Questions about the Fall - The consequences shell game

[Button]

--- PARODY ---

The Fall revisited

God: What is this thing you have done?
Adam: She made me do it.
God: What say you?
Eve: The serpent made me do it.
God: You will have great pain in childbirth.
Eve: That wasn't the original consequence.
God: You will eat by the sweat of your brow.
Adam: That wasn't the original consequence.
God: On your belly you will go, eating dust.
Serpent: Hey, leave me out of this.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The story of the Fall of humankind in Genesis chapter three begs a few questions.
Actually, starting in Genesis chapter two with the consequences stated to Adam.
"But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:
for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." - Genesis 2:17 KJV

Seems pretty straight forward. In the day you eat thereof you will surely die. Dead.
Adam had no questions about this, but what did it mean to him? Did he understand death?
And even more confusing is what happened when he ate thereof. In that day he did not die.
Not physically anyway.

And where did all the other consequences come from? Not part of the original deal.
- For Eve: You will have great pain in childbirth. Your husband will rule over you.
- For Adam: You will eat by the sweat of your brow. Thistles and thorns.
- For the Serpent: On your belly you will go, eating dust.
- For A&E: Banished from the garden.

None of these consequences were in the original warning given to Adam.
Which Adam passed on to his wife Eve, adding the bit about not touching.

--- PARODY ---

Serpent: Did God really say... ?
Eve: He said don't eat and don't touch.
Adam: Oops, my bad, I said don't touch.
Eve: What?! God didn't say that? !!!
Adam: No, I added that because I know you
like to touch things without thinking.
Eve: So, you don't trust me? !!!
Adam: I'm looking out for our best interests. My job.
Eve: I see.
Serpent: Are you going to eat, or not? !!!
Eve: Let me check with the boss. - LOL
Adam: Scram serpent!
Serpent: Hiss... (walks away dejected)
Eve: Hey, let's check out that other tree.
Adam: Good idea!

Indeed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And on top of all of these inconsistencies we have the Fall of humankind.
All we who were born in Adam's race were born sinners in need of redemption.
That much seems clear. Unless you question whether Adam was the first man.
Then things really get confusing.

At any rate, what do you make of all this?

Did the Serpent deceive A&E by lying, or by telling the truth?

The knee-jerk reaction is to claim the serpent lied. Let's give this a closer look. Genesis 2:15-17 NIV The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17...

www.christianityboard.com

Have you heard of the serpent seed doctrine?

One has to wonder,when Gocooked at all he'd made and judged it good,why so? When he'd planted one tree in the center of Edens garden that was forbidden and at the cost of their lives.

 

[Aunty Jane]

Have you heard of the serpent seed doctrine?

Would you like to elaborate?

One has to wonder,when Gocooked at all he'd made and judged it good,why so?

At the end of the creative process, God actually pronounced that everything was "very good".....what does "very good" mean to a perfect Creator?

When he'd planted one tree in the center of Edens garden that was forbidden and at the cost of their lives.

It was a small test of obedience with a large penalty attached to it. The penalty alone should have been enough to dissuade them from ever touching it....but satan took away the penalty and substituted a lie instead......one that he has managed to perpetuate with the idea of an immortal soul....a belief that permeates all false religion.....why? Because it keeps his first lie alive even when people are dead.....because he keeps them alive in the spirit realm. Depending on your religious persuasion, dead loved ones are still alive in a variety of places.

Adam was not told about an afterlife of unending torture in hell.....he was just told that he would die, and return to the dust...nothing more.

 

[Button]

Would you like to elaborate?

No.

At the end of the creative process, God actually pronounced that everything was "very good".....what does "very good" mean to a perfect Creator?

Can a perfect creator create something to be imperfect?

Is very good represented by a forbidden tree being construed as very good?

Why is knowledge of good and evil forbidden,?
How can someone without knowledge of good and evil choose obedience regarding the ultimatum between good and evil?

It was a small test of obedience with a large penalty attached to it. The penalty alone should have been enough to dissuade them from ever touching it....

How so,when they didn't know what it meant to disobey,?

but satan took away the penalty and substituted a lie instead......one that he has managed to perpetuate with the idea of an immortal soul....a belief that permeates all false religion.....why? Because it keeps his first lie alive even when people are dead.....because he keeps them alive in the spirit realm. Depending on your religious persuasion, dead loved ones are still alive in a variety of places.

You realize you're in a Christian forum,right?

Your remarks against an immortal soul makes it appear you are unaware of this.

Adam was not told about an afterlife of unending torture in hell.....he was just told that he would die, and return to the dust...nothing more.

True. As is also taught in Ecclesiastes 3:20, and Ecclesiastes 12:7.

 

[Aunty Jane]

No.

Can a perfect creator create something to be imperfect?

No...but he can give his children free will, and a way to give them a good reason not to disobey him.....God has always given his children rules to live by.....has he not? Was he asking too much? Was he causing them any hardship by preventing access to that one tree that he claimed as his own?

Is very good represented by a forbidden tree being construed as very good?

Yes, if it means that obedience will never allow evil to ever enter their lives.....evil came by disobedience...there was nothing about the tree that was poisonous.....it represented God's Sovereign right to set the limits of the freedom he allowed them. They violated the only rule he gave them, which did not cause them any deprivation whatsoever....what excuse could they have offered legitimately?

Why is knowledge of good and evil forbidden,?

Because it was not going to benefit them in any way....God wanted to keep that knowledge to himself.....for obvious reasons as experience has taught us.

How can someone without knowledge of good and evil choose obedience regarding the ultimatum between good and evil?

These were equal opposites....and it seems that when we contrast one with the other, especially as they relate to God himself, compare his goodness with its equal opposite, and see what entered the world when that knowledge was unleashed...?
Think of all the atrocities that have been committed by humans on this earth, and see why God did not want us to know evil.....

Do you have to experience evil to know that it's bad? Do you have to eat garbage to know you shouldn't?

Was God wrong to want to keep it from us? Wasn't it a loving thing to do?

How so,when they didn't know what it meant to disobey,?

Do you honestly think God would give the humans a command that they didn't understand, when it carried the death penalty? Seriously...?

You realize you're in a Christian forum,right?

Your remarks against an immortal soul makes it appear you are unaware of this.

I am fully aware of that, but I am also a keen Bible student and in my studies I came to realize that this is a false belief.
Can you provide me with a single scripture in the Bible where the words "immortal soul" appear side by side?
I invite you to provide one that I might have missed....?

If you look up the two words individually in a concordance you will see that it is impossible for a "soul" to be "immortal".
"Spirits" can be immortal but not "souls".....but souls are not spirits.

True. As is also taught in Ecclesiastes 3:20, and Ecclesiastes 12:7.

Yes, Ecclesiastes 3:18-20 makes it clear that animals are "souls" like us, and die the same death as we do....we both stop breathing and the "soul" (a living, breathing creature, as Jews understood the word) dies. (Ezek 18:4)


But in Eccl 12:7 we have to understand what Solomon's words meant to a Jew rather than how Christendom interprets it.
What is the "spirit" that "returns to God"?
The Jews held no belief in immortal souls because they believed what God had said to Adam....that he would simply die and return to the dust.
The Jews believed in resurrection, which is a return to life, not a continuation of it somewhere else.

The Bible teaches that the dead "sleep" in a virtual state of suspended animation.....death takes them out of "the land of the living" and they remain unconscious in death, temporarily out of existence, (Eccl 9:5, 10) awaiting the time when Jesus will call them out of their graves. (John 5:28-29) That is when the spirit (breath) that returned to God, is given back, so that the soul (person) lives again.

When Jesus' friend Lazarus died, where did Jesus say he was? Read John 11:11-14.
Where did all the resurrected ones in the Bible come back to? No one went to heaven before Jesus. (John 3:13)
Heaven is promised to a chosen few.....those who experience the "first resurrection"...these alone go to heaven to rule with Christ. (Rev 20:6)

All those not chosen, will have their lives restored to the earth, where God put humans in the first place. When God puts something into operation, he always completes what he started out to do. (Isa 55:11)

Why did God create us mortal humans on earth? He already had a large family in heaven.....so what is our purpose here?

 

[St. SteVen]

Again you ignore the very nature of the warning....death was understood by Adam, because he had witnessed it in nature. If death was the penalty, what does anything else matter...? As far as they knew, it could have occurred at any moment.

If Adam knew what death was and understood that eating thereof meant certain death, he wouldn't have eaten thereof.

Read ch 2 again....it’s a condensed version of ch 1.....the creation of Eve closes chapter 2....the fall had not yet taken place...there is no shame because the knowledge of evil has not yet been unleashed.

So God allowed A&E to live naked knowing it was inherently evil?
And they felt no shame?

......a knowledge of evil, invaded their thought processes, exposed the potential for it everywhere. This is what God wanted to protect them from ever experiencing....

Right, that's why the tree was placed in the center of the garden. - LOL

We cannot turn God into an all forgiving sop.....

It seems to me that forgiveness was the plan all along, not punishment.
Why have Christ die to pay the death penalty if the plan is to enforce obedience with an iron fist?
The Logos was from the beginning.

 

[Aunty Jane]

If Adam knew what death was and understood that eating thereof meant certain death, he wouldn't have eaten thereof.

Big picture StS.....he had waited a long time for her...she was created at the end of the 6th "day" but we don't know how long Adam was alone before God gave him a mate....he was given the task of naming all the creatures who shared life with him....(Gen 3:19-25) He observed that they all had mates and that he was the only creature on earth who didn't have a mate of his own, so God said..."it is not good for the man to continue alone, I will make a helper for him, as a complement of him".....(Gen 2:18)

The reason why he chose to die with her, rather than to lose her, I believe is obvious. Once she partook of the fruit, there was no going back. She would suffer the penalty, but the human race was not condemned until Adam took the fruit as well. It was the man whose sin sealed our fate, not the woman (Rom 5:12)....because the woman was deceived, but Adam wasn't....his sin was greater. Adam didn't make a mistake...he wasn't deceived....his sin was deliberate. (1 Tim 2:13-14)

So God allowed A&E to live naked knowing it was inherently evil?
And they felt no shame?

Boy, you really have a unique way to twist Scripture....
They felt no shame because they knew no evil.....once a knowledge of evil was unleashed, that is when they felt shame.
Never knowing evil would have been a blessing, but they were free willed, so God could not demand obedience, all he could do was make it a bad idea to gain knowledge that existed, but would not benefit them in any way. It would be a burden to carry.

As their Sovereign Ruler, he had the right to set the limits of their freedom in any way he chose.

Right, that's why the tree was placed in the center of the garden. - LOL

Yes...a simple test of obedience that caused them no disadvantage whatsoever. They had everything to gain by their obedience and everything to lose by their disobedience. They were not created as infants who could not be educated.....who could plead ignorance.... Adam was well educated before he became a husband. He had educated her concerning the tree....neither of them had a single excuse to disobey their God.

It seems to me that forgiveness was the plan all along, not punishment.

For Adam's children, that is correct....but for Adam and his wife...a return to the dust is all they had to look forward to in their old age.
God gave them the opportunity to fulfill their first assignment....to "fill the earth" with their children, whom he would redeem when it was time to send his Son into the world. Forgiveness is an essential part of salvation. But unless repentance comes first, no forgiveness can take place.
Acts 3:19-23...
"So repent and turn back so as to have your sins wiped out, that seasons of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord 20 and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, 21 whom heaven must receive until the times for putting into effect everything that God has spoken of through the mouths of his holy prophets from of old. 22 Moses said ‘The Lord God will raise up for you from among your brothers a prophet, like me; to him you shall listen in everything that he speaks of to you; 23 and every soul that does not listen to that prophet shall be rooted out from the people’"

Where has God ever given you a reason to believe that he demands anything less?

Why have Christ die to pay the death penalty if the plan is to enforce obedience with an iron fist?

Where do you get this "iron fist" idea from....Do you think God has some kind of obligation to forgive those who are not one bit sorry for breaking his laws? Life, from day one was conditional....like it or not....Yahweh wants to return to his first purpose for the human race on this planet...those who want to abuse their free will, will not be included in his citizenship awards. Its those who can do as they are told who will be chosen as citizens of his new world.....the prophet Isaiah foretold for the world of the future...

"And a highway will be there,
Yes, a way called the Way of Holiness.
The unclean one will not travel on it.

It is reserved for the one walking on the way;
No one foolish will stray onto it." (Isa 35:8)

God has standards and only those who hold to those standards will even be traveling the road that leads to life. They are "few" . (Matt 7:13-14) You cannot rewrite the Bible to suit your chosen beliefs.

The Logos was from the beginning.

The "beginning" of what? Rev 3:14 tells us an inconvenient truth....

As the one speaking about himself, Jesus said...."These are the things that the Amen says, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation by God".

"The logos" as the "word of God" was "the beginning of God's creation". (Col 1:15)

 

[St. SteVen]

They felt no shame because they knew no evil.....once a knowledge of evil was unleashed, that is when they felt shame.

The assumption is that nakedness is inherently evil.
Again, God asked Adam who told him he was naked.
Who indeed?

"So repent and turn back so as to have your sins wiped out, that seasons of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord 20 and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, 21 whom heaven must receive until the times for putting into effect everything that God has spoken of through the mouths of his holy prophets from of old. 22 Moses said ‘The Lord God will raise up for you from among your brothers a prophet, like me; to him you shall listen in everything that he speaks of to you; 23 and every soul that does not listen to that prophet shall be rooted out from the people’"

Where has God ever given you a reason to believe that he demands anything less?

That assumes that everyone throughout history has heard Jesus speak.

God has standards and only those who hold to those standards will even be traveling the road that leads to life. They are "few" . (Matt 7:13-14) You cannot rewrite the Bible to suit your chosen beliefs.

In reference to the broad and narrow way. "Few there be that find it." ???
God making sport with us?

 

[Aunty Jane]

The assumption is that nakedness is inherently evil.
Again, God asked Adam who told him he was naked.
Who indeed?

Only nakedness in sinful flesh can result in evil. Before they knew evil, their nakedness was unnoticed....it did not induce lust, often mistaken for “love” in satan’s world.

How many of God’s Laws to Israel involved sexual sin? (Leviticus 18, 20 & Deut 22)

Do you understand why Muslim women need to be covered when out in public?
Muslim men consider exposed flesh as inciting a man’s sexual desire. And they will blame the woman for sexual assault if she exposed her body. (That is an extreme example, but it illustrates the point.)

What does modesty mean to you? What does it mean to dress modestly? Were Adam and his wife immodest in their innocence? Or was modesty now a necessity because of sin?

What clothing did God provide for them? It was a “tunic” of “skin” that covered their whole bodies. (Gen 3:21) The source of the skin used is unnamed, so no mention of killing animals to provide this covering. God may have just produced them......he doesn’t say.

That assumes that everyone throughout history has heard Jesus speak.

Sometimes you say things that make no sense....
Why does this “assume” anything more than what it actually says...and to whom?

Who was God’s appointed mediator of the old covenant? It plainly states in Scripture that it was Moses, the one God spoke to in the burning bush and in the Tabernacle.

Since God does not have direct contact with sinful humans, he has always used a representative...his “Logos” is his firstborn Son, who has been at his Father’s side since creation. (Col 1:15) So Jesus was always referred to as “the prophet like Moses” as God spoke through him to his people, as he did with Moses.....and just as Moses was the mediator of the old covenant, Jesus was the mediator of the new covenant.

The Scripture I quoted says we must repent and turn back....what does that mean to you? What does it mean to repent?

In reference to the broad and narrow way. "Few there be that find it." ???
God making sport with us?

Only a person who wants to bring God down to our flawed human level could say such a disrespectful thing.....as if our lives are some kind of game....a sport that He is playing with us for his amusement.

We are players, but in a much bigger picture.....like well armed soldiers that God is using to answer his adversary who has slandered Him and maligned us as his children.
We will give God the victory over satan, who has said that humans will not serve God under adversity. (Prov 27:11) We get to prove that satan is a liar, by supporting God’s side of this issue, even under much suffering. Remember Job....we are all Job. (Job 2:3-6)

Will we still be standing when the war is over? Will we be blessed because of the strength of our faith?

We will if we have chosen to support God’s side of what is a legal case, in the highest court......we won’t if we have sided with the devil.....finding fault with the way God has dealt with the issues, because of flawed human thinking.....the clay telling the Potter that he didn’t do things correctly.
Are we Witnesses for the defence or for the prosecution?

Finding the “narrow gate” that leads to “the cramped road to life” is the challenge. This is not sport...it is God allowing humankind the freedom to make their own choices, based on what is in their own hearts.

Those looking to force God into their own mold will never even find the gate, let alone travel the right road....they are too busy finding fault, so they miss that narrow entry....they probably by-passed it ages ago without even knowing.....but God knows who are grateful for the gift of life, and who have slowed down enough to find the exit that only “few” do. Their path is full of roadblocks, (John 15:18-21) but Jesus is leading them to a wonderful destination.....a reward for their unselfish love and loyalty, often in the face of immeasurable suffering....like he endured for us.

Take time to process that.....

 

[St. SteVen]

Sometimes you say things that make no sense....

I thought it was a spiritual gift. - LOL

Only a person who wants to bring God down to our flawed human level could say such a disrespectful thing.....

I refuse to believe that God is playing games with our souls.

 

[Aunty Jane]

I refuse to believe that God is playing games with our souls.

So do I.....because he isn’t.
He is giving each one of us an opportunity to prove ourselves worthy of the gift he is offering.

Life was conditional from day one.

 

[St. SteVen]

So do I.....because he isn’t.
He is giving each one of us an opportunity to prove ourselves worthy of the gift he is offering.

Life was conditional from day one.

Salvation by works, then?

Worthy of the gift? Wow.

 

[Aunty Jane]

Salvation by works, then?

Worthy of the gift? Wow.

Yes…you have to qualify to receive it….but it is free for those who do so of their own free will.

It isn’t “salvation by works” at all….but it is the works that prove one’s faith, that counts with God…

”Of what benefit is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but he does not have works? That faith cannot save him, can it?….faith by itself, without works, is dead”….

18 Nevertheless, someone will say: “You have faith, and I have works. Show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” 19 You believe that there is one God, do you? You are doing quite well. And yet the demons believe and shudder. 20 But do you care to know, O empty man, that faith without works is useless?” (James 2: 14, 17-20)

Why else would he have laws? And why else would there be penalties for breaking them?
What is the point of “Gehenna” as a penalty? Whatever goes into that “lake of fire” is “destroyed” forever. (John 3:16)

You live in fairly land if you don’t think there are rules and standards to abide by….and if you don’t think repentance is a necessary qualification…..you argue with Scripture if you do. But that is nothing new on these forums…

Universalism is a pipe dream….an empty one. Why are “few” found on “the road to life” whilst “many“ (the majority) are on a road to “destruction”? (Matt 7:13-14; 21-23)

 

[St. SteVen]

Yes…you have to qualify to receive it….but it is free for those who do so of their own free will.

It isn’t “salvation by works” at all….but it is the works that prove one’s faith, that counts with God…

”Of what benefit is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but he does not have works? That faith cannot save him, can it?….faith by itself, without works, is dead”….

18 Nevertheless, someone will say: “You have faith, and I have works. Show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” 19 You believe that there is one God, do you? You are doing quite well. And yet the demons believe and shudder. 20 But do you care to know, O empty man, that faith without works is useless?” (James 2: 14, 17-20)

Thanks for explaining that. I have the opposite view, or see it the other way around.

What I observe is that many people come to God when they are at their absolute worst.
When they hit bottom and need to be rescued. The sinner on his knees crying out in desperation.
Not always, but this is emblematic of God's salvation. Come as you are. (without one plea)

Then the good works come as a proof of a true conversion, a changed life, a new direction.

 

[St. SteVen]

Universalism is a pipe dream….an empty one.

There are strong opinions on both sides.
It's not a modern invention. It was a popular doctrine in the east.
We got our Bible from the church in the west. Bias obvious.
Even the church in the west had a doctrine of Purgatory.

Why are “few” found on “the road to life” whilst “many“ (the majority) are on a road to “destruction”? (Matt 7:13-14; 21-23)

That's life under the sun. (not about the afterlife)

 

[Aunty Jane]

Thanks for explaining that. I have the opposite view, or see it the other way around.

What I observe is that many people come to God when they are at their absolute worst.
When they hit bottom and need to be rescued. The sinner on his knees crying out in desperation.
Not always, but this is emblematic of God's salvation. Come as you are. (without one plea)

Then the good works come as a proof of a true conversion, a changed life, a new direction.

I believe what Jesus said....that ‘no one can come to the Father except through the Son’ (John 14:6).....but conversely, ‘no one can come to the Son unless it is granted by the Father’ (John 6:65).....so, where does that leave any human under those ‘conditions’....because that is what they are.

It is God himself who will “draw” the right hearted person to his truth. (John 6:44) Even death will not separate them from him, as the resurrection is his guarantee that their lives will be restored on earth.....not in heaven, unless they are part of the elect who will rule with Christ in his Kingdom. (Rev 20:6)

There is “one Lord, one faith, one baptism”....so where is a person to find “the only true God AND the one he sent” (John 17:3) if those in Christendom (the very ones who claim a relationship with the “God”), only really have a relationship with the Son? The Father is somehow pushed into the background. Who fused them into one entity and included another “person” in the mix? It was the early church, about whom Jesus and his apostles warned would become apostate. (Wheat and weeds)

“Knowing” Yahweh AND his Son for who they really are, is a salvation issue. Christendom invented a god that the Jewish Jesus and his apostles never knew....and who was never in their minds when they wrote Scripture about the Father and his Son. They knew who their God was and stated it clearly in 1 Cor 8:5-6...

“For even though there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, just as there are many “gods” and many “lords,” there is actually to us one God, the Father, from whom all things are and we for him; and there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things are and we through him.”

Did you notice the words “from” and “through” in those verses? All things come “from” the Father, “through” the Son. He is the one who represents his Father like no one else could. He is God’s “firstborn” (Col 1:15)...the one “through” whom all creation came into existence....again “from” the Father, “through” the Son.
Jesus is also the appointed “mediator between God and men”, so he could not be God because a mediator is assigned to reconcile two estranged parties. He cannot be one of the parties.

So when a person hitting rock bottom, and calls out to “God” for help.....who is the God that they are to turn to?

The one reading their heart will do what he said he would, and “draw” that person to his one truth.
But I f he reads a heart that simply wants God to give him what he lacks, or to get him out of trouble, with no thought of what he must do in return, then that person will not qualify for life in the new world to come.

And if that person already has an image of God in his head that simply does not fit the Creator as he is portrayed in the entirety of Scripture.....same God in both “testaments”....then will that one be willing to accept a different God to the one he has imagined, and come to know him as he is, not how the person might want him to be? We humans have a propensity to want to change God into our image of him....to fit our mold instead of the other way around.


The only way to approach the Creator is on your knees, but once he lifts you up, you are to stand on your own feet, and do for others what others in the faith, did for you. You pay it back to God, by paying it forward to others, giving them the same support that you received. Passing on the knowledge you gained and telling them your own experience.
This is how “Christianity was to grow and spread......but satan was also waiting in the wings to do to Christianity, what he had done to Judaism....only on a much larger scale.

He was going to create a counterfeit “Christianity” and just as in the past, he found willing dupes to accomplish his agenda. He knows human nature better than we do, and he has had so much experience in manipulating the human psyche to achieve success....he’s an expert at deception.

From what is written in Scripture, his success rate is apparent, because the “one faith” that Jesus and his apostles founded, was morphed into the ridiculous situation we see in Christendom today, who seem to go from the sublime to the ridiculous without even seeing what they are doing under the devil’s master plan....he knows he cannot win, and he and his cronies know where they are going.....but he will take the majority of the human race down with him into oblivion. Sadly, the “goats” will outnumber the “sheep”.

 

[Aunty Jane]

That's life under the sun. (not about the afterlife)

“Life under the sun” was the only life on offer in Eden....when Jesus and his apostles performed resurrections, where did their lives resume? Where were they before they were raised?
Where was Lazarus before Jesus called him back to life? Jesus said he was “sleeping” and that he was going to “awaken” him. (John 11:11-14)

If no one went to heaven before Jesus, (John 3:13) where were all those who died before him?
Christendom invented some strange places.

There is no “afterlife” as Christendom believes.....there is only resurrection, which is a return to life, not a continuation of it somewhere else.
The apostasy changed what the Jews believed about death and adopted the immortal soul idea because it was more appealing to believe the devil’s lie that “you surely will not die”.

Adam was told that he would “return to the dust”.....nothing more. Death was the opposite of life and life is what God is going to restore in the new world to come. (Rev 21:2-4)

Jesus calls all the dead from their graves...not from the spirit realm. (John 5:28-29)

The one thing the devil cannot do is take the genuine Christians away from the true faith...he can “blind the minds” only of “unbelievers” (2 Cor 4:3-4) The Jews supposedly worshipped the same God as Jesus and the apostles....but they were “unbelievers” because of denying their own Scripture and adopting human traditions instead of Scriptural truth. (Matt 15:7-9) Their false doctrines invalidated their worship.

So, the Christianity that Jesus started would hinge on monotheism being the key ingredient in the faith followed by the “few” whom Jesus said would be on the right path....a difficult road to travel, but leading to the right destination. (Matt 7:13-14; John 15:18-21)

 

[KUWN]

Seems pretty straight forward. In the day you eat thereof you will surely die. Dead.
Adam had no questions about this, but what did it mean to him? Did he understand death?
And even more confusing is what happened when he ate thereof. In that day he did not die.
Not physically anyway.

And where did all the other consequences come from? Not part of the original deal.
- For Eve: You will have great pain in childbirth. Your husband will rule over you.
- For Adam: You will eat by the sweat of your brow. Thistles and thorns.
- For the Serpent: On your belly you will go, eating dust.
- For A&E: Banished from the garden.

Notice that none of the consequences are eternal. They only affect this life. The only basis for eternal consequences is rejecting God's offer for salvation.

 

[KUWN]

It is God himself who will “draw” the right hearted person to his truth. (John 6:44)

See John 12:32
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth [on the cross], will draw and attract all men [Gentiles as well as Jews] to Myself.

 

[Aunty Jane]

See John 12:32
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth [on the cross], will draw and attract all men [Gentiles as well as Jews] to Myself.

A little more study on the original language word might shed some light on this assertion that “ALL MEN” will be saved. Yes, it definitely means Jews as well as Gentiles, but it goes deeper.

What about other texts that refer to “the salvation of all men,” such as John 12:32, or Romans 5:18 Which convey a similar thought in RS, KJ, NE, TEV, etc.

The Greek expressions rendered “all” and “everyone” in these verses are inflected forms of the word “pas”. As shown in Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words (London, 1962, Vol. I, p. 46), “pas” can also mean “every kind or variety.” So, in the above verses, instead of “all,” the expression “every kind of” could just as correctly be used. That changes the meaning somewhat, so that Universalism is in error.
“All men” were never going to be saved.....

It is clear that the second death is permanent in the Bible.....”the lake of fire” is obviously not literal as “death and hades” are also thrown into this “lake”. (Rev 20:13-4)

2 Thess 1:9 RS: “They shall suffer the punishment of eternal destruction and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.”

Rev 21:8 RS: “As for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, as for murderers, fornicators, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their lot shall be in the lake that burns with fire and sulphur, which is the second death.”

Matt 7:13-14 RS: “Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

It is a receptacle representing eternal death...a place from which no one returns to life. Satan and his angels end up there, and the “goats” go there ahead of them. (Matt 25:41, 46)

 

[St. SteVen]

God anticipated the Fall with a plan for redemption.
The Logos/logic/reason/plan.

Here's a young man that agrees with my theology. (Logos/logic)