Everyone goes to hell, right?

[workmx]

By definition? You're using faulty logic again. Your conclusion that God is not all-loving does not follow from the reality that not everyone gets saved. Those who reject salvation do so freely.

God cannot be all loving. If gods was all loving, it would not create humans that defy it.

You cannot have it both ways, either god is all loving or god does not send people to hell.

Who's asking you to defend Christian doctrine? I'm just asking you a logical question. For some reason, you feel confident enough to assert that it isn't fair that somebody gets infinitely punished for a finite crime, but you can't seem to figure out whether it's fair if somebody gets infinitely rewarded for a finite good deed.

I never mentioned fairness.

I said an all loving god would not infinitely punish a finite crime.

If that god does, then that god is not all loving.

In fact, that god is likely an immoral monster.

According to christian doctrine, it really is simple:

1. God creates humans.
2. God gives them the gifts of free will, large brains and reason.
3. God punishes those who use the gifts that it gave them (to reach the conclusion that there is no evidence for the existence of gods).
4. So, either that god does not love all or does not want us to use the gifts that it gave us.
5. In the second case, why give us those gifts? If it does not want us to fail and be sent to hell, don't give us the gifts.
6. If god deliberately gives us these gifts, then punishs us for using them, that god is an immoral monster.

QED.

 

[Joshua260]

By the way, many of my questions are still unanswered, like:

Why love a god that sends people to hell?

The unsaved freely choose to reject God's offer of salvation.

You are saying that the finite infraction of "rejecting" god deserves infinte punishment, right?

No, I've been saying that people who go to hell because they made a decision to reject God's offer of salvation. You have free will, but you don't always have free will. For example, you can choose whether or not to jump out a window, but after you do, you no longer have a choice.

So, you see why I state that your question is a deflection (it is clear that it is a trap and even more clear is that it is a deflection from the OP, which is about hell).

a trap? seriously? My question was not a deflection at all, but related directly to your assertion. I was testing out your resolve to defend your logical bias by proposing the opposite scenario and then see if you were just as willing to assert the opposite conclusion.

 

[workmx]

The unsaved freely choose to reject God's offer of salvation.

But god created free will. Why do that, if it leads to damnation for some?

If god creates free will and does not want us to use it, that god is a dictator.

If god gives us free will and punishes us for using it, that god is immoral.

No, I've been saying that people who go to hell because they made a decision to reject God's offer of salvation. You have free will, but you don't always have free will. For example, you can choose whether or not to jump out a window, but after you do, you no longer have a choice.

So, god is not omniscient then?

Free will and god's omniscience are imcompatible.

If we can freely choose, god cannot know what we will choose.

If god knows what we will choose, we do not have free will.

All that aside: I have not seen any evidence that free will even exists.

a trap? seriously? My question was not a deflection at all, but related directly to your assertion. I was testing out your resolve to defend your logical bias by proposing the opposite scenario and then see if you were just as willing to assert the opposite conclusion.

I have answered the question, so why persist.

My only reposnse is: I do not know.

Your presistence with that line clearly demonstrates that it is a deflection from the real issue: hell.

 

[dcalling]

Some accuracy is important here: I said



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcJxRqTs5nk

You missed my point "Even if morality is common in other mammals, how does that prove morality is not from supernatural?"

 

[workmx]

You missed my point "Even if morality is common in other mammals, how does that prove morality is not from supernatural?"

I don't have to prove it.

I just answered your question.

Please do me the courtesy of doing the same.

You said it comes from the supernatural.

So convince me that it does.

 

[dcalling]

I don't have to prove it.

I just answered your question.

Please do me the courtesy of doing the same.

You said it comes from the supernatural.

So convince me that it does.

I answered your question too, just you don't believe me or you can't understand.

It is not my job to convince you, I only present my evidence (as you do yours) and it is up to you to understand that evidence.

 

[workmx]

I answered your question too, just you don't believe me or you can't understand.

It is not my job to convince you, I only present my evidence (as you do yours) and it is up to you to understand that evidence.

I have no seen any reasonable evidence presented.


Okay...

What convinced you that absolute morality came from the supernatural?

 

[Usus Vox Tractus]

Free will and god's omniscience are imcompatible.

If we can freely choose, god cannot know what we will choose.

If god knows what we will choose, we do not have free will.

All that aside: I have not seen any evidence that free will even exists.

As I understand it: The Omniscience of The God is because of His surrounding and being at the center of infinite universes. It is not really a matter of God knowing what you are about to do but that God knows all possible choices.

You are freely constrained to navigate among your available choices to the level you are aware of your choices.

Freely constrained meaning you are constrained to biological upkeep and physical Law to retain the integrity of your physical vehicle.

With a physical vehicle you may accumulate time/space and matter. When you no longer have a physical vehicle you reap what you have sown. Your astral time/space wave form and contained information (collected in life) collapses into your soular particle. The universe then transports you according to your consolidated vibrational makeup.

 

[workmx]

As I understand it: The Omniscience of The God is because of His surrounding and being at the center of infinite universes. It is not really a matter of God knowing what you are about to do but that God knows all possible choices.

You are freely constrained to navigate among your available choices to the level you are aware of your choices.

Freely constrained meaning you are constrained to biological upkeep and physical Law to retain the integrity of your physical vehicle.

With a physical vehicle you may accumulate time/space and matter. When you no longer have a physical vehicle you reap what you have sown. Your astral time/space wave form and contained information (collected in life) collapses into your soular particle. The universe then transports you according to your consolidated vibrational makeup.

Got it, so the christian god is absolutely not omniscience then. Cool.

 

[Usus Vox Tractus]

Got it, so the christian god is absolutely not omniscience then. Cool.

Actually it is because GOD occupies the periphery, the center and the entire "floor" quantum field of every universe above and below in time and horizontally forever in space.

He knows all possibilities of choice... all choices that have already occurred or can occur. You are already known before you do anything, even if you do nothing.

 

[JohnRabbit]

All that aside: I have not seen any evidence that free will even exists.

you're "running" your mouth, right?

 

[Joshua260]

But god created free will. Why do that, if it leads to damnation for some?

This is one of those inconsistencies I often see in atheists. They don't want God to tell them how to live, yet they blame him for giving them free will. It sounds here as if you would rather not have been be given free will, is that correct?

If god creates free will and does not want us to use it, that god is a dictator.

I don't know anywhere where the bible teaches that God gave us the gift free will but does not want us to use it, In fact, in several places in the bible, He encourages us to "choose".

If god gives us free will and punishes us for using it, that god is immoral.

God does not punish us for exercising free-will choices. Again, we're in a fallen state, he offers a way out, and you refuse to accept it.

So, god is not omniscient then?

Free will and god's omniscience are imcompatible.

If we can freely choose, god cannot know what we will choose.

If god knows what we will choose, we do not have free will.

You're preaching fatalism here. I believe the bible supports the Molinist view much better, in which God's omniscience and Free Will are most definitely compatible. If you wish to explore that further, it deserves it's own thread.

I have answered the question, so why persist.

My only reposnse is: I do not know.

Your presistence with that line clearly demonstrates that it is a deflection from the real issue: hell.

No deflection at all. You made the assertion that it's not fair to infinitely punish a person for a finite bad deed, but you seem to be stumped in figuring out whether or not it's fair to reward a person infinitely for a finite good deed. I didn't expect you to profess to know the answer, but was only testing your resolve to support your atheistic bias. Sometimes, silence speaks volumes.

 

[workmx]

This is one of those inconsistencies I often see in atheists. They don't want God to tell them how to live, yet they blame him for giving them free will. It sounds here as if you would rather not have been be given free will, is that correct?

I did not make any positive claims.

I asked a question.

And you did not answer it.

So here it is again:

But god created free will. Why do that, if it leads to damnation for some?

Please anser this time, don't offer a strawman of "What the atheist does..." because you have no basis to know that.

I don't know anywhere where the bible teaches that God gave us the gift free will but does not want us to use it, In fact, in several places in the bible, He encourages us to "choose".

Okay. So the burden is on you to prove "free will" exists.

Awaiting the evidence.

God does not punish us for exercising free-will choices. Again, we're in a fallen state, he offers a way out, and you refuse to accept it.

So, god is not omnipotent or oniscient.

Got it. Thanks.

You're preaching fatalism here. I believe the bible supports the Molinist view much better, in which God's omniscience and Free Will are most definitely compatible. If you wish to explore that further, it deserves it's own thread.

I am asking questions.

Not preaching anything.

I doubt that an agnostic has anything to preach!

No deflection at all. You made the assertion that it's not fair to infinitely punish a person for a finite bad deed, but you seem to be stumped in figuring out whether or not it's fair to reward a person infinitely for a finite good deed. I didn't expect you to profess to know the answer, but was only testing your resolve to support your atheistic bias. Sometimes, silence speaks volumes.

No. I asked a question.

You seem to have trouble with the difference between questions and positive claims.

Do I need to exaplain it? (That is NOT a postitive claim BTW... See that question mark???)

 

[dcalling]

I have no seen any reasonable evidence presented.
Okay...

What convinced you that absolute morality came from the supernatural?

Physical world does not have morality, so morality must be from supernatural.

 

[workmx]

Physical world does not have morality, so morality must be from supernatural.

Did you not watch the De Wall video?

The pillars of mortality is very much in the natural world.

We have expereiental eveidence of that.

You still have to demonstrate all thoise premises if you want to claim that mortaility comes from the supernatural.

I have not forgotten.

Despite all your handwaving.

 

[workmx]

Anyway, let's keep things on track:

This thread is about hell not morality.

We have a thread for that: http://www.christianforums.com/t7833589-12/

To help with that, you could start with this question:

So here it is again:

But god created free will. Why do that, if it leads to damnation for some?

 

[aiki]

Cool. So god is not all loving.

Got it.

No, God is not all-loving. He would be an evil God if He was.

But god created free will. Why do that, if it leads to damnation for some?

It seems to me that God's omniscience allows Him to foresee not only what will be, but what would have been under different circumstances. This means, in part, that God could foresee which world out of all possible worlds would contain the greatest number of people who would freely choose to accept His offer of salvation. Since God is a loving, gracious God, it would be this world He would actualize. THe world in which we live, then, is the one world out of all possible worlds where the greatest number of people will freely choose to accept the gift of salvation and avoid damnation. God does good, then, in actualizing this maximally-redemptive world. Any other world would have had fewer saved people in it.

Why would God create a world where He knew some would freely choose to be damned? Because He knew there would be others in that world who would freely choose to be saved.

Selah.

 

[Ellwood3]

Jesus is very clear that he supports the 613 commandments from the Old Testament:



Given this is it clear that everyone who does not uphold every one of the 613 commandments only gets "heaven lite".

And if we do not uphold the 613 commandments and are less righteous than scribes and Pharisees, will go to hell.

This means that the less righteous who have not killed all the descendents of Amalek (Deut. 25:19) go to hell.

The less righteous who have at some stage been rebellious (Deut. 21:18) go to hell.

Same for anyone who failed to return a lost object (Deut. 22).

Or a man who has shaved his beard (Lev. 19:27) or head (Lev. 19:27).

Or failed to say the "Shema Yisrael" prayer twice daily (Deut. 6:7).

So, I am assuming that everyone goes to hell.

Is that correct?

Hello workmx,

Your question, workmx, deals with God sending us to the Lake of Fire. ,

You pose it as if saying, because Jesus takes the scriptures laws very seriously, and since we all break them, we all earn separation from God, and therefore there is no hope for anyone.

Jesus is our hope, and our future is in Him.

God’s plan brings salvation through His Son. Those who accept His sacrifice–for He bore our sins on the cross; was “made sin” on our behalf—are accepted by God through Grace, which is His gift, and which we are not entitled to, but which He freely gives to bring us into His family. God is seeking us to be His children.

2nd Corinthians chapter 5, verse 21 The Amplified Version:

21 For our sake He made Christ [virtually] to be sin Who knew no sin, so that in and through Him we might become [[g]endued with, viewed as being in, and examples of] the righteousness of God [what we ought to be, approved and acceptable and in right relationship with Him, by His goodness].

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Corinthians+5&version=AMP


Isaiah 53: 3-6 :
He is despised and rejected by men,
A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him;
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
4 Surely He has borne our griefs
And carried our sorrows;
Yet we esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But He was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
And by His stripes we are healed.
6 All we like sheep have gone astray;
We have turned, every one, to his own way;
And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+53&version=NKJV


God is not your spiritual enemy.

 

[Ellwood3]

God is not the enemy.

In the Gospel of Luke, in chapter 12, verses 49-50, the text puts Jesus’ words something like this: “I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened will it be accomplished?”

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+12+&version=NKJV

What on earth does that mean?

It sounds like he could be saying, ‘I am bringing the fire of judgment, and what do I care if it is already burning, because I have something to do, and I wish it were already completed.’

That is not what it means.

“This is only one of the hundreds of Hebraisms that lie hidden beneath the surface of the Greek texts of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke” writes Robert Lindsey from Israel in the Foreward of the book Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus: New Insights From a Hebraic Perspective by David Bivin and Roy Blizzard, Jr (revised edition).

They make a good case that the words of Jesus were originally spoken and understood in Hebrew. (Some say Aramaic, but in its first chapters the book makes its argument the New Testament was based on Hebrew. Some of the evidence is that when a difficult passage is put into Hebrew from the Greek, a Hebrew figure of speech is there, and that brings light to the actual meaning.)

The New Testament (meaning new covenant) is written in Greek, and translated into English and into other languages. But it’s original speakers were thinking and speaking in Hebrew.

There are figures of speech, called ‘idioms’ in English. Phrases like “raining cats and dogs” and “make hay while the sun shines” are two examples.

About this passage (Luke 12:49-50) above, the book Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus explains: “Literally, the Greek says, ‘And what I wish if already (it) has been set on fire.’”

But what does, ‘And what I wish if already (it) has been set on fire’ mean?

Does that mean Jesus wants us burnt up in judgment—and as soon as possible?

The authors say the word “what” also means “how” in Hebrew.

So the phrase becomes “And how I wish if already (it) has been set on fire.”

But what does ‘how I wish if already” mean?

Why is that word “if” there?

The “if” in this Hebraism (meaning Hebrew way of speaking), changes the phrase’s meaning to “How could I wish …”

So what is a better meaning of Luke 12 49-50, “I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened will it be accomplished”?

There is a giant gulf between how the text is translated and its actual meaning. It takes several pages in this book to go through the Hebraisms underlying the Greek that was translated into English.



The authors believe that its real meaning is that Jesus was saying something like this:

Jesus is saying His task is to set the world on fire, and that fire has already begun. There will someday be a final judgment. “… But I do not look forward to that Day of Judgment, that final moment—the moment of my Return—when men will no longer have a change to accept me as Lord. How could I wish for that! I am required to baptize the earth, to judge the world. That is the task I have been given by my Father. But in the meantime, until that judgment is complete, how difficult it is for me! How I agonize as some men decide to become my disciples, and others decide to reject my messianic claims.”

Understanding Hebraisms helps us see deeper into the text, and get past the translation problems.

Is God wanting men and women to perish? No. That is what the devil wants.

So, in answer to your question, were there any “unimportant” laws? No.

However, some laws were only for a period of time, and many had purposes not clear to us today, like wearing hair a certain way (to help distinguish those people in Israel for whom the laws were given, from their idol-worshipping and sometimes child-sacrificing neighbors—laws that helped them remain separate from their neighbors, which was an act of love).

Even such laws as those whose purpose is fulfilled are never removed from the Law—they are still in the Torah, but have fulfilled their purpose. Other moral laws (like do not murder) are summed up in loving one’s neighbor and loving God with all heart, soul and mind.

Matthew 22:40

37-40 Jesus answered him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind’. This is the first and great commandment. And there is a second like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’. The whole of the Law and the Prophets depends on these two commandments.”

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+22:40+&version=PHILLIPS

“The Law” is the first five books of the Old Testament of the Bible. It is NOT just the laws found in the text. “The Prophets” is most of the rest of the Old Testament. It’s saying to fulfill the commandments of the Old Testament—love God with all you have (the Shema of Deuteronomy) and love your neighbor as yourself, do that and the other laws are covered.

If you love your neighbor, you will not murder, will not steal.

As for the many laws, to disobey in even something small they were told to do was an act of rebellion.

Jesus is the Way to God. He did not come to get rid of the Law or the Prophets, He came to fulfill those scriptures. He is the fulfillment of the types—the symbols of a greater later fulfillment, like the Passover lamb. The sacrifice of their lambs could not take away people’s sins. The sacrifices pointed to the Messiah, “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the World” (book of the Gospel of John)

Verses 29 and 30:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+1&version=TLB

Jesus came so people could be justified (put in right standing with God), and sanctified (through the work of the Holy Spirit sent 10 days after Jesus ascended, become more and more like Christ, and ultimately to be “perfect” as His Father, so we can be in God’s presence with no more sinning). In the next lifetime, and throughout eternity, we who take God’s promises will have Jesus Christ’s purity.

It may not seem as easy or simple as having us as robots, loving God with no choice to do otherwise, and no chance of crimes against nature or God from the start, so consider what God has done: God has given human beings created in His own image, free will. We are not programmed to behave. He is also making a Way to give each person who chooses Him to have his or her sins taken care of (paid for, covered, blotted out by the sacrificial Lamb who is His Son) at extreme cost to Himself and His Son, so we all can be there eternally with Him, and still be in His presence after billions of years with no one sinning any more.

That is a process that took planning and sacrifice on God’s part. It may not be easy to believe or understand everything at once, but it also was not easy for God to accomplish for us.

These are spiritual realities.

The Bible tells us ask and keep asking, to seek and keep seeking. Matthew chapter 7, verses 7 – 9:

7 “Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.


https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew+7+&version=NLT


The Greek tense in the text means it isn’t just “ask once, seek once, knock once” but it is ask and keep on asking, seek and continue seeking, knock and continue knocking. Even those who trust in God need persistence.

Keep on seeking.

 

[dcalling]

Did you not watch the De Wall video?

The pillars of mortality is very much in the natural world.

We have expereiental eveidence of that.

What did that prove? If you can prove a stone or a computer program has morality, that will be something. It is very possible all living creatures (not only humans) has soul.
that

You still have to demonstrate all thoise premises if you want to claim that mortaility comes from the supernatural.

Already did, can a stone or a computer program have morality?

I have not forgotten.

Despite all your handwaving.

Not sure what do you mean by that.