Does God love everyone?

You have hell on the brain.

 

If we are speaking of sinners yet outside of Christ...That would be their destination.
If they are to know the saving Love of God.....they will only come to know it In Christ.
Scripture is a two edged sword. I will not shrink back from either truth when they need to be expressed.

 

Romans 5

6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
​

Icon,
I am unsure why you think I disagree that Romans is written to believers. However, what state were these who believed when Christ died?

They were NOT believers at that time, which is the point I was making.

The thread is on the question of whether or not God loves everyone, and the thinking that God does not love those "outside (the ungodly). I selected Romans 5 to show that thinking would be invalidated because these verses DO show that God loves those what are NOT believers (the ungodly) BEFORE they became believers.

That they became believers does not modify God's love, rather shows more perfectly that God's love will be effective upon those whom He selects to be His. These verses do not claim that God's love is limited to only those He selects, nor that Christ died only for those selected. That argument is not shown to be valid at this point in the thread.

What has been validated is what Roman's 5 teaches. 1) The ungodly are helpless. 2) The ungodly might give their life for someone good. 3) God sent His Son to die for the ungodly. 5) In this God demonstrates His love toward the ungodly.

What some would read is the "we" and "us" as not sinners or ungodly, not hell bound heathen, when Christ died. Unfortunately, for that thinking, that is not consistent with the statement presented. Rather, that all are ungodly, Christ was sent in demonstrable Love of God to die for the ungodly.

The "we and "us" are shown as being ungodly, helpless, and therefore is not specific for the "us" or the "we" that Christ's death be limited to the we and us. This is also consistent with John's presentation of the death of Christ in His writings. The statement of Romans says, " ...while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly." We are PART of the ungodly, not the ONLY of the ungodly.

 

Hello AGM

God set his love on sinners before creation. Just not all of them. No one questions that all died in Adam and are conceived in sin.
I am thinking of Jer 31:3, and Psalm 139.
The passage is specific not general. We should be also.

 

Ah, most certainly, "The love of God that saves is only In Christ."

In that we agree.

However, that question is not the question of the OP. Annsni opened the thread (in 2008) with this statement and question.

(underlining mine)

The thread isn't supposed to be about the special salvation love specific only to those God has claimed for adoption, but the general love of God that bestows blessings and sustenance upon all creation, even the ungodly.

 

Yes.....In that way God is good to the unsaved and in a benevolent way extends such goodness and acts of benevolent love to those who are perishing in common grace.
Some In CHRISTIAN REFORMED circles deny such common grace....but Romans 12:19..... speaks to that.

 

While the word "love" is a noun, it functions as a verb when applied to God. Not grammatically, but effectively. "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son" (1 JN 3:16). "In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 JN 4:10). "For the love of Christ controls us" (2 Cor. 5:14).

God does not love in vain. In other words, God does not extend His love, and His love fails to accomplish His purpose. God always brings His purpose to pass (Isa. 55:11). If God loved everyone (in a redemptive, salvific sense), then His love would result in the salvation of everyone. God does not love that way. God loves His elect.

 

Does then God expect from the believer what He does not require of Himself?

One cannot take either that of Jeremiah or of the Psalms and discredit the statement of Christ, "Love your enemies."

So either Christ was wrong, or Jeremiah and the Psalms must be rendered in a way that conforms to that statement of Christ.

One cannot have both as correct and present that God does not love his enemies in contrast to Christ stating the believer is to love their enemies.

Jeremiah just doesn't work to support God not loving those "outside" or the "ungodly."

Specifically, Jeremiah is speaking about the restoration (chapter 30) of Jacob. Jeremiah is in a manner singing in this statement recorded.

Thus says the Lord,
“The people who survived the sword
Found grace in the wilderness—
Israel, when it went to find its rest.”
The Lord appeared to him from afar, saying,
“I have loved you with an everlasting love;
Therefore I have drawn you with loving kindness.
“Again I will build you and you will be rebuilt,
O virgin of Israel!
Again you will take up your tambourines,
And go forth to the dances of the merrymakers...."
​

That some would assign this passage to believers is unfortunate, for this section of Jeremiah shows how God loves even the unlovely and ungodly Jacob (Israel) and will restore them.

Psalms 139 contains Davids words of worship in which he desires God to investigate him in the most intimate way most would seek to avoid. In that wonderful request, David says this:

"How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand.
When I awake, I am still with You.
O that You would slay the wicked, O God;
Depart from me, therefore, men of bloodshed.
For they speak against You wickedly,
And Your enemies take Your name in vain.
Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against You?
I hate them with the utmost hatred;
They have become my enemies.
Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Try me and know my anxious thoughts;
And see if there be any hurtful way in me,
And lead me in the everlasting way.​

David is longing (as do most believers) that God would "slay the wicked." That the evil folks would who shed blood need to be separated from him.

David is being jealous for God, as believers should, because of the violation of the Holiness, and righteousness of God. In effect, David is expressing that desire, as should all believers, by contrasting love and devotion to God, a desire for God to know every aspect of thought and action, and to be used of God as He desires, with that which would prevent or hinder such from taking place. David is expressing what Paul stated to the Corinthians, "Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness?"

David was not as Lot, who lived without rebuke nor rebuke those around him. Rather, David desired a better heart and more intimate relationship with God. One that would separate him from all ungodly and ungodliness.

So, again, the Psalms cannot be taken as discrediting the statement of Christ that one should love their enemies.

 

Reformed, I sense you are trying to make excuse and hold to what is not Scriptural in this matter of God's love extending even to the ungodly, by such statements as "While the word "love" is a noun, it functions as a verb when applied to God. Not grammatically, but effectively." That is like saying, that, "Fred ran" isn't Fred ran, but certainly hopped, or jumped, or shuffled.

Further, part of your statement, "God does not love in vain." is no where supported in Scripture principle.

Therefore, your conclusions are not based upon Scripture principle.

Humanly speaking, I may love my family, and even love my father, mother, brothers, (I don't have sisters), but in contrast to the love I have toward God, that love must be considered hate.

Some of the reformed hold love (and some other attributes) as a on/off switch. One either loves or hates. There is no room for one to love in contrast or in modification. How such a reformed person can show such unequality of that love and yet say to the assembly that they love is questionable.

For example, I love the brethren of the assembly, but I certainly do not love them to the measure and devotion I love my wife, nor to the love and devotion I love Christ. That the reformed also express modifications of their love and understand such modifications exist, there is little excuse nor should there be tolerance toward those who would by statements (like that of Jay Adams) withhold that from the ability of God.

God's love does not automatically mean that He must save. Such thinking is, again, not according to the principle of Scriptures.

Christ expressed love and concern when weeping over Jerusalem, and it didn't save that city from destruction.

 

This isn't specific about the "love" of God, but shows a bit of the character of God. This is from Romans 11:

"For God has shut up all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all."

See the "ALL"

Who is the "all?"

This will help:

From the standpoint of the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God’s choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their disobedience, so these also now have been disobedient, that because of the mercy shown to you they also may now be shown mercy.
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Love of God is not a matter of conditioned response in which a child is permanently marred when deprived of love and must learn the limits, parameters, and appropriate expressions of how love is displayed.

Rather, the love of God is that which is an integral part of HIS purpose and plan.

 

Well, you (kyredneck, post 360) had quoted what I had said about God loathing certain ones. But the passages you have cited list some places (and there are more) where David hates those who hate God and show it by working evil.

 

God showed us His love by sending His Son to die on a cross even while we were His enemies. Now, if Christ interceded on behalf of all mankind, all mankind would be saved. The sheep, per 2 Cor. 5:19, are the ones being reconciled, not having their sin counted unto them. These are the ones God loves.

 

And so did Christ, as He spoke about it more than other prophets combined, iirc.

 

Exactly. Quoting the words of Christ garners both a rebuke and contempt toward the one doing so? Yep.

 

Why do Calvinists always use this fallacious reasoning.
Where do you get, If Christ died for all then all would be saved.
That is simply your fallacious reasoning, not what the Bible says. It goes directly contrary to 1John 2:2 which you will reinterpret to mean "applicable only to the elect," yet such an interpretation as that is not warranted.

1Jn 2:2 And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
--He is the propitiation: "not for our sins only" (that is the elect or the believers), "But also for the sins of the whole world." He loved and died for the sins of all men. Here it is as clear as day is from night.
Christ loved and died for all men.
The dreadful thought that his atonement is not made efficacious to all men for all men have not actively received it, is the reason that all men are not saved. Indirectly you are blaming God for evil. You are making him the author of sin. You accuse him of creating men not for his glory but for his condemnation. Such is not the case. He is not that monster. Yes, I use this word freely, because it is true. The very essence of God is love, and indeed, he loves all men.

 

DHK, Christ's propitiation appeased God's wrath. It was God who was propitiated, not sinners. If God's wrath has been appeased, then there's no wrath to be meted out on the day of judgment.

Look at 2 Cor. 5:19...

"that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation."

Now, if God was reconciling the world(everybody who has ever lived) to Himself in the form of a Man(Christ), then everybody who has ever lived, God is not counting their sins unto them. Then how can they then be judged as sinners and being cast into hell? God did not count their sins unto them, seeing God reconciled them through Christ.

 

From Merriam-Webster:

reconciliation

Simple Definition of reconciliation

• : the act of causing two people or groups to become friendly again after an argument or disagreement
  
  
• : the process of finding a way to make two different ideas, facts, etc., exist or be true at the same time

That which I bolded, I'll address. Outside of Christ, we are enemies of God. Christ, via His propitious crosswork, appeased God's wrath. Now, if God's wrath has been appeased via propitiation, then reconciliation has occured. Sinners who die in their sins, were never friendly with God, yea, in fact, were His enemies. Those who Christ died for are those who are reconciled.

 

From Strong's...sorry guys, not a Greek scholar, so it's the best I have...

katallagē

From Thayer's Greek Lexicon:

1. exchange
   1. of the business of money changers, exchanging equivalent values
2. adjustment of a difference, reconciliation, restoration to favour
   1. in the NT of the restoration of the favour of God to sinners that repent and put their trust in the expiatory death of Christ

Strong's definition:

καταλλαγήkatallagḗ, kat-al-lag-ay'; from G2644; exchange (figuratively, adjustment), i.e. restoration to (the divine) favor:—atonement, reconciliation(-ing).

This is the Greek word for 'reconciliation', Bro. DHK. Sinners outside of Christ have no divine favour with God.

 

CONTEXT:
2Co 5:18 And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation;
2Co 5:19 To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
"All things are of God" not some things, not just the elect, but ALL things, in fact all of creation is of God. God has reconciled us (ALL who believe on him) to himself by Jesus Christ. Those who have believed have been given the ministry of reconciliation.

Why?
Because sinful man no longer has to be the object of God's wrath. The death of Christ has make provision for All men to be the object of His love. This was done by God through Jesus Christ. Therein is love; not that we loved Him, but that He loved us and gave his only begotten Son for us.
Christ.
God...reconciling the world (sinful mankind) to himself, not imputing their sin unto them.
Man's sins are no longer counted or imputed against him, for Christ has paid the price on the cross. He took that penalty on the cross. The gift must be accepted by faith, for it is delivered by us in the ministry of reconciliation which we have been given.

You have this ministry. Have you gone to everyone with this ministry. Paul in his time did his best to reach the world of his time. What are we doing with this ministry that God has given us--the ministry of reconciliation. No, not everyone will be saved. But it is our obligation to see that this message of reconciliation is offered to all.

 

Bro. DHK, you and I have had this rodeo before and we'll never agree. So let us move on. Okay?

ETA: I reserve the right to jump back in after I have already done so. BiggrinTongueRoflmaoLaugh