A Weblog Dedicated to the Discussion of the Christian Faith and 21st Century Life
A Weblog Dedicated to the Discussion of the Christian Faith and 21st Century Life ___ I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I believe, –that unless I believed, I should not understand.-- St. Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109)
In a sense, what Calvinists do is an attempt to square some reasonable thoughts that aren't so weird even though the justification becomes weird as noted by this post.
(A) Will God do all His good pleasure? Yes. Is it God's will no man perish? Yes. Is God's will greater in power than our's? Yes.
Since they agree with that and like most western Christians, believe in the (B)eternal hell/eternal bliss dichotomy, they have to figure a way for (A) to be true and yet some still "go to hell".
Thus, they come up with these torturous definitions.
I think we need to re-examine this dichotomy as a church universal myself.
I am not a historian, I have been told for 5 centuries after Christ the church did not buy into this eternal hell idea though.
All language requires interpretation. The birth of Jesus WAS (and is) good news for all people. Not all people then (or since) TAKE it as good news. Herod certainly didn't.
(Yes, I know I'm picking on a different point than the believer in a Limited Atonement.)
3 comments:
That's hilarious.
In a sense, what Calvinists do is an attempt to square some reasonable thoughts that aren't so weird even though the justification becomes weird as noted by this post.
(A) Will God do all His good pleasure? Yes. Is it God's will no man perish? Yes. Is God's will greater in power than our's? Yes.
Since they agree with that and like most western Christians, believe in the (B)eternal hell/eternal bliss dichotomy, they have to figure a way for (A) to be true and yet some still "go to hell".
Thus, they come up with these torturous definitions.
I think we need to re-examine this dichotomy as a church universal myself.
I am not a historian, I have been told for 5 centuries after Christ the church did not buy into this eternal hell idea though.
All language requires interpretation. The birth of Jesus WAS (and is) good news for all people. Not all people then (or since) TAKE it as good news. Herod certainly didn't.
(Yes, I know I'm picking on a different point than the believer in a Limited Atonement.)
Richard,
Here's a good one to think on.
"In Adam, all die, in Christ, all live"(my paraphrase).
Literarily, if we take all literally relating to Adam, we should for Christ. Same sentence, same idea.
Yet, we don't, we qualify it for Christ to those who believe w/o seeing Christ resurrected.
Yet, Paul, Thomas and James got the benefit of seeing Christ post resurrection, then believing.
No being argumentative, but, theologically, eternal hell is open to legitimate questions, IMO.
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