New discussion to come: Universal Salvation (non-exclusive salvation)
I know in my heart that if I had the biggest fight in the world with my mom and told her I hated her and never wanted to speak to her again and then didn't speak to her for any number of years, 5, 20, or even 50, when I did come to her and say I love you, forgive me, she would. I will even go so far as to say that if I left a letter for her with my will, and I died before her, and in the letter it said I love you, forgive me, and she read the letter after my death, she would. Even if on earth we never spoke again, and we met in heaven and I said I love you, forgive me, she would. And evey time she would be overjoyed and overcome with emotion at my return to her.
If I can believe this about my human, flesh & bone, mother what would make me think that God, my heavely Father, would give up on me the first, second, or 10th time I denied Him the love and respect He deserves. Did Jesus not tell us the story of the Prodigal Son? Did He not say "For the Lord will not cast off forever" Lamentations 3:31,32 ?
I can't imagine my mother every saying "that's it, into the fires of hell with you forever" she has proven to me that she loves me too much to do that. I know a percentage of what she suffers when I am away from her, or in pain, or in distress, or when we argue and aren't getting along. How much more must God love us?
So how could someone that loves us so much endure sending so many of us into the fires of hell forever?
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