Eternity: Part 4

"Does God Get What God Wants?", Chapter 4 of Love Wins: Part 2

Note: This is a continuation of the previous post.

Bell next quotes from Zephaniah 3, "Then I will purify the lips of the peoples, that all of them may call on the name of the LORD and serve him shoulder to shoulder." This is a fair translation of the Hebrew, but has the problem of not being quite clear to English readers. Zeph. 3:9, "Know for sure that I will then enable the nations to give me acceptable praise. All of them will invoke the Lord’s name when they pray, and will worship him in unison" (NET). But when are the nations going to be so enabled? If we look at verse 8, we find that it is after the God has poured out His anger on them: "'Therefore you must wait patiently for me,' says the Lord, 'for the day when I attack and take plunder. I have decided to gather nations together and assemble kingdoms, so I can pour out my fury on them –  all my raging anger. For the whole earth will be consumed by my fiery anger'" (NET).

So, the nations will be judged, before they are enabled to bring acceptable praise to God. However, just because Nations are going to be made acceptable before God in the future, it does not likewise indicate that all the people of those Nations will be Saved. Zeph. 3:11-12, "In that day you will not be ashamed of all your rebelliousness against me, for then I will remove from your midst those who proudly boast, and you will never again be arrogant on my holy hill. I will leave in your midst a humble and meek group of people, and they will find safety in the Lord’s presence" (NET, bold added). Here, God has moved from speaking of the Nations to speaking to Jerusalem. In this future time, there are some that will be removed from Jerusalem. There is no indication that these will later be redeemed. Judgment and redemption of Nations is accompanied by judgment upon Individuals. However, while Nations can be restored after such a judgment, it does not likewise mean that all the individuals of the Nations will also be restored. After all, when Jerusalem was rebuilt after the Babylonian Captivity, it was peopled not with the people who had died, but with living people who returned. And, not all that had been Exiled returned. So, while Jerusalem was restored (or redeemed, as we may consider it) not all of its people were restored (or redeemed). Thus, a punished Nation can be redeemed without all of its people, who may have died in their sins, being redeemed as well. This also leaves open the possibility of a Nation or City not being redeemed, while some of its people may be.

Now, Bell moves to Phil. 2, "Every knee should bow … and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is LORD, to the glory of God the Father." While reading this, you should realize that the ellipsis (the …) is not in the verse from Philippians 2, here, it means that something was left out. When properly used, the ellipsis allows an author to leave out some of a quote, while still retaining the gist. This passage reads, "so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow – in heaven and on earth and under the earth – and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father" (NET Phil. 2:10-11). Now, since every includes those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, the ellipsis is used properly.* However, as was addressed in the last post, not all belief is equal. Just acknowledging that Jesus Christ is Lord is not the same as accepting Him as Savior. Nor does Scripture teach that we will have a chance to accept Him as Savior after death. Thus, the acknowledgment of this truth does not likewise have to indicate Salvation.

Ps. 22 can be dealt with in a similar way to some of the other passages we saw before. Let us move on to some of Bell's own words. "This insistence that God will be united and reconciled with all people is a theme the writers and prophets return to again and again. They are very specific in their beliefs about who God is and what God is doing in the world, constantly affirming the simple fact that God does not fail." (p. 99, Kindle edition.) Here, we do not need to debate the second sentence at all. We would only disagree with Bell as to what this pertains to. The first sentence is another story.

Nowhere in the Bible does it say that people who have died in their sins can later be reconciled to God. As we saw before, Nations and Cities and even Peoples can be reconciled to God, without every historic member of the group being so. Also, as we saw, while everyone will in time acknowledge that Jesus is Lord, this does not equate to everyone being united and reconciled to God. Yet, it is this that Bell wants to show.

Bell is about to deal with some of the church father's next, beginning around page 107 of the Kindle version. This will take some additional thought and research, so I will hold off on that for now.

* It is always a good idea to check out what an ellipsis is replacing. Just in case.

A Lesser Son of the King

Copyright RL