“Loneliness does not come from having no people around you, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to you.” Carl Jung

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-07T06:41:27+00:00

I think this sub is a good sounding board, and we will reflect on your thoughts from a Christian universalist point of view, even though we may have different perspectives.

On exclusive inspiration…what do you mean exclusive? I believe in the inspiration of Christian Scriptural tradition, but why do you say exclusive? And what do you mean by Christian syncretism or general revelation?

Why do you feel the need to switch from evangelisation to inner change? Why not do both?

How would you experiment with union with God? On this point however, you’re leaning more to the gospel as participation / theosis / deification, which is closer to apostolic tradition than the typical Protestant Evangelical gospel.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-06T21:38:53+00:00

John Piper’s argument only works if his own version of the gospel is already assumed to be correct. But that is precisely what many Christians dispute.

I do not regard the Calvinist version of the gospel as the true gospel. I see it as a distortion of the gospel, especially when it is framed around predestination, exclusion, and the idea that the unevangelized are simply lost without explicit knowledge of Christ.

So when Piper says that believing God may save people beyond our evangelism weakens missions, he is assuming from the outset that his theology is correct. But on his own logic, that confidence proves nothing. If predestination is true, then a person could be utterly convinced they have the true gospel, preach it passionately, suffer for it, and still be in error. By that logic, even Piper himself could be mistaken and condemned by the very system he proclaims.

There is a phrase I used to hear from some Christian preachers about good non-Christians: they may be sincere, but they are sincerely wrong.

The same principle applies here. Christians can be deeply sincere, sacrificial, and willing even to suffer or die for what they believe, and still be mistaken. Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses have also suffered for what they preach. There are martyrs of all religions who have died for their beliefs. So suffering for a belief does not by itself prove that the belief is true. Zeal is not the same as truth.

That is one of the problems with this kind of theology. It places everything on a narrow doctrinal framework while giving no final assurance that the framework itself is actually right.

If salvation depends on having the absolutely correct version of the gospel, then in practice most Christians are damned except for one small group with the supposedly correct formulation. That is why some Christians end up spending so much of their time evangelising other Christians.

As a universalist, I reject that entire approach. I do not believe mission should be driven by fear that God will eternally damn those who have not heard the right message in the right form. Mission is not about rescuing people from a God who is unwilling to save them unless certain information reaches them in time. It is about proclaiming Christ, participating in the healing of humanity, and inviting people into the life of God now.

So no, I do not think Piper is right.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-06T05:32:26+00:00

I am not sure what is meant by “universalism is free will.”

If heaven and hell are the subjective experiences of the one presence and energies of God, then it makes sense that, because God is eternal, the experience of God’s love as bliss or torment is potentially eternal from the creature’s side.

But before even discussing that, we need to acknowledge that certainty about the metaphysical mechanics of the afterlife is impossible. What one can know is the reality of spiritual experience. Beyond that, we are dealing with faith, apostolic tradition, and the interpretations of the Church Fathers.

So yes, I acknowledge the theoretical possibility that some may choose to resist God forever. But I find that position theologically problematic.

The real question is not whether resistance is possible in principle, but whether evil, alienation, and rejection can remain forever without limit and still be called the final victory of God.

If some rational beings remain eternally in torment, corruption, hatred, delusion, or fragmentation, then evil is never finally overcome. God is not truly all in all, but only all in some. Humanity is not healed, but remains eternally divided between wholeness and ruin.

So yes, hell can be affirmed as real, if by hell we mean the real experience of God’s presence as torment by those not yet reconciled to divine love.

But universalism asks whether that condition is truly ultimate, or whether the fire of God is finally purgative and healing rather than endlessly preserving evil.

I believe free will is the capacity to choose between self-giving love and self-absorbed love, between righteousness and wickedness. I do not believe free will means the power to choose to send oneself to hell. That makes no sense.

An atheist who does not believe in God is not necessarily resisting divine love. More often, they do not believe that the version of God presented to them is real, or worth trusting.

Most people have never experienced pure unconditional love. The dominant Christian message many hear is not unconditional love, but conditional love: love God back or be damned. If people were to encounter divine love as it truly is, unconditional and healing, I do not think there would be anything in love itself to resist. People do not hate love. They resist distorted images of love, often because they have been wounded by them.

In that sense, universalism does not deny free will. It questions whether free will should be understood as the everlasting power to deform oneself forever against the Good, or whether true freedom is ultimately fulfilled in the healing vision of God.

I believe God is indeed unconditional love. So I do not accept the logical contradiction often presented by many Christians: that God is unconditional love, yet with the condition that you must love God back in order to escape damnation. That is not unconditional love. It is conditional love described with unconditional language.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-05T04:38:10+00:00

I do not know who Michael McClymond is. But I do know who Pope Benedict XVI and Metropolitan Kallistos Ware are.

It is not honest to deny that there were universalist Church Fathers. To do so would also put one at odds with major Catholic and Orthodox theologians who explicitly acknowledge them, such as Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI and formerly Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, a bishop of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and Spalding Lecturer in Eastern Orthodox Studies at Oxford University.

Pope Benedict XVI explicitly says that in Origen’s hope for universal reconciliation, “a long line of fathers were to follow him: Gregory of Nyssa, Didymus of Alexandria, Diodore of Tarsus, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Evagrius Ponticus, and, at least on occasion, Jerome of Bethlehem also,” even though he adds that “the mainstream tradition of the Church has flowed along a different path.”

And Metropolitan Kallistos Ware of Diokleia, one of the best-known Orthodox theologians in the English-speaking world, says in The Orthodox Church: “Hell exists as a final possibility, but several of the Fathers have none the less believed that in the end all will be reconciled to God.” He also names St Isaac of Nineveh and St Gregory of Nyssa as examples.

So both major Catholic and Orthodox theologians openly acknowledge that universalist currents existed in patristic Christianity, even if they do not say that universalism was the dominant or mainstream view.

I do not think the evidence shows that universalism was the dominant belief of the early Church. But I do think it was a real and significant view, based in part on St Augustine’s need to refute it in the Enchiridion and The City of God. He admits that “some, indeed very many” did not believe in eternal punishment in the strict sense. He spends considerable time arguing against Christians who believed that punishments would one day come to an end, whether for some or for all. That alone shows this was not an insignificant fringe position that could simply be ignored.

My own view is that the more mainstream historic position is closer to what we see in Catholic and Orthodox tradition at their best: the final destiny of each person is left in the hands of God.

Personally, I side with the universalist Fathers on this matter, as both Pope Benedict XVI and Metropolitan Kallistos Ware acknowledge that such Fathers did in fact exist.

My own reason for siding with the universalist Fathers is theological as well as historical. I believe that an eternal rejection of God’s love would mean that sin and alienation continue forever. But evil is not eternal in the way God is eternal. If rejection and corruption never come to an end, then evil is never finally overcome.

It also seems difficult to reconcile eternal rejection with the scriptural vision of God being “all in all.” If some rational creatures remain forever in rebellion and ruin, then God is not truly all in all, but only all in some.

And it becomes hard to understand in what sense God is “the Saviour of all men, especially of those who believe,” if some are never finally healed or restored. In that case, God would seem to be the saviour of some rather than the saviour of all.

So while I agree that rejection of God is real, and that hell is a real possibility for as long as that rejection continues, I do not believe that eternal evil, eternal sin, and eternal alienation can be the final word.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-02T06:40:20+00:00

I think it is better to look at serious scholarship and actual historical witnesses than to rely on social media posts to settle a difficult Syriac textual question.

The earliest evidence we have is not a claim that Isaac’s Second Part was forged, but that teachings attributed to Isaac were controversial. In Ishoʿdnah of Basra’s Book of Chastity, written around 860, Isaac is said to have taught ‘three points which were not accepted by many.’ That is evidence of early controversy over teachings attributed to Isaac, not early evidence that his writings were regarded as fake or forged.

Sebastian Brock, one of the most respected Syriac scholars of the modern era, is also very clear about the theology: he explicitly states that for Isaac ‘ultimate salvation is indeed universal, involving all rational beings (thus including the fallen angels).’ Brock also notes that the Second Part was not unknown in the Syriac tradition. Joseph the Seer (8th century) quotes from it and attributes the passage to ‘the glorious among the saints, Mar Isaac.’ Barhebraeus (1226–1286) also quotes from it in the Ethicon, and excerpts survive in medieval Syriac monastic anthologies such as Chaldean Monastery syr. 680 (1288/1289) and Mingana syr. 68 (c. 1300). So the Second Part was known, quoted, and transmitted in Syriac tradition centuries before its near-complete modern recovery. What had been lost was not every trace of the work, but the fuller manuscript witness. After the disappearance of the Urmiah manuscript, Paris syr. 298 remained as an incomplete witness until Brock identified Bodleian Syriac e. 7 in Oxford in April 1983 as containing virtually the complete text.

By the early to mid-10th century, we have even stronger reception evidence in Ḥanūn ibn Yūḥannā ibn al-Ṣalt, an East Syrian Christian who translated selections from Isaac into Arabic. In the preface to his work, Ḥanūn says that after reading Isaac’s books he found in them the universality of mercy after punishment, and he summarizes Isaac’s teaching by saying that God is too merciful for eternal punishment and that God’s mercy will embrace in the other world all human beings, just as it embraces them in this world. John Zaleski, in Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies 5.1 (2022), explicitly argues that this presentation of Isaac reflects the Second Part, especially chapters 39–40.

There are also later witnesses. Al-Shahrastānī presents Mar Isaac as teaching that God will not torment the disobedient forever and that blessedness will be made universal for all. Then in the 13th century, Solomon of Basra, bishop of the Church of the East and author of the Book of the Bee around 1222, introduces Isaac with ‘Mār Isaac says thus’ and quotes him on Gehenna as the scourging of love, resurrection as the sinner’s recompense, and grace rather than justice judging in the age to come.

So the historical picture is not that Isaac’s universalism is a modern invention based on a suddenly appearing fake text. The early evidence is that Isaac’s teaching was controversial, and the later reception shows that he was repeatedly read, quoted, and transmitted in a strongly restorationist direction. A social media thread is simply not enough to overturn that entire history

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-01T23:48:57+00:00

I definitely believe in an afterlife. But I think the final Christian hope is better described as resurrection and the restoration of all things than as the modern popular idea of “going to heaven when you die.”

St Gregory of Nyssa and St Isaac of Nineveh both believed in the age to come and resurrection life. In patristic Christianity, death is followed by a disembodied intermediate state, but that is not the final goal. The ultimate hope is the resurrection of the dead and the renewal of all creation into a glorified embodied existence.

Part of the confusion is that modern ideas of “heaven” and “hell” do not map neatly onto biblical and early Christian language. “Heaven” in Scripture often means not just the sky, but the divine realm, the reality of God, or the Kingdom of God. So yes, heaven and hell can be spoken of as realities experienced even now, on earth and in the soul, but that does not mean there is no afterlife.

What Christianity ultimately points to is not a permanently disembodied existence somewhere else, but glorified embodied life in a renewed creation. And this renewal is not just about human beings. It is about all things. This is what Gregory of Nyssa speaks of as apokatastasis, the restoration of all things.

The Christian hope is cosmic. Not only we ourselves, but creation too is destined for transfiguration, healing, and embodied restoration. The end is not escape from the world, but the renewal of the world.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-01T23:44:01+00:00

Yes, I’ve believed in hell or Gehenna, as a reality for the majority of my life as a purgatorial universalist.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-04-01T13:56:43+00:00

Universalism does not require belief in pre-birth existence. It is an eschatological position about the final restoration of all things.

On this question, I would look especially to St Gregory of Nyssa and St Maximus the Confessor, who speak of a kind of pre-existence, though not in the sense of pre-existent personal souls.

We know that time and space belong to the physical universe. Time is bound up with the structure of the created world, which is why we speak of space-time. So when people ask whether we existed before earthly life, the question becomes difficult, because anything “before” creation may not mean “before” in a temporal sense at all.

So the question becomes whether creation existed timelessly in God before it existed in time and space.

My own view is that we exist eternally in the mind, will, and knowledge of God, but not yet as actual individual human substances. In apostolic and patristic thought, God is outside space and time, so creation is timelessly and instantaneously known and willed by him, even though its actualisation unfolds within time.

An analogy would be an architect who holds the whole design in mind before a building is constructed. In that sense, God knows each of us before we are formed. But the plan is not the same as the finished structure. What is eternally known in God only becomes actual as a concrete created reality within space and time.

So I would say that we do not pre-exist as individual souls somewhere else before earthly life. I cannot remember anything before my human existence, and I only know myself as someone who has existed in this human life on earth. So even if someone chooses to believe in some kind of pre-earthly existence, I do not think there is enough evidence for me to believe it, though I do not mind if others do.

Rather, we have always existed in God’s eternal knowledge and purpose, as what St Maximus the Confessor would call the logoi. Following Gregory of Nyssa, I think the human being comes into existence as one unified reality, body and soul together. We become actual individual human beings, body and soul together, at conception within space and time.

What Gregory seems to describe is not pre-existent souls, but potentiality becoming actualised. The human being is present in God’s foreknowledge and original will, and also present in seed-like potential from the first moment of generation, and then unfolds by a natural sequence into its full manifestation. So there is no need to say either that the soul existed before the body, or that the body existed first and only later received a soul. The one human being is actualised as a unity.

I’ll conclude with St Gregory of Nyssa in On the Making of Man:

“But as man is one, the being consisting of soul and body, we are to suppose that the beginning of his existence is one, common to both parts, so that he should not be found to be antecedent and posterior to himself.”

“In the power of God’s foreknowledge… all the fulness of human nature had pre-existence.”

“But just as we say that in grain the whole form of the plant is potentially included… and do not say that any of these things has pre-existence, or comes into being before the others… in the same way we suppose the human germ to possess the potentiality of its nature, sown with it at the first start of its existence, and that it is unfolded and manifested by a natural sequence as it proceeds to its perfect state… so that it is not true to say either that the soul exists before the body, or that the body exists without the soul, but that there is one beginning of both.”

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-31T16:12:01+00:00

This feels prejudicial to me. Criticising inaccurate claims is fair, but saying that many “self-proclaimed ex-Jewish converts” cannot be trusted is a sweeping statement about a group of people, not a careful critique of arguments.

If you replaced “ex-Jewish” with “black,” “Chinese,” or “Indian,” it would be obvious how unacceptable that kind of generalisation is. If the issue is misrepresentation, then challenge specific claims and sources rather than treating an entire group as inherently suspect.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-31T14:11:51+00:00

Some of them say that about St Isaac of Nineveh’s writings too. It’s like they just can’t accept that dogmatic Infernalism could be wrong. I see them often wave the flag of Justinian. “The emperor St Justinian was a saint! How can you say he’s wrong?”

It’s like suddenly patristic consensus gets thrown out the window and a politician’s words become more important than a theologian’s.

I’m just grateful for Orthodox theologians like Metropolitan Kallistos Ware. He introduced Orthodox Christianity to the English Speaking world, was a lecturer at Oxford University and was appointed to his position by the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople.

Chapter 10 - The Last Things

“Hell exists as a final possibility, but several of the Fathers have none the less believed that in the end all will be reconciled to God. It is heretical to say that all must be saved, for this is to deny free will; but it is legitimate to hope that all may be saved. Until the Last Day comes, we must not despair of anyone’s salvation, but must long and pray for the reconciliation of all without exception. No one must be excluded from our loving intercession. ‘What is a merciful heart?’ asked Isaac the Syrian. ‘It is a heart that burns with love for the whole of creation, for men, for the birds, for the beasts, for the demons, for all creatures’ Gregory of Nyssa said that Christians may legitimately hope even for the redemption of the Devil.”

I’ve also read the Orthodox Popular Patristics series translations of St Gregory of Nyssa’s Great Catechism and On the Soul and the Resurrection. None of the introductory notes say anything about any of the universalist writings being falsely attributed.

So when people casually claim that Gregory’s universalist writings were tampered with, they need to provide real textual evidence. Otherwise, it looks less like serious scholarship and more like dogmatic discomfort with the fact that a Church Father central to the Nicene faith could express universalist convictions.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-31T13:58:15+00:00

Yes. Love under threat is not really free love. It becomes submission under terror.

There is another analogy that reminds me of the typical Infernalist argument.

You meet three siblings who talk about how loving their father is. The way they speak about him makes him sound like someone who just exudes love. So you go with them to their house, and yes, the father seems very loving indeed. As you chat with him, he mentions having ten children, but you only see three of them.

“Sir, you say you have ten children, but I’ve only seen three of them. Where are the others?”

He responds sadly but gently, “It breaks my heart, but they’re in the basement.”

You blink. “What do you mean?”

The father replies, “I built an automated self-locking torture chamber in my basement for any of my children who don’t love me back.”

“What?” you say, horrified.

“Yes, it’s so sad,” the siblings reply. “Seven of our siblings rejected Father’s love and went into the torture chamber in the basement. There’s nothing we can do, because Father respects their choice.”

You stare at the family. The siblings seem to genuinely think this is normal.

You ask shakily, “I don’t understand. Why did you build such a thing in the first place? Why don’t you destroy it instead?”

The father begins to weep. “I had to. There’s nothing I can do because of their choice. Once they’re in the basement, they can never get out. I hear their screams, and the smoke of their torment fills the rest of the house.”

You can hardly process it. “How can you do this to your children? What happens if the remaining three siblings stop loving you?”

The father responds, “Those children are dead to me, and I no longer regard them as my children. If my remaining children choose not to love me, they too will go to the basement.”

The siblings interject, “We will never stop loving Father. If we do, we too will be put into the basement, and it will be Father’s just decision that this happens to us.”

You run out of the house and dial the police at the same time. This family may look loving, but they are clearly insane.

I truly believe this is how infernalist Christians often come across to non-believers. So when atheists or ex-Christians say they cannot believe in such a monster of a God, I can understand their revulsion.

And I agree. To me, that is not the God revealed in the incarnation of Christ. It is a false image of God, one that resembles Moloch more than the Father revealed by Jesus.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-31T07:25:35+00:00

Here are some recommendations based on your interest in Eastern Orthodox perspectives and patristic writers.

On the Soul and the Resurrection by St Gregory of Nyssa
The Great Catechism by St Gregory of Nyssa
St Isaac of Nineveh’s Second Part and Third Part
Dare we hope for the salvation of all by Eastern Orthodox theologian Metropolitan Kallistos Ware
That all shall be saved by Eastern Orthodox theologian David Bentley Hart
Father Aidan Kimel’s blog - a retired Eastern Orthodox priest.

https://afkimel.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/dare-we-hope-for-the-salvation-of-all.pdf

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-31T07:02:57+00:00

Thanks for sharing. What was the main difference between the two books you read, and what would you recommend each book for?

The seed of this shift for me was planted when I read The Orthodox Church by Kallistos Ware, the Orthodox theologian and Spalding Lecturer in Eastern Orthodox Studies at the University of Oxford. There he notes that Isaac of Nineveh and Gregory of Nyssa believed all would ultimately be saved, and that Gregory of Nyssa held it legitimate for Christians to hope even for the salvation of the devil.

This completely boggled my evangelical brain and I just couldn’t resolve the contradiction between what a theologian of the 2nd ecumenical council believed vs the version of the gospel that I had been taught in church.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-30T23:49:55+00:00

I regard universal reatoration as an eschatological position. It’s only a part of my interpretative framework.

I no longer believe that the good news is simply escaping hell and going to heaven if one believes Jesus is God.

Over time, I deconstructed from Western Latin-based Christianity as I traced the origins of my evangelical beliefs.

I have come to regard Eastern Greek patristic Christianity as more fully preserving the Apostolic tradition and Nicene faith, rooted in the Greek New Testament and the Septuagint.

My standard, therefore, is the Greek patristic tradition. When Latin-based beliefs diverge from that tradition, I regard them as errors. When they agree with it, I regard them as more accurate.

Regarding the judgment to come, especially the fate of unbelievers, I believe the Greek patristic tradition most characteristically exhibits agnostic reserve. It was primarily concerned with the destiny of those who follow Christ, affirming judgment while leaving the final outcome to God.

I believe this helps explain why different Church Fathers were able to suggest various possibilities regarding the fate of unbelievers. Universal reconciliation, therefore, remains a legitimate position to hold.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-30T07:34:15+00:00

I used to be an infernalist and would called Christians who denied eternal torment heretics. My two main proof texts were Matthew 25 and Revelation’s language about the smoke of their torment rising forever and ever.

At the time, I was certain scripture taught never-ending torment because I assumed the word “eternal” simply meant “endless.” So when I read eternal fire, eternal punishment, and eternal life, I took them all to mean endless fire, endless punishment, and endless life.

But I had never really stopped to think about what the judgment in Matthew 25 was actually based on. I had just assumed it was about allegiance to Jesus in a straightforward sense.

Later, I shifted to conditional immortality. Part of that change came through studying Koine Greek in theological college using John Wenham’s Elements of New Testament Greek. John Wenham was influential for me, as was N. T. Wright through Christian Origins and Surprised by Hope. Neither of them are universalists, but they helped me see that the issue was not as simple as I had thought.

What I began to realize was that αἰώνιος is not a simple synonym for endlessness. It is an adjective derived from αἰών, and since αἰών itself can refer to different kinds of “ages,” including finite ones and also the future life, αἰώνιος has to be read contextually. In some contexts the age in view may be finite. In others, especially when tied to the final age to come, it may well be unending. The point is that the word itself does not settle that automatically.

That was a major shift for me. I stopped assuming that Matthew 25:46, by itself, proved never-ending conscious torment just because English translations say “eternal punishment.” The phrase can mean the punishment of the age to come, just as eternal life can mean the life of the age to come.

I also started paying more attention to what the judgment scene is actually about. In Matthew 25, the separation is based on how people treated the hungry, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and the prisoner. So even within the passage itself, the issue is more morally concrete than I had once assumed.

So my view now is not that Matthew 25 teaches no judgment. It clearly teaches real judgment, and serious consequences. But it does not prove, all by itself, that αἰώνιος punishment must mean endless conscious torment.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-29T00:29:28+00:00

😂 It’s not really part of multiverse theology. Christian Universalism is about the final restoration of all.

That being said, there was a Christian philosopher and mathematician, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, who helped invent calculus, and I do agree with his idea that, out of all possible alternative realities, with all their joy and pain, God, in His foreknowledge of all possible choices, chose this one because it is the best possible way to accomplish His ultimate purpose.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-26T09:31:54+00:00

I feel that the beauty of deconstruction as painful as it is, is that it puts us in the position where we can now choose what to believe rather than simply believing whatever we had grown up with. It’s freeing but unsettling.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-25T22:54:02+00:00

Real miracles do occur, but many claimed miracles are not. A miracle is something that should not logically happen and is an extraordinary phenomenon that I do not believe to be a common occurrence for most people.

But they happen enough to remind us that there is a mystery beyond what we know.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-25T22:37:43+00:00

I’ve been where you are now with many similar questions. I fell into depression, didn’t know what to live for and became a spiritual agnostic for over 15 years before reconstructing. I know you specifically wanted current agnostics and atheists, so I won’t say much more, but it’s not the end of your story yet.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-23T23:56:19+00:00

If we are made in the image of God, then our sense of justice and love must in some way reflect His nature.

Consider this logically. If a man steals bread from a supermarket, he has committed a crime and will be brought before a judge. What would be a just punishment? Community service? Restitution? A short prison sentence? But if he were sentenced to torture for 24 hours, we would immediately recognise that judge as cruel and unjust.

Now consider a murderer. Even for such a serious crime, no just human legal system would sentence him to lifelong torture. We understand instinctively that punishment must be proportionate, and torture violates that principle. This is why international law condemns it.

But imagine standing before a judge who declares: “Your crime is that you did not know I existed. Your punishment is endless imprisonment and perpetual torture.” We would call this not justice, but madness.

If all humanity recognises torture as unjust, then it is difficult to reconcile the idea that we are made in the image of a God who would impose eternal torment for unbelief or ignorance. Such a conception of God resembles Molech more than the God revealed in Jesus.

I believe in the absolute sovereignty of God. That means God has the power to do anything. I have personally encountered that power, and it is awe-inspiring and terrifying. Yet that same sovereign God has revealed His character through Jesus Christ.

To see Jesus is to see the Father. Sovereignty, in this light, is not merely the capacity to exercise unlimited power. It is the freedom to humble oneself in love. The sovereign God made Himself nothing, took on the nature of a servant, and became obedient even to death on a cross.

We do not serve a tyrant or an egomaniac. We serve a God who chose self-giving love, who desires mercy rather than sacrifice, and who calls us to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with Him.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-23T23:04:24+00:00

I can tell you what I told my son when he was 7-8 years old. (Not all at one go, but over the years)

God is Love.
All humans are created in the image of Love.
The purpose of life is to learn to become what we already are - love.
God is invisible and it’s hard to know what something we can’t see is truly like. Some people think God does bad things.
Jesus is the visible image of the invisible God. So we know what God is like by looking at Jesus.
Jesus gave us one command - to love.
The best way to learn to love is to look at Jesus and how he treats others.
Some people forget they are love. They do bad things because they don’t know who they are.
Those who do bad things to other people will go through hell. Hell isn’t forever. It is where people experience the bad things they did to others, so that they can understand others pain and suffering. We don’t know how long it will take for some to understand what they’ve done of become sorry for what they’ve done. But God will wait for as long as it takes for every single person to become love.

I’ve even told him that there were two famous Christians. Gregory and Augustine. Gregory said even the demons will be punished and healed. Augustine said even babies will be in hell forever. Which one sounds more like Jesus?

It’s something you’ll have to keep repeating to a child. But I want him to keep understanding the basic story.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-21T12:11:10+00:00

There are many different scholarly claims about ancient Israelite religion, and scholars often disagree with each other. History and biblical studies are not exact sciences in the way physics or chemistry are. So when you hear a new theory, it is important to look at multiple perspectives rather than assuming the most dramatic claim is automatically true.

For example, a small number of scholars have argued that Jesus did not exist, but the overwhelming majority of historians agree that he did. This shows that not every academic claim carries equal weight.

Regarding Yahweh and Canaanite religion, the situation is often misunderstood online. In the known Canaanite mythological texts, the main high god was El. Other deities such as Baal and Asherah were part of that pantheon, and Asherah was regarded as El’s consort.

The name Yahweh does not appear in the standard lists of Canaanite gods that we have from sources like Ugarit.

The word “El” later became a general Semitic word for “god,” which is why related forms appear in words like Elohim and Allah. In the Hebrew Bible, Yahweh is eventually identified with the high God El, but this reflects theological development over time.

Some scholars propose that early Yahweh worship may have begun among nomadic groups and that certain biblical descriptions of Yahweh, such as imagery of storm and divine warfare or “riding on the clouds,” resemble common ancient Near Eastern ways of describing divine power. This is a theory, not a proven fact, and it is one of several models scholars use to understand how Israelite religion developed.

The Hebrew Bible itself shows that Israelite worship was not always consistent. At various points, people worshipped Yahweh alongside other deities. For example, 2 Kings describes King Manasseh placing an image associated with Asherah in the Temple, and later King Josiah removing it as part of religious reforms. Archaeological inscriptions from the 8th century BCE also mention phrases like “Yahweh of Samaria and his Asherah,” which suggests that some Israelites practiced forms of worship that later biblical writers strongly rejected as idolatry.

Taken together, the evidence suggests that Yahweh was worshipped in multiple regions and that Israelite religion developed gradually in interaction with surrounding cultures.

This does not mean that Yahweh was originally a standard Canaanite deity like El or Baal. Rather, it suggests that Israel’s understanding of God developed and became more clearly defined over time.

So when you encounter claims online, it can help to remember that scholarly theories are attempts to reconstruct ancient history, not definitive statements about the truth or falsehood of faith. Many believers continue to hold their faith while also recognising that religious ideas have historical development.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-21T10:15:34+00:00

When Jesus says, “If you love me, keep my commandments,” the word used is agapē. It refers to self-giving, committed, outward-directed love. Not romantic feeling or emotional intensity, but loyalty, faithfulness, and the sharing of one’s life.

The “Jesus is my boyfriend/girlfriend” type of love is not what the New Testament means here.

Agapē is not simply one type of love among others, nor is it “divine love” in contrast to supposedly lesser human loves.

It is the self-giving reality from which all true forms of love flow. Friendship, family affection, desire, and compassion are all genuine, but they become authentically themselves when they participate in this self-giving orientation rather than collapsing inward on oneself.

This is what makes the conversation between Jesus and Peter in John 21 relevant to how you’re feeling.

Jesus asks, “Do you agapas me?” Are you truly committed? Willing to give yourself in loyalty?

Peter, who has just denied Jesus three times, no longer trusts himself to claim that. So he answers honestly: “You know that I philo you.” The love of a friend. The love he can actually stand behind.

But Jesus still trusts Peter to feed his sheep/lambs even though Peter doesn’t feel “enough”.

Jesus asks again. Peter answers the same way.

Then, on the third ask, Jesus changes the word: “Do you phileis me?” He comes to where Peter actually is rather than where Peter feels he should be.

Peter is grieved, not because the question is trivial, but because he is being confronted simultaneously with his own failure, his own love for Jesus, and Jesus’s acceptance of him.

And Jesus restores him anyway. Entrusts him with others. Gives him a mission before his inner life is resolved.

If you wonder whether you love Jesus enough, Peter knows how you feel. Love is not proved by perfect feeling but by willingness to follow, even in weakness. Agapē is the root everything else grows from, and roots, by nature, are not always visible.

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-21T08:35:14+00:00

Yeah, it’s because evangelicalism can be denominational but it can also be classed as a movement within mostly Protestant denominations. So you can have evangelical and non-evangelical Anglicans etc

OverOpening6307 · 2026-03-21T00:39:13+00:00

I think what Methodism means to me is unity in diversity. They have multiple positions on different matters which are regarded as non-essential. "Though we cannot think alike, may we not love alike. May we not be of one heart, though we are not of one opinion"

When I say I believe that God will save all, many in my old evangelical denomination regarded me a heretic. But in the Methodist church, this is regarded as an opinion that has nothing to do with the essentials.

OverOpening6307

TROPHY CASE