You’re not painting the whole picture, that’s the problem.
Interesting – the Greek there can go either way. But–
Here the point is plainly that the kingdom is the one doing the seeking. Given that, with the above verse being not as clear, I would read both in accord with the second. So–
The grammar clearly supports ‘my’ understanding in the pearls parable; it plainly says that the kingdom is like the man, not like the pearls. The one with the treasure can go either way (depending on how you take the passive/middle participle), though I do like taking it with the kingdom being like the treasure since then there are two complementary views: the kingdom sees each one of us as a treasure worth spending everything on, and we should see the kingdom the same way.
Yet Jesus moved first, giving up everything in order to even be able to call disciples.
This also accords with the Gospel better: the Gospel isn’t about how we should be or what we should so, it is about how eagerly God is seeking us – that Jesus came to seek and save, not to show us a path! The Cross isn’t about how hard we have to do anything at all, it is about God giving His all, all for us: He rather literally gave everything to buy us (as Paul and Peter put it later, we were bought with a price, the precious blood of Christ).
I think it’s a difference in opinion. From my point of view, the emphasis on salvation for all and the radical inclusivity of Christ point towards this. The scripture quotes from St. Roymond above support that. Here are two more of my favorites:
Romans 5:18
“Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people.”
1 Corinthians 15:22
“For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”
Again, it depends on how you view things. In my personal interpretation of scripture through the eyes of God’s nature, universalism appears to be the most rational conclusion to me. And not just rational, but it has influenced my actions and how I live, and made me more honest. That is something I can’t prove to you over the internet😂 but I say by their fruits ye shall know them.
Universalist theology directly influences how I live because it has helped me let go of the need for self-preservation: and I believe self preservation is where sin comes from:
Luke 17:33
“Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it.”
Also, I emphasize love as often as I do, because I believe that God is Love, and the process to reuniting with him must be through love, not fear. And from my experience, universalist theology is the only way I’ve truly been able to learn to love Him not because I want to be saved, but because I genuinely really do love God for how loving He is.
1 John 4:18
“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”
Unfortunately, my personal experiences that led me to this understanding can’t be proven/debated, only felt/experienced, so I also totally see where you’re coming from as well. Thanks for engaging still 
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Not at all. It is what it is, but you need to have the rough to appreciate the smooth.
Death is neither good nor evil. Death is a part of this life. We cannot live without it, and Jesus said as much.
Clearly you do not see the ramifications of the pipe dream. The only people who can live in Paradise are those without sentience. IOW the only reason you will love Heaven is because you are programmed to. Still, you wont know the difference so it doesn’t matter.
Richard
The reality is even the top physicists dont understand time. But it is related to physical space per Einstein. God is not limited or bound by physical space as He existed ‘before’ the universe. I think it is reasonable to say time did not exist until the universe came into being, as time does not exist without space (in our current understanding). Im not sure what you mean by ‘prophecies that went awry’. But perhaps that’s for another discussion.
After one finals week in pre-grad school we went on an impromptu trip to Baltimore (for reasons), and the topic on the entire nine-hour trip was what our bodies would be like in the Resurrection. Having just passed physical education in the first week of classes with an A+ and so been excused from having to attend, I maintained we would have our bodies at whatever peak performance we achieved in this life. The strongest counter-proposal was that we would have our bodies at the peak they could have achieved and so “even better than Roymond!”. A stubborn view was that we would have our bodies as they were at death except that they would function as in the second proposal. A brief proposal was that we would have the potential to have such bodies but would have to work for it.
One comment was that whatever our bodies would be like, they wouldn’t be falling asleep at the wheel "so it’s now someone else’s turn to drive.
At any rate, everyone agreed that just as our spirits would be far better than now, so would our bodies.
This was mentioned, and someone quipped “So we’ll be able to walk through walls”, to which another responded, “We’ll be able to run through walls!”
We wandered far trying to think of what a body like Jesus’ could do, since we are given mere hints in the Gospels.
If you follow one strain of thought in second-Temple Judaism, that’s the significance of the New Jerusalem, which is presented by the language used as a combination of holy city and Eden garden, a place where heaven and earth overlap/intersect. It fits with a theme in the Old Testament that in the summation of things we will get “back to the Garden” (but this time, no serpent). This always makes me think of how in the Narnia stories “Aslan’s country” is bigger on the inside! i.e. the New Jerusalem will “contain” by connection the entire heavenly realm (just as to the inhabitants of that realm it will “contain” the entire earthly realm).
One of the rabbis I knew in grad school had an answer for that, from the Sadduceean perspective (i.e. that this life is all there is): Because this world is still God’s, and that’s how we should treat God’s world.
I couldn’t make sense of that back then, but given how much joy I find in my conservation work I can start to grasp it, that even if this world “is going to burn!” as my Pentecostal friends put it, making this one better is still wroth the effort.
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And a presumption that the image of God has to do with human attributes (which is theologically dangerous when it comes to the value of human life) rather than being a vocation, a responsibility, to which we are called. I agree more and more with the scholars who say we should translate Genesis with “as the image of God”, since that rules out any qualifications or measuring (all are in the image of God, but some are in His image more than others), and because it fits with the fact that Genesis 1 makes use of the temple inauguration genre wherein humans are the “icon” or “idol” at the center of God’s self-constructed cosmic temple.
Ah, the emphasis from the Septuagint rendition, “I am the ‘am-ing’ One”, or as some second-Temple Jews put it, “I am the being Who gives being”, or to stick closer to the Greek tense involved, “I am the Being Who is giving being”.
I like that emphasis to a large degree because it makes the relationship between God and Creation more intimately relational: He is always, even nanosecond (or Placnk second) giving us being – my mind, my emotions, the tip of my left little toe and everything else, are His continual gift.
It’s what is actually said that drags me towards universalism.
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I still disagree.
Matthew chose to put this collection of parables together, and they are ALL about ‘our’ reaction to the good news/kingdom. He put them together for a reason.
Just because a parable starts with ‘the kingdom is like…’ and then refers to a person, doesnt mean it is that person the kingdom refers to! It is the picture that is being painted that is important, which is the whole point of a parable. It is the kingdom that is of great worth, a ‘treasure’ to be found. It is the pearl of great price. It is the thing that changes the world. To say that the Gospel is not about what we should do is ignoring Jesus’ own words. If the rich ruler didnt have to do anything, why did Jesus tell him he did?! And why was Jesus sad when he didnt?You are indeed supposed to count the cost. Without getting into a debate about ‘faith’, it seems to me faith always involves obedience. If when first called, some of the disciples had said, no Im not prepared to stop fishing and follow you and went back to their nets, would Jesus have viewed them as having faith? Even Abraham, whom Paul uses as the great example of faith, obeyed God. If he hadnt obeyed, would Paul have used him as an example? I doubt it.
Have you read Richard J Middleton’s books? He’s very good on the image of God etc.
So Jesus’ resurrection body isn’t good enough for you? or one like it, rather?
Oh ye of little imagination! I say earnestly, if death had been an impossibility, my backpacking on the Pacific Crest Trail would have been far more exciting! The possibility of death limits us drastically in terms of excitement and danger! I would have trudged across glaciers, climbed cliff faces, explored streams . . . all things I didn’t do due to concern about death.
I agree. Even without the last, remove death and excitement and emotions can increase!
I’m exactly painting the whole picture! To get the currently held “heaven or hell” view it is necessary to change the meaning of Jesus’ own words. To get universalism it isn’t.
In fact another approach is to consider that Jesus’ words about judgment were given in conformance to the views at the time (on the Pharisee side anyway, since the Sadducees held there is no afterlife) – something I can argue either way.
And the critical part of the picture is the Cross, where God showed that He is all about giving and forgiving, not about condemnation – all His condemning was laid on Jesus, which means He has none left (though we have to be in Christ to experience that, it isn’t His condemnation we suffer, it is our own).
That fits the “already but not yet” theme in so much New Testament theology: all humans are already (potentially?) made alive in Christ, but only those who are now His have that at the moment – but unless all will eventually be His, the verse contains a contradiction (or at least a fallacy by changing the meaning of “all” between the two clauses).
I’ve noticed that in others as well – of the (Trinitarian) universalists I know, they are all more compassionate without prejudice.
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I call that position a pipe dream: only in Paradise can all and any risks be taken!
There are a couple of mountains near me that I would love to climb. Since this is not Paradise, I am cautious and will likely never do so – but if this were Paradise I would go for it without hesitation! Even Paradise, after all, contains risk – Adam could still have been crushed if a hippo trampled him, even if he would have healed. For the joy of conquering those mountains, I would risk the equivalent of such trampling . . . but since this is not Paradise, that would be irresponsible.
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There is no risk if you cannot die or even be hurt…
(See Kirk in the Nexus)
Your conclusions suck.
Richard
Edit,
Hint
How do you demonstrate the power to resurrect without resurrecting the current body form?
Whereas I would consider what we build ourselves to be our true self and anything just given to us is only our circumstances.
Who said you couldn’t be hurt? Do you expect the physical laws to change?
Not being able to be hurt makes about as much sense as not being able to eat food, which we know isn’t the case.
Romans 5:18
“Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people.”
1 Corinthians 15:22
“For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”
Re Romans, the problem with quoting a single verse is that it is taken out of context. The context of Paul’s letter to the Roman church was the ongoing divisions between Jew and Gentile believers in that church. Paul is showing that in Christ, ‘all’ are saved and treated equally. There are no such divisions in God’s view of them. But even if you read just Romans 5 on its own, it is impossible that Paul means ‘all’ in the sense of ‘every single human being’. Paul has just explicitly said that faith in Jesus results in being justified. And being justified, this means they will be saved from God’s wrath. And Paul makes clear it is only through this faith in Jesus that anyone has access to God’s saving grace. ‘All’ simply cannot then refer to all humankind, otherwise he would be completely contradicting himself within a few sentences. The first few paras of Ch5 qualify what Paul then says.
Re 1 Corinthians, Paul clarifies what he means by ‘all’ in the context of the resurrection - Jesus and then all those who belong to him. Or to use his earlier words those who are ‘in Christ’. Not everyone. This actually completely fits with his words in Romans - it is only those who have faith in Jesus (Jew or Gentile), who are then justified because they have accessed God’s grace, who are saved from God’s wrath and therefore whose hope in the resurrection is justified.
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What evidence are you basing this?
If Christ kept the same body after the ascension where is it?
(sarcasm resisted)
Richard
There’s no contradiction.
Exactly.
Christ’s resurrection body, which we are told is what ours will be like.
Ascended.
Why do you insist on forcing disagreement in the text, and making problems that aren’t there?
There are none so blind as those who cannot see.
Take it which ever way suits. (I know how I take it)
Richard
I dont see what the problem is…its an overriding Biblical theme that God will redeem and restore all humanity that was corrupted by sin unto Himself.
Read Genesis Chapter 3,The entire Sanctuary Service Model (particularly the Day of Atonement), Isaiah 9:6, the crucifixion of Christ in Matthew, then Revelation 21!
For me the reason why the model of eternal hell is wrong…how can God restore everything back to its former glory if corruption still exists in a real place called hell where people are consciously being tormented for all eternity? That is hardly an improvement…thats caging animals to my way of thinking and its certainly not indicative of a universe full of happiness (ie no more tears, suffering, pain etc as illustrated in Revelation 21)
The conflict that the Apostle John creates in what he wrote in Revelation 21…given he wrote this in the AD 90’s and was the last surviving apostle in the bible canon…that means the theology of eternal torment is fundamentally wrong or the apostle Johns writing in the second last chapter of the Bible are wrong.
Clearly the apostle John isnt wrong…he claims in the opening statements of Revelation that he was shown this stuff by God in vision, so our interpretation is the problem not what is written.
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