'We love because he first loved us.'
1 John 4:19 NIV
Misunderstood your question here apparently. I thought you were referring to "us" as humans, I don't put God in the us category. Either way you'll never find anything I said to dispute the above verse.
So everyone is going to hell?
Now it must be your turn to misunderstand me. Where and how would you draw this conclusion? The Bible applies to everyone and the same Grace and Love that I receive can be applied to everyone. There are just those who choose not to receive it and believe in other religions or are atheists.
Now I don't think that anyone defies God and gets away with it.
Really?? So what happens when we sin? What about the wicked men in history who prospered and continue to prosper? Many of them lived full lives such as Stalin who committed 20 million times the murders of Cain. God is a free will God.From
Strong's:
`iyr -- pronounced: eer or (in the plural) `ar awr; or `ayar (Judg. 10:4) aw-yar' from 5782 a city (a place guarded by waking or a watch) in the widest sense (even of a mere encampment or post): KJV -- Ai (from margin), city, court (from margin), town.
Doesn't sound like a little village or settlement to me.
Obviously not. He evidently thought he could do what is wrong but still be acceptable. That is an extremely common characteristic of humanity, as are anger and jealousy of those who
are accepted.
Now who's doing the inventing? There is no room to question what God has laid about before Cain. Abel had no trouble getting it right because his heart was right with God. Cain's failure to please God was not just a result of a little laziness. To say so would be absurd given what God said to Cain.
If God had a master plan that involved Cain flourishing, why did He tell him that he was banished?
This is where you have apply a little common sense with all due respect. Cain was banished from being around Adam and his family for obvious reasons.
One cannot base theology on mere names. Theology is based on events and principles, names being unofficial confirmation
in some instances. Many Hebrew names are completely neutral and without any significance, and this one, having three quite different meanings, must be likely to be one of them. One certainly cannot use it as formal evidence of anything.
This is something you do in every post pointer and I really grow tired of it because it's not the action of someone who wants to teach and instruct. You carp out every little point that you don't agree with even if you do happen to fundamentally agree with someone (such as you demonstrated in other threads).I'm not basing this on names alone, you have to look at the overall picture. You chide me on inventing this yet you make more assumptions than I do about Cain.Look up the Kenites and you'll find them named throughout the OT after the flood. Kenite means "sons of Cain" which means they are from his line.In Genesis 3:16, the word used for the seed of Eve and of the serpent is the same word. It's the very same word used in Genesis 22:17 which describes the very physical seed of Abraham.Now, let's go to
Numbers 33:51-55:
Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye are passed over Jordan into the land of Canaan; Then ye shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, and destroy all their pictures, and destroy all their molten images, and quite pluck down all their high places:And ye shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein: for I have given you the land to possess it. And ye shall divide the land by lot for an inheritance among your families: and to the more ye shall give the more inheritance, and to the fewer ye shall give the less inheritance: every man's inheritance shall be in the place where his lot falleth; according to the tribes of your fathers ye shall inherit. But if ye will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you; then it shall come to pass, that those which ye let remain of them shall be pricks in your eyes, and thorns in your sides, and shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell. Moreover it shall come to pass, that I shall do unto you, as I thought to do unto them.Where do you think the name Canaan came from? Wait! Once again Cain (and his offspring) do something to go against God! Imagine that. He tries to settle into the land that God gives to His people of Israel.It continues on, though. Let's jump to the New Testament now just in case you're one of those who thinks the Old belongs only to the Jews. However, in closing for the OT, let me point out that Cain
is not listed in Adam's geneaology of Genesis 5. That's a bit strange, if following your hypothesis, Cain was later allowed to prosper and do well because of God's mercy.Matthew 13 again confirms the existence of the line of Cain. On the surface, it talks about the the good and bad seed which many people regard as spiritual. However, the Greek word used is
sperma, which is where we draw our word sperm from. Just is in many other passages, there's some more going on here.
Matthew13:38-39The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels.Moving right along to John:
John 8:43-44Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.I John 3:8-12He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous.Not his own works were slack, but because they were evil!
That is not only circular argument again, it is a contradiction of Scripture, which states that God made everything and everyone.There is no evidence whatever for alleging that Cain and his descendants were a 'race apart'. Even the churches were warned not to be like Cain. We are all just a hair's breadth from being like Cain when he killed Abel, if we are not actually like him (and most people, on the broad road to destruction, are like him). The Lord's people must be ever watchful, testing themselves, daily imv.
Salvation is open to all, including the Kenites. As it stands, there is only one condemned to the pit and that is the Son of Perdition and the Angel of the Bottomless pit otherwise known as Satan. It's not in any way a contradiction of Scripture as you are trying very hard to make it by inserting your own words and assumptions to what I post. God created Satan did he not? God created everything. I've never stated otherwise.The whole purpose of knowing about the Kenites is that there is a whole lot of deceit out there. It doesn't change my salvation with the Lord and it certainly doesn't change the availability of it in any way. It simply acknowledges that there those out there who do more than sin in negligence, they actively work against God and his wonderful message.