Hi abundanthealthnow,
Your comment: "I will be the 1st to admit that I also may be Deceived in some of my ideas, but that when I learn that I have been, I am willing to change, always seeking the Truth from God !"
Yes, we should all put Truth first! I'm glad that we can agree on this.
Answer: May I 1st say I am not trying to Personally condemn you in any way ! Also I am glad we can discuss our differences in a civilized manner without calling each other all kinds of names as some want to start doing? I am just pointing out what I have come to see as Truth ! End.
You wrote about Satan...
"he got a Big Head by thinking himself to be Greater than his Creator !" I think that we may be in the same kind of error when we try to analyze God and judge Him. When you make statements such as "my god is not the kind of god who would do something like that!" or "my god is a kind and merciful god and would never severely punish disobedience", you are putting God Himself on trial or you are simply making up your own god, the one that you think you would like. God tells us who He is. He tells us what He is like. He is righteous, just, loving, faithful... the list goes on and on. We can know these things for certain about God because He tells us so. But we can not necessarily take these qualities of God and say, "Because God is good, he would not do this or that." How dare we analyze God! As God said to Job,
"Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man and I will demand of you, and you declare to Me. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Declare to me if you have and know understanding. v17 Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the doors of deep darkness? v21 You must know, since you were born then! Or because you are so extremely old! ..."
In essence, your argument that eternal punishment cannot be true because you don't believe God would punish people like that is a terrible one. God Himself says, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." Isaiah 55:8,9
The verses on eternal punishment, hell, the Lake of Fire, should be looked at and examined without the imposition of whether or not we personally believe that God ought or ought not act in a certain way.
Answer: My I bring up a common problem that comes about:
What I said ! What I ment to say ! What I wanted to Say !
What you read ! What you thought your read ! What you wanted to read !
It is called a Lack of proper communication !
Now to try to Clarify what you thought you read so that you may understand what I ment to Communicate to your mind:
Far be it that I am Judging God !
Much to the opposite in that I am just sharing what God has stated he is and how he does things, Point in case: God set the Fruits of the Spirit as a Guidline for mankind to Live by as How, What, and Who God is !
He also set the Works of the Flesh as an example as the ways of Satan the devil himself, whom is deceiving most of mankind !
There is no where else in the Bible that one can learn to Truth any better than by comparing the Fruits of the Spirit against the Works of the Flesh !
Now let us consider this comment of yours: In essence, your argument that eternal punishment cannot be true because you don't believe God would punish people like that is a terrible one
Answer: Here again we have a Lack of Communication !
This time it may involve the Lack of understanding about what Eternal Punishment may mean in this case?
So, How may we understand the Truth of God about this question?
1st we need to go back to the basics of who God is, the answer is Love !
So how can we determine where Love fits into Eternal Punishment and or How and What this is supposed to mean?
For this we need to understand that God Created the Entire universe and everything in it and established a set of laws to govern the Universe ! It just so happens that the Acid/Alkaline pH balancing principles play a major role in controling everything in the entire Universe !
What does this mean?
Could it mean that God's laws, when Broken by mankind produce a certain result without God needing to do any more about the Poor choice of mankind?
Example of how this may work: Let us consider a car that needs gasoline for the engine to Burn to power the car along and it needs water to keep the engine cool, but we decide to put gasoline in the Cooling tank and water in the fuel tank ! Anyone will find out that when we make these Poor chocies to put the Gasoline into the water tank and the water into the Gasoline tank that the car will --NOT-- work !!!!!!
Just like the Laws God has set in motion, mankinds Poor choices result in the poor results gotten for our Poor chocies ! God does not need to take any action, it is all mankinds choice and the end result is already determined by the laws God has set in motion !
God is Love and he is not going to cause anyone to Suffer forever and ever, but God will allow those who reject him to end up being Burned up to ashes in an Eternal Fire that has been prepared for Satan and his crew to themself having to Suffer forever and ever, because they are Spirit beings and there is No way God can now get rid of them ! This is WHY God made man in the physical, so that those of mankind whom rejected God would not be allowed to become Spirit beings, thus avoid having to Cause them to Suffer in Pain and Everlasting Suffering ! For when the Physical is thrown into this Everlasting Fire, these Flesh and Blood will just Burn up into ashes !
Bottom Line to your Whole belief that mankind is going to Suffer forever and ever in Everlasting Punishment(this does not say Everlasting Pain and Suffering that mankind will end up in) as you want to Quote? Please explain How Ashes are going to Suffer?
Where do ashes have feelings?
What gives ashes the ability to think and feel?
Kinda knocks a Big Hole in the whole idea that mankind is going to end up in Everlasting Punishment in the terms of feeling Pain and Suffering more than the time period that it take to be Burned up into ashes in this Everlasting Fire ! !!!!!
As God has stated in Malachi that those whom reject him shall be Burned up to ashes and the Righteous shall trample these ashes under foot ! God has fortold what he means by Eternal Punishment in that he set up in the begining for this Eternal End result to be in place for Eternity for any who choose to reject him, but the end result is that they shall just end up as ashes under the righteous feet ! The only Eternal result is that everyone who rejects God will end up as Ashes ! Dead!!!Zip!!!Gone!!!
How can we know the Truth is that there will be --NO--Eternal Pain and Suffering felt by those Burned up? Check out and tell me how many feelings ashes have!!!!!!!
Many times the Simpleness it to hard for many folks to see!
WHY is the Truth so Hard to see?
Could it be that those whom have been deceived do not want to beleive it is so Simple?
WHY would folks not want to beleive God is so Loving that he will --NOT-- Cause those whom reject him to Suffer forever and ever in Pain and Suffering?
Could it be that this may take away some of the Glory from those whom may consider themself to be somebody better than those whom Reject God?
Surely it could not be so Simple?
Could it be?
Is this called a problem of Pride and Ego?
Surely it could not be?
Could it be?
Cause and Effect !
Smile Tis your choice?