🚀 go-pugleaf

On Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:29:55 +0100, "Alex W." <ingilt@yahoo.co.uk>
wrote:

>
>"Antares 531" <gordonlrDELETE@swbell.net> wrote in message 
>news:pajm74l4b646olf5e2n7vnm1nnprlb8nlk@4ax.com...
>
>
>> God does indeed have infinite power and wisdom. He could handle this
>> any way he chose to do. He chose to let us live as mortals and learn,
>> hands-on, about sin and rebellion. The intention is to let us learn
>> enough to assure God that we won't try to go back and explore it any
>> further, once we've been granted immortality and absolute sovereignty.
>> God is presently (by our temporal reference frame) in the process of
>> separating good from evil. Those who reject God and are not willing to
>> be with Him throughout eternity will be moved, along with all other
>> aspects of existence that are not good. This will then be separated
>> from God's domain, irreversibly.
>
>You presume that good and evil are only defined through their relationship 
>to a belief in god.  IOW, you claim that a non-believer's good works do not 
>count, are meaningless.  That is unacceptable, both in itself and if one 
>believes in a god of perfect love.
>
Alex, I'm sincerely sorry if you've gotten this impression from what
I've posted. To clarify this a bit, let me say that "good" is defined
as that which benefits everyone involved and does no harm to anyone.
"Evil" is defined as that which may benefit the perpetrator, or at
least seem to benefit the perpetrator for the time being, but in the
final analysis it is harmful to others, and maybe even to the
perpetrator.

Atheists and those who believe in God but decline to align with Him
can, and do indeed do good things. But, their choice to remain apart
from God precludes their being granted immortality in God's domain. As
to what happens to this group of people, the Bible indicates that they
will stand before God in judgment and the outcome of that judgment is
not clearly specified. One interpretation, taken from the passages
that state that God is omnipotent and God is not willing that any
should perish, indicates that some, or perhaps all of these people
will be saved. If this is so, it seems that they may be rewarded for
their good works. 

We are rewarded according to our works. "Salvation is by faith and
faith alone, lest anyone should boast," but "when the Lord returns in
all the glory of the Father, He will bring His rewards with Him and
all will be rewarded according to their works." There will be a social
gradient in Heaven. "Some who are least here on earth will be great in
Heaven and some who are great here on earth will be least in Heaven."
This obviously will be determined by their rewards for their works
done during this mortal phase of their existence.


Those who remain adamantly apart from God at the last judgment will be
among those that are in the domain that is to be eternally separated
from God and all that is good. The risk I perceive here is that an
anti-God mind-set that has endured throughout one's life may be hard
to give up, and there may be those who stubbornly refuse to do so, at
the last judgment.

Gordon