Groovy,
As by now you should know that my fundamental critique of your original post is that it attempts to use a spoonful of scripture to address a mountain of reality. Making eternal life and death declarations based on a few Googled topics is inadequate and misleading. The very nature of God as revealed in the entire corpus of scripture can not and should not be passed off in a couple of lifted bible verses that just happen to prove what you already to be "true" is "true." By declaring who will be and won't be saved using the same snippeture means you are attempting to speak for God where God has remained silent or mining a few rocks from a mountain of data. I attempted to demonstrate that anyone can extract their preferred regality using the same Google me approach. Thus I pointed you to the entire of chapter of Matthew 25 where Jesus is providing an ironclad description of who will be saved and your claims for who will and won't be saved entirely ignored Jesus's specific and detailed description of judgement for all. Jesus reminds us that our primary mission in life is to love God and to love our fellow man as we love ourselves.
Jesus made it clear, there are two crosses for Jesus followers. On one Christ was sacrificed for our sins on the other we are called to take up our cross daily and live sacrificial lives of our own. I don't see that reality in your original post. Jesus also defined another criteria for his true followers. They are those who love one another. They belong to a loving community that all the world can see. Too often the least loving communities in our local communities are the competing, slandering, self-righteous and isolated "Christian churches." If you brought all the "Christians in a town or city together the result would be finger pointing, condemning and defensive posturing.
The number of self identified Christians in our country has dropped from 78% to about 62% just since 2007. People are walking away from a Christianity of rules, creeds, social conventions and politics that describe 21st Century Christianity for millions of people. Over 7,000 ( by some estimates 15,000 Christian churches closed in 2025 alone) Christian churches permanently close their doors in America each year or two. While we rail on and sell our unique "plan of salvation" among the 200-2,000 different denominations. We now sell Christianity cheap. Just nod you head to a 60 second pulpit prayer and heaven is now a guarantee. Did Jesus come, suffer and die to provide heaven for the mear cost of 60 seconds of your life? We have partial phd's in our denominations unique creeds and salvation plans but very few skinned knees for praying with the sick, very few empty pantries from feeding the hungry and nobody prays with those in prison...because they got what they deserve. Has the church panned off to the government all the care and family support the followers of Christ are called by Him to do? Do you know the widows in your congregation? Adoption rates for abandoned children by Christian families is no higher than for "unbelievers." Sad.
Do we live behind a wall of scripture quotations in hopes that our brand of Christianity will survive? Are we know for our "expertise" in understanding the bible or for being America's Good Samaritans. The truth is a people will not believe what we say until they see that we reflect the very nature of the One we claim to worship. By endlessly "perfecting" our theology without actually being born again from self-serving, ego drive, self-righteousness to a life changed by the power of the Holy Spirit into loving servants walking in the image of Christ we should turn our biblical study into changed lives instead of purity of "orthodoxy." If your expertise in the bible does not lead you to understand that to serve God, we must serve those he loves, then we may have missed the entire gospel.
As to the use of the "Bible." The Bible Christians used for the 1st 1,500 years is not the one in the hands of the vast majority of Christians today. The books included in the Bible of Protestants today is not the Bible of the last 1,700 years. There are approximately 900+ complete or partial English translations and in the last 26 years there are 100 new translations. The textural variance in the current library of bible translations are important and significant. Each version requires a relook at our "basic" understanding of key theological concepts. Thus when you post scripture snippets you do so not understanding how they may read differently based on what Bible translation one uses to view your references.
I am always happy to discuss the "bible" but it is never without the priority that I must use it to find continuous rebirth, recommitment to God's mission of love and mercy and to realize that being "right" is not the highest objective of the Christian life.
As by now you should know that my fundamental critique of your original post is that it attempts to use a spoonful of scripture to address a mountain of reality. Making eternal life and death declarations based on a few Googled topics is inadequate and misleading. The very nature of God as revealed in the entire corpus of scripture can not and should not be passed off in a couple of lifted bible verses that just happen to prove what you already to be "true" is "true." By declaring who will be and won't be saved using the same snippeture means you are attempting to speak for God where God has remained silent or mining a few rocks from a mountain of data. I attempted to demonstrate that anyone can extract their preferred regality using the same Google me approach. Thus I pointed you to the entire of chapter of Matthew 25 where Jesus is providing an ironclad description of who will be saved and your claims for who will and won't be saved entirely ignored Jesus's specific and detailed description of judgement for all. Jesus reminds us that our primary mission in life is to love God and to love our fellow man as we love ourselves.
Jesus made it clear, there are two crosses for Jesus followers. On one Christ was sacrificed for our sins on the other we are called to take up our cross daily and live sacrificial lives of our own. I don't see that reality in your original post. Jesus also defined another criteria for his true followers. They are those who love one another. They belong to a loving community that all the world can see. Too often the least loving communities in our local communities are the competing, slandering, self-righteous and isolated "Christian churches." If you brought all the "Christians in a town or city together the result would be finger pointing, condemning and defensive posturing.
The number of self identified Christians in our country has dropped from 78% to about 62% just since 2007. People are walking away from a Christianity of rules, creeds, social conventions and politics that describe 21st Century Christianity for millions of people. Over 7,000 ( by some estimates 15,000 Christian churches closed in 2025 alone) Christian churches permanently close their doors in America each year or two. While we rail on and sell our unique "plan of salvation" among the 200-2,000 different denominations. We now sell Christianity cheap. Just nod you head to a 60 second pulpit prayer and heaven is now a guarantee. Did Jesus come, suffer and die to provide heaven for the mear cost of 60 seconds of your life? We have partial phd's in our denominations unique creeds and salvation plans but very few skinned knees for praying with the sick, very few empty pantries from feeding the hungry and nobody prays with those in prison...because they got what they deserve. Has the church panned off to the government all the care and family support the followers of Christ are called by Him to do? Do you know the widows in your congregation? Adoption rates for abandoned children by Christian families is no higher than for "unbelievers." Sad.
Do we live behind a wall of scripture quotations in hopes that our brand of Christianity will survive? Are we know for our "expertise" in understanding the bible or for being America's Good Samaritans. The truth is a people will not believe what we say until they see that we reflect the very nature of the One we claim to worship. By endlessly "perfecting" our theology without actually being born again from self-serving, ego drive, self-righteousness to a life changed by the power of the Holy Spirit into loving servants walking in the image of Christ we should turn our biblical study into changed lives instead of purity of "orthodoxy." If your expertise in the bible does not lead you to understand that to serve God, we must serve those he loves, then we may have missed the entire gospel.
As to the use of the "Bible." The Bible Christians used for the 1st 1,500 years is not the one in the hands of the vast majority of Christians today. The books included in the Bible of Protestants today is not the Bible of the last 1,700 years. There are approximately 900+ complete or partial English translations and in the last 26 years there are 100 new translations. The textural variance in the current library of bible translations are important and significant. Each version requires a relook at our "basic" understanding of key theological concepts. Thus when you post scripture snippets you do so not understanding how they may read differently based on what Bible translation one uses to view your references.
I am always happy to discuss the "bible" but it is never without the priority that I must use it to find continuous rebirth, recommitment to God's mission of love and mercy and to realize that being "right" is not the highest objective of the Christian life.
