Isn't this just ridiculously logically incompatable? How might you reconcile this?
(I'm atheist, but curious, and mean no disrespect to anyone)
2007-10-17 07:16:23 · 10 answers · asked by katie_london 3 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Maybe my question wasn't clear enough. I'm confused by how you reconcile a god with infinite mercy and forgiveness, with one who would condemn those who don't believe in his infinite mercy to hell. To me it sounds like "I'm really nice, but if you don't think I'm really nice I'm going to punch you"
Again, I'm not meaning to be disrespectful, I'm just trying to explain how I see it so that maybe you could explain more clearly.
2007-10-17 07:26:27 · update #1
Depends. Some Christians believe so. Some do not. The Christian faith is a diverse group of people with a diverse amount of ways of thinking, not too unlike atheists (many different kinds of atheists out there). There are many perspectives to this. Here are a few I am familiar with:
1. The Calvinist view: God is PERFECT. We are horrible. Look at all we have done with our free will, which was God's gift to us. (You can't have free will without the ability to do evil, thus this is not a contradiction to God's perfection). We have destroyed the earth and one another. Wars and pollution and poverty plague our world. So we are totally unworthy of God's salvation, and yet he still saves some of us. Considering that NONE of us deserves it, then the fact that he saves anyone at all is actually quite merciful indeed. This is the source of many Protestant thinkers (although I am a Protestant myself and do NOT accept this view).
2. Another point of view is that works will get you to heaven. If you do good, then you will be rewarded. Believing in God is one of the things you can do to be "good," but it is not the only way. Christians who believe this split, however, on where exactly the line is drawn. Many Catholics (though not all of them), for example, believe in purgatory for this very reason. You don't believe in God, but if you are a really good person, you will serve time in purgatory to pay for this "sin" before you go to heaven. Others believe in reincarnation for people who don't accept God, but otherwise live a clean life, although this is more rare.
3. Many Christians believe there is no way to know God's plans. They believe in God's infinite mercy, and live their life completely based on faith in him. Many Christians like this believe that is possible that God WOULD show you his mercy, but how would we know? We are incapable of knowing God's true plan. It is by experience and instinct that we know his love at all. What happens after our current lives is a mystery.
I won't say where I fall, nor will I judge you for your atheism. It is none of my business what you believe or don't believe. That said, I wanted to illustrate the diversity of Christian beliefs. Christians tend to stereotype atheists (thinking of them all as being fundamental or immoral), while I find that many atheists stereotype Christians as well (thinking of all of us as being fundamental or intolerant or illogical). Belief systems, however, are never as simplistic as we tend to paint them, especially the belief systems that are different than our own.
Hope that helps. Have a good one!
2007-10-17 07:31:20 · answer #1 · answered by Mr. Taco 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Isn't that just another version of the "Can God make a rock so big He can't move it?" question?
God is infinite mercy, infinite grace, infinite love, and infinite holiness. He requires atonement for sin, and in His mercy He made a way for that. If a person doesn't accept that, it is his/her choice. If He forced us to accept it, we would be mindless robots.
However, if He chose to bend His rules and make an exception for you (and everybody else) where would He draw the line in such as way that would seem fair to you? Should He weigh everyone's works and life on earth and if the scales balance or tip to the good side, you're in, but if your evil deeds outweighed your good, you're out?
Well, what if there were extinuating circumstances for some of your bad, let's say you had a horrible childhood or something that led you into evil, then shouldn't He take that into account, too? So where should He draw the line?
And then, let's say He in His infinite mercy and grace let everyone both evil and good, believer and non-believer into heaven? They would soon turn it into hell, because just as here on earth, there would be sin and hatred and violence and it would be a fallen heaven just like our world fell after the Garden of Eden. Those who don't believe in God (many have expressed as much on this forum) would not "enjoy" a heaven in the presence of God. They would not want to participate in worshipping Him or serving Him, so heaven wouldn't really be paradise to them, would it?
Hell was prepared originally for the ultimate punishment of Satan (Lucifer). It will not be his domain (an evil "theme park" if you will) that will be full of naughty fun for its inhabitants. It is not God's desire that any people go there, but it is Satan's desire to take as many people as he can deceive with him so they will have to suffer, too.
So, it isn't God's condemnation on a person, it is God's condemnation on sin, and man's choice to commit the ultimate unpardonable sin against God of rejecting His merciful gift of grace. No matter how people try to twist it around, God doesn't send people to hell; they send themselves there, or allow Satan to trick them into following him there. Blame hell on Satan, not God.
(See John 3)
2007-10-17 07:32:34 · answer #2 · answered by arklatexrat 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If you do not believe, its not because you were incapable of doing so. God deals to every person "the measure of faith." The fact that you comprehend (though not accept) that He HAS infinite mercy is further evidence of your choice. You condemn yourself....God is merely JUST to hold you TO what you choose.
It sounds like you want to have your cake and eat it too..does that even work in THIS world without consequence?
2007-10-17 07:27:53 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
His infinite mercy does include you, even if you don't believe in Him or it. I don't think you'll go to hell, but the suffering you go through will be because you realize, maybe too late, what you could have had. That is what Hell is, the realization that you could have had it all, and didn't - thus, the weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth - because you aren't where He is, and you could have been.
2007-10-17 07:23:20 · answer #4 · answered by Kelly T 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
God gives us a chance to choose His Son and the work He did on the cross while we are here.
God's salvation is a gift that He will and does freely give to anyone. However, as with any gift, it must be received. If you feel to receive it, then you can't have it.
In other words, if you don't believe in His mercy, you will receive his wrath. That's how I'd answer and I hope it helps.
2007-10-17 07:21:32 · answer #5 · answered by Brad P 2 · 1⤊ 1⤋
That's not what He said! Wake up a little bit. I'll show you what He said:
17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. ( John 3)
What does that mean to you? What is the man saying?
2007-10-17 07:23:22 · answer #6 · answered by Christian Sinner 7 · 1⤊ 2⤋
He doesn't condemn you - He gives you a choice. It is a lot to write here but it has to do with Him judging mankind through Adam's fall. Therefore everyone is born into sin. Therefore Jesus provided the way out through him dying for us because he wasn't born into sin He was born of the Holy Ghost. So when you accept him your spirit is re-created.
2007-10-17 07:21:55 · answer #7 · answered by Stan 2 · 1⤊ 2⤋
He would RATHER that you spend eternity in the kingdom of heaven.
However, He HAS given you the gift of free will...AND knowledge of the covenant of the New Testament for the salvation of the eternal soul thru His Son, Jesus.
It's YOUR decision, not His. And, your consequences.
It really IS that simple.
2007-10-17 07:20:41 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 2⤋
Hell is eternal seperation from God, just as heaven is eternal bliss in union with God. If you seperate yourself from God, that is your own doing.
The eternal nature of hell is stressed in the New Testament. For example, in Mark 9:47–48 Jesus warns us, "It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, where the worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched." And in Revelation 14:11, we read: "And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever; and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name."
Hell is not just a theoretical possibility. Jesus warns us that real people go there. He says, "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few" (Matt. 7:13–14).
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: "The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, ‘eternal fire.’ The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs" (CCC 1035).
http://www.catholic.com/library/Hell_There_Is.asp
2007-10-17 07:18:51 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 5⤋
Mercy and justice.
2007-10-17 07:22:19 · answer #10 · answered by Happily Happy 7 · 2⤊ 1⤋