like a brand plucked out of the fire

[marie glen]

Speaking of Zechariah 3, verses 1 and 2, "And he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said to Satan, The LORD rebuke you, O Satan; even the LORD that has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?"

I'm thinking many believers read this and because of the teachings (what they are taught, ET handed down) assume this verse is referring to after life torment of all not saved during this lifetime.

But, I think it is more like this commentary
says - https://biblehub.com/commentaries/zechariah/3-2.htm --

--  The Logos, or Son of God, said unto Satan; The LORD — Namely, God the Father; rebuke thee — And not suffer thy mischievous imagination against Jerusalem and the temple to prosper. Even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem — Who hath chosen that place for his especial residence. Christ, as a mediator, rather chooses to rebuke the adversary in his Father's name than in his own. Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire — "Is not this small remnant returned from captivity," represented here by Joshua, "miraculously rescued from utter destruction, like a brand plucked out of the fire"?

[marie glen]

I was going to start a new topic, but this title seems to fit.. even tho I'm sort of talking to myself in a way :laughing7:

We're all "a brand, an ember plucked from the fire"..

With imperfection, you will always have what we have now. I've come to think it's a natural law, that even a tiny speck of imperfection will, over enough time, become exactly what the world is like right now. There will be the stronger.. there would be oppressions, wars.. God told Eve right away, that man would rule over woman. And to this day in some parts of the world it remains very intact. It's told as if it's a curse God pronounced against woman, but it's prophecy, the telling of things to come, because He knows! A tiny speck of imperfection, over time.. enough time, can and will always ever be, tribulation, apocalypse, and death. (What patience, the Father waited for the first speck to grow.. as it did, into angelic/messenger revolt? :doh: ) Think of what Father God / God Most High, is writing on every heart. [The lesson.. like smoke shall forever rise in our consciousness.] Why else insert into history the strong image of stoning? Could it be because sin - "missing the mark" (the original Greek sense) - Is a disease? Stoning is a community thing, and no one has to touch or get close to the disease. Is it harsh? Maybe the lesson we are learning is harsh. Very harsh. A matter of life or death?! [Death as in not living or alive - "the dead know nothing" - Eccles.9:5.]

"It is given to man, once to die, and then the judgment" (Heb.9:27).
"God knows how to preserve the unjust for correction/kolasis on day of judgment" (2 Pet.2:9). God "is perfect". (Mt.5:48) Is there even one? Which God Al-mighty cannot "correct"?! Jesus said, "ALL in the tombs" (graves) "will hear his voice and come forth" (from the tombs/graves).. "some in the resurrection to life.. and some in the resurrection to the judgment" John 5:28-29. He also said He will draw "all" to Himself (John 12:32).

Per God's choice, our Day of Atonement is "today" - and theirs, it sounds like, is at "the judgment", which follows the millennium / "the thousand years" (Rev.20).

So what else "is to come"?  Hebrews 11:40 says God spoke (audibly) once at Mt. Sinai, and He will speak once more, so that what cannot remain will be shaken. The not yet reconciled to God, the tares, having gathered to fiery Armageddon. The disease of imperfection, "missing the mark", sin, the wayward way, can only ever, ultimately, end in a self destructive puff of smoke. But we, every one of us - first or second Day of Atonement, first or second resurrection (Rev.20) - unlike the first rebel/disobedient one who said to be disobedient would make one "be like god and ascend to His very throne"! We are all, instead, embers snatched from the fiery fire!

And it will never make sense to go back that way again! If "all" fully comprehend that, then (surely?) is when God Most High's paradise / perfection will be inherently non-breakable! An enduring city.

All who are still under the sentence - or make that - consequence, of death, will hear the Good News of Christ Crucified, and "He is risen", and as promised He returned at the last of the "Trumpets" beginning His long second advent of "the thousand years" called the millennium, followed by the resurrection of all humanity who - by God's choice - died "still in their sins" and then begins their (collective) "Day of Atonement" (Lev.23). When else, can "ALL the ends of Earth remember (Hebrew - come to their senses) and turn to the LORD? And ALL families of the nations worship/rejoice before Him"? (Psalm 22:27). After which, is the death of death along with all its dregs, called the second death. The first being the one which occurred in Adam and spread to all - obviously part of Father's "administration of the ages"..?

Then He shall "make ALL things new"; He will be "all, in all"; and He shall now "Tabernacle" with mankind upon Earth made new. "The lion will eat straw like the ox, and the bear will graze with the cow" (Isaiah 11:7).

"HE consigned all to disobedience.." Romans 11:32