douglas

Are you being facetious? The bible is one glaring contradiction after another. Do you agree with this?

I don't see your point. In Matthew it's a wedding banquet and in Luke it's a feast. What difference does it make if it's wedding banquet or a great dinner? And you are wrong on it being about "disciples of Christ." It's a description of the kingdom of heavan.

Bank on it, eh? Wow! Since you put it that way, TonyN, sign me up?:Cheeky: Try making "God doesn't exist" and "the bible is fiction" your major thesis, then see how things "fall in to place."

Johnny Skeptic

While the Bible disagrees with Tony, I think that we should at least give him some credit for believing that God is much more merciful than the majority of Christians believe he is. Tony is a noticeable improvement over most of the Christians who I have debated.

Tony, what exactly are you trying to convince people of at this forum?

Aren't you more of a universalist than a Christian?

maddog

Then it is absolutely unnecessary for anyone to follow any religion or religious doctrine at all. The Christians can stop putting that separatist label on themselves and stop chivvying everyone/anyone else. No need for churches or preachers or any of it. Good!
#1492 ETA: my Christopher Columbus post!

ziffel

I've thought about this, and I agree that he is an improvement. I still see him as a cherry-picker of scriptures, but almost anyone would need to cherry pick and have a strange interpretation of the bible, since the bible does contradict itself so often.

Tony seems to have adopted a god who is logically consistent with 'true mercy'. I kind of like this aspect of Tony's god. He makes more logical sense when it comes to the sacrifice of Christ, truly dying for all. However, I don't know why god had to go to all this trouble in the first place. A wise & omnipotent god could've arranged things better at the outset, than placing A&E in the garden and have them "fall" for the express purpose of being merciful in the end to all.

He could've just said .. "you ate the apple? doh! well, I forgive you". Instead we got a cursed world with endless misery.

ManIsGod

Come on johnny you know is no gods, whats the point?

sharon45

You are still reading into this since it just simply means everyone. Everyone is to be judged, not just leaders.

You just misunderstood what I put because a thousand years of being disciplined equals torture.

Besides still continuing to give your personal impression, you still haven't answered as to what happens next.
A thousand years of being disciplined is not merciful either.

You haven't already said it beforehand but now maybe you are at least willing to address it.
Which you fail because to don't bother with the key part matthew 7:23.

Assuming once again. Nowhere does that passage in whole matthew (7:21-23) say anything about these people being hypocrites. Jesus judges them harshly, but the real reason is unknown. Even still, they are clearly not part of the saved.

Assumptions, assumptions. As if it were even needing an explanation jesus already gives one anyway in matthew 13:36-43 which presents a striking division between the saved and the unsaved.

Like I actally see fire as being literal in the first place as though jesus is really talking about farming techniques. The Jews were being trapped in the hopeless situation of slavery which is another torture that god witnessed, this only for 400 years until he couldn't stand the innocent cries of his children any longer. Another fine example of the ultimate loving parent.

sharon45

That is the beauty of a contradiction, they can't be explained away. The gospels contradict paul and vice-versa.

This is just another explanation telling about the separation between the saved and the unsaved.

TonyN

Thank you Douglas. I'm sure I would be good at that game.

Please note that this judging occurrs when Christ comes back on the earth. It is not about heaven or hell. Matthew 25:31 concerns Christ judging the nations when He returns to the earth. It says nothing about this taking place in heaven.

Please also notice when the judging of the tares takes place:

Mat 13:39 Now the enemy who sows them is the Adversary. Now the harvest is the conclusion of the eon. Now the reapers are messengers.

The phrase "the harvest is the conclusion of the eon" is important. We are in "the eon" which is "the present wicked eon" (Gal.1:4). This eon we are in preceeds "the eon to come" . . . Mar 10:30 "who should not be getting back a hundredfold now, in this era, houses and brothers and sisters and mother and father and children and fields, with persecutions, and in the coming eon, life eonian."

The eon to come is the 1000 year eon or age.

Notice more:
Mat 13:41 The Son of Mankind shall be dispatching His messengers, and they shall be culling out of His kingdom all the snares and those doing lawlessness,

Surely you don't believe that "His kingdom" is "heaven" in the passage in question. How could all those sinners be in heaven that He is going to kick out?

So judgment begins at the house of the Lord where Christ casts out of the 1000 year kingdom all doing lawlessness. Then He judges nations as to their treatment of His brethren in Matthew 25:31-46.

The fire surely is figurative. Just as the furnace of fire in Egypt was figurative. Egypt was not a literal furnace of iron in which hundreds of thousands of Jews were held. Neither was Egypt on fire for 400 years. It is just that the hardships were like fire.
No, no one is enslaved for eternity to any hardship. That would contradict 1 Timothy 2:4-6; 4:10; Col.1:20; Romans 5:18,19; 1 Corinthians 15:22-28 to name a few. It all takes place within the eons or ages. No eon or age is eternal. Therefore it is impossible for chastening to be eternal.

DBT

The Greek phrase for "forever and ever" is used in describing God's eternal state and in the verses on the duration of eternal damnation.


"And if your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; it is better for you to enter life crippled or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into the eternal fire," (Matt. 18:8).

"And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life" (Matt. 25:46).

"And these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power," (2 Thess. 1:9).
"Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example, in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire" (Jude 7).

for whom the black darkness has been reserved forever," (Jude12-13).

"Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen," (1 Tim. 1:17).
". . . To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever" (Rev. 5:13).

"And a second time they said, "Hallelujah! Her smoke rises up forever and ever" (Rev. 19:3).

"And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever" (Rev. 20:10).

Gawen

I don't know. I found it ironic that a Christian found a mistranslated word and uses it to further his ministry. Tony, why not spend some time in the Biblical Criticism and History forum, where you may read about hundreds of mistranslated words and phrases.