The fate of those never had a chance.

[paulhadik]

Dr. Peterson:

I llike ya alot, enjoy reading your posts, wish i could share a doughnut with you. You don't need to apologize for your beliefs to me anymore than I think I should feel apologetic for the actions of My Creator and King.

LDS have the same problem, as you are not universalistic (are you?). Why would God breath life into any creature knowing that even after all He could do that person would still reject Him? Do LDS hold that while in the Spirit Prison every Chinese Peasant will become believers? And while we are on the subject, what kind of God wouldn't just let the entire world know his plan of salvation from Day One? Why allow, right after Christ does the ultimate sacrifice, apostasy to destroy the very fabric of His body, the church?

Why make His love and sacrifice fully dependent on people making a decision while He stands by hoping for the best? fingers crossed, gently "knocking at the door to our hearts". Was Esau treated fairly? Pharoah? Judas?

And come to mention it, why has God not made the LDS Utah church the CLEAR voice of His Spirit to the whole world? For guys like me and others, who, while having friends who are LDS completely reject that LDS church is the true church why hasn't God just said so? why make it so difficult?

Could it be that God's ways aren't our ways, and that like in Job we have no right to challenge him to act as we think he should?

just asking...again, i have the deepest respect for you and I know we differ on this

take care

[Anijen]

I am grateful for Prophets who can help us in today's world understand.

President Hinckley once said;

"I sense in a measure the meaning of His Atonement. I cannot comprehend it all. It is so vast in its reach and yet so intimate in its effect that it defies comprehension. When all is said and done, when all of history is examined, when the deepest depths of the human mind have been explored, nothing is so wonderful, so majestic, so tremendous as this act of grace when the Son of the Almighty, the Prince of His Father

[Rob Bowman]

smac,

You wrote:

It is wrong to damn someone to hell for eternity for not accepting something they never had the chance to accept in the first place.

As an evangelical Protestant, I agree with your statement here. However, no one will be damned for eternity for not accepting something they never had a chance to accept. Everyone who will be damned, will be damned on the basis of his works. It would be unjust if people were condemned for failing to believe something they never heard. However, that will not be the case. They will be condemned for their sins. God will condemn people on the basis of their works (Ps. 62:12; Prov. 24:12; Matt. 16:27; Rom. 2:6; Rev. 20:13). Those who will be saved will be saved by grace, through their faith in Christ, but those who are not saved will be lost because of their sins, not because they failed to believe in someone they never knew existed.

[LifeOnaPlate]

Dr. Peterson:

I llike ya alot, enjoy reading your posts, wish i could share a doughnut with you. You don't need to apologize for your beliefs to me anymore than I think I should feel apologetic for the actions of My Creator and King.

LDS have the same problem, as you are not universalistic (are you?). Why would God breath life into any creature knowing that even after all He could do that person would still reject Him? Do LDS hold that while in the Spirit Prison every Chinese Peasant will become believers? And while we are on the subject, what kind of God wouldn't just let the entire world know his plan of salvation from Day One? Why allow, right after Christ does the ultimate sacrifice, apostasy to destroy the very fabric of His body, the church?

Why make His love and sacrifice fully dependent on people making a decision while He stands by hoping for the best? fingers crossed, gently "knocking at the door to our hearts". Was Esau treated fairly? Pharoah? Judas?

And come to mention it, why has God not made the LDS Utah church the CLEAR voice of His Spirit to the whole world? For guys like me and others, who, while having friends who are LDS completely reject that LDS church is the true church why hasn't God just said so? why make it so difficult?

Could it be that God's ways aren't our ways, and that like in Job we have no right to challenge him to act as we think he should?

just asking...again, i have the deepest respect for you and I know we differ on this

take care

I provided a few links earlier in this thread which address many of your questions.

[LifeOnaPlate]

smac,

You wrote:

As an evangelical Protestant, I agree with your statement here. However, no one will be damned for eternity for not accepting something they never had a chance to accept. Everyone who will be damned, will be damned on the basis of his works. It would be unjust if people were condemned for failing to believe something they never heard. However, that will not be the case. They will be condemned for their sins. God will condemn people on the basis of their works (Ps. 62:12; Prov. 24:12; Matt. 16:27; Rom. 2:6; Rev. 20:13). Those who will be saved will be saved by grace, through their faith in Christ, but those who are not saved will be lost because of their sins, not because they failed to believe in someone they never knew existed.

You say people will be saved by grace through their faith in Christ. You have not answered for the people who couldn't have faith in Christ because they never heard anything about him. That is, you assert an ontological necessity of Christ's atonement but do not address the epistemological question, as I mentioned in my earlier post no one seems to have read. Was it too long?

[Anijen]

You say people will be saved by grace through their faith in Christ. You have not answered for the people who couldn't have faith in Christ because they never heard anything about him. That is, you assert an ontological necessity of Christ's atonement but do not address the epistemological question, as I mentioned in my earlier post no one seems to have read. Was it too long?

I agree it reminds me of this scripture;

2nd Nephi 9:25

Wherefore, he has given a law; and where there is no law given there is no punishment; and where there is no punishment there is no condemnation; and where there is no condemnation the mercies of the Holy One of Israel have claim upon them, because of the atonement; for they are delivered by the power of him.

and

Mosiah 3:11

For behold, and also his blood atoneth for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam, who have died not knowing the will of God concerning them, or who have ignorantly sinned.

[Daniel Peterson]

I llike ya alot, enjoy reading your posts, wish i could share a doughnut with you. You don't need to apologize for your beliefs to me anymore than I think I should feel apologetic for the actions of My Creator and King.

The respect is mutual.

And, if you ever find yourself in Utah, drop me a line. At any given hour of the day or night, according to people who apparently know these things, I'm likely to be gorging myself on Krispy Kremes, and I would enjoy visiting with you. (Though I won't share. You'll have to bring your own.)

LDS have the same problem, as you are not universalistic (are you?).

Actually, I have universalistic inclinations. I tend to believe that things are going to be far better, for far more people, than most of us imagine. But only because I believe in eternal progression. I don't believe that people will simply be given a free pass without remorse and repentance.

Why would God breath life into any creature knowing that even after all He could do that person would still reject Him?

First of all, don't forget that we LDS believe the individual human spirit to be uncreated. God didn't bring it into existence.

Moreover, I, personally, hold to an open view of the future. I think it a genuine possibility -- though, alas, extremely improbable -- that every person now living and still to come could be saved. I also believe that that is what God wants.

Do LDS hold that while in the Spirit Prison every Chinese Peasant will become believers?

I don't know of anybody who expects such an outcome, however much we may desire it.

And while we are on the subject, what kind of God wouldn't just let the entire world know his plan of salvation from Day One?

The veil, something like what the philosopher John Hick calls "epistemic distance," is required to allow genuine human freedom. It's part of the test. God wants his children to freely choose him.

Why allow, right after Christ does the ultimate sacrifice, apostasy to destroy the very fabric of His body, the church?

Such things come about because God allows human freedom, and part of allowing human freedom is to allow its consequences to unfold.

Why make His love and sacrifice fully dependent on people making a decision while He stands by hoping for the best? fingers crossed, gently "knocking at the door to our hearts".

See above, on human freedom.

Was Esau treated fairly? Pharoah? Judas?

Whether or not everybody has been treated fairly during this brief mortal life, everybody will be treated fairly in the long term. (Actually, more than fairly, because of divine mercy and grace. But not less than fairly.)

That, to me, is one of the great beauties of the Latter-day Saint understanding of God's plan.

And come to mention it, why has God not made the LDS Utah church the CLEAR voice of His Spirit to the whole world? For guys like me and others, who, while having friends who are LDS completely reject that LDS church is the true church why hasn't God just said so? why make it so difficult?

Because he allows freedom.

Moreover, please remember that I don't expect people to be tortured for all eternity merely because they failed to recognize (or, worse, even to hear of) the Restored Church during this mortal life. Heck, I don't expect them to be tortured for all eternity even if they reject it in the next life.

Could it be that God's ways aren't our ways, and that like in Job we have no right to challenge him to act as we think he should?

Certainly. But I cannot imagine that God is less just than I am, or less loving.

just asking...again, i have the deepest respect for you and I know we differ on this

take care

Best wishes to you, too.

Incidentally, it's been a while. Are you still in the Pacific?

However, no one will be damned for eternity for not accepting something they never had a chance to accept. Everyone who will be damned, will be damned on the basis of his works. It would be unjust if people were condemned for failing to believe something they never heard. However, that will not be the case. They will be condemned for their sins. God will condemn people on the basis of their works (Ps. 62:12; Prov. 24:12; Matt. 16:27; Rom. 2:6; Rev. 20:13). Those who will be saved will be saved by grace, through their faith in Christ, but those who are not saved will be lost because of their sins, not because they failed to believe in someone they never knew existed.

If I understand you correctly, this doesn't work for me at all.

Imagine a hundred people floating in rough seas after a shipwreck. The captain of a nearby ship has a hundred life preservers that he could use to save all of them, but he chooses to save only fifteen, and he sends out life preservers to the chosen fifteen but not to the others. In his defense at a subsequent trial, a crewman says "Nobody died for not accepting a life preserver that he or she never had a chance to accept. Everyone who died did so because he or she drowned. It would be unjust if these people were said to have drowned because they didn't get a life preserver. That wasn't the case. They drowned. Those who were saved were saved by the grace and kindness of Captain Ahab, through the use of the life preserver that he furnished to each of them, but those who were not saved were lost because they drowned at sea, not because they failed to receive a life preserver that wasn't offered to them." I can't imagine that such a defense would deliver Captain Ahab from the judgment of the court.

[sansfoy]

You say people will be saved by grace through their faith in Christ. You have not answered for the people who couldn't have faith in Christ because they never heard anything about him. That is, you assert an ontological necessity of Christ's atonement but do not address the epistemological question, as I mentioned in my earlier post no one seems to have read. Was it too long?

A false remedy for a non-existent illness.

[yesucan2]

Many years ago, when the Southern Baptist Convention held its annual meeting in Salt Lake, I took the then-editor of the Utah Evangel and then-director of Oklahoma-based Utah Missions, Inc. (an SBC pastor), and his wife out to lunch in Orem. (Lou Midgley came with us, and I believe that Bill Hamblin did, too.)

The conversation turned at one point to the fate of the unevangelized.

I raised the example of a rural peasant in ancient or medieval China who had never heard the name of Jesus. Was such a person damned? Yes, came the response, without hesitation. Somewhat shocked, I pursued the matter. Our guests were Calvinists, who even doubted the Christianity of Catholics. It seems, I said, that God favors the Dutch and the Scots (referring to two nationalities that had, at least historically, been prone to Calvinism, the True Faith). I got no objection. Returning to the matter of China, I said that it seemed pretty clearly unjust to set hundreds of millions, even billions, of people up in such a way that they had literally no chance at salvation. "Maybe God hates the Chinese," offered the pastor's wife. I looked for some sign of black humor or irony, but there was none. She was serious. I was stunned.

Just an anecdote, for what it's worth.

Here's another story about the conversation I had with my son on our way to soccer last Saturday.

My 11 year old son asked me about the notw stickers on the back of cars.

I explained about how others believed in one heaven and one hell and apparently weren't clear about how the meek shall inherit the Earth.

Then I asked him, "How would you like it if you did something in a way that I didn't like so I punished you by sending you to a place to be tortured for the rest of your life".

Of course, he didn't like that idea.

"How loving of a father do you think I would be if I would do such a thing". Of course he said that I would not.

Then I asked Ian who was more loving, me or Heavenly Father. Ian had no trouble with the right answer to that one either.

"So then why would people think that way?"

Ian: "Because they're stupid?"

[LifeOnaPlate]

A false remedy for a non-existent illness.

A terse dismissal without engagement.

[LifeOnaPlate]

Ian: "Because they're stupid?"

I hope you corrected him on that.

[sansfoy]

A terse dismissal without engagement.

The point is that there is no sin which merits eternal punishment, let alone the minor foibles of which most people are guilty. Even the worst Nazi criminals were merely hanged. We didn't torture them to death over the course of several months.

Why then would it be just to sentence someone to eternal torture for the sin of believing the wrong thing about the nature of God. A being that would enable such a punishment would not be God, but the most evil creature imaginable.

What evangelicals do is convince healthy people they suffer from a non-existent illness with absolutely horrific consequences and then offer a non-existent cure at great expense.

(I don't mean financial expense.)

[yesucan2]

I hope you corrected him on that.

It was a question. Not a statement.

Actually I busted up laughing as his response struck me as the kind of brutally honest, astute and reasonable reaction typical of little boys especially to someone like myself who wandered the earth for almost 19 years in the confusion that being raised in around Christianity as usual left me with and having worked in Christian Broadcasting for 20 years.

...But you're right. I guess I should have said that it's not nice to think people are stupid.

[sansfoy]

God = Good.

Satan = Evil.

Eternal Punishment = Evil.

I just realized that by my belief system, those who attribute eternal punishment to their deity worship Satan.

[LifeOnaPlate]

It was a question. Not a statement.

Actually I busted up laughing as his response struck me as the kind of brutally honest, astute and reasonable reaction typical of little boys especially to someone like myself who wandered the earth for almost 19 years in the confusion that being raised in around Christianity as usual left me with and having worked in Christian Broadcasting for 20 years.

...But you're right. I guess I should have said that it's not nice to think people are stupid.

Don't get me wrong, I would have most likely laughed pretty loudly myself. But then maybe it would be a good time to correct the mistaken assumption. Not only was it not nice, it wasn't accurate. I'm not coming down on the kid, he's just a kid, but I would not have spared the rod in this instance, I would fight him.

[LifeOnaPlate]

God = Good.

Satan = Evil.

Eternal Punishment = Evil.

I just realized that by my belief system, those who attribute eternal punishment to their deity worship Satan.

I missed your arrival at the board, was there a place where you described your belief system? I assumed from another thread that you were having doubts about Mormonism, etc.

[yesucan2]

God = Good.

Satan = Evil.

Eternal Punishment = Evil.

I just realized that by my belief system, those who attribute eternal punishment to their deity worship Satan.

So are you saying that you worship Satan?

[yesucan2]

Don't get me wrong, I would have most likely laughed pretty loudly myself. But then maybe it would be a good time to correct the mistaken assumption. Not only was it not nice, it wasn't accurate. I'm not coming down on the kid, he's just a kid, but I would not have spared the rod in this instance, I would fight him.

Why? His conclusion was a good one.

It's inconsistent to think that an all kind and loving Heavenly Father would do that. Even I am a better god than that because, even in my limited capacity as a mortal to love, I could not stand to see my children put into a torturous burning hell forever no matter what they did.

[LifeOnaPlate]

Why? His conclusion was a good one.

It's inconsistent to think that an all kind and loving Heavenly Father would do that. Even I am a better god than that because, even in my limited capacity to love as a mortal, I could not stand to see my children be put into a torturous burning hell forever no matter what they did.

It's not a good conclusion to hold that people who come to that particular conclusion are "stupid" simply because we see it as inconsistent or morally backward. Clearly they are bringing different assumptions to the question which help them make sense of it. Some of them might be stupid, some of them might be incredibly smart, many of them are probably somewhere in between. There are things I have a difficult time explaining about my own faith. Sometimes I have to say "I don't know, but I trust God." If anything, their belief on this issue could be seen as manifesting a high degree of trust in a God who does things that seem extremely contrary to their sense of justice and love. Granted, I think this is an unnecessarily high degree of trust on a needlessly difficult issue by my lights, but still, I can try to appreciate their perspective without simply brushing it aside as stupid. I may find it morally repugnant, unbelievable, even absurd. But why call them as people "stupid"?

Of course, he's your kid. My lecture is aimed at you, not him!

[sansfoy]

So are you saying that you worship Satan?

No, because I don't hold those beliefs. And I should clarify that I don't actually think evangelicals worship Satan, but that post explains why I feel such a visceral dislike of this doctrine.

[yesucan2]

No, because I don't hold those beliefs. And I should clarify that I don't actually think evangelicals worship Satan, but that post explains why I feel such a visceral dislike of this doctrine.

You said this:

"I just realized that by my belief system, those who attribute eternal punishment to their deity worship Satan."

Where do you think the hell you believe in came from, and when God judges people and those who don't go to Heaven, does that also not mean that He would be sending them to Hell?

[yesucan2]

It's not a good conclusion to hold that people who come to that particular conclusion are "stupid" simply because we see it as inconsistent or morally backward. Clearly they are bringing different assumptions to the question which help them make sense of it. Some of them might be stupid, some of them might be incredibly smart, many of them are probably somewhere in between. There are things I have a difficult time explaining about my own faith. Sometimes I have to say "I don't know, but I trust God." If anything, their belief on this issue could be seen as manifesting a high degree of trust in a God who does things that seem extremely contrary to their sense of justice and love. Granted, I think this is an unnecessarily high degree of trust on a needlessly difficult issue by my lights, but still, I can try to appreciate their perspective without simply brushing it aside as stupid. I may find it morally repugnant, unbelievable, even absurd. But why call them as people "stupid"?

Of course, he's your kid. My lecture is aimed at you, not him!

I think I see your point, but I still don't necessarily think his point is a bad one, especially in the thinking of an 11 year old boy.

Probably the correct response is that everyone has things in their lives that they have accepted as truths but are not well thought out or correct conclusions so in that way we are all stupid, but as we go through this life we should work to correct those things as much as we can.

[sansfoy]

You said this:

"I just realized that by my belief system, those who attribute eternal punishment to their deity worship Satan."

Where do you think the hell you believe in came from, and when God judges people and those who don't go to Heaven, does that also not mean that He would be sending them to Hell?

My belief system holds that if there were a such a place as Hell (meaning a land of eternal torment), such a place would be evil and could only be created by and allowed to exist by a similarly evil entity. I don't, however, believe that there is a literal hell.

I am undecided about the nature of Heaven, but some combination of the CS Lewis version a la The Great Divorce and the LDS Degrees of Glory seem like a reasonably just way to construct such a place.

[yesucan2]

My belief system holds that if there were a such a place as Hell (meaning a land of eternal torment), such a place would be evil and could only be created by and allowed to exist by a similarly evil entity. I don't, however, believe that there is a literal hell.

I am undecided about the nature of Heaven, but some combination of the CS Lewis version a la The Great Divorce and the LDS Degrees of Glory seem like a reasonably just way to construct such a place.

Here is the challenge I see with your statement: What does "Eternal Punishment" mean?

Most people intuitively take that to mean torture that lasts forever, however how do we define "Eternal Life?" Does that mean to live forever?

...But if people are sent to hell, aren't they living there forever?

[Rob Bowman]

LifeonaPlate,

You wrote:

You say people will be saved by grace through their faith in Christ. You have not answered for the people who couldn't have faith in Christ because they never heard anything about him. That is, you assert an ontological necessity of Christ's atonement but do not address the epistemological question, as I mentioned in my earlier post no one seems to have read. Was it too long?

I read it. The epistemological question actually has a complicated answer. Is faith in Jesus Christ's atoning sacrifice on the cross necessary for salvation? That is the question of "epistemological necessity." The answer cannot be a simple Yes or No, because there are clearly categories of people to whom it does not apply. One such category would be Old Testament believers in God. They did not know about Jesus' atoning sacrifice on the cross, but they were still saved, through their faith in the mercy of God as it had been revealed to them.

My point was simply to address one small point, but an important one, because it is a key premise in most criticism of traditional Christian teaching about salvation. The usual criticism is that it would be unfair of God to condemn ANYONE who had never heard the gospel because it is unfair to condemn someone for failing to believe something he never heard. The stated premise of this argument is a valid principle -- that it would be unfair to condemn someone for failing to believe something he had not heard. However, the hidden premise of the argument is that in traditional Christian theology God condemns people for failing to believe in Jesus. That is a misunderstanding. God condemns people for their sins, for doing things they know are wrong or failing to do things they know are right. Don't you agree that this is a reasonable rebuttal to the argument?