If? LOL!!
The correct interpretation of the often misinterpreted verse by UR folk, I share here:
1 Corinthians 15:22
Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life.
Just checked this out in my PC Study Bible, pulling the first commentary on the list, Barnes' Notes:
"If this passage means, that in Adam, or by him, all people became sinners, then the correspondent declaration 'all shall be made alive' must have reference to the words 'all die,' and must affirm the co-relative and opposite fact. If the phrase 'all die' there means all become sinners, then the phrase 'all be made alive' must mean all shall be made holy, or be recovered from their spiritual death; and thus an obvious argument is furnished for the doctrine of universal salvation, which it is difficult, if not impossible, to meet. It is not a sufficientanswer to this to say that the word 'all,' in the latter part of the sentence, means all the elect, or all the righteous; for its most natural and obvious meaning is, that is is co-extensive with the word 'all' in the former part of the verse."
Are you aware that God
does know who will accept His only begotten Son and those that will not, no matter what? An example of this is the parable about the rich man and Lazarus. The rich man was in torment and oh so thirsty. He implored that someone be sent back to warn his kin of their coming doom...and He was told that if his kin did not believe the prophets, what makes him think they'd believe a new messenger?
Here's the bottom line. God is aware that there are those that will never seek His face, seek His heart, and not be motivated by a heart that cries out to Him and therefore does not respond to the provision that Jesus Christ provided. He knows that there are those who will attempt to use Him, as a means to an end, but have no love for Him whatsoever in their heart. It is to them these words are for: "Depart from me for I never knew you."
He is extending every opportunity for those that seek Him because somewhere deep inside they are drawn to Him and seek His heart...to find Him through Jesus the Christ. That is the reason He tells us He is long-suffering....to bring His lost ones home, to Him, to His arms.
There will come a day at His appointed time that His grace will no longer strive with man. The door will be closed. Just as in the days of Noah, and just as with Sodom and Gomorrah, destruction will have its say. It is hungry and being held back by God's grace, and only that. Satan is not going down without taking someone with him. The bottom line here is that there are those that love this world and will continue to love this world till their dying breath leaves their body and they return to the dust from whence they came. Grace has ended for them.
I wrote a piece on what eternal seperation from God must be like...i'll try to find it....but in the meantime, i believe that there is an unquenchable regret, and the excruciating pain of remembering God, Abba, and Who He really is...and remember that He once sang over us with singing....and if you've ever been homesick, multiply that by a trillion, and the part where we see now as through a glass darkly? That is removed...we see clear as a bell....and we see Who we have rejected...we remember Him....we see how we embraced sin and not Him...we see the wickedness in our own hearts.....we are incxonsolable...it is lost...we see the cost...we see that we have, in essence, condemned ourselves...
Fiery murmurings, skulls and bones
darkly moving shadowy groans
pits of bondage
howls of pain
haunting sorrows
gnawing shame
hope is gone
all is lost
what a pity
what a cost
to cast aside the grace
that would've saved you
from this place
the above are what many of us would attempt to escape through suicide perhaps....
only thing, it doesn't work there
there is no escape
all that we have ever feared, been repulsed by or has caused us pain will be revisited there.
there is no forgetting
no fuzziness
no tuning out
nothing but
glaring
stark
cla-ri-ty
with
nothing
to
numb
all
that
claims
us
for-
ever-
and-
ever.
i'll try to find that piece i wrote.
be back.