Perhaps pointless to most, but I think it’s an interesting thing to talk/think about. Satan is not necessary for sin to exist, only free will is necessary for sin to exist. By accepted teaching, his ultimate goal is not to make us sin (lie, kill, sex et al), but to turn us from God. Satan can accomplish that goal without tempting us with sin (although his typical MO is to use sin). For example, people who have committed murder, child rape, or other acts would be saved by accepting Jesus (even if they repeatedly fail to repent). A MuslimJew who gave his entire life to honor, charity, honesty, sacrifice, and love would be condemned to an eternity of torture. There is only one thing that matters to God: belief in Jesus. Belief in Him alone without Jesus is not sufficient. If sin is of little real consequence (Jesus died for our sin), then Satan is not interested in getting us to sin unless it leads to the goal of being non-Christian. Satan would actually use the good qualities (obedience, meekness, honoring of parents, trust, religious discipline) of child growing up in a Muslim/Jew family against him. With the case of Jews/Muslims, Satan actually uses God’s previous teachings against man. At the moment Jesus died, Satan started promoting Judaism (God’s word) as a means to keep man from salvation. Even people who follow God’s words, and obey his commandments, and believe everything from Genesis to Malachi are just pawns in the Devil’s plan. Satan actually wants the Jewish boy to grow up with an unquestioned and faithful love of God; thus, he will be burned in hell. God is omniscient. God is perfect, so creating Satan was no mistake. God created Satan knowing what Satan would do. I would assume God had to create Satan so man would have a tempter. God being holy, will not be a tempter. God is so much disgusted by sin, he had to separate from Christ while he was on the cross (a convenient interpretation). So it would seem safe to assume Satan is an agent of God, not an enemy of God. If true, Satan would not be concerned with turning people from God, but testing man’s dedication to God through sinful temptation. Through these tests and failures, man’s character and spiritual growth may be improved, or man may ultimately fail these tests. My conclusion is perhaps Satan is not a rebel, but fulfills a specific function according to God’s design. I think this is what Jewish folks already believe. For some reason, I have grown fascinated by Satan, his motives, and his limits. Everything that I've learned about Satan from my Christian education just doesn't add up properly. In Job, for example, it would appear that Satan has the ability to manipulate God, but this cannot be true. God wanted Satan to test Job, so Satan was just doing God’s will.
Interesting. Some random thoughts I have.... Satan can only do what God allows him to do. See Job again. Satan cannot see the future. Only God can see the future. That is why Satan uses the same old tricks (often manifested) over and over again to trip us up....he knows our past, but not our future. Also, Satan cannot read our minds. He watches our actions and words..how we respond. God loved us so much that he gave us free will. My experience has been that God uses our mistakes of the past, restores us and turns weaknesses into strongholds. They then become our greatest assets. See Job, God restored 7fold.
The Jewish law was in effect during the time of Abraham and Moses; Jesus had obviously not yet been born. The Bible is pretty clear that Moses was present at the Transfiguration of Christ and that Abraham was considered righteous by God because of his faith, so I can only assume they are in Heaven. After Jesus died, the Jewish law that Abraham and Moses obeyed was fulfilled, so man did not need to sacrifice an animal for his sins or avoid certain types of foods to remain clean. Christianity varies (wildly, actually) about what IS required for salvation (e.g., baptism), but the consensus certainly involves some sort of acceptance of the sacrifice of Jesus being man's only way to Heaven.
30% of the adults in the world are Christian. 70 % are not. Do you really believe that the 70% of people in the world that are not Christian are going to hell even if they live their life with honor, respect, love and faith in God?
I think not. Plato argues that homosexuality should be suppressed in The Laws. Plato distrusted most sexual impulses, in fact, since they distracted from rationality and undermined the virtue of temperance. At the beginning of the Republic, Socrates' friend Cephalus describes how, in old age, he has escaped sex as though he were fleeing from "a sort of frenzied monster". Sex, for Plato, is a simplistic (and ultimately misleading) path toward beauty and love. A sort of mis-expression.
In a non-religious point of view, I believe the Old Testament spoke about how to behave in society and what was good and bad behavior. Its punishment to guide morality was pretty limited, however. The New Testament brought in Satan and the Afterlife, where there was a long-term negative consequence for poor choices here on earth.
70% to eternal damnation, period. II'm troubled by this morality. Of course I'm not religious so I should not have any emotions about what religious people do believe, especially as religious belief in general is the norm for humans. Still, I am momentarily appalled and deeply saddened that the majority of my peers support such an egregiously formulated slaughter. I will never know the mysteries of the mind of god, but we have some experience with that of humanity. "I got mine, its ok if the majority roast in hell", is depressing. Of course its not "what the religious think", its simply the implication, an acceptable implication. That's what's depressing. Forgive my sadness. Again, I agree I should not take any emotional view on the beliefs of the religious, not believing a shred of it myself. Consider this an issue for discussion, not a personal critique. How do the religious reconcile themselves and parties to this massive slaughter? The eternal hell, that is. Are they not like the germans and japanese civilians in WWII? Hard to put forth these questions without appearing as an ahole. That's not my intent.
sorry for being a tad off topic, but this is an important point about salvation. not all christians believe the path set forth in the original post. catholics for instance (from the catholic catechism): 841 The Church's relationship with the Muslims. "The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day."330 i'm firmly with coalacath on this one - that the door is left open.
I also realize that it is off topic, but I don't believe that people like Ghandi or Muhmmad or Albert Einstein or Hakeem Olajuwan are going to hell after living their life here on earth. I also am not trying to sound like a jerk or even sound condescending toward people who believe the way to heaven is only through Christ.
The fundamental theology and what it says about God and His motivations is why I am not a Christian, by that definition. Not only is the evidence (i.e., the Bible) highly suspect (which of course doesn't matter if you take its accuracy and literal intent as a matter of faith, but if you want to argue it as evidence, the historical development of the text is going to raise doubts than not), the philosophy of what God is and what He wants is just not something that I can devote my spiritual life to. Yes, I'm well aware of the consequences that people who are of that faith think are in store for me. No, I just can't be so self-serving as to devote myself to a doctrine just because it promises to turn out well for me. I've done the research. Once you get past the physical resurrection (very disputable), Jesus is the one and only son of God (not established as doctrine until the Council of Nicea), and other relatively minor points which for many are the one and only criteria for admittance into Heaven, Jesus had a lot of interesting things to say and things that I find very spiritually sound. He was quite the radical. The shift from behavior-based morality to conscience-based morality in his teaching was astounding (and very unpopular with the status quo). I'm aware that there are plenty of folks who will consider me a "pick and choose" Christian. I'm not. I'm not a Christian by those standards at all. But I do honor and respect what Jesus tried to teach people in life and the many followers that it inspired. I'm not a huge fan of Paul, although there are things that I like about the religion that he created. I just think there are significant doctrines that are quite different than what Jesus was teaching. I'm really not a fan of Constantine who used Catholicism and unified doctrine under threat of death for political gain. I respect Catholicism and the various Protestant faiths (I am a fan of Luthor, although he unintendedly started this whole literal interpretation of the Bible thing). I just don't believe in them the way that they require the one believe in them in order to consider oneself a member. Satan is a interesting character though, whatever your perspective.
i wish more people were as respectful in voicing their opinions as LHG on such sensitive matters as faith. more often we see that people who question/disagree with a faith (almost always christianity) threadshit to the point that little can be learned from what was potentially a thought provoking threead. she's set the table for civil discourse/debate.
Let's just say there are only 144,000 slots, as a certain sect believes, in heaven for earthly souls, and lets say this generation gets ONE of those slots, who do you think is in? If wealth isn't an actual impediment, I say Bono, if it is, it's some penniless person hardly anyone takes notice of.
Coel, You can't really use Romans 2 to argue that there is salvation apart from Jesus because no really obeys the Law or acts righteously apart from the Law. You have to follow his discussion of that whole topic into chapter 3 where unequivocally states that all are sinners and therefore in need of a Savior. Jesus being the only one. Only someone who has NEVER sinned ONCE falls into the categories you are describing in chapter 2. Unfortunately no one does. That is Paul's point. About Abraham and Moses being in heaven or not. We know that they truly believed God from the accounts and statements in the NT. Jesus actually says that Abraham looked forward to His coming and rejoiced when it did in John 8:56. So Abraham and Jesus did have a relationship. It may have even started while Abraham was on earth. In the of story of Lot escaping Sodom, the angel of the LORD shows up, which could very well be the preincarnate Jesus. Abraham honors Him as his Lord at that point. For Moses, I am not as familiar but clearly he believes in God as He revealed Himself at that time. God does not seem to hold people accountable for things God has not yet revealed. Today though it is clear from scripture that access to the Father comes through the Son only as Jesus says Himself in John 14. You either believe in the gospel of Jesus or you don't. Otherwise, why would Jesus have gone to the Jews and sent His apostles first to the Jews if what they knew was already sufficient? Jesus had been revealed therefore belief in Him was now necessary. At the same time, I understand that this subject can be difficult to understand. At least it is for me. All I can do is see what the Bible clearly says and build on that piece by piece. Based on what it says I can not agree in your belief that Plato and Socrates are in heaven, at least from what I know about them.
LHG ftw Honestly, if the world considered religion as thoughtfully and as non-dogmatically as she presents it, the world would be a vastly superior place. I honestly don't believe in Satan fwiw; there's enough devil in the nature of our world. I hear some say that our is the "best of all possible worlds"; really, in our world of hurricaines, fires, earthquakes, and historial mass extinctions - it does its best to do us in. The vast majority of species that have ever existed on earth have been extinguished. But it still has beautiful sunsets, gorgeous vistas and Longhorn football.
In my opinion, Satan is awesome. Where would music be if it wasn't evil. There certainly wouldn't have been these dudes... Also too, imagine how bad Led Zepplin and Black Sabbath would have been if not for the Dark Lord. For this reason, I praise and thank him for his glory. Don't we need more people like this in our lives? Lets rock the satan party. My point of this post? Without Satan, we do not have the movie The Exorcist or Rosemary's Baby. Just think about that for a little bit. Also too, what would be the reason for everyone to condemn Homosexuality, or better yet, how could we possibly explain the Crusades and all the people that have died in the name of God? The teachings of Jesus Christ are, in my opinion, great. I follow them the best I can. But I also believe in the teaching of Ghandi. I think y'all need to chill out and listen to this band. Embrace the Beast. If your going to go to Hell, you might as well be listening to "War Pigs". Better yet, by the vinyl and listen to it backwards... you can actually hear Satan telling you to eat burritos.
