“The cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses was unable to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud rested on it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. The Israelites set out whenever the cloud was taken up from the tabernacle throughout all the stages of their journey. If the cloud was not taken up, they did not set out until the day it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and there was a fire inside the cloud by night, visible to the entire house of Israel throughout all the stages of their journey.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
Here at last, then, we come to the end. We have been slowly but surely working our way through the narrative of Exodus for a little over a year and a half. And while we haven’t hit every single word directly (especially over these last few posts for reasons I explained as we were getting started on them), I’ve linked you to every bit of the text. More than once. I’ve never tackled a project like this with such thoroughness, and I’ll admit that I was a little leery at the start because of its sheer size and scope. Yet God has been good and faithful. Personally, I’ve come to understand just how thoroughly soaked in the Gospel the Exodus narrative is, and I hope you have too. It is soaked in the Gospel, but it is not the Gospel. We are reminded of that here at the end with a potent pointer to just how good and important the Gospel is. As we wrap up this whole journey today, let’s marvel together at another way God was planting the seeds of the Gospel long before it became a reality.
After perhaps weeks, maybe months (we don’t know for sure), of work, the tabernacle was finally standing complete in the middle of Israel’s giant camp. It was assembled, consecrated, and ready to be utilized as a space for worship for the people. All it needed now was the presence of the one they were worshiping to serve as the signal of His approval of it. That’s exactly what we see here. The cloud of the Lord’s presence descended on the tabernacle. This was the same kind of supernatural phenomenon the people had experienced when God’s presence descended on Mount Sinai when Moses went to receive the Law and the plans for the tabernacle from the Lord minus the theophanic aspects.
Instead of the thunder and lightning and the like, the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. The people would likely have experienced this as a bright light, almost too bright to look at. It was so intense that no one could actually enter the tabernacle. This no one included Moses. That little detail is easy to miss here at the end of a long journey, but let’s take care not to overlook it.
God had called and led the people out of Egypt to establish them as His own people. He had met them in the wilderness for them to worship Him which He had told Moses before all of this started would be the sign that He really was who He said He was. He had given them the Law and entered into a covenant with them in which He would be their God and they would be His people, special and set apart from all the other peoples on earth. He had given them detailed (…so detailed…) instructions to create a place for worship where they could interact with Him as God and receive the assurance of forgiveness and the blessing of His presence. They had built and assembled the place for worship.
Here, then, it was completed and standing before them, and God’s presence was in it…and they couldn’t go in. Not even Moses could go in. The people’s sin with the golden calf before the proverbial ink of the covenant was even dry had created a separation. God had withheld His full hand of judgment, but there was a distance between them and Him now that prevented any of them from entering into His presence. In this sense, the narrative here sort of ends on a disappointing cliffhanger. Yes, we get vv. 36-38 as a kind of epilogue that assures us He stayed with them as the pillar of cloud by day and fire by night shifts its form to the cloud over the tent of meeting that glowed with a holy fire at night. And, yes, He was now in the middle of camp rather than in a tent out beyond the borders of camp, but they still could not enter into His presence. Not even Moses could.
How would the people be reconciled? The answer, as I said before, comes in the next part of the narrative in Leviticus where God gives them the sacrificial system where they could offer to God a precious (and perfect) animal in place of their own life. He took a style of worship that was common then and vested it with His own gracious and kind purposes so that the people could have access to His presence by virtue of the righteousness granted to them by the covering for sins the sacrificial offerings merited them. But we should be clear that this covering was a gift of God’s graciousness, not an automatic response to the proper input on their part. If their heart wasn’t in it, if their intention wasn’t truly to worship Him, then they were just wantonly killing the poor creatures without any purpose. Intention makes a difference.
So then, now that we are at the end, what can we say to wrap up more than 18 months’ worth of reflecting together? Let’s start here: The narrative of Exodus in a nutshell breaks down like this. God does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Out of that action, He invites us into a relationship with Him and calls us to live life His way.
That ordering is important. God’s goal is a relationship. As a result, He works to build a relationship before giving us any commands or putting any real boundaries in place for us. The relationship is always first and it is never demanded, but offered by invitation after He has revealed His character to us through some grand gesture first. For the Israelites, it was His leading them out of slavery in Egypt. For us, it is Jesus’ life, ministry, death, and resurrection.
In spite of all God does for us, we violate that relationship with Him by choosing our own interests instead of His. This relational infidelity is a cosmic-sized reflection of the same thing we do in our human relationships. We are not a people given to consistent faithfulness. Maybe we don’t violate our relationships in some gross or tragic way, but we nonetheless have a remarkable ability to choose ourselves, our interests, our desires, and to elevate those in importance over those of the people around us.
When we repent, though, God extends grace and lets us take another run at living life His way. This repentance cannot be merely words and symbols. It has to be a willful turning from our path of sin and selfishness and to the path of God’s righteousness. Notice I said God’s righteousness. Our righteousness won’t do. Pursuit of our own righteousness is what got us into trouble in the first place. Thankfully, though, in spite of the fact that He is just and will hold us accountable for our sins, our God is also gracious and kind. He always responds to genuine repentance. Always.
That’s the basic outline of the Exodus narrative. I could have been describing the basic outlines of the Gospel narrative though. There are Gospel fingerprints all over the Exodus narrative. Here at the end, though, in a passage many treat as a celebration because God was finally among the people, we are actually left with a lingering tension. God’s presence may have been among the people, but none of them – not even Moses – can enter into it. They are still separated from Him because of their sin.
As I said, this tension is partially resolved in Leviticus where God gives the people the sacrificial system that will allow them to see their sins covered, granting them the ability to be in His presence, but this tension isn’t finally and fully resolved until Jesus comes and makes the sacrifice that we could never make ourselves (at least not more than once after which point a relationship with God would be impossible because we would be dead) in order to once and for all and for everyone open the doors to a relationship with the Father.
The reminder here is that doing the things of God, while good and important, is not enough by itself to save us. Our salvation is not based on what we do. Or, to put that another way, we cannot save ourselves. Our righteousness is not enough. It will always and forever fall short – way short – of God’s perfect righteousness. Our best goodness is like filthy rags as compared to His. Our good works are like mere dime store trinkets next to the rich splendors of His majesty. Our only hope is in Jesus who did what we cannot do (that is, He kept the Law), and then laid down His life to pay the price for our sins so that we can have the relationship with God we were made and meant to enjoy. He did this while we were still separated from Him by sin and were even His enemies by virtue of our posture and position of open rebellion. But that’s how great His love for us is. All we have to do is receive it, and we can have the life we have always wanted. God’s presence is here and we can enter fully into it in Christ. Let’s do just that as we prepare to give attention to gratitude and then the grand celebration of when He arrived in the flesh to get started on making all of this possible.
The Nexus 
“Our best goodness is like filthy rags as compared to His. Our good works are like mere dime store…”
There you go, just the type of putrid garbage to build confidence and respect in kids. Denigrate and belittle the crap out of them.
Utterly disgusting.
And yet, when kids read how your god, Yahweh, commits genocide, gives his stamp of approval to slavery, including sex slavery, murders in the name of supposed judgment and then demands love and unflattering unquestioning lavish devotion… Or your soul will be sent to Hell to spend eternity being tortured, you then gave the sheer audacity to tell them he does these things because you, little Johnny are a sinner. But always remember, God(sic) loves you.
This is your worldview? Just sick.
LikeLike
Oh, and I listened to Gilson’s podcast, by the way.
As ignorant as it was likely disingenious.
Perhaps he was unaware of the Wedge document?
However he was certainly aware of Meyer’s book.
LikeLike
What exactly was ignorant about it? What specific facts did he get wrong? And although he certainly wasn’t likely to be a target for being convinced as he was pretty confident in his own positions, and although the thing was delivered somewhat with tongue-in-cheek humor, there was nothing particularly disingenuous about anything he said.
Yes, I suspect he had read all of Meyer’s books that had been released at the time that podcast was originally released. How is that relevant? And anytime the Discovery Institute gets mentioned you wave around the Wedge document like that’s a remotely convincing or even relevant argument. It’s not. That being said, I’m fairly sure that he was well aware of what the document is and what it said.
The irony of your whole response here to me is that you fit the description of the utterly inept interlocutor he describes to a T. That’s what struck me as so comical about the timing on its release since I had just made the same point to you. Your total unwillingness to seek to honestly understand the arguments of Christians on their own terms combined with your near-religious commitment to only engaging with straw man versions of the faith is a huge part of what makes you so bad at this. What makes it so funny to me is that you seem utterly incapable of realizing any of this even when I’ve observed it to you multiple times. Oh well. At least there’s good humor in the whole thing.
LikeLike
He said it was not about God(sic) and that was enough. Period.
Next…..
LikeLike
You seriously don’t see the comedy in that response? You are literally making Gilson’s point for him. If his podcast was a blog, he might as we have put your picture on it and said, “If you want to have a chance of convincing anyone who disagrees with you of anything, just pay attention to what this guy does and do the opposite.” Hilarious. Even more so in that you just can’t seem to see it.
LikeLike
Aah, so what you are saying is that Gilson was being sarcastic and that it IS about God(sic).
LikeLike
I didn’t say that in even the remotest sense. But, you’re going to read into my comments whatever it is you want to hear no matter what I say. You’ve long since demonstrated your commitment to that. To repeat the point I’ve been drumming on for a few days now: this is why we can’t have productive conversations. Case in point: you included (sic) after you wrote “God.” That kind of silliness is literally what Gilson said not to do if you want to come across like a sincere debater.
LikeLike
Well Gilson was either being serious when he asserted that non believers make the mistake asserting that ID was about Yahweh ( happy now?) or he was not.
Which is it?
LikeLike
He was being entirely serious on that point.
And, by the way, simply saying God is fine. Given the you’re having this long-running debate with a Christian pastor, insisting on saying “Yahweh” all the time instead of just “God” comes across as needlessly pejorative, and gives the impression that you’re one of “those” internet atheists who isn’t in the remotest sense interested in a real conversation but only in berating and attempting to belittle believers. I’ve never bothered offering the corrective and won’t bring it up again because I don’t honestly care and can translate just fine. But if you actually want to be taken seriously when you have these kinds of conversations, avoiding being needlessly pejorative will help.
LikeLike
Then Gilson is a disingenious Arsehat as ID IS about your god, Yahweh as Meyer acknowledged.
Needlessly pejorative? Hmmm so calling me inept is….?
LikeLike
There you go making Gilson’s point for him again.
…playing by the rules you’ve set for our dialogue. I’m happy to use better ones if you’d prefer.
Okay, that’s all from me today. Lots to do to get ready for a short week next week.
LikeLike
In a TUS l fact it is Gilson who was making the point for those who reject ID.
I reiterate, Gilson asserted non believers were wrong by saying ID is about God(Yahweh)
ID IS about God(Yahweh) so either Gilson was ignorant of the true nature of ID or he was being disingenious.
You can decide which.
Once he had said this I merely laughed and left it at that.
LikeLike
Or maybe…and I’m just spit balling here, so bear with me…maybe the guy who actually worked for the ID institute knew what he was talking about, while you, the atheist who thinks the whole thing is a bad joke and loves making strawmen out of your opponents’ positions in order to beat those to death rather than being willing to take them on their own terms and actually listen to what they are saying about themselves, don’t quite have it right. I know I’m probably getting way out on a limb here, but it could be.
As for your quote, that’s obviously written by a critic of ID who takes it about as seriously as you do, which is to say, not at all, and does not the first thing to advance your argument.
Out of curiosity, what do you do with an ID proponent (and a Discovery Institute fellow) like David Berlinski? He’s not a believer at all. At best he’s a totally secular Jew. He doesn’t even begin to agree that the identity of the designing mind theorized by ID is the Christian God.
LikeLike
Well, as a layman, to use the term from apologist and indoctrinated Christian, the late Mr Gilson, I will side with the scientific community who consider it to be pseudoscience. Therefore it is a load of bollocks, founded and promoted by indoctrinated Christians, who have never submitted a single paper for peer review(as far as I am aware) yet constantly tried to wheedle it into school curriculums.
As for Berlinski. However the scientific community regards him then this is probably good enough for me.
“… but he (Berlinski) disavows belief in intelligent design. He describes his relationship with the idea of intelligent design as “warm but distant.” ”
Both quotes from Wiki.
LikeLike
If you’re content to keep beating strawmen here, I really can’t do anything about that, but we won’t get anywhere then. This was exactly Gilson’s point. You are a living embodiment of his point. Oh well…
LikeLike
There are no strawman.
Gilson stated it is not about the Christian god as asserted by skeptics of ID yet it clearly is. They just like to throw the stone and hide the hand.
Furthermore, if you acknowledge Gilson was aware of the position of the Christian proponants of ID and also the Wedge document then he was being disingenious and there is no way of getting around this.
LikeLike
But it isn’t. The fact that you keep making that as an argument is the strawman I’m talking about.
LikeLike
You know Meyer wrote a book acknowledging that the Intelligent Designer proposed by ID is Yahweh/Jesus (the Christian god)?
LikeLike
Of course. I own it and have read it carefully. Do you realize that Meyer clearly draws a line between what is possible to say based on scientific findings and what he personally believes is the proper philosophical understanding of the best way to interpret those scientific findings?
LikeLike
I sense you are on the verge of gaslighting. Please don’t.
He believes the god in question is Yahweh/Jesus.
Have the decency to acknowledge this crucial point before you go on the attack once more.
LikeLike
No gaslighting here. I’m simply clarifying for you what his argument is. Your refusal to understand that accurately is part of why we just keeping going around in circles on the issue.
LikeLike
Is Gilson asserting the skeptics accussation that proponents of ID are punting the Christian god is false?
LikeLike
Gilson was laying out the Discovery Institute’s position accurately. It’s the same position Meyer lays out over the course of his trilogy of books. It’s the position I have expressed to you multiple times before. Science clearly points in the direction of the fact that a designing mind is the best explanation for the creation of the universe and the existence of life as we know it. How an individual identifies and characterizes that designer is not something that can be directly supported by science, but is a subsequent question answered by philosophy. While, yes, most ID proponents are indeed Christians, not all of them are. They come from various other faith traditions as well, and some (like Berlinski) are secular in their outlook. And they consistently draw a pretty clear line between what can be said with the help of scientific disciplines and what can be said by philosophical disciplines. What they are all agreed upon is that the neo-Darwinian consensus that currently holds so much of the scientific establishment in its grasp is almost certainly wrong in scientific grounds, and that, again, a designing intelligence of some kind is the best explanation.
LikeLike
Is Meyer asserting the god behind intelligent design is Yahweh/Jesus?
Yes or no?
LikeLike
Look at my other response.
LikeLike
I did.
My assessment is spot on and this is
why Gilson – an indoctrinated Christian apologist – was being disingenious.
And this applies to every Christian proponant of ID, Meyer is no exception.
LikeLike
And this is why Gilson’s argument (and mine) was exactly on the money and why you are so profoundly bad at these kinds of conversations.
LikeLike
Bad?
*Smile*
What is so bad about being honest, speaking plainly, telling the truth and calling a spade a spade?
Let’s look at the facts.
Gilson (like you) is an indoctrinated fundamentalist Christian. Your worldview underpins everything and does not withstand honest scrutiny.
Gilson asserted skeptics of ID were wrong to state it’s proponants believed the intelligent designer is God (Yahweh/Jesus.)
This is factually incorrect. While they try to keep this out of their argument the leaders are primarily Christian.
Meyer acknowledged he believes the god behind ID is a theist god, the Christian deity Yahweh /Jesus.
Aside from the fact ID is pseudoscience – creationism masking as science – the religious aspect (Goddidit) was the prime reason it did not pass muster when its proponants tried to wheedle it into the classroom.
LikeLike
You just keep making Gilson’s point, doing exactly the things he said make it impossible to take anything you say seriously. As long as you do, you’re just not going to be taken seriously. Maybe you should go back and give him a listen one more time and take better notes? The first listen doesn’t seem to have been enough for the point to stick.
LikeLike
Again, the moment he asserted skeptics were wrong to say the intelligent designer is believed to be the Christian god, – Yahweh/Jesus) he lost all credibility.
From that moment onwards his arguments were pointless
Stephen Meyer’s admission in his book confirmed this.
The Wedge Document simply adds further confirmation.
How do expect to have a serious discussion when you continue to push such nonsense?
Seriously, all you have to do is acknowledge your entire worldview is underpinned by faith and NOT evidence then you are standing on an honest footing.
LikeLike
It’s like you don’t really listen to anything I say, and then just fire off whatever prepackaged, straw man beating response you have next in your chamber. That, more than anything, prevents meaningful conversation.
LikeLike
As you refuse to respond to the specific points I keep raising it suggests it is you that is strawmaning and preventing any sort of conversation other than your prepackaged apologetic, thus, more than ever confirming your worldview is simply religiously oriented indictrination.
LikeLike
I’m not responding to specific points because they’re not serious points and don’t warrant a response.
LikeLike
Aaah..When the Truth just will not do.
Out comes the inevitable response of the indoctrinated believer.
LikeLike
When that’s the only conclusion your worldview framework can sustain, yes, that is where you would land. But then we already knew that because it’s where you always land. And it’s easy to do that when you simply straw man your ideological opponents and beat those to death. It is a very safe position to hold as you will successfully avoid ever being challenged, but it also keeps you locked in a place of never being able to have meaningful, substantive conversations. It also renders you thoroughly unconvincing in all of your arguments. Alas…
LikeLike
Let me remind you of a quote from an earliery comment.
“Intelligent design avoids identifying or naming the intelligent designer—it merely states that one (or more) must exist—but leaders of the movement have said the designer is the Christian God.”
‘Nuff said.
As I have pointed out on several occasions already.
LikeLike
Yes, and as it turns out, some people are capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time. They can be good scientists while at the same time being philosophically canny enough to understand the impact their own worldview plays in the process of distinguishing between scientific fact and philosophical interpretation.
In other words, repeating your straw man objection here accomplishes exactly nothing except to reaffirm your inability to make sound, compelling, or convincing arguments when talking about things like this. This is because you resolutely refuse to take your ideological opponents at their word and engage with their arguments as they present them, instead preferring to attack your straw men.
Or, to put that another way, you don’t seem to be able to walk and chew gum in conversations like this, and you certainly haven’t demonstrated much more than a modicum of an ability to grasp the impact of your own worldview commitments on how you process the relevant data here.
It’s like when you revealed your willingness to accept the multiverse explanation for the existence and fine tuning of the universe. After haranguing me for having a faith-based worldview for months, you staked out an entirely faith-based position on the origin of the universe as the one you think is correct. And it took my nearly beating a hole in the drum of that point before the lights finally came on and you somewhat begrudgingly acknowledged the faith-based nature of your own position. If you had such a glaring worldview blind spot then, why would I expect things to be any different now?
LikeLike
It is not a straw man objection to an argument that is either ignorant or disingenious.
Gilson openly acknowkedged he is not an expert… And neither am I… yet he proceeds to make the argument that if one wants to engage become better informed. A sound piece of advice.
Well, I have a basic understanding of the subject, probably a little bit better than most laypeople simply because I have an interest in religion and Christianity, so I knew to check Gilson’s credentials and those of the main proponents of ID.
I stand by what I wrote and for the reasons I did.
Apparently my reasons are pretty much the same ones expressed by the scientific community at large.
ID is pseudoscience. Or if you prefer a more colouful colloquialism. Bullshit.
Nice piece about your dad, by the way.
LikeLike
I appreciate that. He’s about as good a dad as anyone could hope for.
LikeLike
I’m confident he made a good role model for you.
You have every right be proud.
My father recent celebrated his 90th and there’s still life in the Old Dog!
Maybe he will get to receive a telegram from the King?
LikeLike
He most certainly did. I remember when you went back there to see him (or was that your mom’s birthday?). Covid nearly messed up the trip if I remember. A telegram from the King would indeed be pretty cool.
LikeLike
Was Dad’s birthday.
I was very ill just before we flew over – some sort of dreadful bug, goodness knows what it was, but not Covid, and I wasn’t sure if I would recover in time.
Well, I did, obviously, but I then went and got Covid while there.
Sometimes you just can’t win!
LikeLike
I remember now. For what it’s worth, I prayed for that very outcome. The recovery in time part, not the getting Covid while you were there. But yes, it often does feel like life is a grand exercise in not being able to win for losing, like the time when everybody in the house had a nasty stomach bug and then the washer broke. Good times.
LikeLike
Aah.. You had me going for a moment as I read the first sentence.
Yes, after spending time with my folks we drove to France with my sister and her hubby.
I was feeling a bit rough even before we left and my sister, being the ex nurse she is, suggested I took a Covid test.
I won’t disclose what she said when it came out positive but it was R rated and I responded:
“My fault? How the heck was it my fault?
I suspect I either caught it in England or on the plane over, as there was a woman behind us who coughed from Dubai to Manchester.
Anyhow, I had all my vaccs up to date so it was not too bad.
LikeLike
I do remember all of that still. I had Covid once. It was post-vaccine and was thankfully fairly mild as well. I got it after chaperoning a kids’ camp. My middle son and I came back with it and no one else out of the 11 people on the van we drove back in got it. Neither did any of the other 9 people we roomed with. Just the two of us. And we were on total opposite sides of the room all week. Go figure. What’s worse, it was our anniversary when I got back.
LikeLike
Anniversary? Oh well…,l a Covid mask and a minimum of two metres is a sure fire way of putting a damper on any… cough cough romantic inclinations!
As the nuns supposedly used to say to young couples: Have to allow space between you for the Holy Spirit.
😉
LikeLike
He had plenty of space that week. We had a romantic takeout dinner on the back porch from opposite ends of the table.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“Intelligent design avoids identifying or naming the intelligent designer—it merely states that one (or more) must exist—but leaders of the movement have said the designer is the Christian God.”
‘Nuff said.
LikeLike
What is funny but not in any sort of humorous fashion is your ignoring of the comment regarding the post on this page.
LikeLike
Nothing about it merited a response, so I didn’t bother writing one.
LikeLike
Now THAT is funny. The response of the truly indoctrinated.
By the way was I correct when I wrote that perhaps I owed you an apology because you do not hold with the Baptist belief of Hell?
LikeLike
You probably owe me an apology for a lot of things, but if you mean the Southern Baptist understanding of Hell as a future place of eternal separation from God for all those who finally oppose His authority and sovereignty that will be awful in some way we don’t fully understand, then probably not for that, no. That’s the position I hold.
LikeLike
So to be clear you do or do not hold with this view of Hell….
“They believe that hell is a literal place, described in the Bible as a lake of fire, and that those who go there will spend eternity being tormented “where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.”
I owe you lots of apogies? Really? For what? Come on, Jonathan, be a sport and give me a clue.
LikeLike
I hold to parts of it, but not the whole things. I believe it will be a real place, but not that it already exists. I am of the mind that the imagery we find describing Hell in the New Testament is not intended to be taken literally, but collectively as a figurative way of communicating that it will be worse than we can imagine to be totally separated and cut off from God. That’s why I said that we don’t know for sure what it will be like.
Well, we could start with the sheer number of times you’ve accused me directly or otherwise insinuated that I’m a child abuser, but I don’t expect one will be forthcoming for that, so I don’t concern myself with it. That’s just you speaking from out of your worldview position.
LikeLike
Well, I consider indoctrinating any children they are born sinners and will go to Hell if they refuse to believe that a first century human sacrifice is their only gateway to eternal life is absurd, utterly disgusting, a complete fabrication and child abuse. And I stand by that 100%.
Anything else?
LikeLike
Extra point on Hell. Although all branches of Baptists are independant(?) do you incur any sort of reprimand by not adherring strictly to the defined Baptist doctrine of Hell?
LikeLike
There’s not a “strictly defined Baptist doctrine of Hell,” so, no, there’s no particular reprimand coming for where my position deviates from that of others, nor is there anyone who could give it. We’ve talked before about the fact that the Baptist denomination is like the wild, wild West. There are people who claim the label accurately who believe an incredibly wide variety of things about just nearly every point of doctrine. There’s no strictly defined Baptist doctrine of anything save believer’s baptism by full immersion, church autonomy, and regenerate church membership. As long as you hold to at least a version of those three doctrines, you’re a Baptist. So, to answer your parenthetical question, yes, all branches of Baptists are technically independent.
LikeLike
So you don’t toe the line drawn by the Southern Baptist Convention?
LikeLike
Not on a handful of things that I’m aware of and maybe not on some that I’m not aware of either. On most things, and the big things, yes, but not uniformly so.
LikeLike
So although the Convention’s decree(?) on Hell asserts it is binding on all Baptists (if I read it correctly) you say it it flexible ( as in: make it up as you go along but don’t stray too far)
LikeLike
You didn’t read it correctly. It’s not binding on all Baptists. It is a statement that has been generally adopted by a majority of Southern Baptists, but many (including me) don’t agree with every single position at every single point.
LikeLike
Fair enough. So my point about you making it up as you go along is accurate enough for any given value of accurate.
Do you tell your kids Hell is eternal torment?
LikeLike
Not particularly, but I’m not interested in having the debate. And, no, I don’t. If the subject comes up—which isn’t often—I tell them just what I told you earlier.
LikeLike
I have no interest in debating it, I simply want clarification and an honest acknowledgement from you that you tell kids(yours included) that failure to believe the character Jesus of Nazareth is their savior will see them spend eternity in torment in Hell( separated from Yahweh).
Is this what you tell children( you may use different words but ostensibly this is the gist)?
LikeLike
I’m curious how many more times I’ll need to state my position on Hell before you accept that I really do mean it.
LikeLike
Give it one more go…
LikeLike
Why? You’re not going to agree with it since you reject the ultimate starting point, and you’re just going to take the silly approach of accusing me of child abuse again for holding an orthodox Christian position. Why feed the silliness on your part?
LikeLike
Then why do you get so upset when I call a spade a spade?
Just own it.
LikeLike
Own that I’m a child abuser? Do you even listen to yourself? When you keep stopping to silliness rather than having genuinely substantive conversations, how am I supposed to take anything you say seriously?
LikeLike
Let’s consider it differently.
Do you insist that children – who are born sinners – who flatly reject the notion of needing Jesus as their savior to ensure eternal life will spend eternal torment in Hell separated from your god, Yahweh/Jesus ?
LikeLike
I’ve described my position numerous times just today even. But you keep portraying it incorrectly. How can I take you seriously when you won’t actually listen to what I’m saying enough to accurately repeat my arguments?
LikeLike
Are you saying the description above is false?
LikeLike
Did I say anything about eternal TORMENT?
LikeLike
So no torment? Are you suggesting those spending an eternity spent in Hell will be having a picnic?
So I take it that since you did not directly respond to the rest of the description this is indeed what you tell children? ( sans TORMENT)
LikeLike
Once again, you just can’t help yourself from not listening and then saying whatever else you want. Did I say anything remotely resembling that it will somehow be a picnic? Pay attention and read more carefully.
And, I didn’t respond to the rest of the description because it wasn’t worth my time since you’re not willing to actually listen to anything I’m saying.
On the rare occasions the subject of Hell comes up when talking about the faith with my kids, I lay out for them exactly the same position I have laid out with you.
LikeLike
So what you lay out to kids(yours included) is…
All children are born sinners in dire need of redemption which can only be obtained through belief in the character Jesus of Nazareth, who is Yahweh incarnate, and key to eternal life. Failure to accept and uphold this belief will result in an eternity spent in Hell.
( Separation from your god)
Out of interest do you consider unrepentant sinners choose to go to Hell rather than are sent by your god?
LikeLike
That is a very poorly stated but largely accurate description of the core of Christian teaching stretching back nearly 2000 years, yes. All of those points are pretty clearly laid out in the Scriptures. And it’s a both-and to your last question.
LikeLike
So, as none of this can be substantiated, to indoctrinate children with this vile cruel notion is, ostensibly child abuse.
Christianity gets away with it as religion generally falls outside the purview of child protection services.
Aren’t the proponants of such revolting garbage lucky?
LikeLike
Here’s another.
LikeLike