i was just watching msnbc a few minutes ago and caught a show about "the gospel of inclusion", an idea spearheaded by carlton pearson.

the general idea is that "hell" is actually on earth, not a lake of fire. also, everyone is saved by christ already, whether they choose to believe him or not. we all go to heaven when we die.

just curious about everyones ideas on this concept. thoughts? know anything that supports or contradicts these claims?

This is kinda what I believe, we all go to the afterlife.
However I believe there is importance to our learning how to grow spiritually before our material death, akin to us developing in our cocoons (in this earthly life) and emerging as beautiful butterflies (once we shed our bonds). Nourishment for the spirit is vital. Attachment to earthly things causes more strain once in the afterlife. We become spiritual beings after death and materialistic wants and needs are shed as well, so if you are mostly a materialistic person, most of "you" is shed, leaving what little amount of spirit to exist.

Ways of growing spiritually: Meditate, Pray to God for knowledge and inspiration. Shed as much materialism as possible, treat your work as worship (or hobby, be creative) Help others, respect each persons faith and allow others to grow in their faith. (to me faith is a personal thing between you and God) Shine what spirituality you can in this world, we are all mirrors that can reflect the light of God (shine up your mirror!).

For those who are atheist, be a good person (although I hope something happens to change your mind) Remember energy is never destroyed, so your energy converts... make it good energy.

Thanks for the post Skim Milky

Eww I don't like it. Everyone is forced to be a Christian regardless if they want to be or not. Everyone is forced to live with God even if they don't love Him. No choice at all, we are all robots.

I can think of so many scriptures that are opposed to this.

I like some of the ideas of the Gospel of Inclusion. Pearson's views on homosexuality, for example, is a lot closer to biblical understanding than it is to many modern Christian views. I remember reading about what changed his opinion. He was preaching on how homosexuality was a sin and that any practicing homosexuals were not welcome in his church. He then thought back to all the times that he had counseled the people in his church who had had premarital sex, had committed adultery with their spouses, and those who were single and struggled with the sin of pornography. Yet all these people were still welcome to attend church. He then moved from there into an all-encompassing doctrine of inclusion which allowed homosexuals to attend.

Biblically speaking, this is very correct and wise. I think it is a shame that modern society has turned homosexuality into something different than any number of other sins. Pearson has the right idea here.

HOWEVER...... and as I see it, unfortunately..... he took the gospel of inclusion too far, to the point that all people whether repentant or not, are saved. While a nice sentiment, that would seem to deny other parts of the Bible. What would be the point of living according to the Bible when I can live exactly the opposite and have the same result? I could give up worshipping God to devote more time to earning money and worldly pleasures. I could give up the edict to abstain from sex until marriage and be in exactly the same boat as someone who sees sanctity in sexual relations.

The Gospel of Inclusion is a step in the right direction. Much of Christianity has a wrong view of many sins (homosexuality, for example), and while the Gospel of Inclusion moves to address this issue, it takes things too far the other side. That's what I see about it, at least.

~ Regards, PA

I agree with Magnatude about how we're all going to the after life, but I also agree with Llucid about not liking the whole christianity thing. I know it's just my opinion, but I really don't want to have my beliefs chosen for me, so that I have to follow a religion that is filled with so much hate. I get sick to my stomach any time I listen to the speechs given about how certain groups of people are evil just for being born that way. I even saw this one guy who's getting teenagers to wage a war on pop culture (I saw it on CNN) and he called them his "Christian Soldiers". I work part time in a video game store and there's a game named "Left Behind" which is created by christians, and in the game, you can kill people if they oppose you and all you have to do is pray to be saved. That just seems so so so wrong to me. I think Jesus had some good ideas but I really think religion has perverted them, and if the Gospel of Inclusion says that I'm christian no matter what, well I'd rather be excluded.

The lake of fire being eternal hell concept is a roman-catholic concept, not a general christian concept. Yet many christian-debunkers always seems to rant on about hell.

The real Jewish afterlife is Sheol which has a duality about it.

Years ago I worked with a man who wrote "Is Hell a place of eternal torment for the wicked", this booklet is available from Christian Family Fellowship in Ohio. The premise is similar to what Carlton is onto but the work s backed with analytical usages of the greek words used for "Hell".

Today, many view Jesus as a "fire escape from hell" and that is not the concept of "salvation". It means he came to reconcile a spiritual rift that was created long ago. Because God is a Spirit, that spirit in mankind had to be awakened to it in order to have fellowship.

How would there be justice in torturing people for ever and ever in a place like the mythical hell? The punishment would far out weigh the crime by far. I think the un-biblical concept of hell is truly a fear motivated form of control and has nothing to do with the gospel at all.

What is so very wrong with "accept them all and let God sort 'em out"? I have never thought it was a church leaders role to judge his parishoners, I thought according to biblical thinking only god had that job. Seems very reasonable to me that to include everyone and not judge only support, and give councel to is the job of a minister, not deciding who is wrong and which things they did are wrong in the eyes of god. Seems like those that are going to church yet doing things they aren't supposed are the ones that god would want there the most...

(ps I'm a pagan and don't attend church but I'd probably attend a tolerant one if asked by a friend or family member who attended , while if asked to a different one, um no thanks...)

My only issue with a "Gospel of Inclusion" is that it will likely spread and grow and become ridiculous eventually. It seems whenever someone comes up with a good idea like this, it always degrades into foolishness. Next thing you know, "Hey, murderers, rapists, whatever you are, come on over, we don't care" becomes the mantra. It just defeats the purpose and enables and condones what we consider "bad" behavior. Sure, accepting homosexuals, convicted felons, etc. is fine, but I don't want to go to church with a pedophile and a practicing cannibal just because of this "Gospel of Inclusion". It defeats the purpose of religion. What compels someone to be a good human and citizen if there is no consequence to someones actions? What purpose does this church serve if there is no moral compass? I would say good idea in principle, but would be leery of it becoming a haven for lost souls seeking absolution without stopping what they are seeking absolution for.

I had a friend ages ago that became "born-again". He explained to me it was great because no matter what he did, all he had to do was repent and Jesus would forgive him. I was like "Dude, that doesn't mean you have a free ticket. You can't go out and sin, thinking all the while that it's OK because Sunday morning you can go ask forgiveness at church. Willfully committing a sin is wrong, period."

In its simplest form, there is absolutely nothing wrong with saying "accept them all". That is what Christianity is about. There is nothing wrong with accepting people and letting God be the Judge. That is what Christians are called to do. We are not called to Judge, not called to condemn other people based on how they live. And it is certainly not how a church leader or a pastor should act.

However, the Gospel of Inclusion doesn't do this alone. It takes it a step further and decrees that all people regardless of actions are saved. It makes the step from accepting people for being who they are, to accepting the way the act and behave. There is no concept of "let God sort 'em out" (as you put it) in the Gospel of Inclusion. According to the Gospel of Inclusion, all people are saved regardless, and therefore God doesn't have to sort anything out at all.

I don't want to turn this into an argument, but the point that I was making in my previous post is that there is a difference between accepting a person, and accepting the acts that a person commits. While Christians are called to do one but not the other, the Gospel of Inclusion makes no such distinction and accepts all. An unrepentant murderer or rapist or pedophile is saved in the Gospel of Inclusion, just as much as the dedicated Christian. Many churches do make the unfortunate mistake of judging and condemning its members for some particular sin or other. The Gospel of Inclusion does not, but neither does it take a stand and speak out against sin in all its many and varied forms.

I hope that helps with the distinction between the two.

~ Regards, PA

That's exactly what the Gospel of Inclusion suggests. All people - whether Christian or not, whether repentant or not - are saved and are welcomed in the Gospel of Inclusion.

I agree. Many Christians do believe that they can act however they want, as long as they "say sorry" afterwards. For any who think that this is so, I would point them to Romans 6 (among other passages). How can someone who has committed their life to Christ live a life of sin? By giving ourselves to Christ we have become slaves to righteousness, how can we still remain slaves to sin? (Romans 6:17-18).

The Gospel of Inclusion takes it beyond this though. It doesn't matter whether you repent or not. A person doesn't need to say sorry, or even care whether they sin. All people have been forgiven, regardless of what they do or how they act.

As I said, it addresses some of the issues that plague many sects of Christianity. But it takes things too far......

what do you mean weight? As if crime and punishment have a mass.

A fitting punishment is that which satisfies the anger of the judge or jury or whoever decides. Or one that follows what is writen in some law. All depending on how the legal system is arranged. Justice means satisfying revenge.

Then I suppose 25 years for steeling 3 Disney films is justice too. I certainly hope it satisfied the anger of the judge. Certainly got his "revenge", eh? That kind of of crap must have the Taliban laughing their a.... off.

If people do a bad thing again when they obviously shouldn't, then who can say they are to blame? Maybe it's those who know who they are who are to blame for not doing a very good job

Every legal system is devised to bring satisfaction to a certain society

In US, cannibalism has a fitting punishment of death penalty, and in some tribes it is honor.

You see a pattern? Justice is relative.

In truth, punishment is just two acts of violence in a row.

In that case I suppose the "b......" got what he deserved. May he rot in hell for those 3 Disney films.

Get well NW

and you get smart

the guys arguement, and i should have wrote this and it actually makes sense, is that these scriptures are representive of the tyranny of the times. that the ancients maniplulated the scripturesto scare people into believing.

i agree with pretty much all that youve said. but if werer already saved, theres no incentive to live righteously.

I'll try, NW. Do you think the people behind the 3rd offence law will do the same?

a christian game where you kill people?

Actually I'd rather describe it as times of "martial law", where the world didn't have the privileges of higher spirituality (unless you chose to isolate yourself somewhere and become a mystic). World was as it was, it was full of opression, violence, and divine authorities worked with it. If they made Jews so much different from the rest of the world, they would probably disappear of the face of the earth. Just because Jews were allowed to have slaves, doesn't mean it is the divine principle. It is just something that was granted considering the times.
Just as today's government grands the right of promiscuity, but that doesn't mean the social ideal is for everyone to be as such.

Lol, that's a gross but clever gif, Skim Milky. ...I'm lactose intolerant.

I don't know, and don't care much for laws and courts, I just hope I don't get in their way, that's all

And yet others do, NW

get in their way? Or care for them?

Get in their way

yea, they do, but what are you trying to say with that?

Let's not get to philosophical about the whole thing NW, Let's just forget all about them

i dont even like skim milk. i really hate butter milk.

back on topic, part of me feels like "great, the loved ones who were good people but didnt love christ are in heaven."

but that would mean that hitler and stalin and nero had the same eternal destiny that i do.

Sorry, I got caught up with other parts of the forum, it slipped my mind to check this one. Yes, actually there is a game based on the book series "Left Behind" which is about the rapture. The game is named "Left Behind: Eternal Forces" and here's a decent overview of it:
Good Old Wiki Site

Working at a video game store, I am constantly looking at the games we have so I can better sell them to people. When this game first came in, I couldn't believe it was made. The point of the game is to convert people and if they don't convert, it's ok to kill them.

(and just for the people who don't like wikipedia here's a site that seems to be pro religious where they talk about the converting or killing as well: Game review

:-/ It just seems wrong.

^I've actually wanted to get Eternal Forces for quite some time, just for a laugh. It'd be quite funny to see a "Christian" game where you kill people.

But you just can't get those games in Australia. When our church runs LAN days, we all bring our PC's and hook them up together, we're much happier playing Half-life or CounterStrike or StarCraft or Call of Duty or Quake 4

I have that game. You can kill people if you want, but it generally makes you fail the mission. The only type of accepted offense is prayer. You pray for the enemy (among other actions) and this raises their spirit level. Once their spirit level is high enough, you can recruit them to your side. Saying that it's a Christian game where you kill people who are against you is not accurate.

(I haven't played it alot, and I didn't get all that far in it, but there are missions where you have 'army' units. From what I know, these units are for protection, and are used to kill when defending against enemy 'army' units that are attacking)

Edit: my bad. now that I think about it prayer is a defense thing. the offense abilities are things like ministering with music and witnessing to people.

When you buy the game, you get a 'gold' key for your full version and then several 'silver' keys that you can give to people so they can download the game off the internet and try out a sample version of it. If you are interested send me a PM and I can hook you up with a silver key. I'm sure I can find them around here somewhere.

I always wanted to know if it's true that if you kill someone in the game, if you pray, then you can be redeemed, because that was the impression I got from the box.

Well prayer just effects your spirit level. Every unit in the game has a spirit level. I don't remember the exact numbers, but if your spirit was > 50 you were on the good side. If it was < 50 but > -50 you were neutral (these are the automated units that just walk around the city not on either side) and if it was < -50 you were on the bad side. If memory serves, all the main missions I played you weren't allowed to kill anyone. This made things really hard because you had all these evil units trying to kill you and you basically had to run or have music players sing within range of them to raise their spirit level. If a unit went above -50 or below 50 they automatically become neutral. You lose your units if this happens to you, and the enemy loses theirs if it happens to them. Most missions if you killed someone, you automatically lose. I think there were a few of the earlier missions that you could kill the people attacking you, but if you did it was quiet a blow to your spirit level. If a main character's spirit level went below 50, you automatically lose.

To say that you try to convert people and then kill them if you don't is not true. Anyone in the game is convertable (as far as I saw) and you didn't want to kill them because if you kept raising their spirit level, you could convert them to your side.

Another thing I want to point out is the role of 'killing' in the Left Behind world. The story takes place after the Rapture and the Antichrist is ruling the world. In the Left Behind story (the latter part where the killing takes place), Christianity (as well as other religions that weren't 'accepted') is outlawed so all the Christians are having to 'live off the grid' so to speak. If they are caught meeting, or they didn't have the 'Mark of the Beast', they were killed. In the books there are Christians who kill, but this is because they are defending themselves and running for their lives. Everytime a character killed, it was a pretty big deal and it was very traumatic for the person.

[quote name='Llucid' post='1887381' date='Sep 15 2007, 03:18 AM']Well prayer just effects your spirit level. Every unit in the game has a spirit level. I don't remember the exact numbers, but if your spirit was > 50 you were on the good side. If it was < 50 but > -50 you were neutral (these are the automated units that just walk around the city not on either side) and if it was < -50 you were on the bad side. If memory serves, all the main missions I played you weren't allowed to kill anyone. This made things really hard because you had all these evil units trying to kill you and you basically had to run or have music players sing within range of them to raise their spirit level. If a unit went above -50 or below 50 they automatically become neutral. You lose your units if this happens to you, and the enemy loses theirs if it happens to them. Most missions if you killed someone, you automatically lose. I think there were a few of the earlier missions that you could kill the people attacking you, but if you did it was quiet a blow to your spirit level. If a main character's spirit level went below 50, you automatically lose.
quote]

Thank you for your explination, but I just want to simplify it a little bit. Basically, if you kill someone, you lose your spirit level. If you pray you gain spirit level. So, if your spirit level was high enough to begin with (so it wouldn't automatically go away, which I'm assuming as you go through levels, it would increase), if you killed someone, you could pray to bring it back up, right? I'm just trying to make sure I've got it.

Thank you very much for all the explinations so far. :-)

Yep, you got it. If you are allowed to kill and you do, but don't automatically fail because you went below 50 spirit, then you can pray to raise your spirit level back up. (like I said, though, I'm unsure of the exact numbers. I think it's around 50)

Llucid, thank you again. I hope you didn't think I was attacking you, I just wanted to make sure I understood that game correctly.

Peace.

Nah, I never thought that at all. Always happy to oblige!

What if that is just how it is? Your complaint with Hitler, Stalin, and Nero is that they behaved badly in space and time. Perhaps that counts less in determining eternal destiny than you might at first think.

Among Tibetan Buddhists, for example, everybody without exception is offered the "clear white light," their notion of the good destiny, immediately upon dying. You step through or you do not, and nothing else matters. If there is "justice" in the option, then it comes down to whether or not a certain kind of person is more or less likely than another to make "the right choice" when their time comes.

What about the Christian hard case, Judas? A betrayer, a suicide (a mortal sinner, if that is how you do you your accounting), and yet ... if no Judas, then no fulfilment of the prophecies, no crucifixion perhaps. He served his god, effectively if not faithfully. Would God really punish him for that?

Obviously, I am not saying that I believe that Hitler, Stalin, or Nero played any constructive role in human affairs. When they strutted about on the world stage, then godspeed to anyone who might have frustrated any part of their activities. God bless anyone who tried, and died for it.

But from the perspective of eternity? I have a heady thought for you, my Chrisitian friend. What if being a devotee of God requires you to think like a god?

This sounds like the arguement, 'If it brings glory to God to give us grace, and the more sin there is the more grace there is, then doesn't sinning bring glory to God?'

Just because God uses the actions of men to further His plan does not mean that men is justified in doing it.

Thank you. Llucid.

Allow me to be clearer. There was no argument on behalf of sin in my post. Surely not any argument that Hitler, Stalin, or Nero brought glory to God. Nor, with respect to Judas, was I saying that he was "justified" in betraying his friend and in killing himself.

From a human perspective, these are atrocious things, and worthy of censure.

My questions centered on what the eternal perspective on these things might be. In thinking about that, while I am no Christian, I would wonder about the applicability of principles like hate the sin while loving the sinner and judge not, lest you be judged.

The "heady thought" of my closing pargraph was not an exhortation that Skim Milky substitute his judgment for his God's, which Skim Milky would take as blasphemy. But, if the Catholics' venerable Baltimore Cathecism speaks in any way for Christians generally, and the purpose of a Christian's life is to know, love, and serve God - well, maybe a start in that direction would be to consider that some things might look different to God than to human eyes.

It sounds like from your posts that you have never been in a situation where you needed the justice system.

The day may come when you are actually grateful for their services.

Yea, the winner takes it all

I am a Pagan I don't want to be in your Gospel of Inclusion. I don't want to go to your heaven. Jesus can't save me cause I don't believe in him. I don't general go to a church unless there is something going on that involves my son or his wife. If you put Darkwind in your little game you will have to kill him because he is not going to convert.

maybe hell is temporary?

i dont think we can understand gods rationale, because of our limitations of the human experience. but for the sake of arguement ill play along.

as bad as i hate to say it, i would send some people to a deserving lake of fire. thats harsh, but some people truly deserve it. but it wouldnt be fore eternity.

i think we had alll better be glad im not god, because my human nature would screw it up.

GOVOLS! BEAT THE GATORS!

chill out man, its just for the sake of arguement.

see though, this is anotehr good point. some people dont want anything to do with god and quite literally spit in his face. why should they reap the benefits?