If you grew up in a Christian home or you went to church often growing up, you always here about the way to salvation but no one ever talks about how to go to hell or how to grow further from Christ.

No one talks about this, yet people do this without knowing that they're doing it, in a certain fashion. You read the Bible and see examples of it.

Part of being wise as snakes could be having the conversation so that people are better equipped for what they'll be up against in the real world.

I've read The Screwtape letters. Perhaps I should read it again.

"I know a way into hell"
-said no one ever

In before someone says Heaven and Hell aren't real. That kinda helps Satan's cause.

The people who lead you to hell or further from Christ don't tell you they're doing it. If they do, it's rare.

Those who promote secularism don't consider it a ministry or see it as helping this side or the other, though it could be helping a side.

I'm Catholic and growing up it was very clear the things that get you closer to Jesus and the things that get you further away, and mortal sins were very clearly going to get you to Hell. It was simple after that to understand where the line was for my soul and when to back up (and seek forgiveness always). As I've got older the lessons have been backed up by personal experience and perhaps a bit of attained wisdom. Now to just stop sinning...

powerbelly said:

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The churches I have attended have very clearly discussed things that take you away from God.

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Same here. I think the three most important things to keep close to the Lord are prayer, Bible reading, and fellowship with believers. I get more out of my weekly Bible study than anything else.

And Scripture says what the Lord hates
Proverbs 6 16-19
There are 6 things that the Lord hates, seven that are detestable to him:
Haunty eyes,
A lying tongue,
Hands that shed innocent blood,
A heart that devises wicked schemes,
Feet that are quick to rush into evil,
A false witness who pours out lies,
And a person who stirs up conflict in the community.

TeddyAg0422 said:

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Reading C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters would be a great resource for this

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I need to read that again.

dds08 said:

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If you grew up in a Christian home or you went to church often growing up, you always here about the way to salvation but no one ever talks about how to go to hell or how to grow further from Christ.

No one talks about this, yet people do this without knowing that they're doing it, in a certain fashion. You read the Bible and see examples of it.

Part of being wise as snakes could be having the conversation so that people are better equipped for what they'll be up against in the real world.

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Just curious, do you believe in free will and that every person chooses their eternal fate?

That is what CS Lewis believed.

We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

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Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

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Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

I think it simply comes down to the natural law of entropy; Everything of this world decays over time.

Your fence naturally decays, unless you work to maintain it.
Your car naturally decays, unless you work to maintain it.
Your house naturally decays, unless you work to maintain it.
Your relationship with a friend or spouse naturally decays, unless you work to maintain it.

As such is your spiritual life. It is a free gift but if you must maintain it through prayer, gratitude, forgiveness, worship, etc. Otherwise, you risk your soul becoming decayed and overgrown by secular world until it is just as rotten as your ill maintained fence.

dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

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Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

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I'm not the OP, but I'm not going to entertain your effort to derail the thread.

You know my position. It's the Lutheran and historical view.

AgLiving06 said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

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Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

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I'm not the OP, but I'm not going to entertain your effort to derail the thread.

You know my position. It's the Lutheran and historical view.

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And I agree with that if it means people have free will and the ability to accept or reject God. I just do not think punishment is eternal and is meant for rehab not punitive.

I will post nothing else. Sorry.

The Banned said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

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Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

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I'm not the OP, but I'm not going to entertain your effort to derail the thread.

You know my position. It's the Lutheran and historical view.

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And I agree with that if it means people have free will and the ability to accept or reject God. I just do not think punishment is eternal and is meant for rehab not punitive.

I will post nothing else. Sorry.

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This is the most interesting thing part of Luther's theology. You can't really "accept" God because that would mean there is an act of the human will that leads to salvation. He contended that you could only really reject God's grace.

The obvious logical fallacy that this view makes is why Calvin got to double predestination/limited atonement so quickly after the reformation started.

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And that was my point. I was not trying to derail anything. But even proponents of ECT hell have different factions and beliefs. And as far as Orthodox, they have a different view of hell than other denominations. Saints disagreed on theology of heaven and hell.

As do Catholics, Reformed, Lutherans, etc. I was just trying to figure out what the op meant when they posted heaven and hell. Lots of different viewpoints on heaven also.

And now I promise I will not post on this thread again.

dds08 said:

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If you grew up in a Christian home or you went to church often growing up, you always here about the way to salvation but no one ever talks about how to go to hell or how to grow further from Christ.

No one talks about this, yet people do this without knowing that they're doing it, in a certain fashion. You read the Bible and see examples of it.

Part of being wise as snakes could be having the conversation so that people are better equipped for what they'll be up against in the real world.

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I'm not sure what your faith tradition is, but this sounds like the type of faith that is guided by once saved, always saved. If you take that view, it's pretty easy to deemphasize the things that move us away from Christ because there is technically no danger of that. Why spend time talking about being separated from Christ if you don't think it can happen?

The traditions that do not hold to OSAS (Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Methodist(at least traditionally), maybe more???) do talk about the things that separate us from God quite often.

The Banned said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

---

Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

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I'm not the OP, but I'm not going to entertain your effort to derail the thread.

You know my position. It's the Lutheran and historical view.

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And I agree with that if it means people have free will and the ability to accept or reject God. I just do not think punishment is eternal and is meant for rehab not punitive.

I will post nothing else. Sorry.

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This is the most interesting thing part of Luther's theology. You can't really "accept" God because that would mean there is an act of the human will that leads to salvation. He contended that you could only really reject God's grace.

The obvious logical fallacy that this view makes is why Calvin got to double predestination/limited atonement so quickly after the reformation started.

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Calvin gets to double predestination through Augustine (for right or wrong).

That it occurred around the the time of the Reformation is really not relevant.

AgLiving06 said:

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The Banned said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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dermdoc said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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We confess this or something like this nearly every Sunday:

Quote:

---

Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved You with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve Your present and eternal punishment. For the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Forgive us, renew us, and lead us, so that we may delight in Your will and walk in Your ways to the glory of Your holy name. Amen.

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So do you believe God sends people to hell? Or they choose hell?

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I'm not the OP, but I'm not going to entertain your effort to derail the thread.

You know my position. It's the Lutheran and historical view.

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And I agree with that if it means people have free will and the ability to accept or reject God. I just do not think punishment is eternal and is meant for rehab not punitive.

I will post nothing else. Sorry.

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This is the most interesting thing part of Luther's theology. You can't really "accept" God because that would mean there is an act of the human will that leads to salvation. He contended that you could only really reject God's grace.

The obvious logical fallacy that this view makes is why Calvin got to double predestination/limited atonement so quickly after the reformation started.

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Calvin gets to double predestination through Augustine (for right or wrong).

That it occurred around the the time of the Reformation is really not relevant.

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Luther relied on Augustine for his view on predestination as well. It's Luther's emphasis on monergism and total rejection of any kind of salvific synergism (which Augustine does not totally reject) that leads to the ultimate conclusion of double predestination.

The example for how salvation works that I've heard Lutheran theologians use is the idea of a person waking up on a hospital bed with a life saving IV in their arm. They didn't put the IV there. They did nothing to merit the IV. They simply have the life saving IV. The work is already done by the efforts of another. But they still have the choice to pull the IV out and die if they so choose. The choice is do nothing or pull the IV out.

The problem with this is that choices don't work that way. By definition, if I choose not to pull the IV out, I am also choosing to leave the IV in. It has to work in both directions. My choice isn't to do nothing or pull the IV out. It's leave the IV in or take the IV out. Both are active choices that I make. But this means that our cooperation is required to receive and stay in God's grace. Luther rejects this. Augustine did not.

We can't reject something we aren't capable of accepting. If man has no role in accepting God's grace, then man has no role in rejecting God's grace. Therefore, if you are not saved by God's grace it's because He never gave it to you. That is double predestination. Calvin picks up Luther's torch of monergism only and takes it to the finish line.

I know I've totally thread derailed. Feel free to have the last word and if I feel a response is beneficial, I'll move it to a new thread.