God loves everyone

[Not David]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

 

[HTacianas]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

Calvinism has it that before time began, God predestined, absolutely, each individual to either salvation or condemnation.

If we examine this, when God made His promise to Abraham to make his descendants into a nation, we must assume that God had predestined the descendants of Abraham to become a nation from before time. There is no other way to look at it.

Yet when the descendants of Abraham rebelled against God and worshipped the golden calf, God changed His mind, swore to destroy the descendants of Abraham, and build His nation from the descendants of Moses. As a descendant of Abraham, Moses' descendants as a nation would fulfill God's promise, but what happened to the predestination of the Israelites?

At the prayer of Moses God relented and allowed most of the Israelites to live, but destroyed many of them. We see then that the absolute predistination of Calvin cannot possibly be true, and in fact it is embarrassingly false.

 

[nonaeroterraqueous]

Three assertions are made, generally, by Christians:

1. God loves everyone.
2. God can save anyone.
3. God's love never ends.

Only two of the above statements can be true at the same time if we assume that there are some who will not be saved (which is to say that we are not universalists). If God loves everyone, and if God can save everyone he loves, and if God does not change his mind about his love, then everyone will be saved. We know that not everyone will be saved, therefore the above logic cannot be entirely true.

If we say that God loves everyone and that he can save anyone, but we reject the third option, then it becomes possible for God's love to fail, perhaps at the moment of death, causing souls to perish. Unfortunately, it means that we who ultimately are saved remain forever in jeopardy of him changing his mind.

If we say that God loves everyone and that his love never ends, but we reject the second option, then it means that God is powerless to save some, who ultimately perish. This denies his omnipotence, and it leaves us with a hand-wringing God who's too ashamed to admit that he can't handle the challenge.

If, however, we say that God's love never fails and has no end, and that he has the full power to save those whom he loves, then we must reject the first option, or else all souls would be saved.

So we're left with a choice from these possibilities:

1. God was lying about Hell, and no one really goes there.
2. God is fickle. Somewhere along the course of eternity he can, and probably eventually will, change his mind and condemn us.
3. God is weak. He can't do a darned thing about saving some of us.
4. God doesn't love everyone.

The Calvinistic choice is number four. You may not like it, but the logical alternatives are much worse. Most likely you thought to assert some other option that wins from every angle, but there is no such option. If you thought to embrace the notion that God loves everyone forever and can save anyone (but doesn't), then you embrace a logical contradiction, and your position has no merit.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

Reformed believers have always affirmed what is called; "common grace", and every Christian affirming the doctrine of creation affirms God created mankind in His image. So you'll need to be more specific by what you mean by "loves" and "everyone". Is this a temporal "love"? On the "goal of destruction", is this a denial of God having not knowledge of everyone's final destination? Some clarification would help.

 

[bekkilyn]

Ah yes, the idea that God created a bunch of people for the sole purpose of condemning and eternally torturing them.

 

[Not David]

Three assertions are made, generally, by Christians:

1. God loves everyone.
2. God can save anyone.
3. God's love never ends.

Only two of the above statements can be true at the same time if we assume that there are some who will not be saved (which is to say that we are not universalists). If God loves everyone, and if God can save everyone he loves, and if God does not change his mind about his love, then everyone will be saved. We know that not everyone will be saved, therefore the above logic cannot be entirely true.

If we say that God loves everyone and that he can save anyone, but we reject the third option, then it becomes possible for God's love to fail, perhaps at the moment of death, causing souls to perish. Unfortunately, it means that we who ultimately are saved remain forever in jeopardy of him changing his mind.

If we say that God loves everyone and that his love never ends, but we reject the second option, then it means that God is powerless to save some, who ultimately perish. This denies his omnipotence, and it leaves us with a hand-wringing God who's too ashamed to admit that he can't handle the challenge.

If, however, we say that God's love never fails and has no end, and that he has the full power to save those whom he loves, then we must reject the first option, or else all souls would be saved.

So we're left with a choice from these possibilities:

1. God was lying about Hell, and no one really goes there.
2. God is fickle. Somewhere along the course of eternity he can, and probably eventually will, change his mind and condemn us.
3. God is weak. He can't do a darned thing about saving some of us.
4. God doesn't love everyone.

The Calvinistic choice is number four. You may not like it, but the logical alternatives are much worse. Most likely you thought to assert some other option that wins from every angle, but there is no such option. If you thought to embrace the notion that God loves everyone forever and can save anyone (but doesn't), then you embrace a logical contradiction, and your position has no merit.

What about God giving people freedom to choose him? God also doesn't want anyone to commit adultery but he doesn't stop us. Does it mean there is no sovereign?

 

[Not David]

Reformed believers have always affirmed what is called; "common grace", and every Christian affirming the doctrine of creation affirms God created mankind in His image. So you'll need to be more specific by what you mean by "loves" and "everyone". Is this a temporal "love"? On the "goal of destruction", is this a denial of God having not knowledge of everyone's final destination? Some clarification would help.

Knowledge doesn't mean he will by his own merits save some

 

[dqhall]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

I remember the parables.
The gem merchant went to a ruby mine to look at batches of rubies for sale. Some are the size of peas, opaque, reddish brown, dull and full of flaws and cracks. They are worth about as much as common brook pebbles to a gem merchant. Maybe an industrial abrasive firm might buy them by the ton as rubies and sapphires (corundum) are as hard as anything other than diamonds. The gem merchant was looking for something bright red, clear, adamantine, flawless, without a crack, large, and cheap. He/she might not buy a ruby for a long time until finding one of great value at a reasonable price.

I sometimes pondered the fate of trillions of ants. I watched them laboring when I was a boy. They carried loads all day long going to and from their nests underground. Bees were set on going from flower to flower with yellow pollen in sacks on their legs. They were not loafing. I do not know if God will save insects. I think it less likely God would save trillions of bacteria and viruses, or grains of sand on a beach forever. God may create or destroy things.

I think God called to people for help and those who heeded their calling were of more value to God than those who turned aside to do other things.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

Knowledge doesn't mean he will by his own merits save some

What do we call in a court of law someone who has knowledge of another person's crime? All they have is "knowledge", but...help me finish the sentence.

 

[Hillsage]

Knowledge doesn't mean he will by his own merits save some

Would that include that include Saul/Paul who, after God knocked him down by the power of the Holy Spirit, spoke audibly to him?

 

[Not David]

Would that include that include Saul/Paul who, after God knocked him down by the power of the Holy Spirit, spoke audibly to him?

I'm talking in the sense that he allows only some to be saved.

 

[ClementofA]

What about God giving people freedom to choose him? God also doesn't want anyone to commit adultery but he doesn't stop us. Does it mean there is no sovereign?

The same argument applies:

Three assertions are made, generally, by Christians:

1. God loves everyone.
2. God can save anyone.
3. God's love never ends.

Only two of the above statements can be true at the same time if we assume that there are some who will not be saved (which is to say that we are not universalists). If God loves everyone, and if God can save everyone he loves, and if God does not change his mind about his love, then everyone will be saved.

From 1-3 above it follows that

4. God didn't create anyone capable of ever becoming unsavable
5. God will continue to seek & to save the lost postmortem
6. Love Omnipotent will continue to seek & to save the lost in Hades & the LOF ("hell").
7. God didn't predestine anyone to be lost forever
8. God didn't foreknow anyone would be lost forever
9. God has made it impossible that anyone could reject Him forever
10. God will continue to seek & to save the lost till the last lost one is saved.

Love Omnipotent has all eternity to wait & keep trying to save people. And given His willingness & ability to draw men to Himself an infinite number of times through eternity, it is mathematically impossible for anyone to reject Him an infinite number of times. Each time the man has a free choice to choose or reject God there is a chance he will choose God. Given an infinite number of such chances, the odds are impossible that he will not eventually choose God. So all will be saved.

"God is the grand master playing chess and we are the 5 year old rookie. Theoretically we are "free" to win the chess game, it is possible. No not really in the libertarian sense - it is unlikely to the point of virtual zero. in other words, God will always get His way, despite our best efforts not to be saved."

------------------------

“He does not save men by arbitrary force. He saves by their wills, through moral influence. God has resources in his universe, the all conquering agencies of love, to make the unwilling soul willing! He has light enough to make the blind see, and love enough to melt the hardened heart.” -Quillen Hamilton Shinn

“How ironic that those who believe God will not violate the ‘free ’will of man have no problem believing He will violate His own free will—that all men should be saved!” - David Nuckols

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"God did not leave anything to chance, he's not a gambler he's an investor and that investment reaps dividends every time, if it takes a fundamentalist eternity to so."

"Who is stronger? Man with his free will or God who will have all men to be saved?"

According to the Bible mercy will triumph over judgement.

Love will conquer all.

https://www.christianforums.com/thr...-torments-were-true-is-god-a-monster.8042349/

Proof for the Teaching of Christian, Biblical Universalism:
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/unique_proof_for_universalism.html

 

[Not David]

The same argument applies:



From 1-3 above it follows that

4. God didn't create anyone capable of ever becoming unsavable
5. God will continue to seek & to save the lost postmortem
6. Love Omnipotent will continue to seek & to save the lost in Hades & the LOF ("hell").
7. God didn't predestine anyone to be lost forever
8. God didn't foreknow anyone would be lost forever
9. God has made it impossible that anyone could reject Him forever
10. God will continue to seek & to save the lost till the last lost one is saved.

Love Omnipotent has all eternity to wait & keep trying to save people. And given His willingness & ability to draw men to Himself an infinite number of times through eternity, it is mathematically impossible for anyone to reject Him an infinite number of times. Each time the man has a free choice to choose or reject God there is a chance he will choose God. Given an infinite number of such chances, the odds are impossible that he will not eventually choose God. So all will be saved.

"God is the grand master playing chess and we are the 5 year old rookie. Theoretically we are "free" to win the chess game, it is possible. No not really in the libertarian sense - it is unlikely to the point of virtual zero. in other words, God will always get His way, despite our best efforts not to be saved."

------------------------

“He does not save men by arbitrary force. He saves by their wills, through moral influence. God has resources in his universe, the all conquering agencies of love, to make the unwilling soul willing! He has light enough to make the blind see, and love enough to melt the hardened heart.” -Quillen Hamilton Shinn

“How ironic that those who believe God will not violate the ‘free ’will of man have no problem believing He will violate His own free will—that all men should be saved!” - David Nuckols

-----------------


"God did not leave anything to chance, he's not a gambler he's an investor and that investment reaps dividends every time, if it takes a fundamentalist eternity to so."

"Who is stronger? Man with his free will or God who will have all men to be saved?"

According to the Bible mercy will triumph over judgement.

Love will conquer all.

https://www.christianforums.com/thr...-torments-were-true-is-god-a-monster.8042349/

Proof for the Teaching of Christian, Biblical Universalism:
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/unique_proof_for_universalism.html

“How ironic that those who believe God will not violate the ‘free ’will of man have no problem believing He will violate His own free will—that all men should be saved!” -
Like I said, there is a difference between a will of desiring something to happen and a will of doing it. God doesn't want us to sin but we still do it!

 

[ClementofA]

Like I said, there is a difference between a will of desiring something to happen and a will of doing it. God doesn't want us to sin but we still do it!

How does that address or refute this:

"Three assertions are made, generally, by Christians:

1. God loves everyone.
2. God can save anyone.
3. God's love never ends.

Only two of the above statements can be true at the same time if we assume that there are some who will not be saved (which is to say that we are not universalists). If God loves everyone, and if God can save everyone he loves, and if God does not change his mind about his love, then everyone will be saved."

https://www.tentmaker.org/books/hope_beyond_hell.pdf

 

[lesliedellow]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

God is both omnipotent and omniscient. Since he is omniscient, he must have known Jack Smith’s fate when he created him. If he didn’t like what he foresaw, he could have used his omnipotence to arrange things differently. He didn’t. Therefore, whatever Jack Smith’s eternal destiny, God must have willed it, or at least approved of it.

That is before you even get on to the repeated and numerous biblical references to predestination, of course.

The only way out of that is Open Theism, in which God doesn’t know the future, but that gets you into all sorts of theological trouble, and undermines the very foundations of Christian theology.

 

[Hillsage]

I'm talking in the sense that he allows only some to be saved.

And I'm talking in the sense that if He would have knocked my dad on his butt and spoke audibly to him, he would have said YES LORD...just like Paul did. But HE didn't do that for my dad. Because my dad wasn't "predestined, called, chosen or ordained to believe" by God in this vapor of a mist age my dad lived in. Paul was, and it wasn't as another said because God is omniscient. That is FOREKNOWLEDGE in scripture and not PREDESTINATION. I believe my dad will say yes in the age to come.

 

[drich0150]

I am not suggesting God must save everyone. However, I am refuting the idea of Calvinists that God made some people with the goal of destruction. I want to hear any opposing arguments.

John 3:16 comes to mind to the conditionality of God's love. In the God love is bing enough to save the world, but is restricted or reserved to only those whom believe

Then almost all of Jesus parables have to do with separating what belong to him and what belongs to satan.. Wheat and chaff, wheat and weeds, good seed bad seed, sheep and goats. trees that bear fruit those who do not.. All center around taking the good in and destroying the bad.

Proverbs 16 has a list of the type of people God Hates:
16 The Lord hates these seven things:
17 eyes that show pride,
tongues that tell lies,
hands that kill innocent people,
18 hearts that plan evil things to do,
feet that run to do evil,
19 witnesses in court who tell lies,
and anyone who causes family members to fight.

they are more thoroughly explained here:
https://www.gotquestions.org/seven-things-God-hates.html

Now couple these things God hates and center them in on an unrepentant heart and you have a target of God's wrath. God is not a psychopath He does not love what he sets apart to destroy, I love you but will see you to Hell to burn until your second death..

 

[Hillsage]

“How ironic that those who believe God will not violate the ‘free ’will of man have no problem believing He will violate His own free will—that all men should be saved!” -

I disagree, I believe that His free will is going to trump our free will so that it IS OUR WILL, just like He did with Paul. When it's 'your turn' you WILL believe because you will have been CALLED by the "my word which PROCEEDETH" (present tense) from my mouth." And when you HEAR that word/RHEMA spoken, you will have the faith to repent and believe.

2TI 2:25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant that they will repent and come to know the truth,

ROM 10:17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word/rhema of God.

When you HEAR His CALL you WILL WILLINGLY believe. No violation of your 'free will'.

Like I said, there is a difference between a will of desiring something to happen and a will of doing it. God doesn't want us to sin but we still do it!

Doesn't want us to sin???? And yet scripture says;

ROM 5:20 The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more,

IOW, no amount of increasing sin can ever exceed the super 'abounding grace of God' to save one and all.

 

[Hillsage]

John 3:16 comes to mind to the conditionality of God's love. In the God love is bing enough to save the world, but is restricted or reserved to only those whom believe

2TI 2:25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant that they will repent and come to know the truth,
I would say that "repent and come to know the truth" is equal to your "believe" litmus. A litmus which this scripture doesn't 'negate', but it certainly 'elaborates' as to the plan of God, in spite of the failures of man.

Then almost all of Jesus parables have to do with separating what belong to him and what belongs to satan.. Wheat and chaff, wheat and weeds, good seed bad seed, sheep and goats. trees that bear fruit those who do not.. All center around taking the good in and destroying the bad.

Your truth limited. God's provision elucidated;

2TI 2:26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.

I'd say the promise above even pertains to the saved and still very sinful, church.

Now couple these things God hates and center them in on an unrepentant heart and you have a target of God's wrath. God is not a psychopath He does not love what he sets apart to destroy, I love you but will see you to Hell to burn until your second death..

But, when coupled with 'God perhaps GRANTING that they come to know the truth'; still leaves your fate in His hand ultimately. So, for me, it's simply a question as to the time of your "calling". The nominal church belief is it's now in this life or never, His 'plan in the ages to come' is not in agreement.

 

[Not David]

How does that address or refute this:

"Three assertions are made, generally, by Christians:

1. God loves everyone.
2. God can save anyone.
3. God's love never ends.

Only two of the above statements can be true at the same time if we assume that there are some who will not be saved (which is to say that we are not universalists). If God loves everyone, and if God can save everyone he loves, and if God does not change his mind about his love, then everyone will be saved."

https://www.tentmaker.org/books/hope_beyond_hell.pdf

Yeah God loves everyone but he won't force anyone to love him.
"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing."
You, like Calvinists, ignore the fact that God gave us free will to love him or not.