The Evangelical Universalist Forum

why is second death suffering needed ?

why is the second correction a suffering ?
is not purification (or correction) possible without suffering ?
what do you think, believe ?
thank you very much for your help

We read that God’s kindness is meant to lead us to repentance (Romans 2:4)
But what if a person doesn’t respond to God’s kindness?

Sometimes in a human family, the children rebel against the kindest of parents. Then the parents must exercise “tough love”.
God will do whatever it takes to bring each individual to repentance even if suffering is a factor. For God is not willing that ANY should perish but that All should come to repentance. He is well able to influence each individual in the way which is necessary to bring this about.

i have thought about this question (the last 3 minutes)
maybe sin is the exact opposite of our essence (we are created by God) , so (it is not very clear in my mind) if God objective is to destroy sin (which is a dirt) he has to make us live the opposite of our essence ( i repeat it is not very clear in my mind), the second death
it seems illogical but i think i am on the good way
i don’t believe in repentance in the lake of fire, if the scripture defend the idea of repentance in the lake of fire it is a symbol
in my opinion,
i believe that every people will stop sinning without second death

i was not very good in mathematics in high school but i remember the rule: - x - = +
(if i remember correctly)
so maybe we have to live something which is the contrary of our essence (second death) to destroy something which is the contrary of our essence (sin)

“the contrary” (i mean the opposite, sorry for the english)

A symbol of what?

Hi Erwan,

I sense what you are getting at and if I am understanding correctly what you are saying I would say that you are on the right track. We are saved from sin and death not by punishment and more death, to the contrary we are saved, by healing and more life freely given to us–the life of God which is resurrection. So where sin and death abounded so much more the grace (unconditional kindness and generosity of God) and life of God abounds all the more. Sin is overwhelmed not through the brute force of coercion and punishment, but by the “tough love” of the cross. It is God through Jesus the Healer giving all that He is to all that there is. He takes the life of God to the faithless, the hopeless, the unrepentant and the dead–who are truly the very least and most hopeless of all; and brings the healing (and are not the dead in the most extreme state of un-health) life of God to where they are to not only make them alive but to give them a new birth that wipes the slate clean (Jubilee) and frees them to go way beyond mere repentance to living as authentic human beings just as Jesus the Human One is.

Dave

“You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.” What word was this?

In the sermon on the mount, Jesus gives us an idea of what true righteousness looks like. He makes it abundantly clear it is far beyond our power to achieve, even with the help of the Law. Jesus ends his depressing sermon with the words, “Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

I don’t see this as the icing on an already impossible ethical cake. The verb here is future indicative. Jesus is saying, “You *will *be perfect in the end, you know, perfect as God himself. I will see to it.” It’s not a command for us to do the impossible, but a promise that one day the impossible will be done.

“Let there be light!” and there was light. “Be perfect!” and they were perfect. Perhaps this was the creative word that made the disciples clean. A righteousness from God, apart from the law, is revealed, one that is sheer miracle. Our dark selves will be filled in a moment with God’s light. This new creation has not yet come to us in its fulness. We see it only in Christ. But our perfection is sure. We have been made clean by Christ’s creative word, though it is grasped in the here and now by faith alone.

Why, then, the call to good works? Is it so we will slowly, painfully, become more and more righteous until we can bear to live in God’s presence? Where is this notion found in the NT? Or is it so people will see our good works and praise our Father in heaven? ie. By being as good as we possibly can (and failing cheerfully), people may come to believe that our moral efforts are nothing, and that our hope lies in God alone and in his promise of a new creation.

Good questions erwan. Why any suffering at all, first, second, or any death? This to me is one of the most hidden topics in Scripture. Way I see it negative elements in human essence cause sin, sin is an effect, so when we say we’re ‘saved from our sin’ we’re reallly being saved from the cause of sin, the negative stuff in human spirit.
AlanS asks,

I think the ‘word’ is Truth…the two-edged sword of Truth: “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (Heb 4:12) If (as I believe) salvation is identical to regeneration, then the first death is the regeneration of cleansing in this life (salting of fire for all) to moral culpability. The emergent mind is able to use this truth-bearingness to choose…to choose wisely (Prov 1:20-33) or foolishly (Jer 6:27-30), but it is the ‘first death’ of bad stuff in spirit which allows us to participate with Christ to conform to faith. Thus, if Christ speaks strongly enough to burn away bad stuff causing unbelief, one is already clean (in a forensic sense, by faith) and if faith is maintained, does not suffer 2nd death.

Those who choose badly enter the second death at point of physical death, where offer to conform in time no longer stands. Because hell is regeneration, even though the 2nd is terrible, it burns up the bad and restores human spirit to a true or perfect state.

What’s hard for some to get their head around is 1) hell actually saves, and, 2) the hell that is used to form faith in time
is the same hell used to perfect in the end, hence 1st and 2nd deaths. [note I don’t say ‘after time’…all restoration in the LOF can be performed in the last few moments of one’s life, where a small eternity could exist in an unconscious [to outward appearnces] human as he/she takes last few breaths of life. This would elminate problem seen by Aquinas, that one enters eternity in whatever state one finds oneself in at the moment of physical death.

Puzzle #2 above is solved by understanding the salting fires of hell/regeneration in life take place fragmentally and progressively, such that they are mixed into the sufferings we call ‘everyday life’…hell is still mixed with suffering, even if only a little at a time. 2nd death is “in one hour” (Rev 18:10) which most Christians hate to hear (that we are Babylon in Rev…but this is another thread…), therefore the torment, instead of being spread over a lifetime, is compressed and experienced in a very short time in 2nd death.

Those who have Christ’s imputed righteousness by faith instantly become one with the LOF (the fire of God’s pure Truth) as Paul notes (1Cor 15:52) and do not suffer 2nd regeneration.

The real kicker is, while most Christianity believes they’re safe because they belief in and announce Jesus’ name, the metaphor extends beyond Jesus’ mere name who He is] to what He is–Truth–thereby saving all who conform to the call of Christ/Truth in life, regardless of religion. Good Samaritan in Luke 10 reveals the truth of this metaphor. Even the moral atheist may be saved by faith in Truth (unlike the radical, zealous ones who teach apostacy), which idea Chrsitianity cannot accept. When I stated this on a major Christian theology board a couple years ago I was sent a PM by one of the big dogs stating they were ‘watching’ me and I’d better be ‘very careful’ where and what I post. Yikes! We can’t have them damned atheists saved, now, can we?