Eternal conscience torment is a very sensitive point to me. I think I told you once about my nights as a small child laying in bed tormented by thoughts of agonizing in hell. It still brings back scary memories. I have studied this view and opposing ones and found some degree of relief, but when I see anyone presenting this view as if it is "fact", it upsets me.You said:
Quote:
I want you to know every time you are ready to defend the subject of eternality of torment in hell it upsets me very much.
Just me or anybody? May be a moot point, though, as I seem to be rather alone representing what might be called the "traditional view".
You are right. I wish everyone would be more careful in stating their views.Quote:
May I politely request that when you defend your view of the word aionios, you do it without asserting things which you are not the final authority on? Perhaps you could qualify your statements with something like "in my view", or "I believe".
Are you requesting this of me alone, any who support the traditional view, or both sides? (Have you not noticed?)
You can have your company of Christians. I believe most of the people waiting for the Messiah were "disappointed" with the one they got. And to be completely honest, Yes, I would be revolted by the god who allows most of his creation to be tormented for all eternity. Fortunately, I do not believe such a god exists.Quote:
After all, what you seem to be "defending" is the view that the unsaved will suffer for time without end. If this is not true, you may very well be attributing to God something which He might find very revolting (I know it is to me!).
If this is so, I am in company with most of Christianity. If it is true, would God be "revolting" to you? However it turns out, I am sure beyond doubt that God will do what is just.
What does that have to do with anything? Either the arguments presented are valid or not.Quote:
For a lengthy treatment of this word: Aion
Interesting, but written from a universalist viewpoint.
The more I study the Bible, the less I think it is clear on many of the things "traditional" Christianity holds as clear. But then again, there are so many "traditional" denominations, all thinking "they" have it right.There is a bigger issue involved in this matter, IMHO. Do you believe in the perspicuity of the New Testament? That, at least in its important teachings, ordinary people who diligently study can understand the message? After all, this matter is as basic as it gets, Hebrews 6:2. When it is insisted that the Greek word aionios never means eternal, and any ordinary student of the scriptures realizes it is the adjective used about nine times more often to describe the future state of the saved than it is to describe the state of the lost, any reasonable person ought to see the great damage that can be done to the hope of those who are trying to follow Jesus. A system is promoted where the lost are never permanently lost and the saved can have no certainty they are permanently saved.
I guess I am not a "reasonable" person. I do not need the word aionios to mean eternal for me to trust that God will bring the universe He created to a just and glorious fulfillment. I again am having trouble following your reasoning. If God promises that one day He will be all in all, and every knee will bow down and give glory to Him and His Son, why do I need aionios to tell me that I am secure? If God demonstrated His love for me in that while I was His enemy, His Son died for me, why do I need aionios to mean eternal to trust Him?
I must add that my own view of hell is that the "fire" is a metaphor for something else (not a happy place), but that is another subject. And I will be perfectly happy if I am wrong about the permanent state of the lost. I do have the definate impression that the overriding reason the universalist position is advocated is a philosophical one. There is not one unambiguous statement in scripture in support of it.
Can I rephrase that last statement for you? "In your opinion, there is not one unambiguous statement in scripture in support of it." I think I could say the same thing regarding the eternal conscience torment view.
And what is wrong with philosophical reasons for holding to one view over another? Is that not one of the ways we reason things out? It is one of the reasons I hold to the view that the Bible is authoritative. I "reason" that if God truly loved His creation, He would try to communicate to it on a plan for living a successful life. The most "reasonable" document I find is the Bible.
If the Bible told me that God loved all His creation, yet He made it in such a way that all persons who lived their life following the course of least resistance He was going to torture through all eternity without any chance of paroll, I would find that to be a contradiction.
I think the universalist view has both scriptural support and is the most reasonable picture of the kind of God presented in the Bible. It allows me to reconcile the difficult passages you love to bring up (for example, the Amalekites) with a God who does not show personal favoritism. Believing that we are the first fruits, and that in the ages to come we will be working to spread the "eternal" gospel (there's that word again) to those who have yet to embrace it, makes so much more sense.
To believe that God would put His creation in an environment where it is soooooo easy to be deceived, where there are actually spiritual beings whose whole purpose is to lead us into being deceived, where our natural tendency is to follow the wrong path (sinfulness), and then punish us enrelentingly throughout eternity for not getting it right, for not choosing the "difficult" path, just makes absolutely no sense to me. Yes, such a god would be revolting to me, and I do not think I could believe in this god.
But, actually, I think God had a better idea.
In Christ's Love,
Mike
