Who shall not be saved?

For the grace of God has appeared,
bringing salvation to all men...
Titus 2:11 (NASB)

Christ is going "to redeem us from every lawless deed" (Titus 2:14).  But is all all?  Do you believe, as I did once, that this "all" is a subset of the real all?  Maybe God came to save "all" but "all" did not want to be saved?  If this is true, why did Paul hold out such a "blessed hope" without qualifying it?  Yes, you say, but Paul was talking to believers who understood that "all" would not be saved.  Maybe this "understanding" is you and I reading our traditions into scripture?  The evidence is adding up!

Who shall not receive mercy?

For God has shut up all in disobedience
so that He may show mercy to all.
Romans 11:32

God was, is and will remain, merciful.  It is His character.  He is the same Yesterday, Today and Forever.  Is God going to show mercy to all and then condemn most of them to eternal suffering?  Does all mean all?

Who shall not be made alive?

For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die,
so also in Christ all shall be made alive.
I Cor 15:21-22 (NASB)

Who shall not be made alive?  Can "alive" mean some will live with Christ and some will endure eternal torment?  Can "all" mean all in one case and six words later not mean all?  Can we read these verses and assume other scripture negates the clarity of meaning here?

Your thoughts and questions welcome.

Now Something From Our Sponsor...

Discussing Biblical doctrine can lead disastrously to taking oneself too seriously.  We want to remember that when we get too "wise" in our own eyes, our Maker loves to turn us on our head.  It was a week ago Sunday when my turn came.  I was discussing this "Oh so very important" doctrine featured here at godsizedhope.com with some brothers at our church gathering and they began to open up to me a powerful truth.  I began to be blessed by this revelation, enjoying its far superior impact. 

Perhaps you've guessed it. 

Yes. 

Love. 

A brother loving his brothers more than his doctrine of x.  Brothers agreeing to disagree at some point and getting back to basking in the joy of the unity of Christ!  There is no doctrine more central to followers of Jesus.  Love one another.

The encounter reminds me of Joshua's surprise visit before the battle of Jericho.  You know the one Joshua "fit.?"  Joshua comes face to face with the Angel of the Lord and asks him who's side he's on.  Oops!

"No: rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the LORD."

Love entered our conversation and asked me who's side I was on.  The captain of the Host of the Lord was giving me a chance to not get swept away with the rest of those who opposed Him!

By the way, the gentleman who expressed this wonderful doctrine of love so powerfully is a strong supporter of this website.  He just took the Lord's side!

Blessing to you W.P.!

Why Would We Question Our Bible Translators?

People smarter than me and you have dedicated years to researching and collaborating with other scholars to present the English translations we have today.  Why would we need to question their authority?

It's All Greek To Me!

Where does Bible study stop for us laymen (and women!)?  With today's Bible computer programs and available helps (English/Greek Interlinear Bibles) even my teenagers can follow a passage and recognize Greek word usage.  Note the Berean's response to the Apostle Paul's teaching:

Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the scriptures daily, to see whether these things were so. Acts 17:11 (NASB)

Also, consider the exhortation from proverbs:

It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter. Proverbs 25:2 (NASB)

No authority trumps our responsibility or priviledge to "examine the scriptures."  If someone handed us a Bible with passages clipped out and pages missing would we go on blissfully satisfied we had the real McCoy?  Of course not!  But ignorance is not the only weakness that can assail us.

A Blast to the Past

I hearken back to a Bible class I took years ago.  I was to outline and comment on Psalm 46 and in my own study noted that there was a repeating theme (vv. 1, 7, & 11) of God's presence and help.  However, having read some required reading about the passage, I found that the authors of multiple sources were convinced that the passage had been "fiddled with" and that the difference between v. 1 and the two identical vv 7 & 11 confirmed this.  My confidence was blown and my report leaned heavily on the scholars, making only minor mention of my own discovery.  My Professor (incidently, one of the translators of the NASB 1977 Bible) took me to task for ignoring my own observations!  Venturing out on my own was too lonely for me at the time.  Does this ever happen to our Bible translaters?  Do they ever find themselves on stage before their peers and have trouble bucking the trend?

Do the Greek words aion and aionios mean eternity?

I offer the following discussion as a springboard for your own study.  I emphasize our need to observe the text of the Bible itself.  Concerning aion/aionios, note that they occur 199 times in the NT and of these instances the KJV translates them as "age" (2), course (1), world (43) and eternal--or a variation-- (153 times).  In 23% of the instances of aion/aionios, the KJV translators understood that they could not use the word "eternity."  What confidence should we have in how they used aion in the other instances?  (However, age or eon fit nicely in almost every instance.)

Consider the following examples taken from Hope Beyond Hell by Gerry Beauchemin:

Does eternity make any sense in the following passages?

What will be the sign...of the end of [eternity] (Mt. 24:3)
I am with you...to the end of the [eternity] (Mt. 28:20)
The sons of this [eternity] are more shrewd (Lu. 16:8)
The sons of this [eternity] marry (Lu. 20:34)
Worthy to attain that [eternity] (Lu. 20:35)
Since the [eternity] began (Jn. 9:32; Ac. 3:21)
Conformed to this [eternity] (Ro. 12:2)

Eternity has an end?

17 more examples follow.

I suggest that tradition, and not scholarship, was king when it came to translating aion/aionios in most of our English translations today.  Make the investigation yourself.  How does God use the word aion or aionios in His Bible? 

Any student of the Bible will agree that merely observing scripture--that is, counting, measuring, turning pages, chewing on passages, looking at the repetition of words and reading over and over again--will bring helpful revelation without any aid from a commentary, background book or scholar's opinion.  But, as my professor from school often reminded us, ask for the Holy Spirit's help!

Who do you think will get to spend eternity with God?

The results of our first presumptuous poll were 30% Christians, 40% Everyone and 30% "I don't know."  Thanks to those who participated!  Our goal is to simply engage readers with thoughtful questions.  Your questions, comments and participation are greatly appreciated!  Help us fill in the holes by commenting on the posts and engaging with the discussions!  The goal of our blog is Love, not to be intellectual or crusader-like.  Blessings to you all!

Scripture Trumps Tradition

Tradition 1a: an inherited, established, or customary pattern of thought, action, or behavior (as a religious practice or a social custom) b: a belief or story or a body of beliefs or stories relating to the past that are commonly accepted as historical though not verifiable.

Merriam-Webster's online Dictionary

See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.

Colossians 2:8 (NASB)

In the Movie "Fiddler on a Roof," the character Tevye is infamous for his knowledge (or lack thereof) of the Bible:

Tevye: As the good book says, when a poor man eats a chicken, one of them is sick
Mendel: Where does the book say that?
Tevye: Well, it doesn't say that exactly, but somewhere there is something about a chicken.

I have been reminded by a dear friend that no matter what we want to believe about God, we are "obligated" to Scripture. We are not here to take the edge off of a harsh gospel or edit out the Bible as we see fit. Just the opposite! God's desire to save all mankind is not an obscure idea in scripture. Consider the following excerpt from a letter my dear friend wrote to a brother in the Lord who supported "eternal torment":

Let me assure you, [friend], if the Scriptures taught such a thing as eternal torment, we all are obligated to believe it and teach it. But I am throughly convinced that the Word of God is not contradictory. If God says that He will reconcile all to Him, both that on earth and that in the heavens, He will. If He says that in the fullness of times He will "head up all in the Christ -- both that in the heavens and that on the earth", He will. If He says that "in the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, in heaven, on earth and under the earth, and every tongue shall acclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord, for the glory (the expression of His Person) of God, the Father,: it shall be so.

...He died, not just for our sins, but for those of the whole world. God will not waste one drop of that precious blood. It will purchase and secure the redemption of all.

...We need to ask ourselves, "What wisdom of our own has made us the recipients of a believing heart?" We glibly say, "But for the grace of God, there go I," while in the same breath consign billions to a fate of eternal agony that staggers the imagination of even the most brutal of our race. This we do because "The Bible tells me so." But is the Bible in our hands accurate in this matter? We have never gone past the "scholars" (who were wrong in Christ's day, just as they are today and for hundreds of years past), to see how God uses the word "eternal."

(Excerpts from an e-mail from Albert P. Knoch to a friend)

[For a discussion of the Greek word aion -- commonly translated eternal, but used by Scripture for a limited time span, see in the blog the articles "Forever and an Age" and "Scripture gives a real example of eternal fire in Sodom!]


Somewhere there is something about Hell in the Bible, and with the help of the mistranslation of a key word (aion), we have inherited a full blown doctrine of Hell from those who have gone before us. If eternal torment is the destination for most of mankind and we are to warn people of this danger, why does the most prolific writer in the New Testament not even mention it? The Apostle Paul does not mention Hell once in his letters. And interestingly enough, when he knew by the Holy Spirit that he would not see the saints in his mission travels again, he says:

And now, behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God, shall see my face no more. Wherefore I take you to record this day, that I am pure from the blood of all men. For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God.
[emphasis mine]

Acts 20:25-27 (KJV)

Paul shared "all the counsel of God" with "all among whom I have gone preaching." All the counsel of God but he left out Hell? The place of "eternal torment?" How could this be? Shouldn't there somewhere be something about Hell?

The Lesson of Jonah

Free will! It’s in the Bible! God has clearly given us a “free-will”, and He blesses or disciplines us depending on the free-will choices we make. It is very important for us to "freely" submit our will to His. To the degree we do this we are rewarded, and to the degree we resist, we are rewarded with unpleasant rewards.

Our “free will” is clearly limited! Example:

Mt 5:36 Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black.

We have not been given will power to make our hair change color. (We can dye it, but it still continues to grow in according to God’s choice of color, not ours.)
We might have chosen different skin color, or eye color, or skin smoothness or hair thickness or different mental apptitude or different nationality, or different parents or any number of temporary physical attributes, but God has severely limited our free will in these choices.

Lu 12:25 And which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?
Jesus taught that our free will is very limited!

Jonah exercised his free will, and headed for Joppa when the Lord had told him to go to Nineveh. The Lord allowed Jonah the free will to head toward Joppa, however, He also used extraordinary methods to change Jonah’s mind, and to cause Jonah to “choose” to go and preach in Nineveh. It’s extremely interesting to me that Jonah made that choice in a state he described as “hell”.

Jon 2:1 Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish's belly,
2 And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.

Jesus confirms that Jonah had a death experience in the fish for three days and three nights when He compares His own death experience with Jonah’s.

Mt 12:40 For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

So Jonah is a picture of a man who exercised his own free will against God’s known will. We see in this story how God changed Jonah’s direction, took him to hell, waited for him to repent, which he did, and when he cried out to God out of the belly of hell, God heard him and delivered him. At that point Jonah went on to carry out God’s will of his own free will. Jesus validated the testimony of the event and even declared that the people of Nineveh would rise up in judgment against the Jews of His day. So we know this is not just a fiction story, but a real account of God’s dealings with Jonah and with Nineveh.

Mt 12:41 The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

So we can exercise our free will to repent now, like the people of Nineveh…or we can be like Jonah, go to hell, and repent later, but we will all repent “in due time”.

1Ti 2:6 Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.

1Co 3:13 Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. 14 If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. 15 If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.