humans commit against god? God must not have heard the adage that the punishment should fit the crime. Eternal gods aren't required to have eternal punishments...
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It also says he IS just. And he IS Holy.
I agree, god is all those things, the greatest of which is love. The holiness and justice of god come out of his love. What part of torment is loving??
The number of times something is mentioned in the bible does not negate one scripture. If the bible says the greatest of something is LOVE, then it need only say it once.
All of God's attributes work in perfect harmony with each other. God cannot save anyone on the basis of His love. He must be true to His Justice. God's love was the motivation for sending Christ into the world to die for the sins of the world, but it was God's Justice which imputed the sins of the world to Christ, and which judged Him. And it is the Justice of God which imputes the Perfect Righteousness of God to those who believe in Christ. If a person dies never having believed in Christ, then God cannot immpute His Righteousness to that person, and the Justice of God must condemn that person to eternal separation from Him.
Humans have very little resources to use when it come to correcting misbehavior in other humans. Thinking from a mortal standpoint there may be justification, but does god need to justify his actions? The bible says to love your enemies and do good to those who hate you. Is torment by god good simply because he's god? That's fairly hypocritical. IMO.
What sins do humans commit against god? God must not have heard the adage that the punishment should fit the crime. Eternal gods aren't required to have eternal punishments...
I agree, god is all those things, the greatest of which is love. The holiness and justice of god come out of his love. What part of torment is loving??
If you commit a crime against an infinite being you are deserving of an eternal punishment. Anything less would insult the nature of God.
You ask what part of punishment is love? Does it have to be? He is all holy as well. You have this mistaken notion that he's some kind of teddy bear in the sky just wanting to give you a hug. You need to recognize that he is wrathful as well.
If you commit a crime against an infinite being you are deserving of an eternal punishment. Anything less would insult the nature of God.
Is this an universal law or something? I asked what crime a human commits that would be against god.
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You ask what part of punishment is love? Does it have to be? He is all holy as well. You have this mistaken notion that he's some kind of teddy bear in the sky just wanting to give you a hug. You need to recognize that he is wrathful as well.
Love casts out all fear because fear has to do with punishment. Love keeps no record of wrongs.
It seems to me that you don't believe god is love.
Sin, mystic...sin, not simply human weakness. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. Romans 7:18
You miss the point . . . it is our psychological weaknesses that produce the negative emotions that our ignorant ancestors attributed to God as motives. God does NOT have any of those weakness so He does NOT have any of those emotions. Our embryo Spirit lives in us and IS good . . but our animal nature is its adversary because it cannot discriminate between good and bad behavior, period. Our animal nature seeks everything that is pleasurable and avoids everything that is painful. Our embryo Spirit has to learn the difference and try to prevent the bad.
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We do reap what we sow... The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Galatians 6:18
Amen. But we do not reap more than we sow! We produce differing "quantities" of our soul energy . . . that is what is referred to in the "thirty-fold, sixty-fold, and one hundred-fold" passage. Only the responses to our Spirit are retained . . . the other animal ones are destroyed.
DRob4JC, you raised the OP, so I asked you a question about what you thought it meant. Saying "His ways are not our ways" means nothing, for we should interpret that His ways are better than our ways.
Letting people be tormented for a finite amount of time, even a lifetime, is infinitely different that letting someone be tormented for infinity, with no reprieve, ever.
What you described above is the mob boss who takes pity on you while he shows you everyone else that he is letting be tortured forever. Doesn't sound like heaven to me.
Stating that His ways are our not our ways is straight from Isaiah. So it must mean something. It means God's perspective is different from ours. His motives are different. So for us to apply human logic to the issue of post-earth existence is fruitless. We must take what the Bible says about these things.
God's holiness and justice are part of who He is.
He has set forth death as a penalty for sin. Who has sinned? Everybody. Therefore - everyone deserves death - both spiritual and physical.
All of God's attributes work in perfect harmony with each other.
Indeed, that doesn't change the scripture or what it is saying about God. It is saying , GOD IS LOVE and all he does is based on that.
And that does not prevent all he does from being in perfect harmony.
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God cannot save anyone on the basis of His love.
LOL, God is LOVE, that is the basis for everything.
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He must be true to His Justice.
God is LOVE and is entirely true to his justice. He won't be true to YOURS.
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God's love was the motivation for sending Christ into the world to die for the sins of the world, but it was God's Justice which imputed the sins of the world to Christ, and which judged Him.
Actually, it was love that did that too, because his justice is for the benefit of mankind.
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And it is the Justice of God which imputes the Perfect Righteousness of God to those who believe in Christ.
Which is also LOVE.
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If a person dies never having believed in Christ, then God cannot immpute His Righteousness to that person, and the Justice of God must condemn that person to eternal separation from Him.
Stating that His ways are our not our ways is straight from Isaiah. So it must mean something. It means God's perspective is different from ours. His motives are different. So for us to apply human logic to the issue of post-earth existence is fruitless. We must take what the Bible says about these things.
God's holiness and justice are part of who He is.
He has set forth death as a penalty for sin. Who has sinned? Everybody. Therefore - everyone deserves death - both spiritual and physical.
Can you at least agree with this?
I agree.. We all die physically. I'm not sure how a person would die spiritually. I've seen some drug addicts that seem to be alive in body (barely) yet spiritually devoid of life, But even addicts can change. I think if you are 90 years old you deserve death... as a natural course of life.
But gods ways are not ours. If we think all people deserve physical and spiritual death then does god think that way?
Or does god command you to love those that hate you because he loves those who hate him?
Is gods love, justice, and holiness for a purpose or just there to control humans like some mob boss in the sky?
We reap what we sow. How can we sow an eternal consequence in a finite life?
I tire of the psychological ignorance that refuses to understand that ALL the negative human emotions of anger, vengeance, hate, envy, etc. are the result of our human weaknesses. God has no such weaknesses . . . hence God has NONE of the human negative emotions, period!!! (We have a pitiful education system in this country.)
The human spirit is eternal - meaning it will last forever. It was made in the image of God, who is eternal also. Our spirits were made to dwell with God forever.
However, sin happened. God can not dwell with sin - so He separates those with sin on their account from His presence. This is spiritual death - a separation from the source of life.
Samuel is an example of one who even though his physical life ended, he still existed, and God allowed Saul to see him in 1 Samuel 30. Moses and Elijah also appeared with Christ at the Transfiguration.
So to answer your first question - physical life with our earthly bodies is finite. Our spirits are eternal. You can read 1 Corinthians 3 with regards to those in Christ who will be judged for the deeds done on earth.
Second comment...
We are made in HIS image. So the ability to display emotions come from HIM. Our sinfulness allows emotions to result in bad behavior.
Emotions in themselves are not negative. Actions are negative.
God's anger is displayed in Exodus 32:11, Numbers 22:22, 1 Kings 11:9, Psalm 80:4, Joel 2:13. God is slow to anger.
God is jealous - Exodus 34:14, Deut. 6:15,
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