inquiringmind Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 People sometimes say that "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner," and "God loves everyone."I've even heard people say that God loves the devil, and would forgive him if he repented.But is there any scripture, anywhere (Bible, BOM. POGP. etc.), that actually says that God loves everyone?
BookofMormonLuvr Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 People sometimes say that "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner," and "God loves everyone."I've even heard people say that God loves the devil, and would forgive him if he repented.But is there any scripture, anywhere (Bible, BOM. POGP. etc.), that actually says that God loves everyone? Mosiah 28:3"3 Now they were desirous that salvation should be declared to every creature, for they could not bear that any human soul should perish; yea, even the very thoughts that any soul should endure endless torment did cause them to quake and tremble.Should we expect God to love any less?
TAO Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Yes, that one. There is also a verse in the Book of Moses here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/moses/7.28-40?lang=eng#27It's actually one of the most emotional verses in the Book of Moses which I have found. I like it alot because it shows how much God cares for us... each and every one of our souls... each and every one of us ourselves. =) 4
BookofMormonLuvr Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Apparently he hated EsauI believe the NLT translates this better as "rejected". Because of Esau disobedience, the Lord rejected him and did not show him the favor that He showed to Jacob. It wasn't a personal "hatred" for the person but a detesting of his deeds. 1
volgadon Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Yes, that one. There is also a verse in the Book of Moses here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/moses/7.28-40?lang=eng#27It's actually one of the most emotional verses in the Book of Moses which I have found. I like it alot because it shows how much God cares for us... each and every one of our souls... each and every one of us ourselves. =)Thank you. I was going to post this one, as it literally is one of the most crucial scriptures revealed in this, or any dispensation. God does love and care for everyone, he is deeply pained when his children reject him and hate their brothers.
Bikeemikey Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Thank you. I was going to post this one, as it literally is one of the most crucial scriptures revealed in this, or any dispensation. God does love and care for everyone, he is deeply pained when his children reject him and hate their brothers.Sure he does... He just doesn't like most of us most of the time... That's because we are consistently being jerks!
TAO Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Sure he does... He just doesn't like most of us most of the time... That's because we are consistently being jerks!Haha, I think it'd be he doesn't like alot of our actions, some of the time XD.
Libs Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 This is one of the things about the LDS Church that I loved. It is so refreshing to hear people say that God loves "everyone" and that we are ALL his children. Yes, I DO believe that with all my heart! 2
harfad Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Also D&C 76:26. God is love, according to John. God is merciful, but also just. Mercy cannot rob justice. If God were to be unjust (or allow mercy to rob justice), he would "cease to be God". The demands of justice must be satisfied, which means that the wicked must be punished.There are scriptures which say that God hates someone, but I think it means that he hates their sinful nature or disposition, not in the sense of hating them as one might hate one's enemy, in the sense of wishing them harm. God does now wish anyone harm. He does not bear malice or grudge. But He does punish the wicked according to predetermined law, in conformity with the principles of justice.
treeface Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 (edited) People sometimes say that "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner," and "God loves everyone."I've even heard people say that God loves the devil, and would forgive him if he repented.But is there any scripture, anywhere (Bible, BOM. POGP. etc.), that actually says that God loves everyone?John 3:16 certainly implies it. Just because the born-againers hang their hat on that scripture doesn't invalidate it.God is merciful, but also just. Mercy cannot rob justice. If God were to be unjust (or allow mercy to rob justice), he would "cease to be God". The demands of justice must be satisfied, which means that the wicked must be punished.What passes for "justice" in most people's minds would more properly be called "vengeance". In my opinion true justice would be something very different; it would be the undoing of injustice. Vengance does nothing to undo injustice. Our power to undo injustice is quite limited so we don't see how it could happen, but God's power to undo injustice does not suffer from the same limitations. Edited November 2, 2012 by treeface
urroner Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Yes, that one. There is also a verse in the Book of Moses here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/moses/7.28-40?lang=eng#27It's actually one of the most emotional verses in the Book of Moses which I have found. I like it alot because it shows how much God cares for us... each and every one of our souls... each and every one of us ourselves. =)A fine article by Doctor Dan does a great job talking "On the Motif of the Weeping God in Moses 7."Modern revelation received through Joseph Smith clearly teaches of a God who is "passible," who has emotions. The God of the Book of Moses, who identifies his "work" and his "glory" as being "to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man" (Moses 1:39), is not a God who dwells far away, transcendent in lordly and dispassionate isolation. Likewise, in Zenos's allegory of the olive tree, that marvelous document from the Book of Mormon, "the Lord of the vineyard," God, weeps over his vineyard (Jacob 5:41). And, indeed, modern revelation tells us that "the heavens wept over" Lucifer when he fell (D&C 76:26).Although the literal truth of such depictions has long been rejected by orthodox Jewish and Christian theology, these portrayals offer a plausible picture of a personal God. As several contemporary philosophical theologians have argued,God is a loving person, and love requires emotional passibility. To love someone is to care about him, and to care about him is to care about what happens to him, and to care about what happens to him is to be affected by what happens to him; it is to be happy when things go well for him and to be distressed when things go badly for him. If a purported lover was emotionally unaffected by the good and bad fortune of his beloved, by her joys and griefs, it would show that he was no true lover, and if God, the greatest conceivable lover, is emotionally unaffected by our ecstasies and our agonies then it only shows that he is no lover at all. But God is love. Therefore God must be thought of as emotionally passible.69Any expansion of the circle of one's love and concern is, concomitantly, an expansion of its circumference and of one's vulnerability. (The greater the volume of a bubble or balloon, the more space it encloses, the larger its surface area, and the greater its exposure.) Thus, in a very real and important sense, God, who loves more perfectly and more deeply than we can understand, is by that very fact rendered subject to pain.<snip>69 The argument, which he himself rejects, is summarized by Richard E. Creel, Divine Impassibility: An Essay in Philosophical Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986): 113–14, emphasis deleted. Contemporary supporters of the doctrine of divine impassibility include Friedrich von Hgel, Essays and Addresses on the Philosophy of Religion, 2nd ser. (London: Dent and Sons, 1926), chap. 7; John K. Mozley, The Impassibility of God: A Survey of Christian Thought (Cambridge, England: University Press, 1926); and E. L. Mascall, Whatever Happened to the Human Mind? Essays in Christian Orthodoxy (London: SPCK, 1980), 64–96. At the Council of Calcedon (A.D. 451), the divine and human natures of Christ were distinguished on the basis that they were respectively impassible and passible.And in the newest article in the Mormon Interpreter, "Revisiting the Forgotten Voices of Weeping in Moses 7: A Comparison with Ancient Texts," the weeping of God, the angles, and others, as well as the mourning of the Earth, is discussed.Because of their eloquent rebuke of the idea of divine impassibility5 —the notion that God does not suffer pain or distress—the passages in Moses 7 that speak of the voice of the weeping God have received the greatest share of attention in LDS scholarship, eliciting the pioneering notices of Hugh Nibley6, followed by lengthy articles by Eugene England7 and Peterson8. Most recently, a book relating to the topic has been written by Terryl and [Page 44]Fiona Givens9. In addition, with regard to the complaints of the earth described in Moses 7:48–49, valuable articles by Andrew Skinner10 and Peterson,11 again following Nibley’s lead,12 discuss interesting parallels in ancient sources.The purpose of this article is to round out the previous discussion so as to include two voices of weeping that have been largely forgotten by LDS scholarship—that of Enoch and that of the heavens.5. See, e.g, discussion in Peterson, “Weeping God,” 285–98.6. Hugh W. Nibley, Enoch the Prophet, The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1986), 5–7, 42–44, 68–70, 189–91, 198–99.7. Eugene England, “The Weeping God of Mormonism,” Dialogue 35/1 (2002).8. Peterson, “Weeping God.”9. Terryl L. Givens and Fiona Givens, The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life (Salt Lake City, UT: Ensign Peak, 2012).10. Andrew C. Skinner, “Joseph Smith Vindicated Again: Enoch, Moses 7:48, and Apocryphal Sources,” in Reason, Revelation, and Faith: Essays in Honor of Truman G. Madsen, ed. Donald W. Parry, Daniel C. Peterson, and Stephen D. Ricks (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 2002), 373–80. In his discussion, Skinner cites ancient texts such as George W. E. Nickelsburg, ed. 1 Enoch 1: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1–36; 81–108 (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2001), 7:6, 9:2, 87:1, pp. 182, 202, 364; Michael Wise, Martin Abegg, Jr, and Edward Cook, eds, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation (New York City, NY: Harper-Collins, 1996), 4Q203 Frag. 8:9, p. 294. See also Bakhayla Mika’el, “The Book of the Mysteries of the Heavens and the Earth,” in The Book of the Mysteries of the Heavens and the Earth and Other Works of Bakhayla Mika’el (Zosimas), ed. E. A. Wallis Budge (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1934; repr., Berwick, ME: Ibis Press, 2004), p. 29: “[e]ven the earth complained and uttered lamentations.”11. In addition to discussing one of the 1 Enoch passages mentioned by Skinner, Peterson follows J. J. M. Roberts in citing examples of Sumerian laments of the mother goddess (“Weeping God,” 298–306).12. Nibley, Enoch, 11–14, 74–75, 205–206. 1
CV75 Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 (edited) People sometimes say that "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner," and "God loves everyone."I've even heard people say that God loves the devil, and would forgive him if he repented.But is there any scripture, anywhere (Bible, BOM. POGP. etc.), that actually says that God loves everyone?John 3:16. I take "world" to mean everybody, or every one that has a body and that hasn't rebelled against Him in the first estate. This doesn't mean He doesn't love the devils also, but they have rejected the first estate to the point of being "cast out" so that He cannot "so love them" as to allow them everlasting life in a body. Some kinds of love have to be mutually communed and reciprocated to be love. Edited November 2, 2012 by CV75
Saints Alive Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 (edited) CV75:Well said I agree 100% Edited November 2, 2012 by Saints Alive
Duncan Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 kinda of a sensitive subject for me. It's easy to say that God loves everyone and I don't want to cause some crisis in anyone but how do you know God loves you personally? Has he said or have you felt his love?
CV75 Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 kinda of a sensitive subject for me. It's easy to say that God loves everyone and I don't want to cause some crisis in anyone but how do you know God loves you personally? Has he said or have you felt his love?I know God loves me personally because He gave me a testimony (a long time ago), and the the longer I live and stay true and faithful to it, the more I see how He has shown His love in other ways all along, and the more I recognize it in other ways in the present. Feeling His love is more a function of my development than His actual love, and so tracks a little behind my seeing it. But I have great faith in feeling His love based on what I have seen of His love.
volgadon Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 And in the newest article in the Mormon Interpreter, "Revisiting the Forgotten Voices of Weeping in Moses 7: A Comparison with Ancient Texts," the weeping of God, the angles, and others, as well as the mourning of the Earth, is discussed.That article was an eye-opener, because I had planned to use much the same texts, especially Heschel, to make similar points. 1
Mark Beesley Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 kinda of a sensitive subject for me. It's easy to say that God loves everyone and I don't want to cause some crisis in anyone but how do you know God loves you personally? Has he said or have you felt his love?Yes, He has.
Tacenda Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 (edited) kinda of a sensitive subject for me. It's easy to say that God loves everyone and I don't want to cause some crisis in anyone but how do you know God loves you personally? Has he said or have you felt his love?Somehow and some way, I feel it. But have not quite come around to loving myself. And just as we want our children to know how wonderful they are, our HF does too, so he's probably sad that I don't feel good about myself alot. But I feel Him with me. Edited November 3, 2012 by Tacenda 1
Bill “Papa” Lee Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 People sometimes say that "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner," and "God loves everyone."I've even heard people say that God loves the devil, and would forgive him if he repented.But is there any scripture, anywhere (Bible, BOM. POGP. etc.), that actually says that God loves everyone?I think God does love all, but I have heard anyone suggest Satan could repent, and I assue there is no forgiveness for his sins committed with a perfect knowledge. His fate is set, as are any in this life who deny the Holy Ghost after having received a sure knowledge. If we with the viel drawn, cannot be forgiven in this life or the life to come for such a sin, then Satan will remain as he is...damned.
MiserereNobis Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 From the LDS view, if Satan repented, wouldn't that mess up the plan of salvation by removing temptation?In Catholicism, Satan is damned, end-of-story.
Damien the Leper Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 Maybe not depending how you read Russell Nelson.
thesometimesaint Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 From the LDS view, if Satan repented, wouldn't that mess up the plan of salvation by removing temptation?In Catholicism, Satan is damned, end-of-story.In LDS Theology no one is beyond the Atonement of Christ that wants it.Presumably that would include Satan and his minions. That the part we have no theology on. That being said It is Gods' will that none should be lost if they would but repent. Satan and his minions through their own act of will WILL not ever repent. 1
Bikeemikey Posted November 2, 2012 Posted November 2, 2012 From the LDS view, if Satan repented, wouldn't that mess up the plan of salvation by removing temptation?In Catholicism, Satan is damned, end-of-story.I think the idea that Satan is the origin of temptation is rather non-sensical - he may be really good at tempting people but the capacity for tempting is pre-existant in the human condition, Satan is not required.
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