In Order For You To Be A Christian

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
Seriously. Who can look at their mother, their wife, their husband or father, their children, their true love - and honestly say that it would be acceptable for them all to go screaming into an eternal pit of despair? Who can honestly tell themselves that these people really deserve this fate?...

God does not permit any imperfect thing to be in his presence. But Jesus, who is fully God, did go to be with sinners. (But he did not hand out with the worst kinds of sinners.) That is because he was the one that removes the imperfection. He is the mediator between the sinner and God, and his perfection is credited to sinners, so that some will not be separated from God for eternity.

Christ was fully man. He had a body, he was tempted as a man to sin, he ate and slept, and breathed. And yet he did not sin. And still he was punished and died - and that sacrifice is the means that sinners are justified before God (made perfect in God's eyes). Not by their good works, because no good works can make one perfect (that's only adding floor to the dough).

Now the evil within men is like yeast in dough, it spreads throughout the lump. So to say man is totally deprived means that there is no part of man that is perfect, flawless, or sinless. The yeast spreads throughout the whole lump of dough, even the tiniest amount. Sin is like yeast. And everyone has sinned. And once there is sin, it is impossible for us to remove it. So if one has told a white lie, or called their brother a fool, or looked at a woman with lust, any of these things is like adding yeast to the mix. One can not remove the yeast by adding more flour or water.

Christians do acknowledge that all people deserve hell. And no one merits salvation. And because of this, we are all the more grateful that Christ died for our sins. And because he loves us, we love him. And because we love him, we wish to do what he asks us to do, good works as much as we can.

But we never simply say that we all deserve hell and leave it at that. We say we deserve hell and yet Christ forgives us our sins, and for that we should be grateful and show love to each other. It would be wrong to take that one idea, all are sinners, and leave it at that.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
You have to admit that you; your mother and father; your children; Mother Theresa; every President we've ever had in the U.S.; Ghandhi; Martin Luther King Jr.; and everyone else who has ever existed; is a vile, evil person

i hear you...

i think a distinction is in there somewhere: i don't think you have to admit they are vile, evil people -- just humans who are ultimately imperfect. this, to me, only strengthens your arguments.

i do agree that to be christian, you would have to admit that given their small, minor imperfections, they deserve to go to hell and spend an eternity engulfed in the flames for their small, minor imperfections. i guess the christian would say, yeah, but god has left a readily accessible way to circumvent this by simply accepting jesus. still, the idea that a great person with only small minor imperfections should go to hell if he refuses (actually, he wouldn't even have to be refusing, right? -- we could relax this and just say that he simply doesn't accept jesus for any number of reasons) to accept jesus is hard for me to swallow. seems so arbitrary.

Originally posted by Coletti
God does not permit any imperfect thing to be in his presence.

Hey! What happened to the omnipresent god? There seems to be some sort of contradiction here.
And why would the proximity an imperfect thing bother an all-powerful god? Especially if that thing was an object that he himself created.

Originally posted by chinking58

I think it's more accurate to say that a sinner cannot be with God.

Before Jesus died on the cross, he was surrounded by sinners. Moreover not all of these sinners rejected him.

Satan also hung out with God in the book of Job.

By definition, a sinner rejects God and all that He stands for.

This is false. Actually, the sinner must accept God and thus "all he stands for" before he be cleansed of his sin. If your definition were correct then a sinner could never come to God.

He wont abide by God, he wont abide with God. Why would he?

Because he would know for sure at that point that Hell awaited if he did not learn to like God. Hell is supposed to be so bad that no one wants to be there. If God is so wonderful, then the dead sinner who discovers that God is real will want to repent and start a relationship with his creator. Of course, vindictive xtians believe that the paragon of goodness and love will deny the penitent sinners plea, simply because the sinner is dead. I find it unbelievable that a creator who wants nothing more than to share his love with all his creation will callously turn them away once they have left the physical world. The more I think about xtianity, the more obviously man-made it is.

Having made the decision to reject God, even when He did come and walk with man, he will either continue to reject God, or repent and turn to God. God's arms are always open.

Oh, maybe you do not share the beliefs of Darfius et al, that once a sinner dies, it is too late to repent. Few people reject God (i.e. Yahweh) just to be recalcitrant. Nearly all those that reject God do so because they do not believe that Yahweh exists, so your claim that He did come and walk with man is irrelevant.

Originally posted by telerion
[b/]Originally posted by chinking58

I think it's more accurate to say that a sinner cannot be with God.

Before Jesus died on the cross, he was surrounded by sinners. Moreover not all of these sinners rejected him.

...[text shortened]... m that He did come and walk with man is irrelevant.



[/b]

That's an excellent point I never really thought of; why would death be such a critical dividing point for God? Why couldn't an immortal soul accept Christ after death if it was still in existence? Why would God accept this if it happened one minute before death but reject it if it occurred one minute after? Just cuz the Bible says so?

Originally posted by huntingbear
Originally posted by AThousandYoung
[b]Yes, insult. You think your wife should go to Hell. She deserves eternal torment. That would be justice in your opinion. Am I wrong?

Just to verify, I posed this to my wife not t ...[text shortened]... ticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.[/b]

If I'm mischaracterizing you, I apologize. My intent was to simply show the other side of the coin; you seem to be focussing only on those aspects of your belief that sound good to you, and I was focussing on those aspects you seem to be tiptoeing around. It's entirely possible I misrepresented your views, and I'll try to understand them more clearly when I have time.

So your wife does not find your view of her insulting. OK.

Do I think your profession of love for your wife is insincere? I don't honestly know. Maybe. To tell someone they deserve something is to judge them, I believe. If I love someone, I feel they deserve only good things. In fact, I feel this way about every being that can experience pleasure or suffering. I have a basic love for all beings and so I cannot honestly feel anyone or any animal that can experience anything unpleasant deserves it. Every such being deserves all the love and happiness that is possible. Since we come from such opposite perspectives, I guess it's hard to relate to one another.

I don't see punishment and consequences as something people "deserve"; they are necessary evils which we cannot avoid because we have limited power.

I'm unsure why you think it's ok for people not to have to suffer the punishment they deserve; since you think everyone deserves misery, and yet through Christianity they don't have to experience it - isn't there something wrong with that? If someone feels a child molester deserves to go to jail or be executed or whatever, and then that person walks, it would be an injustice from the perspective of that person who feels that way. That's what "deserving punishment" means to me anyway. Do you see the word "deserve" differently?

Why don't we deserve to be with God? If being with God is so wonderful, I say we all deserve it, no matter how vile we are.

Logic necessitates that one is either with God, or without, for any third option would be a contradiction.

OK, sure; though there are many assumptions I think you're making which I don't agree with. For example, equating pleasure and happiness with being "with" a being with certain characteristics and a certain personality who allegedly did certain things and is accurately described in the Bible.

You seem to be saying there are only two possibilities; infinite bliss, and infinite torment. That is not the case. In any event, I do not agree at all with your basic premise that no one deserves eternal bliss.

The phrase "simply because she's a human" distorts my beliefs.

I am not sure that it does. All humans, according to your perspective, except for the one who had the advantage of also being God, sin. This one could not be a sinner because he was God, and God cannot be a sinner by definition (at least according to what I've heard from Christians). To me the obvious conclusion is that humans, unless they are also God and therefore cannot sin, are just sinners by nature. It's part of being human. Aren't humans sinners as soon as they are born simply because they are human? Am I making a mistake somewhere?

You have inserted a premise, assumed but unstated, that simply being human suffices to make one a sinner, a premise never stated by me, and with which I disagree whole-heartedly.

Really. I find this extremely hard to buy. The premise I did assume seems obvious. I don't see how every human being is a sinner and therefore deserves damnation the second they are conceived because their hypothetical ancestors disobeyed this being called God; and yet being human does not suffice to make one a sinner (assuming the human is not also God). How do you reconcile this?

I don't dwell on my sinfulness. I dwell on God's love and my gratitude for it, which is the life I live with all my heart, trying to do good and not evil. Humility consists not in thinking oneself filth, but in not thinking of oneself. I am far from perfect in that regard, but that is my aim.

You and I see this entirely differently. To me, it's an injustice if someone deserves something and yet does not get what they deserve, whether it's good or bad. The world in fundamentally unjust in my eyes, but that makes sense because I don't think there is an omnipotent being who can change this. It seems as though you disagree; you seem to think it's just if someone deserves something and doesn't get it. I find your perspective very confusing. To me your perspective seems impossible; self contradictory.

My motive for my stating your beliefs in the way I do has a number of facets. One is political; I don't like the influence Christians have and the way they use it in the world I live in, so I try to undermine it. I feel Christians use their power immorally, and their religious beliefs are one of the things that fuels this immoral use of power. In addition, I like to study things critically, and challenging others' beliefs often leads to either my being more confident of my own, or else leads to me questioning my own. For example, I've been led to look carefully and critically at the concept of macroevolution because of my debates with creationists. There may be other reasons that aren't coming to mind right now, but these are the most significant ones.

However, I do not intend to distort anything; I am a firm believer that honesty is very important and being deceitful and manipulative as a general rule is destructive to those things I value. Short term political gains earned through insults and distortions of others' beliefs are not what I am interested in in the slightest. Instead I want to present the true beliefs of Christians in a manner which is not sugar coated to hide the seriously creepy and dangerous nature of those beliefs. I feel Christians generally express their beliefs in such a manner as to hide and sugar coat these aspects. As you yourself say, you don't dwell on these aspects. I feel you basically ignore them and focus on that part of your belief that sounds nice. It's like how a criminal describes robbing a house to himself or his friends. He might talk about how corrupt the owner probably is, how the criminal's people deserve this money that was stolen from them, how the owner can afford it, how it's a dog eat dog world, how the police are just another gang, how everyone robs everyone else anyway...all these things sound convincing to many people, yet a policeman's description of the same event will be far different and less complimentary and not incorrect.

To me, if your wife doesn't deserve your love, there would be nothing wrong if you cheated on her, if you walked out on her and your children, insulted her, gave her AIDS, etc. It's nothing compared to what she really deserves anyway. It's wonderful that you do love her, but you could treat her like garbage and she would deserve even worse in your eyes. I don't see how that's a distortion of what you believe. Please clear it up for me.

By the way, I asked my sister how she felt about all this. She says that the fact that you think everyone deserves all these things means it's not really that bad. She feels it would be much more horrific if you said she deserved these things and other people didn't, for what that's worth. I don't really agree.

I asked my parents too. Both of them think you're insane. Given that you have the beliefs that you have, my father think's you're a freak and my Mom didn't give a clear answer. First she said she wouldn't feel insulted because you're nuts, then when I pushed a little bit she said she'd feel insulted. I don't know if she was just agreeing with me to be nice though.

Called to share God’s eternal life in Heaven but wounded by sin, Man stands in need of God’s salvation. God’s help comes to Man in Christ, whose teaching guides him and whose grace sustains him.


God's Salvation: Law and Grace

http://www.catholic.org.uk/library/catechism/lawandgrace.shtml

Please accept my apologies, AThousandYoung, for the lengthy delay in replying. I have been ferociously busy.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
you seem to be focussing only on those aspects of your belief that sound good to you, and I was focussing on those aspects you seem to be tiptoeing around.

Tiptoeing? I said very plainly that hell is the worst possible situation in which one could find oneself. I could list a bunch of really bad situations and go into great detail about how bad they were, but I don't think it would make much contribution to the discussion. If I were interested in tugging at emotions, I might do it. As it is, I trust in others' imaginations enough to feel confident that if I say hell is the worst situation in which one could find oneself, then they can imagine a bunch of bad situations themselves, if they like, and understand that any they imagine are, in my belief, not as bad as hell.

There is really no distinction to between these aspects you think you've identified in my faith. The less I deserve God's love, the more I know it to be unconditional, and the more secure I feel in it. My wife knows that I love her for her no matter what, that my love is not conditional upon her meeting any expectations of mine. No whim or fancy will distract me.

So your wife does not find your view of her insulting.

Of course, she's a Christian. So my survey sample was biased. But that's the whole point. You believe our claim that "All have sinnned" is insulting. To a Christian, it is not. If you wish to understand our viewpoint, I can help clear this up for you. I'm not asking or urging you to adopt our viewpoint. But if you understood our viewpoint before evaluating our claims for their level of insult, you might reach a different conclusion. You may still think we were misguided, or wrong, or stupid, or whatever you like.

There are a number of things said by non-Christians in these forums which I would find dreadfully insulting, if I were not sensitive to the differences between their viewpoints and mine.

To tell someone they deserve something is to judge them, I believe.

Merely to tell them? Odd. I would think that deciding their dessert was judgment. If a hearing impaired man were in court and found "not guilty," and a sign-language interpreter announced to him the judgment, would it make any sense to say the judgment was the interpreter's?

If I love someone, I feel they deserve only good things.

I feel the very same things about my wife. When did you ever get the idea that I didn't? I haven't been discussing feelings in this thread. If you have, then we have not been "on the same page".

I'm unsure why you think it's ok for people not to have to suffer the punishment they deserve

I value mercy, and forgiveness. In fact, I treasure them.

since you think everyone deserves misery, and yet through Christianity they don't have to experience it - isn't there something wrong with that?

No.

If someone feels a child molester deserves to go to jail or be executed or whatever, and then that person walks, it would be an injustice from the perspective of that person who feels that way.

Forgiveness is difficult.

"I'll never forget talking to a close friend of mine who confessed to me that his father had sexually abused him for many years. He spoke of the crippling anger and pain it caused him ... But my friend ... eventually chose to forgive his father. However, that was no simple thing! He told me how agonising this choice was. Why? What is involved in forgiveness? When we forgive, we choose to absorb the anger and pain caused by someone else. We choose not to take out the anger and hurt on them. We choose to let our own sense of justice punish us, instead of them. Forigiveness costs!"

That's from an article by Martin Foord, one of my teachers and also a friend. I just read it early this evening. It helps illustrate the Christian perspective.

That's what "deserving punishment" means to me anyway. Do you see the word "deserve" differently?

This is why we Christians go nuts about the word "grace." We think it's amazing. My wife and I named our third child Grace.

Why don't we deserve to be with God?

I am not the judge. Don't ask me. I can't say any more than I already have. "All have sinned," "Nobody's perfect," etc.

If being with God is so wonderful, I say we all deserve it, no matter how vile we are.

I don't believe you are the judge, either.

OK, sure; though there are many assumptions I think you're making which I don't agree with.

That's ok. I'm not trying to convert you. I'm just trying to explain my viewpoint. I have little doubt that the assumptions you make are very different from the ones I make.

For example, equating pleasure and happiness with being "with" a being with certain characteristics and a certain personality who allegedly did certain things and is accurately described in the Bible.

This is where I get very confused about why you even care to be insulted by the opinion of some that you will not be in God's presence for eternity. You don't even like Him, and you don't believe He exists. I don't see what's so insulting. If someone stopped me on the street and said, "Hey, if you don't lick the heel of my boot then you'll suffer forever, because without licking the heel of my boot you deserve to suffer forever, and only licking the heel of my boot will let you avoid suffering forever, and not licking the heel of my boot results in the worst possible situation in which one could find oneself" then I doubt I could muster up a rat's posterior to give. I just couldn't be bothered being insulted.

You seem to be saying there are only two possibilities; infinite bliss, and infinite torment. That is not the case. In any event, I do not agree at all with your basic premise that no one deserves eternal bliss.

That's ok. I'm not trying to convince you. I'm just asking you to see the question from my point of view. If there were only two possibilities, and if no one did deserve eternal bliss, what would be insulting about saying there were only two possibilities, and saying no one deserves eternal bliss? I can see your point of view: you think these things are false. But I still don't see the grounds for being insulted. If that guy really thought I should lick his boot, I wouldn't be insulted. I wouldn't lick his stinkin' boot, but I wouldn't be insulted. He's only operating according to his best understanding of reality. I might feel insulted momentarily, but sober thought would cure that. The same thing happens to me when I read some of the posts around here, or overhear things in public. People use all kinds of foul language, even around my toddlers, but apparently they don't know any better. So, though I may not like it, I don't lose any sleep over it.

huntingbear: The phrase "simply because she's a human" distorts my beliefs.

I am not sure that it does.

I am sure it does. But this post is long enough as it is, and I'm not opening this can of worms. Or, if it is open already, I'm shutting it. Or maybe I'm just leaving it open. Your view of original sin is not universally held among Christians. These big questions about free will and original sin and all that jazz are not answered directly and fully in the Bible. You should be wary of any Christian who thinks he can explain all that with certainty. I happen to believe in freedom of the human will, but I don't have the time to go into it in depth. I've touched on it in other threads and I just don't have the time. So you may trust me or not when I say that my beliefs do not match your presentation of Christianity. In my view, merely being human is not enough to make one a sinner.

To me, it's an injustice if someone deserves something and yet does not get what they deserve, whether it's good or bad.

Do you really believe mercy is a bad thing?

you seem to think it's just if someone deserves something and doesn't get it. I find your perspective very confusing. To me your perspective seems impossible; self contradictory.

I'm at least as confused as you are. I never said it is just for someone not to get what they deserve. Before I can respond to this meaningfully I'll have to find out why you think I believe that.

Instead I want to present the true beliefs of Christians in a manner which is not sugar coated to hide the seriously creepy and dangerous nature of those beliefs.

I am happy with that. In fact, I hope to aid you in your attempt to understand the beliefs of Christians, and thus to aid you in your presentation of "the true beliefs of Christians". I don't like artificial sweetening, either. Neither, however, do I like the idea of scrubbing off natural sugars. Many Christians upset the balance of their beliefs in the direction of over-emphasizing the "feel-good" stuff. Many non-Christians upset the balance in the other direction. Presenting our true beliefs would require not skewing the data in either direction.

As you yourself say, you don't dwell on these aspects. I feel you basically ignore them and focus on that part of your belief that sounds nice.

These two sentences are worlds apart. That is quite a leap from "you don't dwell on" to "you basically ignore." The nice parts sound nicer because of the bad parts. I can't help but dwell on the good parts. The more I learn about my own imperfection (sin, badness, whatever term you like), the more I understand the greatness of God's mercy and love. You've never seen the regret I have over the bad things I've done, the people I've hurt in my life. I know what I have been saved from, but also what I have been saved into. I know hell is the wor

I know hell is the worst situation in which one could find oneself, and I don't need, from you or anyone else, dramatic examples of other bad situations to get that. I also know that heaven is the best possible situation in which one could find oneself. You complain that too many Christians distort their faith by ignoring hell (which is true), but then you make exactly the same kind of error. You skew the data to support your conclusion. You want to hush up mercy and talk about justice. You want to find insult and forget love. There are unpleasant and pleasant things in Christianity. I will deny neither. Some will deny one, and sugar coat their faith. Some will deny the other, and distort the faith just as badly. Do you wish to do that, or do you wish really to understand Christianity so that you can "present the true beliefs of Christians" ?

Some Christians want to make Christianity look good. I don't. Some people want to make Christianity look bad. Do you? I want to explain Christianity to the best of my ability. If you like it, then you like it. If you don't, then you don't.

To me, if your wife doesn't deserve your love

Let me clarify that. My wife doesn't deserve perfect love (neither do I), but because I am far from perfect (so is my wife) my love is imperfect (so is hers). Now you need to remember to be careful to distinguish between what I believe and what I feel. Anyway, none of us deserves to have another put us above everything else. My ideal in living love for my wife is to put her and her needs above my own and above anything else in the world. Often, I fall short. I could be doing the dishes now instead of writing long posts. My wife does not deserve that ideal love, but neither does she get it. My love is not ideal. I'm not that great a husband. We're a match made in hell. The closer my wife's love comes to perfection (and her love comes closer than mine), the less I deserve it. Why is it not abundantly clear how wonderful that is? I don't need to deserve her love, and she doesn't need to deserve mine. Neither do we need to deserve God's. These loves don't depend on the beloved being lovely. My wife is lovely, but that's just a bonus. I find this hard to explain to you, because I don't think I've ever before encountered someone who does not see the beauty of unconditional love.

To me, if your wife doesn't deserve your love, there would be nothing wrong if you cheated on her, if you walked out on her and your children, insulted her, gave her AIDS, etc.

Now I'm puzzled more than ever. What could possess you to think that my wife's having sinned would justify me to sin?

It's nothing compared to what she really deserves anyway.

Who appointed me to administer suffering? Because I deserve separation from God, which is worse than a punch in the gut, does not justify Jim to punch me in the gut. Who appointed Jim to administer some portion of justice to me? What could possibly give me the right to harm my wife?

It's wonderful that you do love her, but you could treat her like garbage and she would deserve even worse in your eyes.

Define "in your eyes." And what does her dessert have to do with whether I would be justified in immorality? I believe it's as wrong to steal from a murderer as from anyone else. I believe theft is wrong, regardless of the character of the person from whom something is stolen. How in the world do you think my belief that "All have sinned" permits me to sin by abusing others with impunity?

I don't see how that's a distortion of what you believe. Please clear it up for me.

I need you to clear up what you're saying first. I do not follow your argument. I expressed the basic shape of my confusion above.

By the way, I asked my sister how she felt about all this. She says that the fact that you think everyone deserves all these things means it's not really that bad. She feels it would be much more horrific if you said she deserved these things and other people didn't, for what that's worth. I don't really agree.

Neither do I. That's kind of sugar-coating it. Sin is really bad, whether some people have done it or all have.

I asked my parents too. Both of them think you're insane. Given that you have the beliefs that you have, my father think's you're a freak and my Mom didn't give a clear answer.
First she said she wouldn't feel insulted because you're nuts, then when I pushed a little bit she said she'd feel insulted. I don't know if she was just agreeing with me to be nice though.

As for my being insane, even if your parents are both mental health professionals, they do not have enough information for an accurate diagnosis. But I won't bother being insulted. Your father's welcome to think I'm a freak. I am confident that his belief that I am a freak represents his best attempt to describe reality as he sees it.

I thought my time after the semester ended would be more plentiful, but I was wrong. I will look out for your reply to this, but with apologies this will be my last post in this thread. Please don't let that deter you from replying. I'd be interested to know whether I've made things any clearer.

A couple of personal thoughts on love (strictly on the human level: no statements about God should be read into them or out of them or through them…well, you get it). These are not directed at huntingbear or anyone else; just reading the last couple of posts or so jiggled by brain.

1) My “definition” of love is something like “a free passionate whole-hearted caring-for.” Am not interested in surveying dictionary definitions, or parsing that one. I am not excluding feeling or action or willing, or trying to identify different “kinds” of love. In all of my other comments, that full definition needs to be kept in mind. With that—

2) Love and deservingness have nothing to with one another. Not that one precludes the other; but if I love someone because they deserve it, it is their “deserving” characteristics that I love, or my perception that those characteristics sufficiently outweigh other “less deserving ones.”

3) I don’t love everyone. Some people I choose to love, others not. I’m not claiming anything for that, it’s just the way it is. (Just as with deservingness, “should” and love have nothing to do with one another.)

4) My love for someone—I’ll use my wife here, since I love her above all people: my love for my wife is not her decision; it is mine. She can accept it, reject it, walk away, whatever. But she can’t change it; it’s mine. I give it freely. I require nothing. There is no clinging or clutching: she is free too. If she felt somehow trapped by my love, then love is probably not what I am showing her.

5) How unconditional is our love? Well, we never really know that until we bump up against a condition. A story—

A man once claimed to his friend that he could run 100 miles without stopping (pick any numbers you like here). They told him he was crazy, no one was capable of that. So he set out to do it; his friends followed along in a car. Well, the man actually made it 60 miles before he could no longer go on. As they helped in the car, his friends—rather than marveling that he made it farther that any of them could have imagined, said: “See? We told you nobody can run a hundred miles!”

“Well, I made it 60 miles!,” the man answered happily, between gasps for air.

“But you said you could go 100 miles.”

“Yes,” he smiled, “and if I would’ve said 60, I probably only would have made 40.”

“Well,” they asked, with just the trace of sarcasm, “just how far do you think you can run next time?”

“Me?” he replied with a grin, “Why, I can run forever!”

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
You have to admit that you; your mother and father; your children; Mother Theresa; every President we've ever had in the U.S.; Ghandhi; Martin Luther King Jr.; and everyone else who has ever existed; is a vile, evil person who really, really deserves horrific, eternal torture. This is a torture worse than being raped, worse than being immerse ...[text shortened]... le and evil that they deserve these things. This is what it means to call yourself a Christian.

Er ... no.

Originally posted by huntingbear
Please accept my apologies, AThousandYoung, for the lengthy delay in replying. I have been ferociously busy.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
[b]you seem to be focussing only on those aspects of your belief that sound good to you, and I was focussing on those aspects you seem to be tiptoeing around.

Tiptoeing? I said very plainly tha ...[text shortened]... I know what I have been saved from, but also what I have been saved into. I know hell is the wor[/b]

I appreciate your carefully thought out and respectful post. It is (they are) so long that I never seem to get around to responding, but that does not mean I don't have responses to make. I'll try to respond to a piece at a time.

Tiptoeing? I said very plainly that...

The aspect that I feel you (and all other Christians) tiptoe around is the fact that you believe everyone deserves these bad things, with emphasis on "everyone deserves" and not on what the nature of Hell is.

I'll start there.

Merely to tell them? Odd. I would think that deciding their dessert was judgment. If a hearing impaired man were in court and found "not guilty," and a sign-language interpreter announced to him the judgment, would it make any sense to say the judgment was the interpreter's?

Well, yes, you are correct, sort of. However there's a difference between telling someone "you deserve XXX" and "this court has decided that you have committed YYY and therefore must undergo the punishment XXX".

Deciding someone's punishment is not necessarily a judgement about deservedness; what a judge is judging is what the appropriate penalty should be in light of the fact that someone has apparently committed some crime, the law says whatever it says, and considering practical matters as well. Deserving, to me, is independent of what is practical, because practicality is a result of limited power.

Now, let me think about your analogy.

God supposedly has decided that everyone who sins in the slightest deserves eternal torment. You, from what I understand, as a Christian, have absolutely no disapproval of God. Everything God decides is perfect to you. In other words, you agree with everything he says. In the case of the interpreter, not only is the judge not judging moral deservedness, the interpreter doesn't necessarily agree with the judge. Therefore your analogy fails. You are not like the translator, neutrally passing on a message, but instead you are wholeheartedly endorsing the content of that message. On the one hand it's hard to blame the messenger; in the other, it's very easy to resent the messenger and feel insulted by him, because he's not only delivering a message from a third party but in addition making it clear that he judges the same way as the third party.