Aionion is not Eternal, Everlasting or Forever

hey van.

Since the passage no where refers to the age to come, perhaps John 3:16 means that folks who have eternal life never perish, but live forever with God.

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Perhaps, but what about other contextual issues, such as style and genre? Didn't Jesus often preach of the coming age wherein He would reign over the Kingdom of heaven?

To say shall not perish, means shall not perish with the others in the age to come is simply adding to scripture to avoid the obvious.

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I disagree.

Now if one tries to redefine the kingdom of God as the age to come, one must sidestep the thief who on that day was in Paradise with Jesus.

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I am only suggesting that Jesus, in verses like John 3:36, was speaking of things that would occur in the age to come when He rules over the Kingdom. As for what Jesus told the thief, I'm not sure I see how this contradicts the notion that those who perish will perish only for the Kingdom age.

Sounds like folks enter the kingdom of God when they physically die in the current age. In fairness to scripture one must admit that the kingdom of God includes anyplace God exercises kingship, such as the future kingdom of God where Jesus rules from David's throne, but to exclude the kingdom of heaven where we are seated spiritually with Christ once we are "in Christ" seems silly.

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I am only suggesting that, in John 3:36 and the like, Jesus is referring to the time when He reigns from the throne of David. Just a possibility that I want to consider.

At the end of the day, the only valid way to look at John 3:16 is to say those that believe in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. And this eternal life never ends for we do not perish, and the eternal kingdom never ends.

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I agree that your second sentence is manifestly true, but I don't yet see how this truth is to be gotten from John 3:36.

Perhaps, but what about other contextual issues, such as style and genre

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There are no contextual issues which impinge upon John 3:16 clearly demonstrating that eternal means never to perish, forever.

Van, it looks like you've got your mind set. I'm not quite there yet, which is why I find it beneficial to discuss these matters.

CCWoody said:

That's funny cause my Greek dictionary of words notes the following concering the Matthew 25 verse (I picked that one because it was a verse from my devotion study from last night) that the definition of the word is:

eternal, for ever, everlasting, world

It does seem pretty clear that you are just redefining words for your own convenience. Perhaps, instead of forcing your own definitions upon the Bible, you should study what accepted scholarship has to say about the meanings of words. Then, after you know what the Bible says, you can study for yourself to learn what it all means.

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If aionios, the adjective of aion is without beginning and ending ,can you tell us CC. what pro aionios cronos means?


He is the agent and the goal of all creation. He exists before anything else, and everything else holds together in Him. His church is His body, and He is its head. He is its beginning, for He was the first to return from the dead, which means that there is no part of the universe in which the topmost place is not His, for by God's own decision God in all His completeness made His home in Him. More, it was God's decision to effect an act of universal reconciliation to Himself of everything in heaven and on earth, and it was through His death on the cross that God did bring the whole universe into a right relationship with Himself. -Dr. Wm. Barclay N.T.