Salvation: Why necessary? How does it work?

[fhansen]

I was raised Catholic, never really “rebelled” against the Church as a teen or any of that stuff, but throughout my life (I’m in my fifties) my faith has waxed and waned. Much about Catholicism appeals to me greatly, but at this point I think that appeal might be largely due to nostalgia. I am broadly sympathetic to the whole Catholic enterprise–particularly in its ethical teaching and its philosophical underpinnings, but I have big problems with many of Christianity/Catholicism’s main doctrines. My interest in ritual, liturgy, etc., is about nil. My belief in the Real Presence is also about about nil–I haven’t taken communion for a couple years. I have a slew of questions, and I do a lot of reading on various religion/theology-related topics, but I thought I’d put one out here to see if I could get some help.

This one’s really basic (not simple, I grant you, but certainly fundamental): Why is our salvation necessary and how does it supposedly work?

Here’s the context for the question… I was listening to a sermon the other day in which the priest said that “we are responsible for the death of Christ by our sins.” This is not new, of course. We’ve all heard it a thousand times. And I take the line of reasoning to go something like this: Our sinful nature is offensive to God, and we need to be rescued. This rescue could only be effected by a blood sacrifice, so God sent his Son, the spotless lamb, so to speak, to pay the price in our place. The challenges, for me, with this argument are many, and many questions pop up. Why is a sacrifice required in the first place? How does killing someone (i.e., the sacrifice) help anything? And I’m not so sure I buy the notion that our sins are so offensive to God as to require this kind of fix. How can we “offend” an omnipotent, omniscient Creator? He made us; didn’t he see our “offensiveness” coming? I understand the argument about free will being a requirement for loving and for doing genuine good (i.e., doing good only has value in a world where doing bad is possible), but if that’s God’s take on it (free will as a baseline feature of human nature), then why doesn’t He abide by that design decision and let us live with its consequences? Why offer us an “out” by sending Christ? And how does sending an incarnate version of Himself to carry out the expiation accomplish anything? Isn’t that something like an adult man being brought in to pinch-hit in a Little League game? He’s going to dominate, but how meaningful will it be to him?

I know this all supposedly goes back to Adam & Eve, or original sin, but that’s just another problematic can of worms. How do the personal failings of our first ancestors devolve onto us? In what logical or ethical system does that seem reasonable?

Lots there, but what I’m looking for at this point is a simple point-by-point explanation of why salvation is necessary and how the Christian version of it is supposed to work.

That’s all.

THANKS

It depends a lot on our standards. Our faith teaches that the perfectly just man-the man who is truly righteous on all counts-is the one who loves God with his whole heart, soul, mind and strength and his neighbor as himself. Any other disposition is an offense against God-against nature itself-a disorder in the universe. Every other aspect of nature including dogs, cats, trees and stones act according to His will-according to the nature He gave them. Only man and angels, as far as we’re told, can deviate from the norm He’s created for them.

We’re lost without necessarily recognizing it- we don’t know where we came from, if anywhere, what we’re here for, if anything, and where we’re going, if anywhere. We’re dead in our sins. We’re cut off from a Father on whom any true and lasting life and happiness depends. We’re all heading towards nothing more or less than certain death and yet we live life as if the latest silly trend or football game were the most important thing in the universe. What can wake us from our stupor? Scripture says that he who’s forgiven much, loves much, and where sin abounds, grace abounds. I think those who’ve been downcast/outcasts/prodigals often respond better to the gospel, recognizing its value easier than cradle-Christians or those who’ve suffered less.

There are various theories as to why the Atonement should’ve happened the way it did but it makes sense to me that the wages of sin should be death-that a disordered universe is one that God needn’t put up with. And yet He does-out of the love He had for man before He created him, let alone before he fell. If we recognize our sickness, then a healer/savior begins to make sense. And what better way to demonstrate His love than by incarnating and laying down his life for us. This is an act we can understand-rather than a mere platitude. God as suffering servant-what a concept-what a God! Anyway, it grabbed my attention. Fortunately I wasn’t alone or I probably wouldn’t have stuck around-grace takes over where we leave off.

 

[Cathoholic]

Hello “Porcupine” and “jonfawkes.” This is mostly merely my personal thoughts so if it in any way it contradicts the Catholic Faith, I retract it in advance. A really fine post YinandYang and Pieman333272 - some of this is repetition of your advice but I wrote it before seeing your posts – sorry. Also my post is too long and perhaps I should have pitched it but I didn’t. I’ll also echo and paraphrase fhansen and suggest you ask yourself frequently where did I come from, what am I doing here on earth, and where am I going in the next life (what is the purpose of life?).

As you pointed out Porcupine, God is perfect, omniscient, infinite, etc. We won’t be able to exhaust His attributes. But God is also perfectly just AND perfectly merciful.

God creates creatures to love Him of their own free volition.

Imagine for a moment you are creating people out of nothing. You can 1-Wire them all to love you (in which case it is really a “doll” and not volitional “love” at all). Or you can 2-Give them the dignity of a free will in which case the people can love you without you being “forcibly pre-programmed” to do so which makes real love a possibility.

He gives all His created rational beings (angels and persons) a free will. They are free. Freedom means you can choose to do what is right. It doesn’t mean it’s OK to do what’s wrong.

If someone were forcibly preprogrammed to “love” Him, it really wouldn’t be “free will” at all would it. It would merely be pre-programming.

God created man (and also angels which I won’t mention much more here for brevity sake) in such a state. Adam was created in a state of where God’s Spirit was breathed into him in a special way, a kind of original justification, to share in the “Divine life” of God or as the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) in paragraph 375 calls it, a “state of holiness and justice”.

This isn’t merely what Adam and Eve did (be “just” so far), it is who Adam and Eve ARE (“Just” individuals). They are created in a state of original justice and somehow have a share in the divine life. They were also given a sublime position of “dominion” over earthly creation as Genesis 1 tells us.

Not too bad of a deal here for mankind.

But now that man (Adam and Eve) was created, they had to choose God by obedience.

More on Adam (and Eve) shortly.

 

[Cathoholic]

Let me state the obvious here not to be condescending but rather just to bring it to mind. When a being procreates, the best it can do is pass on it’s own nature to it’s offspring. When flowers procreate, they give off little flowers. When crows procreate, they give off little crows and so on.

If Adam and Eve would have remained in a state of holiness and justice, they would have passed on their “state of holiness” nature to their progeny as well. They would have had kids in a “state of holiness and justice” and some share in the “Divine life”.

Back to Adam. Adam chose himself (and Eve too) over God’s will. In the day he did that, he died. There is a spiritual death (we call that “mortal sin”) and a physical death (what we commonly merely call “death”). Adam died a spiritual death immediately. He sinned mortally. He eventually died a physical death too because of his sin. He also LOST the state of “state of holiness and justice”. This changed his very being.

Adam brought sin and death into the world (so did the devil but we won’t get into that here).

So now even creation is subject to a sort of disorder. Man doesn’t merely mature, but ages and eventually dies. Animals are even affected. I suppose someone might even say that even non-living things are subjected to a state of disorder (metal rusts, etc.) but that is more speculative regarding cause and effect.

So again, the effects of sin were not only on his (and Eve’s) spirit, but on their bodies as well.

We would NOT be fit for Heaven. Incidentally Adam even in his original justice and holiness was not in “Heaven” only the Garden, and was not fit for Heaven yet - Adam needed more than he had for that.

Now let’s stop again and reflect on an axiom of the Church. When God allows these types of things to happen we don’t completely understand why (that’s kind of the definition of a mystery), but we can know some things about a mystery and we do know God brings a greater good out of it. The greater good may not be evident always in this life, but will be revealed to us at the General Judgment at the end of time.

The early Church has always seen this falling of Adam as a greater good too. Painful to be sure, but a greater good. Let’s look at the CCC for a moment.

CCC 412 But why did God not prevent the first man from sinning? St. Leo the Great responds, “Christ’s inexpressible grace gave us blessings better than those the demon’s envy had taken away.” And St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, “There is nothing to prevent human nature’s being raised up to something greater, even after sin; God permits evil in order to draw forth some greater good. Thus St. Paul says, ‘Where sin increased, grace abounded all the more’; and the Exsultet sings, ‘O happy fault,. . . which gained for us so great a Redeemer!’”

So instead of a world like the Jehovah’s Witnesses falsely envision, which is back to a type of the Garden of Eden for many of their adherents, we now, thanks to the work and grace of Christ, are able to attain much more, we are all able to attain Heaven by the grace of Christ!

Back to Adam and Eve. The best Adam and Eve could do, is pass on their nature to their offspring. Remember flowers have little flowers, etc. Well Adam and Eve are now sinful and fallen by nature. They pass on their fallen-nature to their progeny (their kids). That’s a part of what procreation is – the passing on of your nature.

So we have kids that are born LACKING a “state of holiness and justice”. That’s what Original Sin is. It’s not “black spots” on the soul of the infant. No. It is the “privation” or deprivation or LACK of this “state of holiness and justice” (see CCC 417 and 1472) and some sharing in the divine life (again as CCC 375 puts it).

Remember, God is perfectly merciful, but ALSO perfectly just. In this state, mankind cannot possibly attain unto Heaven. We also cannot attain unto perfection (we commit sins too don’t we – not merely have Original Sin). We also have sinful tendencies that Adam and Eve didn’t have before they sinned.

And what about this committing of sin that we do. Is there any consequence to it? Yes.

 

[Cathoholic]

A little sin against a little god (bear with me here for a moment as I am making an illustration) would be a “little sin”. A little sin against a big god would be a sin against ALL of that big god so even a little sin would be “big” because that big god is . . . “big”.

But a little sin against an all powerful and all omniscient and omnipresent and infinite God would have what kind of effect (remember you are sinning against ALL of God) . . . . . an infinite effect. Because it is a sin against God (who is infinite).

Our account that we owe (remember God is perfectly merciful but He ALSO demands perfect justice, He is perfectly just) is out of our reach. We could never pay this account.

So how could we possibly pay this account? Blood of sheep, goats and cattle can’t do it – they are a merely a sign or foreshadowing (Hebrews 8:5-6 and Hebrews 10:1-6) of Jesus shedding His precious blood on Calvary. Covenants with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, or even David couldn’t do it. And we couldn’t pay the account either could we?

I am going to digress here for a moment. The Jehovah’s Witnesses (who believe Jesus is merely an angel – St. Michael the Archangel) stopped by one time and I told them their “Jehovah-god” is too little for me and I wanted an infinite, omniscient, omnipresent, etc. God. Following the argument from the ancient Church Fathers against the Arian heresy, I insisted they not bother me until they get an infinite God.

They insisted they did have an infinite (etc.) God. I went over these original sin issues with them. I told them if we have an infinite account to pay because we have sinned against not a little god, not a “big” god, but an infinite God, a perfect FINITE man cannot pay this account. A perfect FINITE Angel couldn’t get the job done either as good as the Angel is. They could actually see that you needed an infinite sacrifice to atone for sin.

But alas, they pretended to look at their watch and said they had “an appointment” elsewhere and promptly left (I know this looking at the watch and “gotta go” bit is part of their shtick because I’ve heard about it from ex-witnesses – they are trained to do that – but this would be for another subject and thread altogether).

So HOW could we possibly get an infinite account paid and since we are mankind, how could we get the account paid in full by a man (one of us – someone of our nature) that we must somehow some way really actually be in communion with so we can get into Heaven “connected” to Him so to speak?

The only way possible would be for a Redeemer that is truly God (infinite), yet truly man (one like us in all ways but sin). God would have to take flesh upon Himself and become a man too (“blessed be Jesus Christ true God and true man”)

And then we NEED to be really and actually in His body, Jesus and mystically the Church. Baptism is what puts us there. That’s why Jesus says we need to be born of water and spirit otherwise we can’t even see the Kingdom of Heaven (John 3). We need to really be in Christ with our soul AND our bodies (our whole being). We are called to a deeper relationship with Him too. We are called to abide in Him and He in us through Holy Communion (John 6:50-60). “The flesh” such as works of the flesh (i.e. offering blood of goats, sheep, and cattle and good works ON OUR OWN or merely “natural virtue”) is of no avail, but HIS flesh which he gave for the life of the world IS of avail (but in Holy Communion we don ‘t merely get His body but rather His body, blood, soul, and divinity – ALL of Jesus with either the consecrated “bread” or the consecrated “wine”).

All of this results in not a mere stingy Jehovah’s Witness type of eternity like Adam had. No! We get much more! We not only enjoy a “state of holiness and justice” but we get to become partakers of the Divine nature (as CCC 1692 and 2nd Peter 1:4 says)! We have God Almighty dwelling in us in a special way that was more lofty than Adam and readies us for Heaven which is so glorious that our “eye has not heard and ear has not seen” yet.

And we begin to do this not just up in Heaven someday. We get to begin this life NOW. That’s why St. Paul can call people on earth “Saints”. But this membership of Sainthood on earth is provisional. It is conditional. Not until the next life, assuming we persist in grace or regain a lost grace, will we have this. And not until the end of time when we have our bodies back will we enjoy it to the fullness that is our destiny . . . IF you REMAIN (notice your IN-Jesus, but you must REMAIN in Him) in Jesus - the Vine (Jesus Himself) as Jesus tells us in John 15.

There is so much more. The Mass is so important. Heaven touches earth in the Mass. We are mystically present at Calvary too. If you want more info on all of this, I would suggest getting a hold of all the Scott Hahn audios you can on the Mass (and for that matter any other subject). You need to listen to them many times as he is very deep but well worth the effort.

His audios can be purchased here saintjoe.com/ and he has some complimentary audios (but these tend to be more advanced – for Priests, seminarians, theologians, but the average Joe can benefit from them too) here salvationhistory.com/studies/courses/audio . I’m not affiliated with either place so I feel free to recommend them. . . . more in a moment . . .

 

[Cathoholic]

I would start though by making an appointment with a Priest. They all have the power to have God forgive your sins in this special way through them, but try to get the best Priest you can to hear your confession. Talk to penitents and get a Priest that loves the truth, is faithful to the magesterium or teaching office of the Church, and offer prayer and sacrifice on your behalf even after you leave the confessional.

CCC 1466 The confessor is not the master of God’s forgiveness, but its servant.
The minister of this sacrament should unite himself to the intention and charity of Christ.
He should have a proven knowledge of Christian behavior,
experience of human affairs, respect and sensitivity toward the one who has fallen;
he must love the truth,
be faithful to the Magisterium of the Church,
and lead the penitent with patience toward healing and full maturity.
He must pray and do penance for his penitent, entrusting him to the Lord’s mercy.

Consider a Priest from a different parish or town where you don’t know him, but have heard good things about him so you are not intimidated or at least less intimidated. Ask him to help you through the confession. Tell him in advance when you’re making the appointment “Father, this is going to be a general confession and it may take awhile and I may need your help through some of it”.

Do a life long confession of every sin you can remember. Prepare yourself prayerfully and well. Consider fasting on bread and water for a few interspersed meals here and there instead of a regular meal – don’t overdo the fasting but try to do some fasting. Maybe bread and water lunch on a Wednesday and bread and water supper on a Friday for example.

Don’t worry about the priest being scandalized by your sins. He will have heard these sins many times before. Don’t worry about it. Anything you will confess, he’s almost certainly heard much worse.

Your sins however striking will be puny compared to the infinite value of the precious blood of Jesus Christ which washes away these sins (see 1st John - not the Gospel of John but the first letter of John toward the back of your Bible – 1st John 1:5-10). This blood of our Lord Jesus CAN offer the account for your sins (and the sins of the whole world – but you’ve got to want this – He won’t force it on you – remember “free will” and all of that?).

You will need to follow this up with prayer. Try saying a decade of the Rosary every day for starters. It takes about 4 measly minutes. Think about the mystery that you’re praying while saying the hail Marys. If you don’t know how to say the Rosary just think about Jesus being crucified in your mind while saying an Our Father, 10 Hail Marys, and 1 Glory Be until you can get some materials to help you learn how or someone to teach you – its very simple yet profound. If you are already doing that try saying a 5-decade Rosary a day. Ask God in prayer to help you to pray more frequently and sincerely.

Go to confession often. Once a week would be good. Once you do that general confession, the once-a-week confessions will take only a few minutes.

Take your faith to heart. We prepare years for our occupations (high school, trade school, apprenticeship, college, continuing ed or whatever), why not try preparing for all eternity with even a fraction of this study that you’ve already done for earthly things. When you study the Mass your soul will soar.

If you are not in a state of grace now and are awaiting this confession appointment, go to Mass but don’t receive Holy Communion. You can find out why when you visit the Priest for the general confession. Then after the confession, go to Holy Communion frequently. The Priest will explain that too but at that point you’ll probably have more of an interior awareness and won’t need much explaining.

The purpose of life is to know, love, and serve God in this life, and be happy with Him forever in the next. I hope this helps you “Porcupine” and you too “jonfawkes” and any other fellow Catholics (or anyone else) that’s having this journey. I have at least some awareness of what you have gone through because I am a sinner too. I have stopped to pray for you and have asked the Blessed Virgin Mary to add you and all who read this into my daily petitions so I will pray for you the rest of my life as well. God bless.

 

[Mulder]

I don’t. I think about a topic and then write about it. It frequently happens to be based on or agree with the Bible or Catholic Teaching, but that’s because they’re authoritative.

We aren’t brought into the earth broken, just sinful. You may misinterpret it as that, but no, sinfulness is a sign of God’s forgiveness and love for our souls enough to create them.

I don’t know how it was accomplished, but Jesus saved us by death and suffering, which he ultimately triumphed over anyway. So yes, blood was needed to be spilled, but only one more time. It was an infinite sacrifice.

Did you do your homework? The Church Fathers refuted it because Christ’s Sacrifice eliminated the need for that. Also because it was to a false God(s), and practiced (continued) human sacrifice is wicked.

The crucifixion happened, the atonement happened. The Church Fathers didn’t fabricate it to appeal to Pagans. Do some research and don’t insert emotional bias next time.

I used the term ‘broken’ loosely, for sinful. And thats one of the most transparently manipulative thing about christianity. Telling people that, hey look, you were brought into this world a sinner, so right from the start, you need to drink the koolaid so to speak and get on board.

So let me get this straight, god basically sent himself (jesus), down to earth to show people how a perfect sinless person should act like, but for some reason he needed a scapegoat, a blood sacrifice to HIMSELF to ‘wash away’ mankind’s sins? But yet you still dont know how this was accomplished… and still there is plenty of ‘sin’ in the world.

And pieman, i meant blood sacrifice in general, i should have been more clear. And please dont tell me how i should or shouldnt make posts.

 

[jonfawkes]

This is all well and good but how does blood wash away sin? I get that the Animal sacrifices foreshadow Jesus’ blood sacrifice but still don’t get

***why does God (YHWH) need blood?

---

 

[davidv]

This is all well and good but how does blood wash away sin? I get that the Animal sacrifices foreshadow Jesus’ blood sacrifice but still don’t get

***why does God (YHWH) need blood? ***

God does not need blood. He chose to use it. Being perfect, His choice was perfect and He has a perfect reason for chosing it. Have you asked Him for His reason?

 

[jonfawkes]

Saying He chose it Still doesn’t answer the question - God thus far hasn’t provided an answer, if He does I’ll let you know.

 

[fhansen]

This is all well and good but how does blood wash away sin? I get that the Animal sacrifices foreshadow Jesus’ blood sacrifice but still don’t get

***why does God (YHWH) need blood?

---

The bloody sacrifice of Jesus points to the real reason blood is shed in this world-for reasons of jealousy, self-righteousness, covetousness. In that sense He died because of the sins of the world, the righteous dying at the hands of the unrighteous, simultaneously convicting the world of sin (our lack of love). Why would anyone kill something so perfect, so beautiful except for those jealous of His perfection, His beauty? He’s a scapegoat in the real sense of the term. Get rid of Him and we have no reason to change ourselves-we can keep believing in our own righteousness. So the light came into the world but man preferred darkness.

If humanity “hates God without reason” as scripture attests, but God is the source of mans life and enduring happiness, then this particular sacrifice would seek to accomplish something-the piercing of mans heart of pride-the stony heart that God seeks to replace. Self-sacrifice is the heart of love. All other “saviors” seek to change the world by force. God changes it by love.

**Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said:

“Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
6 with burnt offerings and sin offerings
you were not pleased.
7 Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll—
I have come to do your will, my God.’”

15 The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says:
16 “This is the covenant I will make with them
after that time, says the Lord.
I will put my laws in their hearts,
and I will write them on their minds.”
17 Then he adds:
“Their sins and lawless acts
I will remember no more.”

18 And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary. Heb 10

**

 

[steve_b]

I was raised Catholic, never really “rebelled” against the Church as a teen or any of that stuff, but throughout my life (I’m in my fifties) my faith has waxed and waned. Much about Catholicism appeals to me greatly, but at this point I think that appeal might be largely due to nostalgia.

How bout grace
P:

I have big problems with many of Christianity/Catholicism’s main doctrines. My interest in ritual, liturgy, etc., is about nil. My belief in the Real Presence is also about about nil–I haven’t taken communion for a couple years. I have a slew of questions, and I do a lot of reading on various religion/theology-related topics, but I thought I’d put one out here to see if I could get some help.

I like what Peter said

2 Pet 1:
*" 5 For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. 8 For**if *these things are yours and abound, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 For whoever lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. 10 Therefore, brethren, be the more zealous to confirm your call and election, for if you do this you will never fall; 11 so there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. 12 Therefore I intend always to remind you of these things, though you know them and are established in the truth that you have. 13 I think it right, as long as I am in this body, * to arouse you by way of reminder, "

Notice the IF’s. that go along with this teaching? They are conditional statements

conditions

• restrict,modify, depend, & qualify what must be done to achieve the desired result. That’s why Peter says, if the conditions aren’t met, the object of ones desire won’t happen.

P:

Why is our salvation necessary and how does it supposedly work?

Once created,

1. • it’s essential to know where our immortal soul will be in eternity. Without salvation, we are guranteed to spend eternity seperated from God.
   • Salvation works by following what Peter taught above.
   P:
   

   Why is a sacrifice required in the first place? How does killing someone (i.e., the sacrifice) help anything? And I’m not so sure I buy the notion that our sins are so offensive to God as to require this kind of fix. How can we “offend” an omnipotent, omniscient Creator? He made us; didn’t he see our “offensiveness” coming? I understand the argument about free will being a requirement for loving and for doing genuine good (i.e., doing good only has value in a world where doing bad is possible), but if that’s God’s take on it (free will as a baseline feature of human nature), then why doesn’t He abide by that design decision and** let us live with its consequences**? Why offer us an “out” by sending Christ? And how does sending an incarnate version of Himself to carry out the expiation accomplish anything?
   
   I know this all supposedly goes back to Adam & Eve, or original sin,

   As Augustine said, the son of God became the son of man so that sons and daughters of man could become sons and daughters of God.
   
   Jesus transformed in His humanity, all humanities transgressions during His life. And because He’s also God, that work He did has infinite application past present and future. And because He didn’t want to see us punished for all our transgressions, Jesus, out of perfect love for us took the punishment meant for us, on Himself instead. All we have to do then, is follow the conditions laid out by Jesus to benefit from all that love.
   
   As a suggestion read the following
   
   Read Rm 5:7-21
   jmom.honlam.org/rsvce/106roman.html#5

 

[jonfawkes]

The bloody sacrifice of Jesus points to the real reason blood is shed in this world-for reasons of jealousy, self-righteousness, covetousness. In that sense He died because of the sins of the world, the righteous dying at the hands of the unrighteous, simultaneously convicting the world of sin (our lack of love).

So God need’s Jesus’ blood because we shed blood. But how does that satisfy YHWH? How does that rectify the situation? Is sin soluble on in blood ?

 

[fhansen]

So God need’s Jesus’ blood because we shed blood. But how does that satisfy YHWH? How does that rectify the situation? Is sin soluble on in blood ?

I don’t think it did satisfy YHWH. I think Jesus’ shed blood was the natural consequence of YHWH incarnating and expressing His own nature to this world.

 

[jonfawkes]

I don’t think it did satisfy YHWH. I think Jesus’ shed blood was the natural consequence of YHWH incarnating and expressing His own nature to this world.

So if God incarnates it is natural to kill him?

 

[davidv]

So if God incarnates it is natural to kill him?

How did you get this out of the post you quoted?

 

[jonfawkes]

How do you not?

Jesus’ shed blood was the natural consequence of YHWH incarnating

 

[davidv]

How do you not?

I read it context.
Edit: And I didn’t add anything to what was typed.

 

[jonfawkes]

So did I, I didn’t add anything. I was so shocked I asked for clarification. That is what it says.

I don’t think it did satisfy YHWH. I think Jesus’ shed blood was the natural consequence of YHWH incarnating and expressing His own nature to this world.

Restructured: The natural consequence of YHWH incarnating and expressing His own nature to this world is Jesus’ shed blood, I think.

I added a comma.

 

[fhansen]

So if God incarnates it is natural to kill him?

Kind of- that’s what the Passion was about. Humankind prefers its autonomy.

 

[jonfawkes]

Kind of- that’s what the Passion was about. Humankind prefers its autonomy.

I can see that for those that reject him as savior, so what was the point of him dying if it didn’t settle a debt - iyo.