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3277
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Why Hell should be eternal.
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on: June 26, 2010, 11:31:25 AM
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For
a good description of the "conditional immortality" position mentioned
above (in too much repetitive detail, perhaps) here is a reference. The
book is "Four Views on Hell", edited by William Crockett, Zondervan
Publishing House, Grand Rapids, MI, 1992.
There are four
sections, one for each view, which are the "Literal" by John Walvoord,
the "Metaphorical" by William Crockett, the "Purgatorial" by Zachary
Hayes and "Conditional Immortality" by Clark Pinnock.
Pinnock
does an excellent job of summarizing the latter position. After each
chapter, the other three authors get a chance to reply to the material
in that section. Nice layout.
Kk... i am still not
connecting in a conscious way the above verse that makes a comparative
of eternal punishment to eternal life. Are you saying that "punishment"
is a metaphor for a second death sentence? So on the parallel rules of
grammar what would the metaphor for "life" be? Like an unconscious
euphoria? It seems to me that you are going against the plain logic of
grammar.
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3279
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD Jonathan Edwards
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on: June 24, 2010, 08:59:16 PM
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6. There are in the souls of wicked men those
hellish principles reigning, that would presently kindle and flame out
into hell fire, if it were not for God’s restraints. There is laid in
the very nature of carnal men, a foundation for the torments of hell.
There are those corrupt principles, in reigning power in them, and in
full possession of them, that are seeds of hell fire. The principles are
active and powerful, exceedingly violent in their nature; and if it
were not for the restraining hand of God upon them, they would soon
break out; they would flame out after the same manner as the same
corruption, the same enmity, does in the hearts of damned souls, and
would beget the same torments as they do in them. The souls of the
wicked are in Scriptures compared to the troubled sea—Isaiah 57:20. For
the present, God restrains their wickedness by His mighty power, as He
does the raging waves of the troubled sea, saying “Hitherto shalt thou
come, and no further,” but if God should withdraw that restraining
power, it would soon carry all before it. Sin is the ruin and misery of
the soul; it is destructive in its nature; and if God should leave it
without restraint, there would need nothing else to make the soul
perfectly miserable. The corruption of the heart of the man is
immoderate and boundless in its fury; and while wicked men live here, it
is like fire pent up by the course of nature; and as the heart is now a
sink of sin, so, if sin was not restrained, it would immediately turn
the soul into a fiery oven, or furnace of fire and brimstone.
7.
It is no security to wicked men for one moment, that there are no
visible means of death at hand! It is no security to a natural man, that
he is now in health, and that he does not see which way he should now
immediately go out of the world by any accident, and that there is not
visible danger, in any respect, in his circumstances. The manifold and
continual experience of the world, in all ages, shows this is no
evidence that a man is not on the very brink of eternity and that the
next step will not be into another world. The unseen, unthought-of-ways
and means of persons going suddenly out of the world are innumerable and
inconceivable. Unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a rotten
covering, and there are innumerable places in this covering so weak that
they will not bear their weight, and these places are not seen. The
arrows of death fly unseen at noon-day; the sharpest sight cannot
discern them. God has so many different unsearchable ways of taking
wicked men out of the world and sending them to hell, that there is
nothing to make it appear that God had need to be at the expense of a
miracle, or to go out of the ordinary course of His providence to
destroy any wicked man, at any moment. All the means that there are of
sinners going out of the world, are so in God’s hands, and so
universally and absolutely subject to His power and determination, that
it does not depend at all the less on the mere will of God, whether
sinners shall at any moment go to hell, than if means were never made
use of, or at all concerned in the case.
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3280
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: CHAPTER 3. - REGENERATION BY FAITH. OF REPENTANCE: CALVIN
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on: June 24, 2010, 08:53:30 PM
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17. But as there are some who, from the
frequent mention of sackcloth, fasting, and tears, especially in Joel
(2:12), think that these constitute the principal part of repentance, we
must dispel their delusion. In that passage the proper part of
repentance is described by the words, “turn ye even to me with your
whole heart;” “rend your heart, and not your garments.” The “fastings”,
“weeping,” and “mourning,” are introduced not as invariable or necessary
effects, but as special circumstances.314314 French, “Circonstances
qui convenoyent specialement alore;”—circumstances which were then
specially suitable. Having foretold that most grievous disasters were
impending over the Jews, he exhorts them to turn away the divine anger
not only by repenting, but by giving public signs of sorrow. For as a
criminal, to excite the commiseration of the judge, appears in a
supplicating posture, with a long beard, uncombed hair, and coarse
clothing, so should those who are charged at the judgment-seat of God
deprecate his severity in a garb of wretchedness. But although sackcloth
and ashes were perhaps more conformable to the customs of these
times,315315 French, “Fust la coustume de ce temps-la, et ne nous
appartienne aujourduhui de rien;”—was the custom of that time, and we
have nowadays nothing to do with it. yet it is plain that weeping and
fasting are very appropriate in our case whenever the Lord threatens us
with any defeat or calamity. In presenting the appearance of danger, he
declares that he is preparing, and, in a manner, arming himself for
vengeance. Rightly, therefore, does the Prophet exhort those, on whose
crimes he had said a little before that vengeance was to be executed, to
weeping and fasting,—that is, to the mourning habit of criminals. Nor
in the present day do ecclesiastical teachers act improperly when,
seeing ruin hanging over the necks of their people,316316 The French
adds, “Soit de guerre, de famine, ou de pestilence;”—whether of war,
famine, or pestilence. they call aloud on them to hasten with weeping
and fasting: only they must always urge, with greater care and
earnestness, “rend your hearts, and not your garments.” It is beyond
doubt that fasting is not always a concomitant of repentance, but is
specially destined for seasons of calamity.317317 Latin, “Calamitosis
temporibus peculiariter destinari.”—French, “Convient particulierement a
ceux qui veulent testifier quils se recognoissant avoir merité l’ire de
Dieu, et neantmoins requierent pardon de sa clemence;”—is particularly
suitable to those who acknowledge they have deserved the wrath of God,
and yet seek pardon of his mercy. Hence our Savior connects it with
mourning (Mt. 9:15), and relieves the Apostles of the necessity of it
until, by being deprived of his presence, they were filled with sorrow. I
speak of formal fasting. For the life of Christians ought ever to be
tempered with frugality and sobriety, so that the whole course of it
should present some appearance of fasting. As this subject will be fully
discussed when the discipline of the Church comes to be considered, I
now dwell less upon it.
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3281
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Christian Supernaturalism: Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield
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on: June 24, 2010, 08:44:23 PM
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Before all that we call nature came into
existence God was, in infinite fullness of life and of the innumerable
activities which infinite fullness of life implies: and that nature has
come into existence is due to an act of His prenatural power. Nature, in
other words, has not come into existence at all: it has been made. And
if it was made it must have been by a supernatural act. The Christian
conception of creation involves thus the frankest recognition of the
supernatural act. To the Christian man nature cannot be conceived either
as self-existent or as self-made or as a necessary emanation from the
basal Being which we call God, nor yet as a mere modification in form of
the one eternal substance. It is a manufactured article, the product of
an act of power. God spoke and it was: and the God that thus spoke
nature into being, is necessarily a supernatural God, creating nature by
a supernatural act. As Christian men, we must at all hazards preserve
this supernaturalistic conception of creation.
There are voices
strong and subtle which would woo us from it. One would have us believe
that in what we call creation, God did but give form and law to a dark
Somewhat, which from all eternity lay beside Him - chaining thus by His
almighty power the realm of inimical matter to the divine chariot wheels
of order and progress. Or, if that crass dualism seems too gross, the
outlying realm of darkness is subtly spoken of as the Nothing, the power
it exerts is affirmed to be simply a dull and inert resistance, while
yet the character of the product of God's creative power is represented
as conditioned by the "Nothing" out of which it is made. Another would
have us believe that what we call nature is of the substance of God
Himself, and what we call creation is but the modification of form and
manifestation which takes place in the eternal systole and diastole of
the divine life. Or, if this crass pantheism seems too gross, a subtle
ontology is called in, matter is resolved into its atoms, the atoms are
conceived as mere centers of force, and this force is asserted to be the
pure will of God: so that after all no substance exists except the
substance of God. As over against all such speculations, gross and
subtle alike, the Christian man is bound to maintain that God created
the heavens and the earth - that this great act by which He called into
being all that is was in the strictest sense of the words a creation,
and that in this act of creation He produced in the strictest sense of
the words a somewhat. It was an act of creation: not a mere molding or
ordering of a preëxistent substance - not a mere evolution or
modification of His own substance. And in it He produced a somewhat -
not a mere appearance or simulacrum, but being, derived and dependent
being, but just as real being as His own infinite essence. In creation,
therefore, the Christian man is bound to confess a frankly supernatural
act - an act above nature, independent of nature, by which nature itself
and all its laws were brought into existence.
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3282
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: [The Adamic Adminstration] John Murray
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on: June 24, 2010, 06:16:33 PM
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God gave to Adam a specific command or, more
accurately, a specific prohibition. The term prohibition is significant.
It is negative and, as such, differs from all the other ordinances. It
is in character and intent not in the same category and stands off in
this distinctness (Gen. 2:17). It applied to Adam and Eve alone and had
relevance to the particular conditions of Eden. We are constrained to
ask: Why or for what purpose?
To disobedience was attached the
threat of death (Gen. 2:17). Failure to comply with the other ordinances
would have been disobedience and disobedience would carry the
consequences of penal judgment. But only in connection with the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil was this eventuality enunciated. Again we
ask: Why?
There was also in Eden the tree of life (Gen. 3:22,
24). As the other tree represented the knowledge of good and evil, this
tree must have been symbolic of life, and we may infer that in some way
it would have been the seal of everlasting life (Gen. 3:22 — ‘take also
of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever’; also Gen. 3:24 in that
Adam having forfeited life was prevented from access to it — ‘to keep
the way of the tree of life’). There must have been in the institution
some provision for eternal life. And it is natural, if not necessary, to
infer that it is the opposite of what actually transpired that would
have secured this life, that to obedience was appended the promise of
life, after the analogy of Genesis 2:17 in respect of disobedience.
Although from Genesis 3:22 we infer that Adam had not partaken of the
tree of life, and although it was not forbidden as was the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil (cf. Gen. 2:16), yet, apparently, by the
arrangements of providence or of revelation, it was recognized as
reserved for the issue of probationary obedience. This would explain
Genesis 3:22, 24 (cf. Rev. 2:7; 22:2, 14, especially the expression,
‘right to the tree of life’).
We know that Adam acted in a public
capacity. Not only his destiny but that of the whole race was bound up
with his conduct for good or for evil (Rom. 5:12-19; 1 Cor. 15:22, 45,
46).
The race has been confirmed in sin, condemnation, and death
by Adam’s trespass. Surely this principle of confirmation would have
been applied with similar consistency in the direction of life in the
event of obedience on Adam’s part.
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3283
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD Jonathan Edwards
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on: June 24, 2010, 06:12:45 PM
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mbG:
"How can a person experience eternal life if there no conscious
connection? Eternal is qualifying punishment... the existence of
punishment in a conscious way. Eternal punishment means nothing in a
non- conscious state."
K_k: Exactly right. A person cannot
experience eternal punishment if they have no conscious connection with
the unending Life of Christ. There is no eternal existence apart from
Him. The lost will die, Eternal punishment is not eternal punishing,
but a one-time punishment which has eternal effects or consequences.
The punishment is never revoked or modified, it stands forever, and
that punishment is death, real death, not the temporary state which
precedes the First and Second Resurrections. A death which means
complete cessation of existence.
You evade several points, mbG.
One is that the wages of sin is death, not eternal torture. Second is
that Christ died to pay the penalty for our sins, He did not suffer
eternal torture for our sins. Third is that Jesus and others said the
lost are like dead branches, dead grass, chaff, weeds, fit only to be
burned up. We don't torture dead branches, just burn them.
But
the major point you must continue to ignore to continue your doctrine is
the fact that only God has immortality, that mankind lost it in the
fall, that Believers have to put it on at the Resurrection, and that
immortality does not exist apart from Christ. So there will be nothing
that can withstand the "consuming fire" which Scripture says our God is,
in both the Old and New Testaments.
Note He is not an
eternally torturing fire, but a consuming one. And consume His enemies
He will. In fairness, justice, mercy and compassion. No matter what
our theology tells us.
This is mans conscious connection to God. God would need to cease to exist if one soul was destroyed. MAN
was created in the image of God, a self-conscious, free, responsible,
religious agent. Such identity implies an inherent, native, inalienable
obligation to love and serve God with all the heart, soul, strength, and
mind. This God could not but demand and man could not but owe. No created rational being can ever be relieved of this obligation. All that man is and does has reference to the will of God. John Murray
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3284
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Forums / Theology Forum / [The Adamic Adminstration] John Murray
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on: June 24, 2010, 06:08:35 PM
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MAN was created in the image of
God, a self-conscious, free, responsible, religious agent. Such identity
implies an inherent, native, inalienable obligation to love and serve
God with all the heart, soul, strength, and mind. This God could not but
demand and man could not but owe. No created rational being can ever be
relieved of this obligation. All that man is and does has reference to
the will of God.
But man was also created good, good in respect
of that which he specifically is. He was made upright and holy and
therefore constituted for the demand, endowed with the character
enabling him to fulfil all the demands devolving upon him by reason of
God’s propriety in him and sovereignty over him.
As long as man
fulfilled these demands his integrity would have been maintained. He
would have continued righteous and holy. In this righteousness he would
be justified, that is, approved and accepted by God, and he would have
life. Righteousness, justification, life is an invariable combination in
the government and judgment of God. There would be a relation that we
may call perfect legal reciprocity. As this would be the minimum, so it
would be the maximum in terms of the relation constituted by creation in
the image of God.
This relation falls short in two respects of
what may readily be conceived of as higher. (1) It is a contingent
situation, one of righteousness but mutably so, and likewise of
justification and life. There is always the possibility of lapse on
man’s part and, with the lapse, loss of integrity, justification, life,
the exchange of these for unrighteousness, condemnation, death. (2)
There is the absence of full-orbed communion with God in the assurance
of permanent possession and increasing knowledge.
In addition to
the account given of man’s creation and of the creation ordinances, we
find a special series of provisions dispensed to our first parents. In
other words, there are data which cannot be construed in terms simply of
creation in the divine image and the demands of awards belonging to
that relationship.
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3285
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD Jonathan Edwards
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on: June 24, 2010, 05:59:26 PM
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2. They deserve the be cast into hell; so that
divine justice never stands in the way; it makes no objection against
Gods using His power at any moment to destroy them. Yea, on the
contrary, justice calls aloud for an infinite punishment of their sins.
Divine justice says of the tree that brings forth such grapes of Sodom,
“. . .cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?”—Luke 13:7. The sword of
divine justice is every moment brandished over the hand of arbitrary
mercy, and Gods mere will that holds it back.
3. They are already
under a sentence of condemnation to hell. They do not only justly
deserve to be cast down thither, but the sentence of the law of God,
that eternal and immutable rule of righteousness that God has fixed
between Him and mankind, is gone out against them, and stands against
them; so that they are bound over already to hell. John 3:18—“. . .he
that believeth not is condemned already,” So that every unconverted man
properly belongs to hell; that is his place; from thence he is. John
8:23—”. . .Ye are from beneath;” and thither he is bound; it is the
place that justice, and God’s Word, and sentence of His unchangeable
law, assign to him.
4. They are now the objects of that very same
anger and wrath of God, that is expressed in the torments of hell; and
the reason why they do not go down to hell at each moment, is not
because God, in whose power they are, is not at present very angry with
them; as he is with many miserable creatures now tormented in hell, who
there feel and bear the fierceness of His wrath. Yea, God is a great
deal more angry with great numbers that are now on earth, yea doubtless
with some who may be hearing me speak now, who, it may be are at ease,
than he is with many of those that are now in the flames of hell. So it
is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and does not resent
it, that he does not let loose His hand, and cut them off. God is not
altogether such a one as themselves, though they may imagine Him to be
so. The wrath of God burns against them, their damnation does not
slumber; the pit is prepared, the fire is made ready, the furnace is now
hot, ready to receive them; the flames do now rage and glow. The
glittering sword is whetted, and held over them, and the pit hath opened
its mouth under them.
5. The devil stands ready to fall upon
them, and seize them as his own, at what moment God shall permit him.
They belong to him; he has their souls in his possession, and under his
dominion. The Scripture represents them as his goals—Luke 11:21. The
devils watch them; they are ever by them, at their right hand; they
stand waiting for them; like greedy hungry lions, that see their prey,
and expect to have it, but are for the present kept back. If God should
withdraw His hand, by which they are restrained, they would in one
moment fly upon their poor souls. The old Serpent is gaping for them;
hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if God should permit it,
they would be hastily swallowed up and lost.
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