HelenM

Hi David,

Did you ever study who goes to Hell, according to Jesus?

Matthew 25 - people who don't help the sick, feed the hungry, clothe the naked and visit prisoners.

Matthew 24 - hypocrites.

Matthew 7 - people who call Jesus "Lord" and do miracles in his name - evidently - but he never knew them.

To cite just a few of the references.

I don't think this squares very well with the simplicity of "say this prayer and you're safe forever from hell"

So...um, was Jesus wrong?

Am I creating inconsistency where there is none?

love
Helen

Muad'Dib

My apologies David, I somehow missed your reply to my earlier post. I'll have a response up tonight or sometime tomorrow.

davidH

Yeah.

To you that don't bother - why not? Are you afraid of the truth? Is it perhaps because the parallels are so exact that it seems hard for any reasonable person to believe that they were chance?

I'd encourage everyone here to look this up.

davidH

Yeah, this post is getting cluttered and it's hard to answer everyone.

Mageth

Maybe these verses are all pure chance and they just happened to fit. - What do you think?


<a href="http://www.positiveatheism.org/mail/eml8612.htm" target="_blank">Some</a> think the writers of the NT kept those scriptures in mind when concocting the gospels...what do you think?

<a href="http://www.jewsforjudaism.org/j4j-2000/html/library/isaiah.html" target="_blank">Jews</a> think Isaiah 52-54 was referring to the nation of Israel - what do you think?

<a href="http://www.answering-christianity.com/isaiah_53.htm" target="_blank">Muslims</a> think Isaiah 53 agrees with Islam - what do you think?

I think the text was directed at Israel (as the Jews, whose religion the scripture originated with, believe), and retrofitted into the gospels to give prophetic credibility to Jesus as a messiah - a combination of the first two - what do you think?

davidH

Why do you think that it is silly? You have told me (or others here)that prophecy is so vague. Yet as yet I have seen no evidience of that.

True Psalm 22 was written by David. David was inspired by God to write it.
Why did David write that Psalm the way he did? When were his clothes divided up and lots cast for them.
Seriously take time to read it and read the various accounts of Jesus death. Don't the parallels strike you? I don't care about the past, future tenses - what I see is that the parallels are such that you would have literally thought that David was there at the cross writing down what happened to Jesus! That's what is so amazing about this.
You say it's vague but there's nothing vague - everything clearly points to Jesus death.


Your first point there has no bearing on this at all. Cause it doesn't matter whether this was told as a prophecy or as a worship/prayer to God, the fact that from hindsight you can see it referred to Jesus death. You read it and explain to me how this can not be prophecy and yet accurately tell of Jesus death.


I focus on this because it's a clear prediction of Jesus death - not so much a prediction but as a commentary of what Jesus was actually feeling and what happened at calvary.

There are also other prophecies that are messianic. You know why some Jews say Jesus was not who he claimed to be? Because they killed him, to acknowledge him as God is a big step for them. To realise that they missed the Messiah they had been waiting for for so long, and yet more than that - to kill the Messiah they had been waiting for.

Yet I don't blame the Jews or hold this against them - because it was God's plan - to bring salvation into the earth through them.
This salvation is for them as it is for everyone but for them it is an even bigger step - and yet you will see, God will move in them and bring them to himself.

If you are open minded and willing to examine everything freely, then do so.

One other thing - about pulling verses out of context.
Read Luke 24 v 13-35.
especially verse 27.

The disciples in the NT in the letters quote passages of scripture that fortell Jesus.
Does God not have a right to quote himself? If he says that these verses speak of him and u can see how they do - do you not accept it?
God can quote himself and say what his words meant - hence this being passed to the disciples. So then who are we to tell God that he couldn't have meant what he says he meant.
- An interesting thought.

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

HelenSL,

Yes, I did study who goes to Hell.


"I tell you the truth whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me."
v 45.

He said this while talking to those already condemned - they had already been separated at this time.

My interpretation of this is that the basis for judgement will be whether Love is shown to God's people.

".....did not do for the least of these..."

I believe he was pointing at those on the right hand side - hence those that are saved.

However does this mean the level of punishment in Hell is determined by this....I don't know nothing is written on this in the Bible, because this alone is not enough to save a person from Hell. They need to put their trust in Jesus - once they do - everyone they see in need and it's within their power to help they will help - Christ's love for others.

v 51 "He will asign him a place with the Hypocrites...."

What is a hypocrite? A person who says something and yet goes and does the opposite.
I wonder if he is refering to the pharasies here... he called them hypocrites many times before.

They did not practise what they preached - they cared more about how they looked in man's eye than how they looked in God's eye. They had abandonned their love for God in order to pursure man's respect and honour. I wonder if Jesus is telling us about those types of people? The pharasies didn't know God - they knew his laws but not the Judge, therefore Jesus said that they were condemed.

I think that is a major lesson for all Christians.
It really breaks my heart whenever you see some Churches in the West that care only about appearance - not about God. They do nothing to help the homeless, the naked the poor the sick, how then can they be truly people who love God since they don't show his love to others?
I wonder about their life after death, I am not the judge God is, but I think this is a warning that many Christians miss.

NB. Bring that up if you talk to any other Christians.

This again ties in with what I was saying above there.

"and I will tell them plainly "I never knew you."

God has actually challenged me much though this (even though you will not believe in God I speak from my experience).

I think this is the key point to get at, You will only get into heaven if God "knows" you. It is hard to grasp, because God knows everything about every one of us - he knows us better than we know ourselves.
So how then can God say, away from me I never knew you?

What God is saying here is the same as what he was saying in John 10.

"He calls out his own sheep by name and leads them out, when he has called out all his own he goes on ahead of them and the sheep follow him because they know his voice." v 4.

"I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me - just as the father knows me and I know the father - and I lay down my life for the sheep." v 14,15.

So then what does God mean when he says"I never knew you" ? Well, since it can't mean, knowing about the person since God knows everything , it must therefore mean something else. That something else we find in the verses I have just mentioned and it is this;

"I know my sheep and the sheep know me - just as the father knows me and I know the father."

Jesus has basically explained it in this verse.
You know the relationship between a father and a son, there is that relationship, fellowship and love. Jesus has said that he knows us (his sheep ieChristians) just as he knows his father God. That is one intimate relationship! For Jesus to compare knowing us to him knowing God the father is mind blowing! That's what Jesus means when he says that he knows us, there's a love that is compared to the love between God the father and God the son!

In essence God is saying that whoever doesn't know him in this way is lost, but once you accept Jesus as your saviour and acknowledge him as God you enter an amazing relationship with him. You are loved as you have never been loved before - freely! There's no price, no sacrifices - only our love and his love. We the sheep know him as he knows us.
That is the message we teach.

Mageth

As per Psalms 22, reading the Jewish translation/interpretation of the scripture vs. the Xian translation/interpretation puts the "prophecy" aspect of this Psalm in a new light, another example of "Hebrew Bible revisionism" by the church:

<a href="http://people.atl.mediaone.net/rabbi/psa22.html" target="_blank">Jewish vs. xian translations/interpretations</a>

Pay particular attention to the xian substitution of "they pierced..." for the correct translation "like a lion..." in IV-D.

[ March 05, 2002: Message edited by: Mageth ]</p>

Kosh

I'm just trying to figure out how this thread
turned from a discussion of Hell to davidH's
pathetic attempts to evangelize us all through
weak apologetics?

Mageth

Kinda gone to hell in a handbasket, eh?

Talulah

(scratches head).....I was wondering the same thing....