Introducing myself - GKY

[gky]

Hello to all,

I have benefited greatly from all of you on this blog.
I've been a reader only for long time but finally registered today (I hesitate to  register onto blogs, but this is the first blog worth doing so).

I'll try to be efficient with background.

1. Been a "born again Christian" for 18 years, participating mostly in a very
       prominent world famous conservative charasmatic "non-denomination"
       if you might know what I mean.

2. Roughly 2-3 years ago, the doctrine of ET relentlessly began to vex my soul
    a.  Simply caused by of all things intense daily reading of the entire text (NKJ)
    b.  Local buzz from a book "23 Minutes in Hell" by Bill Wiese
    c.  Tormented by the "reality" that ANYONE would literally burn alive
            for eternity.  Being "saved" myself was no consolation at all.
            I have spent most of my "Christian" life unsure if I was really saved
            to begin with.
    d. Even before this, much intense anger and hostility toward God and Jesus
            because of the apparent discrepant partiality of God/Jesus
    e. Serious inconsistency with teaching pastors, music ministry leaders (I
          was deeply involved in music ministry) in regards to teaching vs. fruit

3. Unexpectely arrived at the very dark, nightmarish destiny of "Ex-Christian"

4. Personal results
    a. Haven't gone to ANY church in over 3 years
    b. Huge gap between my wife and I (spiritually and otherwise)
    c. For that matter, I know of no one personally (NONE of the many I know
           who are Christians, including family)  that would even be open to UR
    d. My wife, daughter went beserk when sharing UR
    e. After 14 years of marriage, I am currently entering dissolution
    f. Continue to be very estranged from God/Christ

5. Desperate and persistent searches on the web using the words hell, eternal
       led me to tentmaker.com.   Eventually other sites that present UR,
       Christian Universalism, etc helped pull me out of the "Ex-Christian" pit

6. Where I'm at now
    a. I have bought into UR 75%.  There's no way I'll go back to the
           traditional paradigm concerning ET
    b. The 25% that holds me back remains enough to keep me tormented
           in spiritual cognitive dissonance
    c. The source of 25% doubt mainly stems from Scriptural text itself
        Beyond texts explicitly using the word HELL, Hades, Lake of Fire, etc
        are many texts (even from the Apostle Paul) that explicitly imply
        EXCLUSIVITY
    d. Still have profound distrust and hostility towards God/Christ

    e. The only thing that I have not battled with is Christ's diety. Everything
           else that I have been taught or thought to believe is now open game.

7. Therefore, I joined this post mainly to discuss item 6.
   
8. As a beginning question, have any of you reached "100%"
       certainty of UR, resulting in restful/peaceful resolution of soul???

   Is it even possible to become completely 100% convinced of UR???
   Or will we (me anyway) bang on internal conflict the rest of our earthly life,
       being "mostly" convinced of UR, but never achieving full certainty?

   Maybe THAT's "faith" - faith to proceed and buy into UR fully, despite
       the ever existing contradictions in the TEXT.

   Perhaps this will be my first "real" post.


Thank you all
It is a huge privilege to be welcomed by you and join you.
I hope to be an asset, and hope to be as astute as you have consistently
    demonstrated - THANK YOU!

[onlytruth]

Welcome GKY...and I will pray that God will reveal Himself to you so that you will have peace and assurance.
blessings :icon_king:

[WhiteWings]

75% at the beginning of the year. 100% at the end of the year. Deal? :laughing7:

:welcome: :hithere:

[whyiloveitaly.com]

 :boyheart:

Brian

[HartleyDamboiseII]

Gky, My name is Lee and I can't spell worth poop.

Christ or The Anointed of the Father are not ONE. or I should say what the Catholic's set up as a "thinking process" is a lie, Jesus and YOU and I and everyone else is one IN the Father=God. No matter how we look at it we are as much God as Jesus is God, this will be one road you will explore.


% 100 % UR, Oh Ya, the rest is sweet as apple pie, (my favorite) , Calming as a soft river in the morning with the birds singing softly, loving as the new reactions on your child's for the first time.

My advice with wife, like mine, don't tell her a thing for months, or even years if it takes that long, "She will see the "love" change in you and your peace and that will be her sign that it is true....


Love a member Lee Damboise II

[jabcat]

Hi and welcome.  I'm starting in a place besides #6

"Continue to be very estranged from God/Christ"

If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, thou art there.

If I ascend the heavens -- there Thou art, And spread out a couch in Sheol, lo, Thee! (Young's Literal Translation)   Ps. 139:8

Jesus loves and believes in you - because He knows exactly where He is leading you

"In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines His steps."  Pr. 16:9

[fullarmor2]

     Welcome to Tentmaker   !     Yes!!  You can be 100%  convinced!         The problem your having is the lingering influence  from your old theological syetem in you.  Be patient.  You are in the process of learning a  radically different theology system of universal restoration and it will take time.  And as you come to understand this better, I believe it will set you free from all the inner torment you described  because  this is the truth of Jesus Christ which sets  captives free. I state this boldly because I experienced being set free by this truth.    You are going to learn about some wonderful truths regarding church history, the church fathers, the bible, etc.....   One of the things in UR that really helped me is how UR teachings emphasize what the bible says in the original languages.   Thats the key.  When I started looking at my particular bible that I use,  in the light of  a more accurate understanding of what the Hebrew/Greek says, regarding this topic of UR vs ET,   by referring to literal translations of the bible, like Young's, the Concordant Literal, Rotherham's Literal translation, also interlinear bibles,   etc...     I came to love the bible again!        And I'm sure that as you  keep studying  this ,  you will find what your looking for as well.

[reFORMer]

Throughout my life since the Holy Spirit entered into me He has made God a tangible and perceived reality, made me determined to find out what it meant to be Jesus' disciple, and gave me a hunger to read and understand His Word.  From that time over 40 years ago I have undergone progressive and radical change in my understanding of the things of God, specially what the Bible actually says or does not say versus many claims to what it says.  I walked with God believing in ceaseless torture for ever for the damned.  There was about a 7 years interim when I didn't know what to understand by what was written and to come to freedom from the power of sin in my life was more important than the ultimate states in God.  I've walked with God since July 18, 1981, 3 am when I believed the Scripture: "This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation.  For therefore we both labor and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe." (1 Ti 4:9-10, AV)  I checked my watch since I realized I had become an outcast and of no use to the "Christian" religious systems, even though I had come to faith in what the Bible they claimed to represent actually says.

I share this because I trust you understand the importance that the foundation is first of all the person of Jesus Christ.  I continued knowing Him though I've gone through many changes in my ideas about Him.  We ought to be increasingly intimate with Him as we cross on over though change after change.

I would also add, since it was brought up, I believe the aspect of God that His manifestation Jesus was, emptied Himself to become God manifest as a real human, not as God, but as a man. Because of Who He was all died when He died.  He went to hell, raised from the dead, ascended into the right of the Father and sent Himself into us as Spirit.  Not only does the Bible not use the word Trinity, it is too limiting for the evidence.  The Father is God, the Spirit is God and the Son is God.  But we have been grafted in as partakers of the Divine nature.  "For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones." (Ep 5:30, AV)  If I placed my hand on your shoulder, would I have touched you?  Apart from others who have the Holy Spirit how can we have anything but a limited fellowship with the true God?  What if you asked me to come over to your house for dinner and fellowship, only you said I could not bring my body; How would you fellowship with me?  Father God has the Spirit quicken the embodiment, the sonship realm.  "The fullness of the Godhead bodily dwells in Christ," who is, "the manifestation of the invisible God."  When I speak with my sister on the phone and we are about 3,000 miles apart, did she speak with me, was it me in manifestation she was fellowshipping with?  "The Word was toward God and God was the Word."  There are nine indisputable passages in the N.T. where Jesus is called God.  An additional 3 are almost without controversy.  There are about another dozen in varying degrees of certainty.  But then Jesus says, "He called them Gods to whom the Word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken."  He was referring to the Psalm that literally says, "I called you Elohim, all of you, sons of El Elyon."

[gky]

Hello and wanting to thank you all for extending yourselves as you have.

1. Thank you all for investing your time, energy, empathy to respond and
      welcome me in, completely open arms.

2. I am encouraged to see you share that it is possible to achieve complete
       resolve and be fully convinced of the truth of UR, to the point of
       living in peace NOW.

3. To fullarmor2 - thank you I feel like I have a bottomless pit's worth of
                            detoxification ahead of me - detox from many poisonous
                            "tradition of men" paradigms deeply ingrained in my soul.
                            It's been and will continue to be a huge mountain to
                            climb before I can "see" freely.

4. To Lee and Reformer
    Interesting about Christ being "One" and the actual breakdown of the
        Tri-une God, and how that is shared/distributed/manifested in our actual
        life/being.  I've never given much thought about that, taking verses like
        John 10:30 at face value.  Because I just felt the 3 Persons / 1 God thing
        was kind of ... mystical and beyond me, I never pursued to understand
        that better and just ... went along like many of the doctrines that have
        been propogated.

5. Anyway, I am really, really grateful to be here - thank you again!

[SteveW]

Hi GKY,

Welcome from a fellow new member of the forum!  My heart goes out to you - it is all a bit mind blowing.  I spent much of my life feeling the pressure of wanting to know, wanting to have everything nailed down.  It's pretty important to have everything in your belief system foolproof if your belief system condemns the majority of mankind to an eternity in hell!!!

I can say 100% that I do not believe that the God will condemn people to an eternity in hell.  That has been amazingly freeing to me.  It has been freeing to me to recognize that even those with a pure heart and intent can be trapped in the traditions of men.  That those who say they know don't necessarily have a corner on the truth.  That God is so very much bigger than our need to know everything and have it systematized in an impeccable theology.

I won't say it hasn't been or isn't at times a bit scary, but that fear or uneasiness is readily outweighed and replaced by how amazing God is and how much bigger He is than my need to have every answer or have it all figured out.  I don't have to.  One way or another he is drawing me, drawing you, and drawing the next person, regardless of whether we get the details right.

That doesn't mean I'm not studying and trying to better understand His ways or means.  It just means I can rest in the basic message and what is very clear while I do so.  I'm so excited to be on this journey of discovery - makes me feel alive again!!!

Anyway, May God bless you and reveal Himself to you!!!

Steve

[jabcat]

 :thumbsup: Steve.