18 Jan 19
@ragwort saidBut how is it even coercion when the most common reaction is to not believe?
@Philokalia
Then there is a severe overhanging threat, which seems to imply coercion. Nowadays we recognise this as an abusive rather than a loving relationship and not free will at all.
Moreover, hell is not a creation of God (at least in Orthodox theology), but rather it is the natural result of said attitude.
18 Jan 19
@sonship saidRight -- I think one of the hardest things for our generation (of Westerners in particular) to accept is the notion of man's depravity.
@divegeester
Thankyou for voicing your honest feeling. I will take it to the Lord in prayer.
Personally, I feel that me in myself am only good for the lake of fire. God has had mercy on me. What motivates me is a feeling that I cannot be alone. The mercy God had on me through Jesus Christ, I simply have to let God do whatever He can in me that others could receive that mercy also.
It is perhaps a lot easier for people who have "seen some things," so to speak, and who know the naked default of man when he is given total free reign...
And it is also especially hard when the default in a lot of the Western Christianity as well is that God exists for me, and God is simply there to love me.
It's a sort of therapeutic deism as opposed to an actual reflection of what both man and God are.
And what is doubly funny about this is that these same people will go on to seriously lament the Holocaust without thinking about what that actually means in the greater context of what humanity is and does. And you would think this would be an especially relevant truth to materialists.
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18 Jan 19
@Philokalia
Isn't it wonderful? In Christ we are saved.
Through the blood of Jesus I am justified, acquitted, not guilty, reckoned righteous, made righteous, just as if I had never sinned.
His precious blood continually cleanses us from sins.
He went through the judgment of God for us.
What a word, beyond man's imagination to invent.
I suppose that if I am not put into Christ, I would be frozen in a state in which God would ever make known forever what He judges about my perpetual rebellion and sinning against Him.
Since none of us yet alive can know what this means He uses language of the familiar that can at least convey what eternal separation from Him would mean.
Did you listen to any of the above message ?
It is very good.
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18 Jan 19
Then there is a severe overhanging threat, which seems to imply coercion. Nowadays we recognise this as an abusive rather than a loving relationship and not free will at all.
I don't see the warning of judgment and the good news of justification in Jesus in quite this way.
There has been some abuse of the negative side of the Gospel. And if I wanted to rationalize an excuse to dismiss the teaching of Jesus, I could lay hold of some reasons.
But more so I think of the world as like the ship the Titanic. Say, I was on the Titanic, obvious to the impending doom to shortly envelope the entire ocean liner.
Some one comes to my cabin at night to say I am in need of being saved from what in a few hours is going to happen. The entire ship with thousand or so unsuspecting people are going to under the cold waters of the Atlantic.
I could respond "Why do you come to my cabin to fear monger me? This need, you say, to be saved sounds like coercion. Why do you come to unsettle me with talk of an overhanging threat? There is no love in this. This is coercion. Be saved from what ? I am quite comfortable here, thankyou."
There is no shortage of talk about the love of God towards human beings. With it there is an understanding that God loves righteousness from which we have sorely departed.
Something has gone wrong with the world. And there is a need for salvation from ourselves in the face of our Creator who is perfect and perfectness by eternal nature.
He came as a man to be a realm within we are saved from our sins which have been introduced as an infection into God's creation by means of an opposition party to God.
It is not a story which can be told with just a few words. But to know the need for salvation is in it - in Jesus the Son of God.
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18 Jan 19
@sonship saidYour Titanic metaphor is an interesting one because in this scenario your version of god is the ship designer, the iceberg itself, the sub-zero temperate sea, the titanic captain and the person responsible for not including enough lifeboats.
But more so I think of the world as like the ship the Titanic. Say, I was on the Titanic, obvious to the impending doom to shortly envelope the entire ocean liner.
ome one comes to my cabin at night to say I am in need of being saved from what in a few hours is going to happen. The entire ship with thousand or so unsuspecting people are going to under the cold waters of th ...[text shortened]... is no love in this. This is coercion. Be saved from what ? I am quite comfortable here, thankyou."
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18 Jan 19
@divegeester
Your exploitation of the analogy to arrange parallels as you wish, may be "interesting" to you.
18 Jan 19
@sonship
To me the path of christian spirituality is to develop an open heart, open enough so as "whatever you did for the least of these...you did for me" - presumably unconditionally given. A tall order and a "narrow gate" indeed. I know it's been kicking around for millenia but I don't see the doctrine of hell torment as necessary. It looks to me like a reflection of the all to human response to a problem - kill something or failing that make it suffer. Hardly a kingdom of heaven on earth.
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18 Jan 19
2 edits
To me the path of christian spirituality is to develop an open heart, open enough so as "whatever you did for the least of these...you did for me"
This was spoken by Jesus in a teaching found in Matthew 25:12-46 Now in that very same section in He said something about eternal punishment (v.46) at the conclusion of the teaching.
Now should I believe that everything except this part was spoken by Jesus but mean people fictitiously added that sentence in v.46 ?
"And they shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." (Matt. 13:46 see also v.41)
Should I consider these words inauthentic but the rest authentic teaching of Jesus ?
- presumably unconditionally given. A tall order and a "narrow gate" indeed. I know it's been kicking around for millenia but I don't see the doctrine of hell torment as necessary. It looks to me like a reflection of the all to human response to a problem - kill something or failing that make it suffer. Hardly a kingdom of heaven on earth.
You are suggesting going through His words and selecting what is necessary and discarding what is not.
Okay. Now when I go through His words with this process is the result going to be that ONLY things which I like to hear are "necessary" ?
Because if this is the case, I have to tell you based on what I know about myself - I have a vested interest in discarding a few things as not necessary because they interrupt my agenda to live exactly as I WANT to live with no interference from God.
If I look back over my life of over 60 years, I have to tell you, there are some things in which I am quite happy God would not interfere. I don't trust myself to be really equitable about this. I suspect that some things God would say kind of rub my fur the wrong way, if you know what I mean.
Like, I know me.
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19 Jan 19
1 edit
@sonship
I listened to most of the other parts to the four parts of Derek Princes message. I don't recommend them as much here. I thought the first message only was the best help. The reasons I won't discuss now.
The Structure of Satan's KIngdom was the best of the four IMO.
19 Jan 19
@sonship saidYou agree with the bits of what this guy said that you agree with, but the reasons why you don't agree with bits of what this guy said are, for now, secret?
I listened to most of the other parts to the four parts of Derek Princes message. I don't recommend them as much here. I thought the first message only was the best help. The reasons I won't discuss now.
Is his 'expertise' on this matter reliable or do you only recommend his expertise when it coincides with what you believe, making his expertise only partially reliable in your view?
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19 Jan 19
@fmf saidArrow-splittingly on target.
You agree with the bits of what this guy said that you agree with, but the reasons why you don't agree with bits of what this guy said are, for now, secret?
Is his 'expertise' on this matter reliable or do you only recommend his expertise when it coincides with what you believe, making his expertise only partially reliable in your view?