Martin, given that your attitude has resulted in those shipmates who actually belong to Lutheran churches disengaging from this thread, I’m not sure I’d hold my breath waiting for an answer to that question.
I’m also afraid you may be taking the lack of argument with your propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. It’s more likely, I think, that no one sees any point in wasting their time.
Agreed.
With what? Nick's baseless fear?
Martin try putting your thought into language we can all understand; explain odd linguistic constructions if you feel you must use them; and be open minded enough to not disregard other's objections out of hand. If you can do those then maybe we can talk.
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour. Back tomorrow.
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour.
Well, that certainly seemed to be what you were implying here:
So, that's great! Nobody here is a Protestant, an Evangelical, a Lutheran in anything else but name, nobody here is still living under the twisted delusion at its core and/or blaming Paul for that or anything else!
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour.
Well, that certainly seemed to be what you were implying here:
So, that's great! Nobody here is a Protestant, an Evangelical, a Lutheran in anything else but name, nobody here is still living under the twisted delusion at its core and/or blaming Paul for that or anything else!
So what did you mean by that?
Nick, I was being infernally puckishly ironic.
The 'twisted delusion' is that what we believe - our faith, in Christ - has anything to do with salvation. That the whole overblown, baroque, clunky, imparsimonious calculus of how we get and keep grace, atonement, righteousness, justification, sanctification; salvation, is like Ptolemaic, geocentric cosmology, Hellishly complicated and damnationist. Derived from putting the Second Temple Messianic Jew Paul in our place, whether Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant and hybrids et al (see nice wee chart) over the past 1900 years. But the worst of them all is Protestant, Lutheran, Evangelical for a start. Its projection on Paul, in particular in the translation of pistis Christou.
In the link, rather than the objective genitive in, try the subjective genitive of for a start, as Catholic bibles including Wycliffe's do up to 1961, as even the English KJV Protestant bible does. At least this starts the process completed by substituting 'the faithfulness of Christ' which is more than allowed through the lens of love.
All are saved in Christ, by His faithfulness, there is universal reconciliation. As Barth properly understood.
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour.
Well, that certainly seemed to be what you were implying here:
So, that's great! Nobody here is a Protestant, an Evangelical, a Lutheran in anything else but name, nobody here is still living under the twisted delusion at its core and/or blaming Paul for that or anything else!
So what did you mean by that?
Nick, I was being infernally puckishly ironic.
In other words, intentionally obtuse—the other reason people give up on trying to discuss anything with you, as has been brought to your attention too many times to count.
But the worst of them all is Protestant, Lutheran, Evangelical for a start.
It’s the absolutist pronouncements like this that actually get in way of any point you might have to make, and that signal that maybe you don’t understand the nuances of what you’re talking about as nearly as well as you seem to think you do.
All are saved in Christ, by His faithfulness, there is universal reconciliation. As Barth properly understood.
I’m not sure you’ve properly understood Barth. Barth posited not that there is universal reconciliation, but rather that there is reason to hope for universal reconciliation.
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour.
Well, that certainly seemed to be what you were implying here:
So, that's great! Nobody here is a Protestant, an Evangelical, a Lutheran in anything else but name, nobody here is still living under the twisted delusion at its core and/or blaming Paul for that or anything else!
So what did you mean by that?
Nick, I was being infernally puckishly ironic.
In other words, intentionally obtuse—the other reason people give up on trying to discuss anything with you, as has been brought to your attention too many times to count.
But the worst of them all is Protestant, Lutheran, Evangelical for a start.
It’s the absolutist pronouncements like this that actually get in way of any point you might have to make, and that signal that maybe you don’t understand the nuances of what you’re talking about as nearly as well as you seem to think you do.
All are saved in Christ, by His faithfulness, there is universal reconciliation. As Barth properly understood.
I’m not sure you’ve properly understood Barth. Barth posited not that there is universal reconciliation, but rather that there is reason to hope for universal reconciliation.
OK Nick. Again of course. Something went wrong with my potty training obviously.
I'm sure that I've properly understood Barth, but let's see.
'I don't believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, the reconciler of all.', Erberhard Bush, Karl Barth: His life from letters and autobiographical texts, trans. J. Bowden (Philadelphia: Fotress, 1976), p. 394
This is Barth referring to Paul referring to the cosmos reconciling God in Christ in Colossians 1:19-20 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things...
So if Barth wasn't a universalist, but believed that all are reconciled to God in Christ, what did he mean? How is this reconciled? There is only one possible way I suggest.
There are not many equal pathways that lead to life beyond death. And there isn't the one of Christianity, mere faith, of course. There is universalism in Christ. Sola. Which is unpacked in The Coming of God and in more detail in The Humanity of God:
'One should not surrender himself... to the panic which this word [universalism] seems to spread... before informing himself exactly concerning its possible sense or non-sense.'
'One should at least be stimulated by the passage... which admittedly states that God has determined through His Son as His image and as the first-born of the whole of Creation to "reconcile all things (ta panta) to himself" to consider whether the concept could not perhaps have a good meaning.'
(I love the litotes, don't you?)
'This much is certain, that we have no theological right to set any sort of limits to the loving-kindness of God which has appeared in Jesus Christ. Our theological duty is to see and understand it as being still greater than we had seen before.'
Ibid. (Richmond, VA, John Knox Press, 1960), pp. 61-2.
In other words, there is no automatic universalism, we don't all just go to happily ever after. As in Catholicism and Orthodoxy it's all about Jesus. Every part of the calculus: 'Jesus Christ is the elected man', all are elect in Him, by Him, because of Him. God chose, elected. Jesus who saves all-inclusively, universally efficaciously. The quote and paraphrase are from the preface to Church Dogmatics: The Doctrine of God 11.2. Vol. 10 (London: T & T Clark, 2010). p. 116.
As Paul said 'It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me' Gal. 2:20
God elects everyone through Jesus. When God looks down on us all, He only sees Jesus.
Barth, radically shifted from a beloved Calvinist background, transcends Calvin's election and limited atonement with no assurance; 'salvation anxiety'.
'I would have preferred to follow Calvin's doctrine of predestination much more closely, instead of departing from it so radically. I would have preferred, too, to keep to the beaten tracks when considering the basis of ethics. But I could not and cannot do so. As I let the Bible itself speak to me on these matters, as I meditated upon what I seemed to hear, I was driven irresistibly to reconstruction.'
Ibid. Vol. II, 1942, Preface.
This is my take on Steve Chalke's The Lost Message of Paul.
It's complemented, to the same conclusion, by the excellent Roger Olson:
'Barth was and was not a universalist. The solution is not sheer paradox, however. He was a universalist in the sense of everyone, all human persons, being reconciled to God, not just as something potential but as something actual from God’s side. He was not a universalist in the sense of believing that everyone, all human persons, will necessarily know and experience that reconciliation automatically, apart from any faith, having fellowship with God now or hereafter. Without doubt, however, he was a hopeful universalist in that second sense of the word.'
Paul's exclusivism in Christ is totally inclusive.
I'm sure that I've properly understood Barth, but let's see.
'I don't believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, the reconciler of all.', Erberhard Bush, Karl Barth: His life from letters and autobiographical texts, trans. J. Bowden (Philadelphia: Fotress, 1976), p. 394
Barth said “I do not believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, reconciler of all." (Though as I’ve noted before, simply saying “Barth said” can be a dangerous thing. His writing is dense and complex dialectic theology that regularly holds in tension seemingly paradoxical truths and claims, and for this reason I’m skeptical of anyone, myself included, other than the real Barth scholars who claim to understand Barth properly.)
Barth, as I understand him, drew a line at saying there must be universal reconciliation, because in his view that conflicted with salvation being the free gift of God, and for us to say that there must be universal salvation amounted to us saying what God must do with God's free gift, as though we could make some claim on it. So he held in tension two ideas—salvation is a free gift of God to which we have no claim of right, and "theological consistency might seem to lead our thoughts and utterances most clearly in [the] direction" of universalism. (Church Dogmatics, IV.3.2) Just prior to this portion of Church Dogmatics, he wrote:
If we are certainly forbidden to count on this [universal reconciliation] as though we had a claim to it, as though it were not supremely the work of God to which man can have no possible claim, we are surely commanded the more definitely to hope and pray for it as we may do already on this side of this final possibility, i.e., to hope and pray cautiously and yet distinctly that, in spite of everything which may seem quite conclusively to proclaim the opposite, His compassion should not fail, and that in accordance with His mercy which is "new every morning" He "will not cast off for ever." (Lam 3:22f,31)
One clear implication here, it seems to me, is that Jesus being reconciler of all and all being reconciled aren’t quite the same thing. Which one is “universal reconciliation”?
For what it’s worth, I’m not sure you’re that far off what Barth meant, now that you’ve actually taken the time to unwrap it. But I also don’t think the pronouncements you’ve made in this thread about “the great heresy of Lutheranism” actually align with what you’ve said here or with Barth, or with actual Lutheranism. They’re a caricature, it seems to me, not an actual engagement with sola fide and its implications as understood by those who formulated sola fide to start with. It seems as though you may be arguing with a sola fide of your own definition—one that I think may divorce it from sola gratia and maybe even solo Christo.
It's complemented, to the same conclusion, by the excellent Roger Olson:
'Barth was and was not a universalist. The solution is not sheer paradox, however. He was a universalist in the sense of everyone, all human persons, being reconciled to God, not just as something potential but as something actual from God’s side. He was not a universalist in the sense of believing that everyone, all human persons, will necessarily know and experience that reconciliation automatically, apart from any faith, having fellowship with God now or hereafter. Without doubt, however, he was a hopeful universalist in that second sense of the word.'
I note the bolded, which is how I understand Barth, and which raises the question that all of this presents: When we talk about things like being saved by faith alone, what exactly is meant by “saved”?
You seem to want to find a way for damnation? A chink of darkness in the light? Or is that me? Seeing that in you and it's not there? And that the filthy rag work of faith is required before death? No, it's not me Nick. If Jesus reconciles all, all are reconciled. Did Barth vacillate? Oscillate over the cusp, over the razor's edge? May be, and you are in his company. In that case I'm not. And I don't think he did vacillate, he reached without daring to grasp. One thing we all agree on, it's all down to Jesus. We are all saved by Jesus' faithfulness alone. Which means we will all align with that, all come to trust Him, have faith in Him, grasp Him. In the resurrection. For now a few of us see through a glass darkly.
Salvation is rescue, being saved. From death. From extinction, from being snuffed out as if we'd never been. From oblivion. From meaninglessness, purposelessness in suffering and causing suffering prior to that. Being assured that life has transcendent meaning, purpose, for all in Christ alone, that we may be and preach the gospel to those in want.
You seem to want to find a way for damnation? A chink of darkness in the light? Or is that me?
It’s you, bringing a lot of assumptions and, my guess is, baggage to the table, and reading my posts like mine and, I think, even the books you quote, through the lens of those assumptions, that baggage and the questions/issues that matter to you.
You seem to want to find a way for damnation? A chink of darkness in the light? Or is that me?
It’s you, bringing a lot of assumptions and, my guess is, baggage to the table, and reading my posts like mine and, I think, even the books you quote, through the lens of those assumptions, that baggage and the questions/issues that matter to you.
Happy to hear it. That you don't fit anywhere in that table. The assumptions, the baggage are from 15 years experience in damnationist congregations preached at by damnationists, in a damnationist Church full of damnationist apologists who crucify the enlightened few.
In my baggage is the distorted perception that the enlightened here reach for but don't grasp universalism in Christ on the basis of their Biblical understanding, in the style of Barth. Whereas I am able to grasp it, in my ignorance I'm sure, I mean I must be missing something? I'm able to see it perfectly clearly, fully in Paul and Jesus. That not for the first time Paul is vindicated, as in him not being a homophobe. That the Bible is redeemed again and finally and is not just something to be moved on from.
And thinks Nick, for your infinitely subtle reproach to my egregious ignorance: me, 'There is universalism in Christ. Sola.', you, 'solo Christo'. Second-declension singular ablative case gender pronominal adjective.
You seem to want to find a way for damnation? A chink of darkness in the light? Or is that me?
It’s you, bringing a lot of assumptions and, my guess is, baggage to the table, and reading my posts like mine and, I think, even the books you quote, through the lens of those assumptions, that baggage and the questions/issues that matter to you.
Happy to hear it. That you don't fit anywhere in that table. The assumptions, the baggage are from 15 years experience in damnationist congregations preached at by damnationists, in a damnationist Church full of damnationist apologists who crucify the enlightened few.
Your experience is your experience, but it isn’t universal experience. And I wonder if the baggage doesn’t also include lingering effects of the warped perspectives of Armstrongism. Perhaps?
You use “damnationist” a lot, accusing almost everyone who doesn’t see things exactly your way of it. But it isn’t at all clear exactly what you mean by it. It’s tossed about in such a seemingly indiscriminate way that it really does become the “wah waah” of Ruth’s video.
@Martin54 - you could just let it go? It seems to me that you enjoy poking your wounds too much to ever let them heal. Picking scabs off is fun, sure, but maybe it's time to forgive yourself, if not those who gave you the scars.
You seem to want to find a way for damnation? A chink of darkness in the light? Or is that me?
It’s you, bringing a lot of assumptions and, my guess is, baggage to the table, and reading my posts like mine and, I think, even the books you quote, through the lens of those assumptions, that baggage and the questions/issues that matter to you.
Happy to hear it. That you don't fit anywhere in that table. The assumptions, the baggage are from 15 years experience in damnationist congregations preached at by damnationists, in a damnationist Church full of damnationist apologists who crucify the enlightened few.
Your experience is your experience, but it isn’t universal experience. And I wonder if the baggage doesn’t also include lingering effects of the warped perspectives of Armstrongism. Perhaps?
You use “damnationist” a lot, accusing almost everyone who doesn’t see things exactly your way of it. But it isn’t at all clear exactly what you mean by it. It’s tossed about in such a seemingly indiscriminate way that it really does become the “wah waah” of Ruth’s video.
Is anyone lost, or not? I use damnationism a lot because that's what I've experienced a lot. Armstrongism was annihilationist, which we regarded as euthanasia. It's still damnationism of course.
@Martin54 - you could just let it go? It seems to me that you enjoy poking your wounds too much to ever let them heal. Picking scabs off is fun, sure, but maybe it's time to forgive yourself, if not those who gave you the scars.
They're not my wounds Doc. I have plenty and compulsively pick the scabs in rumination all the time. But this is nothing to do with that. The scabs, the running sores are those on the tatterdemalion, motley old bag lady we call the Church. Damnationism is the cancer at the heart of Christianity.
@Martin54 - you could just let it go? It seems to me that you enjoy poking your wounds too much to ever let them heal. Picking scabs off is fun, sure, but maybe it's time to forgive yourself, if not those who gave you the scars.
So very much this. Whatever this is about, it's not about the communities who've experienced injustice because of some of the beliefs that some groups insist are baked into Christianity. More about your feelings and thoughts.
I don't have the mental energy for outrage against someone who appears to be hijacking the very real ill-treatment that some groups have experienced to justify getting upset about something they're bothered about right now.
@Doc Tor's right ... Forgive yourself. Forgive them. Let it go and move on.
Yes, but because of how often and indiscriminately you use it, it's not at all clear what you actually mean by it, other than "bad" or "wrong" or "cancerous."
Who do you damn? And why are you being evasive, dissimulating, obtuse?
No one - If Jesus says that grace is freely available for those that answer it, I ain't second guessing. I don't do the excluding or decide who's name gets written in the book of life.
Now, that's not true of all sections of the church, but I have no control over what they do. I only have control over what I do. And one of those things is to try and not put people off God - who is amazing and awesome etc - by not being an arse. *
* Before anyone points out the obvious, there are days when this plan goes better than others.
Who do you damn? And why are you being evasive, dissimulating, obtuse?
Oh good grief! I'm not being evasive, dissimulating or obtuse. I'm asking you to actually be clear about what you're talking and asking about, so that I and others don't have to guess. I'm asking that because your apparently default approach of intentional evasiveness and obtuseness can make it impossible to be sure what the hell you're talking about.
I don't damn anyone—except perhaps myself for thinking it might be worth trying once more to discuss things with you.
Who do you damn? And why are you being evasive, dissimulating, obtuse?
No one - If Jesus says that grace is freely available for those that answer it, I ain't second guessing. I don't do the excluding or decide who's name gets written in the book of life.
Now, that's not true of all sections of the church, but I have no control over what they do. I only have control over what I do. And one of those things is to try and not put people off God - who is amazing and awesome etc - by not being an arse. *
* Before anyone points out the obvious, there are days when this plan goes better than others.
In other words, you leave it to Jesus who He damns.
Who do you damn? And why are you being evasive, dissimulating, obtuse?
Oh good grief! I'm not being evasive, dissimulating or obtuse. I'm asking you to actually be clear about what you're talking and asking about, so that I and others don't have to guess. I'm asking that because your apparently default approach of intentional evasiveness and obtuseness can make it impossible to be sure what the hell you're talking about.
I don't damn anyone—except perhaps myself for thinking it might be worth trying once more to discuss things with you.
In that case, my apologies. As long as none are lost, none are damned by you or your Jesus.
And what's that Ruth? And no, there isn't, whatever it is, until the refining fire of Judgement Day. I'm certainly looking forward to having my dross burnt away. Wonder what'll be left! As for many of us all just a nubbin. Our mutual friend 'itler for a start.
As long as none are lost, none are damned by you or your Jesus.
You’re illustrating my point. You didn’t ask me who Jesus damns. You asked who I damn, and you did so after I asked you “excluded by whom?” (which was, in turn, in response to your question about who is “excluded” in my faith). You don’t just move the goalposts, you refuse to even say where the goalposts are.
And for the record, this response should not be taken as me asserting that Jesus damns anyone.
I’m done. You’ll have to look for someone else to play games with.
Fascinating. You cannot, will not admit it, deny it. Games indeed.
What’s fascinating is that you absolutely refuse to be clear about what you’re asking or saying, and then accuse of others of prevarication, obfuscation or playing games when they give up trying to read your mind or parse your incoherent posts and pronouncements.
I take that back. It’s not fascinating. It’s pathetic and utterly assholish.
No games on my part. I’m happy to discuss and explore these things. But not with you.
@mousethief, I think Kool-Aid was suggested as a response to the question about what Martin might have been drinking. I think “contains no juice, totally artificially flavored” fits pretty well.
I’m done. You’ll have to look for someone else to play games with.
Fascinating. You cannot, will not admit it, deny it. Games indeed.
What’s fascinating is that you absolutely refuse to be clear about what you’re asking or saying, and then accuse of others of prevarication, obfuscation or playing games when they give up trying to read your mind or parse your incoherent posts and pronouncements.
I take that back. It’s not fascinating. It’s pathetic and utterly assholish.
No games on my part. I’m happy to discuss and explore these things. But not with you.
@mousethief, I think Kool-Aid was suggested as a response to the question about what Martin might have been drinking. I think “contains no juice, totally artificially flavored” fits pretty well.
As I said, fascinating, as is your descent to others' levels. You know exactly what I mean. You're a damnationist.
I’m done. You’ll have to look for someone else to play games with.
Fascinating. You cannot, will not admit it, deny it. Games indeed.
What’s fascinating is that you absolutely refuse to be clear about what you’re asking or saying, and then accuse of others of prevarication, obfuscation or playing games when they give up trying to read your mind or parse your incoherent posts and pronouncements.
I take that back. It’s not fascinating. It’s pathetic and utterly assholish.
No games on my part. I’m happy to discuss and explore these things. But not with you.
@mousethief, I think Kool-Aid was suggested as a response to the question about what Martin might have been drinking. I think “contains no juice, totally artificially flavored” fits pretty well.
As I said, fascinating, as is your descent to others' levels. You know exactly what I mean.
No, I don’t. Perhaps I’m dense, but I do not know exactly what you mean. Your superpowers of knowing other people better than they know themselves is failing you. Again.
You're a damnationist.
Whatever. Think what you want, however wrong you might be. Can’t stop you, and it’s hard to describe how little I care anymore. Knock yourself out.
Who do you damn? And why are you being evasive, dissimulating, obtuse?
No one - If Jesus says that grace is freely available for those that answer it, I ain't second guessing. I don't do the excluding or decide who's name gets written in the book of life.
Now, that's not true of all sections of the church, but I have no control over what they do. I only have control over what I do. And one of those things is to try and not put people off God - who is amazing and awesome etc - by not being an arse. *
* Before anyone points out the obvious, there are days when this plan goes better than others.
In other words, you leave it to Jesus who He damns.
That's a very uncharitable translation. I leave it to Jesus to decide who does and doesn't make that particular list - and I'm expecting surprises. Good ones. "Damnation" is closer to the Jewish idea of "absence of God" than anything else.
It seems a better approach than attempting to do His job for Him by shouting my prejudices from the rooftops and assuming He shares them.
@mousethief, you started serving Coolers yet? I can bring savoury snacks for anyone who doesn't want cookies.
Comments
Sir. As if one would take the lack of argument with ones propositions as an indication of full agreement with them. I mean, I might be unutterably sodding dim ect, ect, but, do me a favour. Back tomorrow.
So what did you mean by that?
Nick, I was being infernally puckishly ironic.
The 'twisted delusion' is that what we believe - our faith, in Christ - has anything to do with salvation. That the whole overblown, baroque, clunky, imparsimonious calculus of how we get and keep grace, atonement, righteousness, justification, sanctification; salvation, is like Ptolemaic, geocentric cosmology, Hellishly complicated and damnationist. Derived from putting the Second Temple Messianic Jew Paul in our place, whether Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant and hybrids et al (see nice wee chart) over the past 1900 years. But the worst of them all is Protestant, Lutheran, Evangelical for a start. Its projection on Paul, in particular in the translation of pistis Christou.
In the link, rather than the objective genitive in, try the subjective genitive of for a start, as Catholic bibles including Wycliffe's do up to 1961, as even the English KJV Protestant bible does. At least this starts the process completed by substituting 'the faithfulness of Christ' which is more than allowed through the lens of love.
All are saved in Christ, by His faithfulness, there is universal reconciliation. As Barth properly understood.
It’s the absolutist pronouncements like this that actually get in way of any point you might have to make, and that signal that maybe you don’t understand the nuances of what you’re talking about as nearly as well as you seem to think you do.
I’m not sure you’ve properly understood Barth. Barth posited not that there is universal reconciliation, but rather that there is reason to hope for universal reconciliation.
OK Nick. Again of course. Something went wrong with my potty training obviously.
I'm sure that I've properly understood Barth, but let's see.
'I don't believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, the reconciler of all.', Erberhard Bush, Karl Barth: His life from letters and autobiographical texts, trans. J. Bowden (Philadelphia: Fotress, 1976), p. 394
This is Barth referring to Paul referring to the cosmos reconciling God in Christ in Colossians 1:19-20 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things...
So if Barth wasn't a universalist, but believed that all are reconciled to God in Christ, what did he mean? How is this reconciled? There is only one possible way I suggest.
There are not many equal pathways that lead to life beyond death. And there isn't the one of Christianity, mere faith, of course. There is universalism in Christ. Sola. Which is unpacked in The Coming of God and in more detail in The Humanity of God:
'One should not surrender himself... to the panic which this word [universalism] seems to spread... before informing himself exactly concerning its possible sense or non-sense.'
'One should at least be stimulated by the passage... which admittedly states that God has determined through His Son as His image and as the first-born of the whole of Creation to "reconcile all things (ta panta) to himself" to consider whether the concept could not perhaps have a good meaning.'
(I love the litotes, don't you?)
'This much is certain, that we have no theological right to set any sort of limits to the loving-kindness of God which has appeared in Jesus Christ. Our theological duty is to see and understand it as being still greater than we had seen before.'
Ibid. (Richmond, VA, John Knox Press, 1960), pp. 61-2.
In other words, there is no automatic universalism, we don't all just go to happily ever after. As in Catholicism and Orthodoxy it's all about Jesus. Every part of the calculus: 'Jesus Christ is the elected man', all are elect in Him, by Him, because of Him. God chose, elected. Jesus who saves all-inclusively, universally efficaciously. The quote and paraphrase are from the preface to Church Dogmatics: The Doctrine of God 11.2. Vol. 10 (London: T & T Clark, 2010). p. 116.
As Paul said 'It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me' Gal. 2:20
God elects everyone through Jesus. When God looks down on us all, He only sees Jesus.
Barth, radically shifted from a beloved Calvinist background, transcends Calvin's election and limited atonement with no assurance; 'salvation anxiety'.
'I would have preferred to follow Calvin's doctrine of predestination much more closely, instead of departing from it so radically. I would have preferred, too, to keep to the beaten tracks when considering the basis of ethics. But I could not and cannot do so. As I let the Bible itself speak to me on these matters, as I meditated upon what I seemed to hear, I was driven irresistibly to reconstruction.'
Ibid. Vol. II, 1942, Preface.
This is my take on Steve Chalke's The Lost Message of Paul.
It's complemented, to the same conclusion, by the excellent Roger Olson:
'Barth was and was not a universalist. The solution is not sheer paradox, however. He was a universalist in the sense of everyone, all human persons, being reconciled to God, not just as something potential but as something actual from God’s side. He was not a universalist in the sense of believing that everyone, all human persons, will necessarily know and experience that reconciliation automatically, apart from any faith, having fellowship with God now or hereafter. Without doubt, however, he was a hopeful universalist in that second sense of the word.'
Paul's exclusivism in Christ is totally inclusive.
How do you understand Barth again?
Yes, I quoted that same bit of Barth recently, so I may as well just copy and edit a bit what I said there.
Barth said “I do not believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, reconciler of all." (Though as I’ve noted before, simply saying “Barth said” can be a dangerous thing. His writing is dense and complex dialectic theology that regularly holds in tension seemingly paradoxical truths and claims, and for this reason I’m skeptical of anyone, myself included, other than the real Barth scholars who claim to understand Barth properly.)
Barth, as I understand him, drew a line at saying there must be universal reconciliation, because in his view that conflicted with salvation being the free gift of God, and for us to say that there must be universal salvation amounted to us saying what God must do with God's free gift, as though we could make some claim on it. So he held in tension two ideas—salvation is a free gift of God to which we have no claim of right, and "theological consistency might seem to lead our thoughts and utterances most clearly in [the] direction" of universalism. (Church Dogmatics, IV.3.2) Just prior to this portion of Church Dogmatics, he wrote: One clear implication here, it seems to me, is that Jesus being reconciler of all and all being reconciled aren’t quite the same thing. Which one is “universal reconciliation”?
For what it’s worth, I’m not sure you’re that far off what Barth meant, now that you’ve actually taken the time to unwrap it. But I also don’t think the pronouncements you’ve made in this thread about “the great heresy of Lutheranism” actually align with what you’ve said here or with Barth, or with actual Lutheranism. They’re a caricature, it seems to me, not an actual engagement with sola fide and its implications as understood by those who formulated sola fide to start with. It seems as though you may be arguing with a sola fide of your own definition—one that I think may divorce it from sola gratia and maybe even solo Christo.
I note the bolded, which is how I understand Barth, and which raises the question that all of this presents: When we talk about things like being saved by faith alone, what exactly is meant by “saved”?
Salvation is rescue, being saved. From death. From extinction, from being snuffed out as if we'd never been. From oblivion. From meaninglessness, purposelessness in suffering and causing suffering prior to that. Being assured that life has transcendent meaning, purpose, for all in Christ alone, that we may be and preach the gospel to those in want.
Happy to hear it. That you don't fit anywhere in that table. The assumptions, the baggage are from 15 years experience in damnationist congregations preached at by damnationists, in a damnationist Church full of damnationist apologists who crucify the enlightened few.
In my baggage is the distorted perception that the enlightened here reach for but don't grasp universalism in Christ on the basis of their Biblical understanding, in the style of Barth. Whereas I am able to grasp it, in my ignorance I'm sure, I mean I must be missing something? I'm able to see it perfectly clearly, fully in Paul and Jesus. That not for the first time Paul is vindicated, as in him not being a homophobe. That the Bible is redeemed again and finally and is not just something to be moved on from.
I'd get that looked at Ruth.
You use “damnationist” a lot, accusing almost everyone who doesn’t see things exactly your way of it. But it isn’t at all clear exactly what you mean by it. It’s tossed about in such a seemingly indiscriminate way that it really does become the “wah waah” of Ruth’s video.
Is anyone lost, or not? I use damnationism a lot because that's what I've experienced a lot. Armstrongism was annihilationist, which we regarded as euthanasia. It's still damnationism of course.
They're not my wounds Doc. I have plenty and compulsively pick the scabs in rumination all the time. But this is nothing to do with that. The scabs, the running sores are those on the tatterdemalion, motley old bag lady we call the Church. Damnationism is the cancer at the heart of Christianity.
So very much this. Whatever this is about, it's not about the communities who've experienced injustice because of some of the beliefs that some groups insist are baked into Christianity. More about your feelings and thoughts.
I don't have the mental energy for outrage against someone who appears to be hijacking the very real ill-treatment that some groups have experienced to justify getting upset about something they're bothered about right now.
@Doc Tor's right ... Forgive yourself. Forgive them. Let it go and move on.
No one - If Jesus says that grace is freely available for those that answer it, I ain't second guessing. I don't do the excluding or decide who's name gets written in the book of life.
Now, that's not true of all sections of the church, but I have no control over what they do. I only have control over what I do. And one of those things is to try and not put people off God - who is amazing and awesome etc - by not being an arse. *
* Before anyone points out the obvious, there are days when this plan goes better than others.
I don't damn anyone—except perhaps myself for thinking it might be worth trying once more to discuss things with you.
In other words, you leave it to Jesus who He damns.
There's no cure for what ails you, apparently.
In that case, my apologies. As long as none are lost, none are damned by you or your Jesus.
And what's that Ruth? And no, there isn't, whatever it is, until the refining fire of Judgement Day. I'm certainly looking forward to having my dross burnt away. Wonder what'll be left! As for many of us all just a nubbin. Our mutual friend 'itler for a start.
And for the record, this response should not be taken as me asserting that Jesus damns anyone.
Welcome to the club. We've got juice.
Damned if I know!
I believe cookies as well.
Or biscuits depending on your vocabularic leanings.
Hope it’s okay if I spike the juice with a splash of bourbon, though.
Is that the juice Martin has been drinking?
By all means, as long as you share.
No telling.
Contains no juice. Totally artificially flavoured.
Fascinating. You cannot, will not admit it, deny it. Games indeed.
Only Angostura and ice with my finger. It's not Friday night after all.
You sure got something boy.
Quite. Twice baked not half.
I take that back. It’s not fascinating. It’s pathetic and utterly assholish.
No games on my part. I’m happy to discuss and explore these things. But not with you.
Exactly what I was thinking.
@mousethief, I think Kool-Aid was suggested as a response to the question about what Martin might have been drinking. I think “contains no juice, totally artificially flavored” fits pretty well.
As I said, fascinating, as is your descent to others' levels. You know exactly what I mean. You're a damnationist.
Whatever. Think what you want, however wrong you might be. Can’t stop you, and it’s hard to describe how little I care anymore. Knock yourself out.
That's a very uncharitable translation. I leave it to Jesus to decide who does and doesn't make that particular list - and I'm expecting surprises. Good ones. "Damnation" is closer to the Jewish idea of "absence of God" than anything else.
It seems a better approach than attempting to do His job for Him by shouting my prejudices from the rooftops and assuming He shares them.
@mousethief, you started serving Coolers yet? I can bring savoury snacks for anyone who doesn't want cookies.