If you cannot love an eternal torment god

If you cannot love an eternal torment god

For the first 500 years after Christ, universalism was the prevailing doctrine believed and taught by the Christian church. These three online books also explain why and how this changed.

http://www.tentmaker.org/books/Prevailing.html

http://www.tentmaker.org/books/OriginandHistory.html

http://www.tentmaker.org/books/Doctr...etribution.htm

Universalism The Prevailing Doctrine Of The Christian Church During Its First Five Hundred Years

The author, J.W. Hanson wrote ?The purpose of this book is to present some of the evidence of the prevalence in the early centuries of the Christian church, of the doctrine of the final holiness of all mankind. The author believes that the following pages show that Universal Restitution was the faith of the early Christians for at least the First Five Hundred Years of the Christian era. He has aimed to present irrefragable proofs that the doctrine of Universal Salvation was the prevalent sentiment of the primitive Christian church.

The salient statements and facts in all which will be found in these pages show that the most and ablest of the early fathers found the deliverance of all mankind from sin and sorrow specifically revealed in the Christian Scriptures.? And they were reading the Bible in its original language.

Up until now, after reading this post, many believers in eternal torment have said something like, ?I truly sympathize with your sufferings, but it?s what the Bible says that matters, not whether or not it makes you suffer.? That?s why I want to say right at the outset that many of the links posted here show that a correctly (literally, not interpretively) translated Bible actually teaches universal salvation, not eternal torment, or even annihilation.

I?m 69 years old. The idea that God lets anyone suffer forever has caused me more suffering, including a twelve year nervous breakdown 1966-78, than all the other sufferings of my life combined.

This suffering was caused by the fear produced by not being able to love a god who would let anyone suffer forever and wondering what this god would do to me for not being able to love him. Even though I was and am trusting for my salvation in what Jesus accomplished by His death and resurrection, through the power in the blood of His cross, I was, and still am unable to love a god who would let anyone suffer forever. Here are testimonies similar to mine.

http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/hells_fruit.html

http://greater-emmanuel.org/Hope4You/consequences.html

If you are like me and cannot love a god who would let anyone suffer forever, you can copy and paste (if necessary) the following urls into the address bar and find out that a literally (not interpretively) translated Bible actually teaches universal salvation, not even annihilation.

THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD

If necessary, copy and paste the following urls into the address bar.
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...ircularity.htm

At the top and bottom of that same THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD page, there is the following link to fourteen other writings in the same series that are related to this same subject.
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...orld/index.htm

Don?t kid yourself. If anyone suffers forever JESUS IS DOING IT TO THEM

http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...ircularity.htm

THE GOD THAT CALVINIST AND ARMINIAN ETERNAL TORMENTORS PROFESS TO LOVE

The eternal torment theology of the Arminian Christian relies on so-called ?free will? and luck.

The god that Arminian eternal tormentors profess to love says to his fallen creatures

?Unless you are lucky enough to find out about my son during this lifetime, and even if you are that lucky, if you don?t have the good sense to cooperate with my son properly before you die, then I am going to raise you from the dead and I will sustain you alive in an inescapable state of eternal torment forever.?

The eternal torment theology of the Calvinist Christian relies on God alone, not ?free will? at all. It is summed up by the word TULIP: Total depravity, Unconditional election, Limited atonement, Irresistible grace, and the Perseverance of the elect.

The god that Calvinistic eternal tormentors profess to love says to his fallen creatures

"I created most of you for the purpose of torturing you forever. However, I am going to choose a few of you undeserving ones to go to heaven where you will be happy forever." John Calvin said there will be infants a span long in hell because they were not among the elect. (A span is the distance between the tip of the thumb to the tip of the little finger.)

And then both the Arminian and Calvinistic eternal tormentors say that the feelings that they have for this god of theirs is ?love.?

To read a description of eternal torment combination Calv-Arminianism see
ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST ? Charles Slagle
http://www.tentmaker.org/books/Absol...us-Christ.html

This next url sums up the end result of all three
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...ircularity.htm

Without God?s sustaining power everyone would cease to exist.
So if anyone were to suffer forever, our all-powerful God (Who is Love in essence, not just loving) would be fully 100% responsible for it. We would have to conclude that any definition of the manifestation of ?love-in-essence? includes eternally sustaining people alive in an inescapable state of suffering.

What a travesty; what a revolting definition of love it is that God, Who is love personified, would grant any creature a will so strong that they can choose themselves into an irreversible state of never ending suffering (Arminian), or they deserve to suffer forever just by being born into the human race (Calvinist)!

Thank God the Bible does not teach such an insane idea! Yes, God is just but He is not justice personified. However, God is Love personified. That is why He will temper all of His administrating of justice only to be for the good of the individual being judged.

Here is what the God that universal transformationists love and worship with complete abandon will do. He will complete the process of salvation for the first fruits of election, (the remnant chosen by grace), after the first resurrection. Then He will complete the process of salvation for the non-elect after the great white throne judgment. For some, it will include an experience in the lake of fire.

Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead to guarantee that any necessary "kolasis aionian" (age-during corrective chastisement) will be 100% effective in changing wrong attitudes. All acts of sin have been forgiven for everyone. Attitudes cannot be forgiven. Attitudes must change. This is what the lake of fire which is the second death will do. It will last no longer than God sees is good for everyone involved.

http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...fFire-Eby.html

You can Google up good articles on this subject by typing in kolasis aionian

Also see

http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...orld/index.htm

For anyone who cannot love an endless-hell god ---
BIBLICAL CHRISTIAN UNIVERSALIST RESOURCES

Copy and paste the following urls into the address bar

http://www.christian-universalism.com/links.html

http://www.christianuniversalist.org

Also see

Information, and frequently asked questions in support of a correctly (literally, not interpretively) translated Bible teaching universal salvation,

http://www.tentmaker.org/bloglinks.htm

http://www.tentmaker.org/sitemap.html

http://www.tentmaker.org/ScholarsCorner.html

http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/sa...orld/index.htm

http://www.tentmaker.org/books/Bible...Explained.html

(If necessary, copy and paste them into your address bar)

and they will learn that the Bible actually teaches universal salvation instead, not even annihilation.

Or, they will go to the search engine at the top of http://www.tentmaker.org and will type in a key word or phrase from any argument or scripture passage. Ten articles will come up refuting the claim that the Bible teaches eternal torment or annihilation. Then they may click to the next page and ten more articles will come up, and so on and so on for many pages.

The many entries in my guestbook that is accessed towards the bottom of my front page at http://greater-emmanuel.org/Hope4You/

and the many entries at http://www.tentmaker.org/visitorcomments.htm
show just how much this information is helping people.

Also see http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/hells_fruit.html

This was the information that enabled me to recover from a twelve year nervous breakdown 1966-78, and it gives me great joy to keep learning that it is helping more and more other people too!! I?m 69

I am also going to guide you to the testimony of a man whose experience was almost identical to mine. Even the thought processes that took him into, through, and out of his breakdown are the same as mine. His name is Charles Slagle.
He responds to the question, "Which view of salvation is true?"

http://www.tentmaker.org/books/Absol...us-Christ.html

My testimony contains information that, according to the many entries in my guest book, and the many positive emails in my email file folders, is helping many people. My guest book can be accessed towards the bottom of my front page on my site.
Google up HELL IS NOT ENDLESS

My guest book only holds 150 messages. Then the oldest ones are automatically deleted to make room for the newest ones.

Also see the testimonies at TENTMAKER. Google up
TENTMAKER VISITOR COMMENTS

Also Google up
tentmaker hells fruit (small case letters)

SO MUCH SUFFERING is caused by the horrific false doctrine of endless suffering in hell, that it gives me great pleasure to guide people to the evidence that a correctly (literally, not interpretively) translated Bible teaches universal salvation, not endless suffering in hell, or even annihilation.

We agree with fundamentalist Christians that we should not believe things that go against Biblical teaching. We don?t.
Google up
universalism is not in the bible?

I'm 70, and I am acquainted with many people who are, or were in various stages of nervous breakdown over their inability to love a god who would let anyone suffer forever. Even though they have embraced Christ and His gospel, they are afraid of what God might do to them after they are raised from the dead for not being able to love Him. The information in my testimony has helped many of these people.

I myself suffered a twelve year nervous breakdown (1966-78) because of my inability to love an endless-hell god. I?m 70 now.

If any member or surfer on forums is suffering because they are unable to successfully emotionally cope with the idea that God is going to let any creature suffer forever, they can Google up the search engine at the top of the TENTMAKER front page. Just type in a key word or phrase from each argument or scripture passages and ten articles will appear that refute the eternal hell and annihilationist doctrines.
Then click to the next page and ten more articles will appear, and so on and so on for many pages.

Most fundamentalist Christians are not even aware that there are two sides to the argument about what the Bible teaches.

This debate always ends with the words, "My Greek scholars are more reliable than your Greek scholars," and the result is a stalemate.
The findings of Greek scholar Louis Abbott and the other Greek scholars quoted in
chapters three and twelve of his online book IMHO renders all other arguments irrelevant.

IMHO these findings effectively close the case on the arguments that eternal tormentors try so hard to uphold.
But of course one has to actually read them to see what I mean.
Just Google up AN ANALYTICAL STUDY OF WORDS and enjoy

If your readers think it glorifies God more to believe that He is going to let some of His creatures suffer forever, then they should keep believing that.
But if they think it glorifies God more to eventually meet everyone on the level of their greatest and deepest need, which is a change in their stubborn will, then I would like them to know that that is exactly what the Bible teaches that God is like.

I am a Concordant Christian. I have read and recorded gleanings into my more than four thousand page personal journal from most of the back issues of UNSEARCHABLE RICHES that has been published back to 1909. Every argument that I have ever heard against the Bible teaching universal salvation have been repeatedly dealt with in these magazines.
Largely, but not exclusively, because of the contents in these magazines, I am convinced that the evidence in support of the Bible teaching universal salvation is irrefutable. That is why the argument that we should teach endless suffering in hell just in case it might be true is unacceptable to me.

IMHO the greatest of all manifestations of God's grace in action on this earth is that anyone can believe in "eternal suffering" for anyone and not have a nervous breakdown thinking about it.

Why not check out the reasons why we believe the Bible teaches universal transformation by typing into Google
THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD SERIES
or
UNIVERSAL SALVATION UNIVERSITY
or
ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST

I also would like to leave you with one more thing. I am going to guide you to the testimony of a man whose experience was almost identical to mine. Even the thought processes that took him into, through, and out of his breakdown are the same as mine. Only he is more eloquent in telling his story than I am in telling mine. His name is Charles Slagle.

You can Google up his testimony by typing in
ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST

It may begin to change your thinking.

God bless you in your study!
From Rodger Tutt in Toronto, Canada

Hello,

The fundamental point of biblical revelation is that God is Love. The apostle John, in his epistles, emphasized this essential truth about the God of the Bible:

"He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him (1 John 4:16)."

For this reason it seems inconsistent to contend that the Bible warns us of hell, if hell is understood as a place of eternal torment of the lost souls who did not reconcile with God. Nevertheless, we can find in the Bible numerous descriptions of God's wrath. In some of these biblical scenarios of God's wrath, God is seen as judging some people by sending them to the everlasting torment of hell. Such a biblical picture of a wrathful God is very hard to harmonize with the picture of the benevolent God full of love. We are, therefore, confronted with the cardinal question of God's fairness: how can God impose these kinds of punishments involving everlasting and ceaseless torments if God is inherently good and full of love?

Christians have two different approaches to the problem:

1) Finding alternative interpretations of hell-texts where hell is understood as something not involving eternal torment. Hell is rather understood as a place or state involving temporary torment. (This can be consistent with soteriological universalism, for according to universalism, all will eventually be saved)

2) Finding explanations showing how the idea of hell, as eternal torment, is in harmony with the doctrine of God's inherent benevolence and love.

It seems that alternative interpretations of hell-texts are motivated by the conviction that it is, in principle, impossible to harmonize the notion of an eternal punishment of hell with the concept of God's perfect love and goodness.

I have written a paper where I show that the idea of hell, as the place of eternal torment of lost souls, is not incompatible with the doctrine of God's intrinsic benevolence and love, and by that token, it is not necessary to seek alternative interpretations of hell-texts. My paper demonstrates that hell, as the place of eternal torment, is metaphysically possible in the universe of an intrinsically benevolent God, who is morally perfect and full of love and goodness.

My paper is in two parts. The first part, "Biblical reasons for the doctrine of hell as eternal torment," examines all relevant biblical texts about hell and show that the Bible teaches that lost sinners, who died in their unrepentant sins, will be punished with everlasting torment. The second part, "Apologetic defense of the doctrine of hell as eternal torment," is more philosophical in approach and endeavors to explain how eternal torment of lost souls is metaphysically possible in the universe of a benevolent God.

My paper is available both as a web page and and as a pdf-document; see below web addresses:

early-church.net/hell.html

early-church.net/hell.pdf

Your comments and eventual objections are welcomed.

Kind regards,
Aleksandar

My name is Rodger Tutt and I’m 71 years old.

You could read only the paper that Kalkas wrote and referred to on the previous post, or you could also read the following to get another point of vew

The following information helped me recover from a twelve year nervous breakdown, 1966-78, caused by my inability to love an endless-hell god.

WILL JESUS TORTURE BILLIONS FOREVER?
The Law of Circularity: Will Jesus Torture Billions Forever? How Men Are Saved
or
The Law of Circularity

A great introductory series to ultimate reconciliation. J. Preston Eby does a thorough job covering many aspects of the topic. Fundamental reading for any person interested in studying universalism from a solid Biblical perspective. Highly Recommended!
Kingdom Bible Studies: J. Preston Eby, Kingdom of God; Saviour of The World

Also see
ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST
absolute assurance in jesus christ
or
Absolute Assurance

Also see
UNIVERSAL SALVATION UNIVERSITY
Universal Salvation University
and
BIBLE THREATENINGS EXPLAINED – John Wesley Hanson
Bible Threatenings Explained
and
THE SCHOLARS CORNER THE CENTER FOR BIBLE STUDIES
Scholar's Corner: The Center for Bible studies in Christian Universalism