Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!genrad!decvax!harpo!floyd!vax135!ariel!houti!hogpc!houxm!hocda!spanky!burl!duke!unc!tim
From: tim@unc.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: exclusive salvation
Message-ID: <5380@unc.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 14-Jun-83 16:47:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: unc.5380
Posted: Tue Jun 14 16:47:54 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 16-Jun-83 00:12:43 EDT
Lines: 51


	If in this life	you choose to alienate yourself	from
	God, you will find yourself alienated in the next as
	well, possibly with no better idea of the fact that
	you alienated at that point than you have now (Lewis
	spends most of "The Great Divorce" on this topic).  I
	too doubt that God would consign anybody to an eternal
	weinie roast.

Could someone clarify this for me?  I was under	the impression that
Jesus in the Gospels spoke of Hell as a	place of eternal torment for
the unsaved, but a Christian could probably place the reference	(if it
exists)	faster than I could.  Joe, on what basis do you	distinguish
valid from invalid pieces of scripture?	 Does this not put you above
the people who wrote it?

If I won't know	I'm alienated from God after I die, and	I don't	know
it now,	and I'm	having a good time now,	what possible reason is	there
for me to seek out this	thing called salvation?	 Apparently, there is
no punishment from my point of view.  Why should I seek salvation?

	As to whether only Christians are saved.  I do believe
	that salvation is through Christ, and only through
	Christ.	 However, Paul spends some time	in Romans
	(2:12-16) saying that those who	have not heard of the
	Law are	saved according	to how they have behaved-- in
	other words, if	you haven't heard of Christ it would
	hardly be sporting to blame you	for not	accepting His
	salvation.  If you have	heard and have chosen not to
	accept it, you have chosen alienation.	If it has been
	preached at you	but for	some reason you	don't "really"
	hear it, as with people	who decide that	the accounts
	of Christ's life don't fulfill some standard of
	historical documentation they choose to	apply for
	example, well I'm not God and I'll just	leave that
	question up to Him.

Ah!  An	oblique	threat of damnation!  This is a	refreshing break from
the direct threats I've	been getting lately.

About standards	of historical documentation.  Any standards that would
let Christianity through would also let	through	at least a score of
other religions.  How would I distinguish between them?	 They are
not an arbitrary barrier I impose between myself and God.  They	are
necessary to a consistent system of belief, and	that is	why I have
them.  If God wishes to	contact	me as a	human being, he	will have to
convince me as a human being.  (In any case, I don't think that	the
historical veracity of a set of	scriptures is nearly as	important as
their content.)

Tim Maroney