Universal Salvation and Other Matters Part Three

Click to listen to an audio of this: Universal Salvation Part Three

by Fred Pruitt

MY BEEFS

What About the Scriptures?

As I have said, the “idea” of universal salvation as a possibility, is not necessarily a problem. Many great Christians have worked from this perspective. The “problem,” as I see it, comes in, in the “package” that seems to be most often carrying this idea.

By no means have I read all the material put out by the universalist movement. I have only read a few articles and writings, but never a whole book. It has never appealed to me.

One article that was recommended outlined the writings of several first and second century “church fathers,” the post-apostolic period. As I read through it, much of the reasoning sounded very convincing for a while. The more I read the more “logical” it sounded. “Hmm, maybe there is something to this,” I thought as I was reading. I went on for a while like that.

Then suddenly, clear “out of the blue,” a thought hit me in the head like a sledge hammer. The thought was, “Wait a minute! The New Testament does not say these things!!” I stopped right there in my tracks, and put it away. I did not know, at the time, that I had hit on what would become my main “sore spot” with this. What about scripture?

Prior to this, even from the first time I read something “universalist,” it had bothered me that almost everything I had ever read started out with something like, “How can we believe a loving God would send people to eternal torment and ______?” From there would proceed the most horrible ideas and tortures and punishments anyone could conceive, usually concluding that we must certainly agree no “loving God” would do such things.

I have thought from the very beginning that is an incorrect question based on a perverted and skewed idea of the truth. It is starting from human reason, from an already formed notion of what love and righteousness should be according to the model of human reasons. From the very beginning, I have always believed it was “I” who might need adjustment, not God. “What does God say?” being the operative question, rather than, “No loving God would do this.” Do what? Things promised and warned about in the words of scripture, in passages so numerous we do not have time to list them. That is what some are saying no “loving” God would do. On the basis of what? Human ideas of love? Human ideas of righteousness? Human ideas of grace?

I believe in all those things, in their godly meanings. But we cannot just take those words, and then fill them up with some sort of meanings WE think they should have, and then judge everything according to our “revised ideas” of love, righteousness and grace. Things like, “No flesh shall enter my presence.” Rather than rebel and say we could not serve a God who would be so exclusive and unrelenting, would we not want to understand why He says that, what it means, and through our faith and trust believe all God’s works and intentions are only Good and Blessing toward us, even in something that seems to exclude and seem as if it is “not” grace? All of us have a very small picture of the whole.

Here is what the Lord says on the last page of the New Testament, Rev 22:10-15:

“And he saith unto me, Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book: for the time is at hand. He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.”

Every time I read that, I believe it. I do not know what it all means, or what forms the working out of all that will take. But I know it is something that is more than an individual message, and as I see it, it is the final outworking, the revelation, the “shout it from the housetop” extravaganza for the end of the age or transition from one realm for another. What happens in that all revealing moment, is that everything in the universe and all creation will be fully revealed in crystal clarity what it is. That is what it means when it says “to every man according as his work shall be.” From God and His highest host to the most lowly of created creatures, everything will become fully what it is and stand in its own principle.

As I said in the beginning, I have been mulling this question for a long time. It was not so much that I was being tempted by the idea – I actually never was – but that was I waiting for things to become clear in me so I could articulate it. It stayed in the “mulling over” state for quite a while, as I was reading this and that and doing other things. But a big piece of the puzzle, of why this current wave of universalism has been disturbing to me, fell into place just a few weeks ago.

More and more people I am hearing about or running into who are “pushing” universal salvation, are coming to the conclusion that their problem has been the scriptures themselves – intimating that all scripture is not inspired, or, not “God’s word.” I am hearing about it a lot. And then I remembered from a few years before, how someone I knew who was sharing universal salvation plainly told me that “everything in the New Testament is not inspired.”

“How do you know what is?” I asked.

He just “knew,” he said.

Another sledge hammer! BOINK!!

I’m really pretty thick-headed, so it takes those sledge hammers sometimes. Like Newton with the apple, I saw a pattern! And it greatly disturbed me? Why would they need to disparage the scriptures, to prove their point? Why are the scriptures under attack? Who would do that?

Recently, I found a blog that portrayed itself a “grace universalist” page, never been there before, and read through some of the blog discussion. As circumstances would have it, I happened in on a session where they were discussing the scriptures. Two men were having a discussion on the very topic I just mentioned, whether the scriptures are inspired or not, or whether some are and some are not, or partially inspired, how one could tell the difference, and making fun of people who they called something like “scripture zombies,” because those people just believe everything that is written there. Ha ha.

I could not believe what I was reading. I might have expected a discussion like that from non-believers. I used to think like that myself. I cannot say they are not born again, because we are born again because we “received Him,” and not necessarily “the Book.” The Book is not our savior. Oh, but to my mind, they were so greatly mistaken, and everything they were saying was just good old fashioned unbelief, in the guise of being more righteous and loving than the “God” portrayed in scripture.

I’m not kidding. Some of the writings I see, portray “a God who would send people to eternal hell,” (their words, not mine nor the Bible’s) to be more like the SS Officer who greeted the Jews when they got off the train at Auschwitz. He just arbitrarily selected some on the spot for one line – to the showers, and the others he pointed to the other line, which meant they might at least live another day. They portray “a God who would send people to eternal hell” as a MONSTER! That is quite an indictment!

I am not easily offended. But this offends me. No need to explain it.

What of this mysterious thing, this book, this Bible I have been quoting and referencing in this whole discussion? In a sense, it defies description. There are a few passages in which the book seems to announce its own worth and necessity, but even without those passages, the book stands on its own. I know what it is to me, and that was settled long ago, and I have no need to address that question for myself again.

The question is, what is it to you? I don’t use words like inerrant or infallible. That’s just more human reason. No, I use words like Light and Treasure. About gold and precious jewels of the Spirit, that shine off its pages. About things hidden from the wise and prudent, but revealed unto babes. I’m talking about a miracle, if you see it. If you have seen the wonder and miraculous quality of this book, you know! No matter how much the scholars take it apart and explain it away, to those with eyes that see, the story told from Genesis to Revelation, with numerous authors with probably different viewpoints and theologies, is one continuous thread of redemption and restoration, one complete story, that no “plan” of man could have pulled off, since it was put together over a thousand or two years and no visible “master plan.” As I said, to the eyes that see, it all fits, it all works, and it is all leading to one end, and kings, priests and prophets of old longed to know and see what we are given through grace and mercy and love to see right now in our midst. Let us not be ignorant of the time of our visitation – as many were ignorant in their time.

We really cannot define the Bible in a human way. When we attempt to take it apart like that, we end up with textual criticism, contradictions, two Isaiahs, synoptic gospels which all had Document A common, Documents B and C which somehow amalgamated together and came out as Matthew, Mark and Luke, and a whole bunch of other surface unimportant information that just tickles the intellect. Men can be proud they know such things, and pat each other on the back and give each other awards and accolades for their great learning and scholarship, except that knowing and thinking too much of those things, tends not to lead to faith, but just good old-fashioned unbelief. I have no problem with scholarship. But scholarship that leads to unbelief I would throw out the window.

Here is a question I’ll throw out. Has anyone ever had a discussion with a non-believer, trying to get them to see the Bible as “God’s word?” If so, were you successful? Did they take your word? I haven’t “argued” about the inspiration of the Bible with anyone in decades, because I learned early on it did not do any good. One must see and understand for oneself. So I certainly wasn’t going to challenge that discussion on that blog, coming as I do from my “scripture zombie” viewpoint.

Now, I am not a person who believes “the Bible” is part of the Trinity. I might have been a “thumper” years ago, but those days are long past. I am one of those who for the past three plus decades have been saying the scriptures are pointers to the Real, but not the Real themselves. I have also said that “scripture reading” is not something we do to gain favor or think if we have done so much scripture reading God will give us spiritual brownie points. It must take a living root in us. Now, if I have given anyone the impression I disregard or have no use for scripture (I don’t see how I could, seeing every piece of writing is littered with it), I apologize. There is no “law” which says one must read one’s Bible on a daily basis. However, never one time have I even hinted we should toss it out altogether, or chop out parts of it we do not like or agree with. Without even thinking about it, it just being what has occurred with me and the Book over the years, I have seen the truth of Paul’s word to Timothy, in my own life:

“But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” (2 Tim 3:14-17).

I take this one seriously, too. God gave us the scriptures in order to communicate to us through words. In the Fall, in a sense we fell out of the “unified WORD,” and into the chaos of “words” – Babel! And anyone whose business is with “words,” knows what a miasma that can be. When we first come to scripture as beginners, it’s all just a bunch of words, that we may read over and over and over, with little understanding or seeing how it all fits together. We get little bits to start out usually. But as we go, the little bits join with other little bits, and we begin to see certain “understandings” take form and we begin to see patterns in scripture that play out in life. Without directly realizing it, the Spirit is using the words of scripture to build Christ’s building in us.

Taken in the “natural,” it is confusing and preposterous to the modern technological-oriented man, still appreciated as “world literature,” but placed in the category with all the world’s other “religious myths.” Even the more liberal “Christians” think of it like that. But when the Spirit communicates Christ to you through words of scripture, it surpasses every aspect of the wisdom of men and their ideas. There is no ability to appreciate or understand the scriptures without the Spirit. But in the Spirit, there is no reason to fear the scriptures, because they testify of our sonship in Christ! And the scriptures communicate these specific things of God to us that can come in no other way, except words, because for now, until everything is finally restored, by God’s purpose we are still in the “weak and beggarly elements” of this world and still have to live, give and receive in the way of this world – using words.

It is wonderful to find God in nature, in sunsets at the Pacific Ocean, big sky at night in the Rocky Mountains, since all those things testify to the glory of God. As the Psalmist said, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork.” (Ps 19:1). And I do not deny one could meet God in that way. I have many times. But God has not chosen to plainly display the specifics of the need of our salvation, and the outworking of His overall desire to manifest the Son through the Sons, fully through nature alone. Trees and valleys are beautiful and truly do speak of God in every sight and breeze, but they do not give the story of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of Saul and David, Solomon, of Elijah or Elisha, nor even John the Baptist or Jesus Christ. People may think those are just children’s stories, or morality plays, but in these simple stories are the full realization of Christ in us, the Fall and its ramifications, the extent to which Christ goes for us, and even the realization that He is our inner life. We learn all those things from the stories and writings we call scripture, and there is no other source where we can find them.

These are the things that put the HUMANITY in our understanding. God didn’t just send down a correct theology for us all to acknowledge, and that be that. God came in Jesus Christ and WAS the TRUTH He came to give us. He came in a human body like ours, and felt everything we feel, thought everything we think, and was tempted to sin just like everyone else. God had to communicate all that, and much much more, using men’s words. And the scripture is the one and only perfect communicator of that.

Still, there is no law one “must” read and/or teach the scriptures. I would just give one caveat to that. If one decides he has a “new revelation” that, in order to be proven or seen as true, the scriptures as they have come down to us from the forefathers must be negated, discredited, or thrown out, then I think that one probably might find himself in the category of Paul’s word to Timothy:

“These things [sound doctrine] teach and exhort. If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness; He is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself.” (1 Tim 6: 2c-5)

Or worse, this one:

“Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” (2 Tim 4: 2-4).

Going back to that site I mentioned earlier, the “how much of the Bible is inspired and how much is not” discussion is simply reflective of things I see on a daily basis. I suppose it was interesting chatter, but to me it was just a bunch of intellectual mind-tickling completely devoid of faith, and I took the advice in Proverbs 14:7 – “Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not in him the lips of knowledge.” I have nothing to discuss with those men. It struck me how they held in their hands the most precious “physical” thing in the world. Over the centuries men and women died for the sake of getting it into the hands of common people in their own language. In parts of the world today the greatest gift one can give is a Bible, because it is forbidden and suppressed, even unlawful to possess it, in some places. Why would anyone denigrate it so?

Yes, the Bible is not God, but I will testify that to me it has been God’s perfect purposed communication to us through the fog of the deception that binds us hard and fast in the prison of our own self-godhood. It is not the Treasure itself, but for certain it is the only right and perfect and True pointer to the Real Treasure that can be put into words in a form men can understand. But those folks seemed to regard the scriptures as a cow would regard a piece of gold if you threw him a piece. What’s gold to a cow?

Do I seem harsh? Let me tell you, this is throwing out the money-changers times! We come with a refiner’s fire. Take these things hence! Make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise! As it is written, ‘The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up!’

END OF PART THREE