THE ELECT: DID GOD CHOOSE YOU TO SPEND ETERNTIY WITHOUT HIM?

John 6:44 says: "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him." Also Romans 8:29-30 states: "[29] For God knew his people in advance and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn, with many borthers and sisters. [30] And having chosen them, he called them to come to him. And he gave them right standing with himself, and he promised them his glory." So in short, God chose who would be considered "his children" or the people that would go with him to heaven. So I feel bad when I see people who are denying the name of Christ, because they may be one of the Elect, or the people who are going to hell because they do not have faith in Jesus.Christ lives in me and He loves you,
Brianna

Hi Peanut So if God has predestined you to be saved why did Jesus have to die on a cross, if you are predestined to be in heaven then surely it doesn't matter what you do, you are destined to be in heaven, makes Jesus' paltry gesture fairly pointless. Well if they are one of the elect it doesn't matter if they deny Christ, they will still be in heaven.The Christian abuse of the concept of Hell is one of the greatest horrors ever inflicted upon mankind. This childish myth has been the main component of a faith that has persecuted countless thousands for hundreds of years, a faith full of prejudice and bigotry, a faith that is based on a fairytale.Guess what, Jesus Christ used to live in me too, but I got cured with a small dose of common sense.Brian.------------------
Remembering events that never happened is a dangerous thing!

Ah, double predestination. And like any doctrine you might make up on a bored Sunday afternoon, you can find proof-texts to support it.But it sits with great difficulty with John saying that that "...whosoever might believe in Him might have eternal life". Whosoever. Not a predetermined list, but whoever. Indeed Jesus' parables might imply that anyone who thinks they're in because they're on a predetermined list (in Jesus' time this meant being a descendant of Abraham) could be in for a nasty shock.God predestined His Church to be yadda yadda (you know the verses). But membership of that group called "His Church"? That's up to you. Election in the OT (which the early church knew very well as it was the only Scripture they had) is about being set aside to do a particular job - Cyrus was elected to free Israel from Babylon for example (IIRC). But it was the freed Jews who obtained the salvation, not Cyrus! So Paul was elected to be the apostle to the Gentiles, but it was the Gentiles who obtained salvation from that election, not Paul (Paul's own salvation came from the Damascus road experience, not his own ministry).So there you have it. A doctrine based on a lack of understanding of the OT concept of election, which makes God look like a right git.

By your account I am going to hell. By my religion you're going to hell for polytheism, worshipping a man as God.

peanutbean6111 writes:

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So I feel bad when I see people who are denying the name of Christ, because they may be one of the Elect, or the people who are going to hell because they do not have faith in Jesus.

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BZZZZT!Pascal's Wager. I'm so sorry, peanutbean6111. Johnny, tell him what parting gifts he has!Well, Bob, peanutbean6111 has won himself a lifetime of anguish in someone else's hell! Yes, that's right. After spending all of his life fighting against Satan and worshipping the Christian god, peanutbean6111 gets a reward of going straight to Hades for his hubris. He'll be sentenced to solve a series of puzzles for which the instructions can be read in many ways. Every attempt to glean more information will be met with "Since it would just be a waste of my time to tell you, I won't." Of course, every proposed solution will conflict with something in the contradictory instructions. This being for his continued insistence that those around him are unworthy of explanations.But, he won't get hungry because he'll have an afterlife-time supply of Rice-a-Roni, the San Francisco Treat.You didn't really think that the god that truly exists is the Christian one, did you?------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Let n be how funny that is now. Let n' how funny it was to begin with. Let k be the number of times you've posted that on the board. Therefore:n = n' * 1/2^kThat should give you some idea about how funny that joke is now.

Hey, if you don't like it, you don't have to read it.But if they're going to use the same argument over and over and over again, why must we devise a unique response every single time? Why not provide a standard response to a standard logical error?------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

I tend to agree. Just try not to overuse it. So did you write that or pick it up somewhere else?

Maybe something a little shorter and less arrogant, then. Like "That's Pascal's Wager, and it's stupid." Or something.Yeah, I don't have to read it. Just thought you might like to know if you're coming off like a ya-hoo. My mistake, I guess.

Hi Rrhain,I suppose it might wear thin after a while, but I hadn't seen this before, and I thought it a pretty appropriate reply to Peanut's post. After all the time I've spent debating Creationists I still have no better insight into their "we're right and everyone else is wrong" mindset. It puzzles me as much today as it ever did. Attempts to engage in serious discussion on this topic never seem to bear fruit because one can never get past the "you have to accept Jesus Christ into your heart before you can see the truth" part, and so sarcastic and funny replies seem as good as anything, I guess.--Percy

zephyr responds to me:

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So did you write that or pick it up somewhere else?

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I wrote it myself. On the MSN group I frequent, we also get a lot of people invoking Pascal's Wager: Believe or go to hell. I got tired of having to come up with new ways of pointing it out, so I became a bit flippant, hoping that by making an outrageous comment, they might rethink their positions and come up with something other than an appeal to force.If they want to insist, I can go into all the bigger reasons why Pascal's Wager doesn't work (the assumptions Pascal made that believing costs nothing is untrue, for example...there is the time and money spent in worship that could be more productively spent elsewhere), but since the invokers of the Wager often don't realize they are making it, it rarely gets that far.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

By way of partially making up for being a sour-ass, I thought I'd point out that the bit where it says "an after-life-time supply" always cracks me up. That's a funny turn of phrase.

Election vs free-will is scoffed at in vain here by all of us. I apologize in advance for my own stupidness in this matter.Scriptures define election adequately enough and need no apologetics for us willful ignorants. Our damnation is just. What good work could possibly atone for the depraved sinfulness we're all elected with, i.e., filled with:Jestings, backbitings, maliciousness, debates, hate, blasphemies, frolicking, womanizing, whoremonging, porno, terrorizing, intimidators of believers, abusers of ourselves, lust-stricken, filthy, etc. etc.Seeing that we daily commit these sins, who is going to pay for each and every one of these crimes against a God who does not wink at any of my sins.Of course Salvation SANS redemption is impossible. Examples:1) If I face my Maker with say good works, that could never pay for a single sin nor make me righteous and holy.2) What a damnable lie for me to believe God would save me for heroically giving my life for my friends, despite it being Christ-like.3) I toss out my convictions and guilt trips in lieu of humanistic missions. I.e., I excuse my sins because I'm helping people.On the other hand, election coupled with redemption is beautiful to me, as long as it is NOTHING but the BLOOD of JESUS I plead.Now, if I'm elected to plead nothing but the blood of Jesus to pay for each and every one of my sins I have and will have committed, to work out your Salvation, Sanctification, Love, Good-works, etc.The trick remains, can I continue to walk on this water when the storms and mists of sin arise? When I sink who elects Himself to save me? Yes, Amen, I hope so, and believe unto the Salvation of the soul, despite my damnable tendencies.In sum, the Blood of the Son of God is adequate Sacrifice to swallow my sinfulness and raise me up, to purge my conscience of guilt and dead works, to forgive me, ere he takes and pays for each and every one of my sins upon Himself to suffer the vicarious punishment in my stead.Ah, am I elected because I am stuck on believing "Nothing but the Blood of Jesus can save me"? Seems arbitrary to me that I'm elected or not. Albeit I thank God He will never divorce me nor forsake me in this matter.Or, just cause I took the bait and swallowed it hook line and sinker in a public spectacle. Born again above all cults. Born into the body of Christ, raising from the dead with Him constantly and in due time, being quickened in love toward other Christians and neighbors and foreigners alike.Does election take place before the foundation of the world? Any theistic methinks would not be concerned about time paradoxes and Newtonian (science) traps of thinking.Election violates all Newtonian and common sense notions of time as God is omnipresent by definition, no?Now God's Cosmic-Matrix is summed up for me: "Nothing but the Blood of Jesus" can elect me for the Holy Heaven and pay for each and every sin I've committed. Oh that the sprinkling of Jesus' Blood would utterly consume my proud mountains in His presence, transform me into His goodness, make me born above, and do the same for you all like-wise. May it be so, forever, Amen.Philip

I don't see that these are all sins. Certainly, some of these are in poor taste or are outright infringing on another persons rights, but personally I don't believe that there is anything inherently bad about jesting, debates, blasphemy, frolicking, pornography, "self-abuse" (masturbation, I assume?), or being particularly lusty.If they're not wrong, why should I be concerned that a god might judge me for them? Or why should I be expected to pay penance for them? And is "death" really the appropriate penance for a sin like, I dunno, gluttony? (Why aren't rape or murder so-called "deadly sins"?)I find the sin thing inconsistent at best and at worst, a guilt trip for very natural behaviors. Why not? Why can't a big donation to the poor or homeless pay for a peek at your dad's Playboys? Well, with the callous, unjust god some people appear to worship, I can believe this. The question is, would a good and just god ignore a self-sacrifice?I just find the moral calculus you're using questionable. Why so harsh on yourself? Why can't good deeds cancel out bad ones? I think, in this life anyway, good works can redeem for bad deeds. I'd feel cheated if everyone who accepted Jesus went to the same afterlife, no matter their earthly deeds. After all, who's to say that Hitler hadn't accepted Jesus as his savior? Wasn't he Lutheran?

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Jestings, backbitings, maliciousness, debates, hate, blasphemies, frolicking, womanizing, whoremonging, porno, terrorizing, intimidators of believers, abusers of ourselves, lust-stricken, filthy, etc. etc.

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Hey - retract that immediately! I'm not filthy!