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My personal belief is God made us creatures of free will, including the free will to open our eyes and accept his love. God could go into our souls and convince us of his truth, but it would be like having pets in a sense. God, I believe, is an emotional being, and wants to believe our choice to accept his gospel is based on our own love for him.
It's one thing to have ultamite power and another to use it. Just like Jesus in the desert being tempted to use his powers to satisfy his suffering, God wants us to love him on our own accord, not becuase he made us so (I mean, why even put the tree in Eden in the first place?)
If we are all dead in sin and, according to scripture, not only do we not seek righteousness but are unable to do so because of our sin nature, then how would we choose God?...unless God Himself opened our eyes and imbued us with the desire to seek after Him?...
But i don' think the lambs book of life refers necessarily to the life that all will have in God when all is said and done. That is to say i don't think that people are being judged as to whether or not they will live, but whether or not they had lived. If they were not in the lambs book of life, then they did not have aionios life. They will have to pass through the fire in order to enter the kingdom of Christ, which i believe may be a second mortal life. Those who had aionios life in this world will not be hurt of the second death, because when they are resurrected they will be immortal.
This is all speculation of course, as the scriptures are not specific about it other than that God will have all be saved.
So i am open to any other suggestions as well ...
Perhaps the lake of fire is being resurrected immortal at which yet they are simply so very ashamed of the lives they lived in this life that they will suffer the loss of their pride and arrogance and be abased. The fire perhaps is the burning sensation of their shame at the revelation of their evil works in this life.
I am still considering these things as you are my sister ...
Where in Scripture does it even allude to this?...
Do you know what being in the flesh is?...it is a way of thinking and behaving...
Of cause it does , it's our old nature, old man , carnal man , outward man, alienated mind , whatever you want to call it .
The point being God condemned sin in the flesh , not condemned man himself , if he condemned man , how can a condemned man walk in newness of life if he's condemned ?.
The same chapter tells us that God did what the law could not do do in that it was weak through the flesh.
He condemned sin the flesh (not condemned man) so that the righteous requirements could be fulfilled in us.
John 3 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
Is the unbeliever condemned ? Absolutely not . He just lives is life out under the condemnation of his own heart because he's in the flesh.
After following many discussions centered on Universal Reconciliation I have been seriously contemplating the merit of the doctrine. After much study, contemplation, prayer seeking guidance from the Spirit and further study I have come to the conclusion that Universal Reconciliation is indeed confirmed in Scripture.
My journey for the truth wound up in the first book of the Bible, Genesis. Towards the end of the creation account, God created Adam and planted the garden with many trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil – Gen. 2: 9.
God then placed Adam in the garden and commanded him “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.†Gen 2: 16-17. Shortly thereafter God created Eve to be Adam’s helpmate.
Eve was confronted by the crafty serpent who said to Eve, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?†Successfully planting a seed of doubt in Eve’s mind. Eve then responded to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’" Gen 3: 1-5.
Obviously the serpent knew God’s command to Adam and knew the consequences that mankind would suffer if Adam & Eve would partake of the fruit - severing their relationship with God. The cunning serpent then helped to germinate the seed of doubt he previously implanted in Eve’s mind when he said, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.â€
“You will not surely die!†Does this sound familiar when held in the spotlight of Universal Reconciliation? My friend the tenets of Universal Reconciliation are nearly as old as mankind. Satan himself, in an effort to draw mankind away from the relationship with the one most despised by Satan, his own creator, God, successfully hatched the proposal that you surely won’t die.
It is for this reason that it became crystal clear to me that Universal Reconciliation is confirmed in Scripture. Indeed, confirmed and identified as a false teaching – the product of Satan himself.
God Bless,
Salt & Light (http://compassoc.com/eph4-13/ - broken link)
I don't know of any universalists that preaches that you won't die. On the contrary, I have heard many preach that it is appointed unto all to die. We just have the hope and confidence that God is both ABLE and WILLING to raise ALL the dead back to life.
You do realize don't you that if God didn't want Adam and Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit then it would have been impossible for them to eat of it. What does that tell you? Look at what God did with the Tree of Life AFTER they took of the forbidden fruit - they couldn't access that Tree after they partook of the forbidden fruit. God could have easily restricted the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the same manner.
And of course Universal Reconciliation is in scripture. It is at the core of the Gospel. Anything ELSE is a Gospel of Death and Failure.
I don't know of any universalists that preaches that you won't die. On the contrary, I have heard many preach that it is appointed unto all to die. We just have the hope and confidence that God is both ABLE and WILLING to raise ALL the dead back to life.
You do realize don't you that if God didn't want Adam and Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit then it would have been impossible for them to eat of it. What does that tell you? Look at what God did with the Tree of Life AFTER they took of the forbidden fruit - they couldn't access that Tree after they partook of the forbidden fruit. God could have easily restricted the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the same manner.
And of course Universal Reconciliation is in scripture. It is at the core of the Gospel. Anything ELSE is a Gospel of Death and Failure.
Yes He will bring all back to life...some unto eternal life and others unto eternal death...this is after the judgement seat...
Yes He will bring all back to life...some unto eternal life and others unto eternal death...this is after the judgement seat...
Oh, I see. So when Jesus said He is the resurrection and the life, we need to interpret that as Jesus being the resurrection and eternal death? I think you've been smokin' Sciota's pipe...
A small and controversial offshoot of the Latter Rain is the "Reconciliation" movement, especially those who believe in Manifest Sonship theology.[12] Reconciliation (also called ultimate or universal reconciliation) is a doctrine of Christian Universalism focusing on God's plan to save the whole world through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. According to this tradition, the manifest Sons of God are expected to reign on earth during a coming millennial age until ultimately every human being will be restored to harmony with God.[13 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latter_Rain_Movement
A small and controversial offshoot of the Latter Rain is the "Reconciliation" movement, especially those who believe in Manifest Sonship theology.[12] Reconciliation (also called ultimate or universal reconciliation) is a doctrine of Christian Universalism focusing on God's plan to save the whole world through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. According to this tradition, the manifest Sons of God are expected to reign on earth during a coming millennial age until ultimately every human being will be restored to harmony with God. - Latter Rain Movement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Christian universalism is the original gospel which was believed and taught by the vast majority of Christians throughout Asia minor in the first 500 years AD.
Quote:
The Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, vol. 12, p. 96; Retrieved April 29, 2007. “In the West this doctrine had fewer adherents and was never accepted by the Church at large. In the first five or six centuries of Christianity there were six theological schools, of which four (Alexandria, Antioch, Caesarea, and Edessa, or Nisibis) were Universalist; one (Ephesus) accepted conditional mortality; one (Carthage or Rome) taught endless punishment of the wicked.” * Seymour, Charles. A Theodicy of Hell. p. 25. Springer (2000). * Ludlow, Morwenna. Universal Salvation: eschatology in the thought of Gregory of Nyssa and Karl Rahner. Pp. 1-2. Oxford University Press (2000).
ET was only taught later in the west, and only became the orthodox teaching after Rome made Christianity the state religion. However you might like to make the teaching of UR into a relatively contemporary teaching, the fact is that it is not.
Most of the early Greek Fathers taught UR as well ... Here is a list of some of the fathers that taught UR.
UR is the true Gospel which the scriptures teach, which the Greek speaking fathers taught and believed. ET was believed and taught by the Latin speaking western Church under the Roman School in Carthage ...
Christian universalism is the original gospel which was believed and taught by the vast majority of Christians throughout Asia minor in the first 500 years AD.
ET was only taught later in the west, and only became the orthodox teaching after Rome made Christianity the state religion. However you might like to make the teaching of UR into a relatively contemporary teaching, the fact is that it is not.
Most of the early Greek Fathers taught UR as well ... Here is a list of some of the fathers that taught UR.
UR is the true Gospel which the scriptures teach, which the Greek speaking fathers taught and believed. ET was believed and taught by the Latin speaking western Church under the Roman School in Carthage ...
Thanks Ironmaw. If you take the original UR doctrine and Good News to be the one that was dominant for 500 years after the time of Christ . . . then the predominance of ET today certainly begins to look very much like the prophesied worldwide Apostasy and false "precepts and doctrines of men" warned about in those earlier writings.ET also seems a better candidate for the "false doctrine that strays from the original" . . . that we are warned not to accept. Just saying.
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