According to the tales, Jesus gave up a weekend.

[Zzyzx]

.
According to the tales, Jesus gave up a weekend. What’s the big deal?

What is the ‘sacrifice’ in a supposedly eternal being giving up a weekend being ‘dead’?

An 'omnipotent god' (or part thereof, or whatever is claimed) would presumably know that the 'death' was extremely temporary -- just a few hours (less than 48 according to the tale).

[JehovahsWitness]

1 John 5:17 All unrighteousness is sin:

Did deliberately cut out the rest of the verse ?

1 JOHN 5:17

All unrighteousness is sin, and yet there is a sin that does not incur death.

So evidently the repercussions of sin are not automatically the same as those of unrighteousness. And visa versa. So we still have the question does the bible say that the wages of sin is eternal/everlasting death?

[Divine Insight]

Since you seem to be quoting scripture, may I ask does the bible say "The wages of sin is everlasting death"?

Have you read the stories of Jesus?

Matthew 25:46 And these (the unrighteous) shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
.

Does the word "SIN" appear in that verse? Perhaps I wasn't clear...what I meant to ask was, does the bible say the wages of sin is everlasting death? (Maybe we can leave what the bible means by "righteous" or "unrighteous" for another day and just keep to the plain meaning of things. I think we can both agree that verse makes no mention of the word sin. Do you have one that stipulates that the wages of sin is everlasting death?).

I'm not going to play evangelist word-salad games with you. If unrighteousness doesn't count as "sin" then why is Jesus proclaiming that the unrighteous will go the way of everlasting punishment?

Clearly your favorite theology is in deep trouble. So deep that your only hope to try to defend it is to pretend that there are two different things "Sin" and "Unrighteousness", both of which must necessarily be different things

So all you've done here with your word salad is dig a far deeper hole for yourself as an apologist.

Clearly your theology has problems or you wouldn't need to be resorting to playing semantic games.

[Divine Insight]

So evidently the repercussions of sin are not automatically the same as those of unrighteousness. And visa versa. So we still have the question does the bible say that the wages of sin is eternal/everlasting death?

We clearly have far more questions than that.

If all unrighteousness is sin, but not all sin requires the wages of death to be paid, then which actions are merely unrighteous but do not require death?

We would need to know these details laid out in crystal clear uncertain terms before we could know whether we would need Jesus to pay for our "sins".

Perhaps we have never done anything unrighteous that would qualify for the death penalty?

In that case we wouldn't need Jesus to be our sacrificial penal substitute.

The problem with all your apologies for this mythology is that you don't have a clear and unambiguous theology to back up your apologetics.

You'd end up having to confess that you have absolutely no clue what your theology is even demanding of you. And in that case, your theology is basically worthless.

Do you deserve death?

If not, then why would you need Jesus to serve as your penal substitute?

Until you can answer all of those question with absolute crystal clear clarity with no ambiguity then the theology you are supporting has no merit.

So your attempt to apologize for this broken theology fails miserably.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 33 by Divine Insight]

All, interesting questonsof course but lets not get distracted my initial question was ...

Since you seem to be quoting scripture, may I ask does the bible say "The wages of sin is everlasting death"?

Since you started with scripture and felt free to refer to it to make your point it without first proving whether any of it was true or not, I will finish on the same basis ....

ROMSNS 6:23 (NIV)

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life Christ Jesus our Lord.

Biblically, for all but the incorrigbly wicked ALL death is temporary thanks to the ransom (see above).



JW

[Zzyzx]

.
Is there something about Apologetics that predisposes people to word play?

Death
Eternal death
Everlasting death
Unrighteousness

Has it been established that death is anything other than permanent (in the real world, not imagination or fantasy)?

[Willum]

[Replying to post 34 by JehovahsWitness]

JW, you seem to have facted and scriptured yourself into a corner.
I know I've said this to you before, but have you considered another religion? one more in line with your principles, that won't make you compromise them?
Jainism is nice, and you won't lose much by becoming a Zoroastrian. I think you will find their ethics are high, as are your own, and you will not have to compromise yourself by defending a deity like Jesus or YHVH.

It is easy to change your username.

Kind regards,

[Divine Insight]

Since you started with scripture and felt free to refer to it to make your point it without first proving whether any of it was true or not, I will finish on the same basis ....

I don't need to prove whether any of it is true or not. In fact, my position is that it's so obviously false due to its own self-contradictory nature that it necessarily has to be false.

So I'm not even trying to claim that any scripture is true. All I need to do is point out where it's self contradictory in its claims. And I've done that.

Moreover, your apologetic excuse for this theology requires that you start making up imaginary concepts such as a supposed difference between "righteousness" and "sin".

Now you've got a far more complicated theology on your hands where you will need to start showing where in this theology there are distinctions made between "sinners" a other people who might merely be "unrighteous".

And then you'd need to show where there are two different fates promised in the Bible for these two different situations.

We already know that the wages of sin is death. And there's nothing in the Bible that has ever suggested that death would be temporary.

But now, you've created a new theological problem for yourself. Now you need to claim that "unrighteousness" is somehow a different concept from "sin", but then you'll also need to show where the Bible speaks of the "wages of unrighteousness" and how they differ from the "wages of sin".

The problem is that your attempts to try to make apologetic excuses for this theology only serve to get you deeper and deeper into the black hole of apologetics. Instead of clearing anything up all you've done was create a far more complex theology that you could never justify with scripture.

The mere fact that you already recognize that you'll need to make a distinction between mere "unrighteousness" versus "sin" in an effort to try to defend this theology already shows that you recognize that such problems exist.

[JehovahsWitness]

The following are all faith statements I have no proof to offer beyond my faith in the bible

[Replying to post 15 by JehovahsWitness] ...he could take their punishment for them, but what he could not do was take away from them the responsibility they had in committing those wrongful acts in the first place.

The ransom wasn't meant biblically to remove personal responsibility for our own sinful actions, it was to provide the basis to forgive us for them. No sin can be committed without consequence (and there is no forgiveness for those that knowingly and unrepentantly persist in wrongdoing), but thanks to Christ we can be forgiven for our sins and "escape" the punishment they would normally entail.


HE BORE OUR SINS

ISAIAH 53:5

But he was pierced for our transgression; He was crushed for our errors. He bore the punishment for our peace, and because of his wounds we were healed.

I find there is a fundamental misunderstanding of the ransom because many do not grasp the notion of atonement . When the bible says Christ "bore the punishment", "bore our sins", "died for our sins" ect ... it means his death atoned for them. The word "atonement" probably stems from the Hebrew Kapharʹ “to cover,� “wipe off" (think of wiping a blackboard clean of chalk marks), so Jesus wasn't "punished" for us, like a whipping boy taking the beating instead of the another, his death was the means by which the inevitable effect of those sins, namely condemnation and death, were wiped off the board, "covered over" so you can't see them. He "bore"/ endured the experience, at (as Isaiah wrote), no little cost to his person and because of him those that put faith in him may not be held to account.

The penalty of sin is death, not torture, but Jesus torture was the only way to pay the ransom. He endured it all because of his love for His Father and for us, his adopted children, and in response we love him so.



JW








RELATED POSTS

Did Jesus' death have to be the most painful one in human history, for the ransom to be valid?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 472#978472

Why was Jesus' death so significant?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 477#978477

Was Christ punished for the sins we commit?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 639#978639

Go to other posts related to THE EXECUTION and RANSOM SACRIFICE of ... JESUS CHRIST

[Willum]

[Replying to post 38 by JehovahsWitness]

In focusing on atonement, does this mean you concede the other points that were made?
In which case, why focus on atonement? It is life saving your couch while your house burns down. You’ve lost, and the religion is false.

I am sure everyone will point out that God will judge you worthy or unworthy whether you atone or not; He is all-knowing, right? He knows if you are bad or good, so Jesus, atonement etc., mean very little.

Will He accept a really rotten human who atones, or reject a good person who did not? If the former, is He an idiot? If the latter, is He malign?

So atonement is a dead end too.

[JehovahsWitness]

The following are all faith statements I have no proof to offer beyond my faith in the bible

ARE ALL SINNERS UNRIGHTEOUS?

No. Sin is any action which violates divine law and principle. Unrighteousness is any action that violates divine standards. While in the absolute all sin is by definition unrighteous (and visa versa) God's standards for humans are not necessarily placed at perfection, thus he may attribute righteousness to a sinner, if they obey his requirement for them.

DO THE RIGHT THING

• While God’s personal standards remain ever constant, His specific commands may vary from one time to another and from one person to another. Thus the person judged as "righteous" conforms to God's expressed will and purpose for them , they "do the right thing" when asked, the "unrighteous" do not.

RIGHTEOUS SINNERS

• All human descendants of Adam are "sinners" ie have a inherited tendance to commit errors, and God could of course dismiss them all as unrighteous but he chooses to consider or view those that obey him and do what is right as "righteous". For example Noah was imperfect as we know, but he was commanded to build an ark, gather all the animals into it and he obeyed to the letter. He was thus counted by God as "righteous". So there are sinners that are counted as righteous and there are sinners that are counted (esteemed/judged/viewed by God) as unrighteous.

WHAT FATE AWAITS UNRIGHTEOUS SINNERS?

ACTS 24: 15

And I have hope toward God, which hope these men also look forward to, that there is going to be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous.

Interestingly the above indicates that God will resurrect both categories of persons; sinners who are "righteous " and sinners who are "unrighteous", thus the death of both classes of persons is merely "temporary". However there is a category of people who face permanent unending death ... the wicked. A person may be a sinner and yet not necessarily be termed or classed as “vile,� “wicked,� or “evil,� . The wicked are deemed as being unworthy of everlasting life and face eternal non-existence.

CONCLUSION God's personal standards are set at absolute perfection but he lovingly makes allowances for imperfect people and counts them as righteous if they do what is right. He attributes them a righteous standing before him until they can merit it as his perfect children 1000 years into paradise. For this reason biblically while all humans are sinners not all sinners are deemed as being unrighteous.

RELATED POSTS

What is "perfection"?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 305#930305

Was Job "righteous ", "blameless" or"perfect"?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 100#753100

Was Noah "perfect"?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 937#974937

What is the "unforgivable sin"?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 530#977530

If death "pays" for his sins, why the need for a ransom?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 112#910112

Go to other posts related to...

SIN , DEATH and ...THE RANSOM

NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses