Universalism

[bluehillside Retd.]

NS,

Why do you think that quote makes your case at all? Seems to obviously build up mine.

Because it doesn't build your case at all - it undermines it. Phrases like, "lacking in integrity" give the game away - you can lack integrity without being a liar, and you can't just conflate the two.

This reminds me of the discussions about morality. Almost no-one thinks themselves to be immoral, even though everyone else might. The 9/11 hijackers for example were pious men who thought they were moral exemplars. Similarly, when folks like Alan Burns cherry pick, quote mine etc while they may not think themselves to lack integrity other people do. It all goes to intent - can you be dishonest without intending to be? I do, though you presumably don't. 

[Outrider]

The reason why many Christians do not subscribe to Universalism (and why all Christians should not) is that it is not supported by Scripture.  So while it might intuitively have a good deal of appeal to Christians, there is no escaping the fact that we need to do a balancing act on a Scriptural knife edge. Because the Scriptures are quite clear that while God is a God of love who went to great lengths to procure the opportunity for salvation for all, He is equally a holy God who cannot tolerate sin.  Thus, if his free gift of salvation is rejected there are consequences, however uncomfortable that concept might be, even for many Christians.

Two points - firstly, that's only important if you're a Christian who thinks that the scriptures are something more than a guide or an imperfect human conceptualisation of the reality; secondly, if God cannot tolerate sin, why did he create it? If he can forgive sins - which apparently he can, as we're all sinners - why is the sin of not believing somehow different to the others?

In some ways universalism is a reflection of Western culture.

Or, perhaps, just the influence of culture at all on what is, fundamentally, a fairly primitive and barbaric premise with centuries of patina, veneer, tradition and obfuscation lacquered over the surface.

It is of interest that when the Gospel was brought to Africa subjects such judgement and its consequences were not an issue for the listeners.  It was when subjects such as turning the other cheek, going the extra mile and feeding you enemy when he was hungry came up that the early missionaries lost their audience who were often affronted by any such suggestions.

And, similarly in the ultra-capitalist US you get things like prosperity theology... it's almost as though it's a pernicious, fact-free, malleable framework that can be shaped to fit any underlying cultural mores and subvert them to establish a control system...

On a lighter note perhaps all will get to heaven eventually.  I suspect that for many on this forum the idea of having me remind them every morning that I was right and they were wrong would be – well – sheer hell.

On an even lighter note, if you're wrong none of us will have to sit through the awkward remonstrations

O.

[Jack Knave]

Makes no sense to me. If God is a God of love he will do what is best for all without fear or favour, that simply follows from being a God of love. If God is going to discriminate on some basis of people's cognitive ability to recognise truth then he is falling well short of being all that he could be.

The logic here would be that if all pass the test then what is the point of the test? The whole point of a test or "race", as Paul puts it, is that some may lose or fail to complete it.

[Jack Knave]

The tenor of quite a few of the recent posts on this subject have concerned the idea that Christians believe that only they, and none other, get to heaven.  In terms of my understanding of the teaching of Scripture this is a serious misconception and is simply not correct.

The classical text verse used to support this view is Peter’s statement in Acts 4:12 ‘And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.’   So it is only Jesus who can save.  This is the unambiguous claim of Scripture and I believe it is the absolute truth.

The problem arises when many Christians conclude that the corollary to this Scripture is that only Christians find salvation and get to heaven.  Such a conclusion is false and stands in contradiction to several other Scriptural passages.  Some examples.

In John 5:24 Jesus says, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

So as a Christians I will not appear before God’s Judgement Throne.  Through my belief in Jesus I have already be declared (not found) not guilty and have eternal life through grace by faith.

Now there are two great judgements described in the New Testament.  The first is in Matt 25:31-46, sometimes referred to as the Judgement of the Nations.  The second is the Great White Throne Judgement of Revelation 20:11-15.  Now if Christians do not come under judgement then there can be no Christians appearing before these tribunals.  And yet in both cases there are those who find salvation.  And the basis for their salvation is their works, not grace.  Who are these people?  If not Christians they can only be from those of other faiths or even those of no faith.

So while Universalism is not supported by Scripture, neither is the teaching that only Christians are saved.  There will be both surprising additions and surprising omissions when the roll is called up yonder.

So the only remaining issue is to reconcile the truth that while salvation is only found in Jesus this is not necessarily exclusive, with non-Christians also able to find salvation.  But a little bit of thought will reveal that that is easily done.           

Matt 7:21 Not all those who say Lord, Lord...

Just mentioning it, I'm not a Christian.

[Brownie]

DaveM: Peter’s statement in Acts 4:12 ‘And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.’   So it is only Jesus who can save.  This is the unambiguous claim of Scripture and I believe it is the absolute truth....

Well Dave, that is what many Christians believe but my view is that we have to read scripture in the light of the times in which it was written;  so much has been uncovered and discovered since Peter's time and as humankind develops and learns, so faith evolves.
That's my opinion.

[DaveM]

Matt 7:21 Not all those who say Lord, Lord...

Just mentioning it, I'm not a Christian.

Thanks for a good Scriptural reference, which I think gives added support to the phrase you highlighted in my post about some surprising omissions.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Brownie,

Well Dave, that is what many Christians believe but my view is that we have to read scripture in the light of the times in which it was written;  so much has been uncovered and discovered since Peter's time and as humankind develops and learns, so faith evolves.

That's my opinion.

I remember that awful casuist Alister McGrath trying the same line (I think in a conversation with Richard Dawkins), and I find it very curious. As I understand it, those who think scripture to be authoritative think it to be definitively and so unchangingly so. What actually happens though when its content is thought to be morally iffy or worse is that we’re told that we should now interpret it differently. 

Once the foundation of literal certainty is swept away though, whence the confidence that the interpretation we put on it today will be the same in, say, 100 years’ time? And if that confidence is misplaced, what value has scripture beyond that of any other early and crude attempt to define the human experience and set a few rules of moral probity?

[Shaker]

...that awful casuist Alister McGrath

That's what I've always called him.

Well, more or less.

[DaveM]

DaveM: Peter’s statement in Acts 4:12 ‘And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.’   So it is only Jesus who can save.  This is the unambiguous claim of Scripture and I believe it is the absolute truth....

Well Dave, that is what many Christians believe but my view is that we have to read scripture in the light of the times in which it was written;  so much has been uncovered and discovered since Peter's time and as humankind develops and learns, so faith evolves.
That's my opinion.

Hi Brownie. Correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding of your post is that we are both agreed that there will be those who do not subscribe to the tenets of Christianity who will find salvation.  My view on this is squarely rooted in the teachings of Scripture but I cannot determine from you post whether this is also the prime reason for your view or not.

Where we appear to differ is that you seem to have concluded that, based on this view, Peter’s claims about ‘no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved’, no longer applies.  But I believe this is the unambiguous claim of Scripture and therefor remains the absolute truth.  I do this on this basis of my belief that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the supreme authority for believers.  To me Scriptures such as Isaiah 40:8, ‘the grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever and Mark 13:31, ‘heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away’ need to be taken seriously.

So the challenge for me is how to reconcile these two apparently contradictory truths that, while salvation is only found in Jesus, this is not necessarily exclusive, with non-Christians also able to find salvation.  I believe this can be done, at least it can be to my own personal satisfaction.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi DaveM,

Hi Brownie. Correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding of your post is that we are both agreed that there will be those who do not subscribe to the tenets of Christianity who will find salvation.  My view on this is squarely rooted in the teachings of Scripture but I cannot determine from you post whether this is also the prime reason for your view or not.

Even if they devoutly worship a different god entirely and therefore spend their lives driving a coach and four through the first commandment (or indeed any of the others)?

If so, why bother with it/them?

Where we appear to differ is that you seem to have concluded that, based on this view, Peter’s claims about ‘no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved’, no longer applies.  But I believe this is the unambiguous claim of Scripture and therefor remains the absolute truth.  I do this on this basis of my belief that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the supreme authority for believers.  To me Scriptures such as Isaiah 40:8, ‘the grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever and Mark 13:31, ‘heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away’ need to be taken seriously.

Which is a personal faith belief to which you’re perfectly entitled of course. Just out of interest though, if you think the rules of Scripture to be unambiguous and set in stone what role do you think there to be for the subsequent “interpretation” of them as Brownie suggests?

So the challenge for me is how to reconcile these two apparently contradictory truths that, while salvation is only found in Jesus, this is not necessarily exclusive, with non-Christians also able to find salvation.  I believe this can be done, at least it can be to my own personal satisfaction.

How would you reconcile these two flatly contradictory claims please?

[SusanDoris]

I heard on the news (yesterday I think) that the Bishops have again stuck to their outmoded, outdated, prejudiced, unhelpful, unkind, etc interpretation of their, man-made, lrules of celibacy, because they must stick to the scriptures. *deep sighs* for clergy who are gay, etc. How dare they so flatly and firmly refuse to drag themselves out of their blinkered views. I'dlike to go and give them a bit of a shake! Oh, and I forgot to add the word bigoted!

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Susan,

I heard on the news (yesterday I think) that the Bishops have again stuck to their outmoded, outdated, prejudiced, unhelpful, unkind, etc interpretation of their, man-made, lrules of celibacy, because they must stick to the scriptures. *deep sighs* for clergy who are gay, etc. How dare they so flatly and firmly refuse to drag themselves out of their blinkered views. I'dlike to go and give them a bit of a shake! Oh, and I forgot to add the word bigoted!

Indeed, the upside though being that the CofE has painted itself as even more outmoded, unpleasant and irrelevant than it was before. Every cloud and all that!

[DaveM]

Makes no sense to me. If God is a God of love he will do what is best for all without fear or favour, that simply follows from being a God of love. If God is going to discriminate on some basis of people's cognitive ability to recognise truth then he is falling well short of being all that he could be.

Apologies for the delay in responding.  Not sure why but I was responding to some of the later posts first.

I am not surprised that it makes no sense to you.  If Christians struggle with this concept it can hardly be expected that the non-Christians would not do likewise.  The only difference is that for many Christians this seems to be what Scripture teaches and thus Christians need to grapple with the idea and seek answers if possible.

Christian responses to this issue generally fall into three broad categories.

There are those, a minority, who seem to relish in the idea of perpetual condemnation.  But this is not a Christian attitude as Scripture makes it clear that God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked but would rather they should turn from their ways and live.

Others simply reject the doctrine and conclude that Universalism must be correct.

Others, like myself, struggle with the concept but accept that this is the teaching of Scripture.  This is but one of a number of issues, like the problem of suffering that the Christian grapples with.  And like suffering, although we can reach some tentative conclusions, we fall short of even ‘seeing through a glass darkly’ in our search for answers that satisfy.  In the end we accept that there are certain problems where we will not know the true answers this side of the grave.

Of course issues like these have no influence on the fact that God ‘is’.  But they do confront with the challenge to think very deeply over the nature of God and why we still believe and have come to know that He is a God of Love.     

[bluehillside Retd.]

DaveM,

Apologies for the delay in responding.  Not sure why but I was responding to some of the later posts first.

I am not surprised that it makes no sense to you.  If Christians struggle with this concept it can hardly be expected that the non-Christians would not do likewise.  The only difference is that for many Christians this seems to be what Scripture teaches and thus Christians need to grapple with the idea and seek answers if possible.

Or perhaps question whether the intractable contradictions suggest that Scripture is just primitive moral philosophy rather than a “God-inspired” rule book? 

Christian responses to this issue generally fall into three broad categories.

There are those, a minority, who seem to relish in the idea of perpetual condemnation.  But this is not a Christian attitude as Scripture makes it clear that God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked but would rather they should turn from their ways and live.

“Wicked” here presumably defined as, “what Christians decide it means". There’s are some who are condemnatory here I’d say, and they seem to be able to pull out quotes from eg Leviticus that do confirm their biases (albeit that they do so selectively – the shellfish eaters get off pretty lightly for example).   

Others simply reject the doctrine and conclude that Universalism must be correct.

Fair enough. Why then bother being a Christian at all though given that the prize of eternal non-fattening pizza and endless re-runs of Songs of Praise is on offer anyway?

Others, like myself, struggle with the concept but accept that this is the teaching of Scripture.  This is but one of a number of issues, like the problem of suffering that the Christian grapples with.  And like suffering, although we can reach some tentative conclusions, we fall short of even ‘seeing through a glass darkly’ in our search for answers that satisfy.  In the end we accept that there are certain problems where we will not know the true answers this side of the grave.

Personally, I reach for my shotgun when a Christian reacts to the contradictions in his faith beliefs with this “it’s a mystery” escape clause. It just assumes a benevolent “God” and the inerrancy of Scripture, and so concludes that when the logic collapses that must be a fault in reasoning rather than with the assumptions in the first place.

Why not instead challenge the assumptions?

Of course issues like these have no influence on the fact that God ‘is’.

That’s not a fact at all – it’s your personal faith belief, and just asserting it to be fact is called the fallacy of reification.

But they do confront with the challenge to think very deeply over the nature of God and why we still believe and have come to know that He is a God of Love.

So why do you? If you must have “God” and you don’t want to dodge the problems you’ve identified with the “it’s a mystery” line, wouldn’t it at least be better aligned with the observable facts to think “Him” to be an evil rather than a loving deity?

[SusanDoris]

This morning I was just passing some time starting to go through favourites list in order to delete stuff. I got as far as this link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSzttF8EXrE&feature+channel
and watched three or four of these quite amusing you tubes* and the cartoon one (about fourth, but I didn't count) is quite fun and ends with a human pointing out that it was humans who created god.

* Ignore the music at the beginning - it doesn't last long.

[Alan Burns]

Makes no sense to me. If God is a God of love he will do what is best for all without fear or favour, that simply follows from being a God of love. If God is going to discriminate on some basis of people's cognitive ability to recognise truth then he is falling well short of being all that he could be.

But love is a two way thing
If God's love is rejected, the inevitable consequence is eternal separation from God.

[Alan Burns]

Once the foundation of literal certainty is swept away though, whence the confidence that the interpretation we put on it today will be the same in, say, 100 years’ time? And if that confidence is misplaced, what value has scripture beyond that of any other early and crude attempt to define the human experience and set a few rules of moral probity?

This reminds me of John Lennon's controversial quote that He was more famous than Jesus, but would he still be more famous in 2000 years time?

[Rhiannon]

But love is a two way thing
If God's love is rejected, the inevitable consequence is eternal separation from God.

Bollocks. My kids can reject me all they like but there's no inevitable consequence of separation until I'm in my grave.

[ippy]

This reminds me of John Lennon's controversial quote that He was more famous than Jesus, but would he still be more famous in 2000 years time?

You do love your fairy stories Alan, Lennon's far more interesting and brought a load of joy to all.

ippy

[Alan Burns]

Bollocks. My kids can reject me all they like but there's no inevitable consequence of separation until I'm in my grave.

If the separation is just one sided, it is still separation.  No amount of love from one side can count if it is continually rejected.

[Stranger]

But love is a two way thing
If God's love is rejected, the inevitable consequence is eternal separation from God.

Since there isn't even the hint of jot of any objective evidence that this god even exists, how can it be said that anyone is rejecting its supposed love...?

[Rhiannon]

If the separation is just one sided, it is still separation.  No amount of love from one side can count if it is continually rejected.

But that means that love isn't a two way thing, doesn't it? Which is what you claimed.

[Shaker]

But love is a two way thing

Monumental bullshit even by your habitual standards, Alan, and that's a tall order in itself.

[Shaker]

If the separation is just one sided, it is still separation.  No amount of love from one side can count if it is continually rejected.

Are you talking about love - which is where you started in #240 - or separation? Because any reasonably normal human being, as I'm increasingly coming to think you are not, recognises the difference between these two entirely different things.

You have children, I gather. Let's say they reject you, spurn you, turn their backs on you - do you love them less because of this? I'm not referring to how sad it would make you as that's a different thing - would you love them less? Remember that you said that love is a two way thing, so your answer may well show you up to be inconsistent, even incoherent ... not for the first time I might add.

But please, feel free to ignore the question and gloss over it as though you'd never even seen it. That's what you normally do, after all.

[torridon]

Apologies for the delay in responding.  Not sure why but I was responding to some of the later posts first.

I am not surprised that it makes no sense to you.  If Christians struggle with this concept it can hardly be expected that the non-Christians would not do likewise.  The only difference is that for many Christians this seems to be what Scripture teaches and thus Christians need to grapple with the idea and seek answers if possible.

Christian responses to this issue generally fall into three broad categories.

There are those, a minority, who seem to relish in the idea of perpetual condemnation.  But this is not a Christian attitude as Scripture makes it clear that God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked but would rather they should turn from their ways and live.

Others simply reject the doctrine and conclude that Universalism must be correct.

Others, like myself, struggle with the concept but accept that this is the teaching of Scripture.  This is but one of a number of issues, like the problem of suffering that the Christian grapples with.  And like suffering, although we can reach some tentative conclusions, we fall short of even ‘seeing through a glass darkly’ in our search for answers that satisfy.  In the end we accept that there are certain problems where we will not know the true answers this side of the grave.

Of course issues like these have no influence on the fact that God ‘is’.  But they do confront with the challenge to think very deeply over the nature of God and why we still believe and have come to know that He is a God of Love.   

That reads like a tawdry choice to indulge apologetics rather than doing the right thing.  If a teaching or a law appears to be wrong or divisive or unhelpful or hurtful then what is wrong in saying so ? It is a triumph for tribalism over personal integrity to settle for ignoring what your own conscience is telling you and instead yielding to group think; it is a triumph for weakness over courage to avoid the challenge of questioning your deepest assumptions. Many christians seem to be able to distance themselves from the excesses of the wrathful Old Testament god with talk of context, applicability to the Jewish people etc. but seem to have a blind spot when in comes to the need for contextualisation in respect of the New Testament.  All scriptures, whether written by Hindu or Jew or Moslem or Christian have at least one thing in common, they are all written by humans and all humans get things wrong, it comes with the territory.  And if we can all admit to our human fallibility then the world would be a less divisive, friendlier place.