Who did Christ die for?

It seems like you forget that you believe that God's foreknowledge is perfect and complete. You've said that God already "knows from the foundation of the world which humans would accept Him".
Can you explain your bus driver analogy again, keeping in mind that if God is the bus driver, He already knows the man's eternal destiny?
Does He not already know how many seats will be filled and who will be filling the seats?
Of course He does, but He "desires" according to your interpretation of 2 Peter 3:9that more will get on the bus all the while infalliably knowing that is impossible.


So why does He tell His Son, who also knows the list of believers, "Now, not only will you die for our children's sins, but you will also die for the sins of Satan's children." "Just to make it fair and more loving of me", the Father says.
God then opens the door to hell and shows Jesus the souls of all who are there. "You're going to die for those too, okay?"

Why?

 

From Adam onward God promised to humanity a Savior. God fulfilled His promise. Who eventually believes on Christ is irrelevant to our Lord fulfilling that promise. Your inability to understand why God would suffer for the sins of someone that would reject Him is not a problem of God or the gospel but a problem with projecting onto God your ideas as to what is or isn't reasonable regarding God, His determinations and His actions.

To you it might be unfathomable that God in His Divine capacity could simultaneously know infallibly who would and would not believe while suffering for both but that is exactly how God designed and executed the plan of salvation for mankind. YOU might be confused by such mechanics but I don't think your attempting to speak for the Godhead and state it would confuse or bring confusion to them is the same.

But how would it bring confusion anyway?

No one has presented the error of Open Theism here that I know of. Many oppose limited atonement without accepting the error of Open Theism. God's foreknowledge is exhaustive, it simply does not force what you are suggesting, that He only die for those in His foreknowledge He knows, would believe.

God in His foreknowledge knows that you won't always be filled with the Holy Spirit or yielded to Him yet he has deposited His Spirit in you and made Him available at all times for you to be filled with though often you and the rest of us do not always make that choice. According to you God wouldn't do that but He did quite clearly.

Again this is a case of you projecting onto God your idea of how foreknowledge must work and not the acceptance of the reality of exhaustive foreknowledge, Divine Sovereignty and Human Volition.

I am of course NOT a universalist nor accept the error of Open Theism and I gladly can explain how Jesus can truly die for every person while knowing the final out come. It's called being Divine. The end of your argument places God as an agent of His foreknowledge and unable to act outside of it but forced to acquiesce. This is where you err. To you, yes, if you had foreknowledge you might be forced in such a way lacking all the other necessities of Divinity to accommodate that capacity but God is not limited and in this case I believe you are imposing on God your limited ability to comprehend not just Divine foreknowledge but the remaining essence of God and its function.

*I appreciate your term Non-Calvinist instead of the usual presumptive and erroneous label of Arminian often automatically assigned to Non-Calvinists by Calvinist who sadly often can only see the world of theology in either/or contexts. I myself and neither a Calvinist or Arminian so your tact here is appreciated.

Friend I am a FORMER LIMITED ATONEMENTIST so trust me, I have considered and held to that tenet. So the idea that your ideas or thoughts won't cause a stir (with me anyhow) are without warrant.

God provides many things for many people who do not partake. You are limiting God to acting only if one responds favorably to His effort, particularly in the context of Salvation. But more broadly, if one applies this idea of yours, that God only acts in view of favorable responses you are found theologically wanting and it simply is absent in the Scriptures. God may act at times knowing someone will respond favorably, in as much as a human can, but you are prescribing to God the necessity of this on every occasion. I know of no Evangelical Theologian advancing this.

Time and time again God provides where one, many or all reject His offer of temporal aid and in the case of salvation God acts as is consistently represented in the gospel, the offer for all, the sacrifice for all and whosoever will.

 

The Atonement according to the Law which Christ must satify to appease the Holiness of God MUST be done on behalf of all. We see this in the Atonement which was done on behalf of ALL of Israel (for their sins), and yet we know not all of Israel (every person) was saved due to the Atonment made for All Israel.
Why not? Because that sacrifice for atonement (propitiation - substitute) had to be received by faith. That propitiation is to be made for ALL in the OT just as it is in the NT, and is the reason you will read in scripture that Jesus death was a "propitiation for our sins, but not ours ONLY, but the sins of the Whole World. AND YET - Just because the act of atonement was done does NOT mean it was automatically given. Why not? Becuase it had to be receivedthrough faith just as in the OT and so it is the same in the NT. (Rom 3:24-26)

Notice the Atonement alone is not what justifies else we would have no need "to believe in Jesus" TO BE justified. But that the propitiation of the Atonement is applied ONLY when we receive it through faith.

I elaborated a bit better (though much the same) in another recent thread by TCGreek of Atonement and you can read it as well here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost.php?p=1110466&postcount=9

EDITED IN --> Another point is this: Can a person be saved if Atonement was never made for them? Answer: Of Course not! So does the Bible speak of any who are MOST DEFINATELY going to be unsaved, and at the same time speak of them as though they COULD HAVE BEEN SAVED but did not receive it? YEP! Look here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost.php?p=1110486&postcount=11

 

Allan and Alex, thank you. Very good posts.

I would like to suggest one more thing about atonement. It was not just done for man, it was done for God. Justice could not be unsatisfied eternally. God is just. One sin unatoned for, one debt owed, and eternal justice would not have been satisfied. And it was only the Perfect Lamb who could do this. Each sin deserves death. Each of us sins many times, but we could only die once. That leaves debts unpaid even if we were to die for our own sins.

Jesus satisfied all justice for all eternity for all sin for all people. And only God could do that.

And now it is not because of our sins anyone suffers eternal death -- it is for lack of believing in Jesus Christ, either as the Promise to come or the Promise fulfilled.

 

I will disagree only slightly here Helen.

Though all sin is atoned for in Christ that atonement is not imparted to everyone because not everyone will receive that atonement through faith. Thus, THEY must pay the debt of sin THEMSELVES since they reject the propitiation or substitutionary death of Christ on their behalf. That is why they are 'condemned' (found guilty) and must pay themselves a debt that can never be fulfilled outside of Christ alone, thus eternally damned.

If atonement paid for it all (as in paid for all sin automatically), then all are justified because it has redeemed them to whom it was applied. Thus they are in a right standing with God and judged NOT GUILTY.
BUT if that redemption is not applied because they reject it, then that someone must satify THEIR sin debt STILL OWED of which unbelief is apart.

Remember - unbelief IS a Sin and if we are condemned by unbelief then it is sin that has condemned us.

 

Allan, when I go to John 3:16-18 and on, I find that it is unbelief that condemns a man, not his sin. The law was fulfilled by Jesus. Fully. All sin is atoned for, but not all forgiven. And, in fact, there is one that CANNOT be forgiven, atoned for or not -- the sin against the Holy Spirit. Jesus said the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth (and He is The Truth...). If we follow this through with referencing to Romans 1, we find that what a man does with the truth he is presented with in his life has everything to do with whether or not he will be saved. Wanting the truth, he can be led to the Son by the Father, which is salvation, or he can be given over to the lie, thereby allowing his evil to multiply in his life.

But all that evil has still been atoned for -- which makes their condemnation all the more fierce.

The idea of the 'application' of atonement is not found in the Bible. It is entirely a human idea. Hebrews says Christ died once for all and tasted death for EVERYONE. Either that is a lie or the truth.

 

Isaiah, I'll refer you back to Alex and Allan's posts (#102 and #103) for answers to your questions of me. They have done a very good job explaining what I believe.

Allan and Helen have gone deeper than I have gone before with their last discussion, so I'm not going to comment on that issue as I'm not sure where I stand. I'll watch and listen instead.

 

Me too. I tend to agree with Helen more on that aspect of the atonement (Christ tasted death for every man, etc.)...but we'll see. This could be it's own thread.

 

When does God stop loving the ones that go to Hell?

 

When it freezes over?

 

That is a joke used by non-believers and means it will never happen.

Are you saying God will never STOP love anyone?

 

So you believe that Jesus died for people who are in hell and because He is Divine it somehow works and should be accepted.

 

It's a joke also used by believers...as I am one.

Can you supply Scripture stating God's love is ending?

 

Not exactly, Isaiah. People can't be saved after they have died.

Christ died for all who would believe in Him during their life on earth, therefore, no one from the OT came up out of hell(notice I said hell, not hades) after He died and into heaven. If, during their lifetime, they had simply believed that God would provide a Messiah, that faith would have been rewarded with salvation. So, the potential was their for all OT people to be saved and Christ's blood could have/would have covered their sin even though it would be shed in their future.

So, though God intended Christ's sacrifice to be sufficient for all, all are not saved because of their own unbelief.

 

No I cannot. I never said it would end. That would be the point. Gods love never ever changes does it? So we agree.

So what do we do with a verse like this.

?

so when John writes..." We love him, because he first loved us."

I ask again...

When does God change and start hating people?

 

That is limited atonement.

This is general atonement or universal atonement.


Which do you believe, since you seem to be saying you believe both?

 

Actually, Amy, it does not matter what anyone here 'believes' about any given issue -- it matters what the Bible says. And the Bible says Jesus died once for all and tasted death for everyone. I assume you disagree....

 

It is clear in scripture that Jesus died for all, but instead of some. All the elect will be saved. The atonement is efficient for those chosen in the purpose of God for humankind.

I preach to all. God calls His own. I shall leave it at that. I will do my part, and I am certain God will do His.

Cheers,

Jim

 

When do we change...and start hating our parents?

 

It would be my guess that you are talking about .....

also you may want to look at...

Notice in verse 33 of the luke passage it reads..

I have read you on this verse before and I must say I disagree. You will have to know a bit about Hebrew culture to understand it. My Hebrew is lacking, but I did sit under two Hebrew teachers that helped me

The key idea to understand this is found in the subject matter. Consider this...

If a man come to me. "Come to me"...key phrase. Come to me is not as in seeking, but they have made up their mind to follow God.

Now look at the end of the verse...."My disciple"...same idea.

This is better understood if looked at by the culture point of view. Its talking about rejection of all things, a giving up if you will, of the things of this world in order to follow the things of God. 1st and foremost it is talking about teachings and doctrines that the hearers heard from their mother and father. You must leave behind and reject or hate the teachings of you mother and father, which in this setting was Jewish in nature, and have only one true teacher and that would be the One from God.

So to answer you...

When do we change...and start hating our parents?

In the context it it is when we become His disciples and follow Him.


and also we know..
" We love him, because he first loved us."...and this love for us will never change.
You and I agree...Gods love never changes.

So how do we address verses like...

When does God change and start hating people?

If Gods love never changes...and I agree it never changes....when does he start hating, for it is clear you does?

How does God show love in His wrath? There is a way you know.