If you aren’t redeemed according to the Baptists, you’re going to fry in hell for all of eternity. Nice message /s
*** “God will somehow understand in the end that we were pretty good people, and based on our overall behavior He should let us into heaven.” ***
Pelagius would be proud.
Does it truly hurt Christianity if Ronald Reagan used the words from a poem in memorializing national heroes? I can understand the greater point, but still...
Amen. Being focused on the world is dangerous. Too many evangelicals see lost man as their primary focus, rather than Christ Jesus. This results in church becoming a haven for spiritually dead people, with the saints being droned into submission or departing for a true church. Worldlings invite other worldlings to entertaining event-driven religious meetings, all the while convincing one another that they are approved in the Lord. Spurgeon said, “If your religion does not make you holy it will damn you to hell.”
The church must first and foremost focus on the Lord. It’s primary mission on Earth is to disciple saints of God so they are equipped to go and proclaim Christ to those who are perishing.
2. According to Christian "Doctrine", had Adolph Hitler accepted jesus as his Lord and Savior, he too would have been headed for the Pearly Gates. That's an even "nicer" message. That's why deathbed conversions are empty.
3. Those who claim they will go to Heaven because they are born-again are comparable to someone who would walk into a state lottery office and claim winning because they believe they have the true numbers.
It's based upon an imperfect interpretation of a few chapters of one document.
4. I wouldn't share a one floor elevator ride with most people who claim they will be going to Heaven, no less an entire afterlife.
And in reality, no one really knows what happens after we die.
How about this for a poem:
I guess ya aren’t expectin’ no resurrection to soon,
World doom.
That story’s got to be bunk about that trumpet tune,
Cheese on the moon.
Well won’t your peepers get the creepers when you realize,
It’s all happening before your eyes.
Oh my, you’ll fry as we wave good bye to you.
— Daniel Amos
Noteworthy article. My Pentecostal grandmother refers to the concept of preaching “heaven and hell” as that “old time religion”.
What are the primary doctrinal differences between Baptists and Presbyterians?
Ironically, the pilot who wrote the poem died in a mid-air collision with a fellow RAF pilot.
“If I knew God I’d be Him.”
As a Christian, we know 2 things for certain:
1) Hell is a bad place. You don't want to go there. Mankind, because of the Original Sin of Adam and Eve, is destined to go there because they do not meet God's standards of perfection.
2) Because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, on a Roman cross, you don't have to go to Hell...IF you believe that He died, rose again from the dead, AND are willing to freely turn your life over to His care and direction as Lord.
Now, having said that, it does follow that a Christian, knowing that Hell is a bad place, would not wish for anyone to go there. However, that is not true for all. I'll 'splain...
One of the things that Hell signifies is the concept of Ultimate Justice. It doesn't matter your social status, how much money you did or did not have, who you know on earth, or any other factor SAVE for the submission of your life to Jesus. It means that all the terrible people we've heard about over the years who have passed away are now, and will forever more be punished for their crimes. Every unrepentant soul, no matter who they are, who either decided that they openly reject Jesus and want live their own way, or simply did not care, is now and forever more will be tormented in eternal flames.
This means that people who mock the Christian religion, although Christians might be unable to do anything about it, unless they repent, will be ultimately punished.
It means the foul creep who kills a family and robs their home, even though he is never caught, unless he repents, will be ultimately punished.
It means that the fat cat who cares nothing for the poor person and lives only for his own pleasures, unless he repents, will be ultimately punished.
It means the Congressperson or Senator who passes laws that fly in the face of the laws of God, or who's inaction causes the death of innocents...no matter their age, or whose lives are monuments to corruption and greed, unless they repent, will be ultimately punished.
It means the judge, no matter how high the bench they sit on, that do not provide true justice but instead rule on laws that prevent justice from happening, unless they repent, will be ultimately punished.
It means that everyone from the illegal alien to the DUmmies who deride us...from the liberal Democrat who demands special rights for homosexuals, to the environmentalists who wish to cripple the economy and throw us all back to the Middle Ages in the name of "Mother Earth"...from the Islamic Jihadist who wants all American infidels dead, to the former President who sullied the office he held with adultery (and his wife who likely had people murdered)...
Unless they ALL repent and name Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God as their Lord and Savior...then they will eventually face Ultimate Justice and be sent for an eternity in the everlasting fires of Hell.
ping for later read
1 Timothy 4:9-10 "9This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance 10(and for this we labor and strive), that we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, and especially of those who believe."
This is far from the only verse that could support the third view. I personally believe this third view is the correct view, if original scripture could be studied in the original languages. I believe God is love, and love never fails. Otherwise the "Good News" is really not all that great, since that would mean that most of creation is burning in hell for all eternity without hope of exit, if traditional Christian teachings on this were true. If you truly think about it, a God who is defined as being love, would never close the door forever. Eternity is a "helluva" long time. If the gate is open, and people choose to stay in hell or more correctly, Hades -then it's on them.
Mathew 16:18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
First person mis-represented our teachings, and the second guy just repeated the mistake.
Read this later
If Harry Caray was elect, what difference does it make whether the commentator has examined the "evidence"?
I still haven't gotten this advance copy of the Book of Life all these commentators seem to have gotten their hands on.
What's new?
Mark Coppenger, professor of Christian apologetics at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, sees a lamentable example of that in the 1941 poem “High Flight,” which was quoted in tribute to astronauts who died in the 1986 explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger.
Not all the astronauts were Christians “but we were told they ‘slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God,’” Coppenger noted.
__________________________________________________
My youngest daughter was 6 when this happened and was excited about watching the blast off on TV at school. Because of the teacher aboard the shuttle, schools were taking part in a big way...
She left home that morning thrilled about the days events and chatting like a magpie...
When the shuttle exploded I immediately thought of her and how I was going to help her through such a horrendous tragedy....when I called her school, they told me that the students were to be dismissed but the time was uncertain...
When Jean came home ABOUT AN HOUR LATER, the mystery for the school’s evasiveness was apparant...They had immediately gone into mourning mode and taken the children with them...
Little Jean was already a Bible believing Christian and came into the house disgusted with the adults at her school..She proved she knew more about God and where the souls of the dead had departed to, and why..
She said, “Mom, they dismissed us, but told us to wait in our classroom. After a while, some people who were crying came into the room and told us that it had been the worse thing that would ever happen to us, and that we were sad, and we would never forget what happened, and would be sad all our lives. Mom, that’s not true. I know what happened to those people. If they believed in Jesus, they went to Heaven. If they did not believe in Jesus, then they went to Hell. John 3:16, Mom. I tried to tell those people, but they would not listen to me. They were all crying and made all the kids cry too. We were sad until they came into the room, but after they said that, kids were frightened, and screaming, and it was awful. I ran all the way home to tell you that. Why did those people say we would always be sad ???”
Out of the mouth of babes...
I was incensed that they would keep my child at school and lie to her.. I found out those hysterical people had been mental health workers from the community...without my permission, they had preached to my child a doctrine of devils..Her school was 5-10 minutes walk and I could have just gone and got her, if I had known..
Consequently Jean got over the horror of what she had witnessed a lot faster than some of the other children..when she discussed the tragedy with her little Christian friends at school, she discovered that their parents had used the event as a Bible learning tool, and had mentioned Heaven and Hell to them, too..
For a time those students not thinking that the world had come to an end were lightly ostracized..the children had been encouraged to believe a lie...religion in the schools..
Jean remembers the shuttle explosion to this day..not only because of the deaths of the astronauts, but because of how helpless she felt, at age six, when adults lied to her about God and His Heaven, and our hope of Glory...
I read to this point and cannot help but wonder about alllll those first penned by Isaiah 6: 9-10, and then spoken by Christ. Matthew 13:10 And the disciples came, and said unto Him, "Why speakest Thou unto them in parables?"
Matthew 13:11 He answered and said unto them "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of *HEAVEN*, but to them it is not given. Matthew 13:13 Therefore speak I to *THEM* (the multitudes) in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.
What kind of religion does NOT read with understanding that it is not and was not given for all to understand the mysteries of heaven.... while in this flesh age? The Heavenly Father has the ultimate perfected justice, He knows our thoughts and nobody cons Him ... and ignorance of the law/WORD is not held against us, as our legal system in this day holds.
Every soul born from above (John 3) returns to the Maker that sent that soul the good the bad and the ugly.
Now there are even some that God says HE will send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie; IIThessalonians 2: Whole chapter!!! Hmmmmmm.
Very interesting thread! When I am not on FreeRepublic, I am often on a board for people with melanoma. When one of the members there loses their battle, the euphemism “earned their wings” is utilized, implying that they have become angels and gone to heaven. Several problems with this theology!
Through personal experience, I have learned not to argue this nuance in the public forum, but have often gone to private messages to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ.