Chalke Talk 86: Does God believe in me?

Would God, who is described as the definition of pure love, punish people with infinite and eternal torment based on decisions and actions taken in their few short years of life on earth?

Or, similarly, did Paul understand God to be vengeful and bigoted, as he is often painted, or a God that loved each of and believes in each of us to start with?

This is the theme for this week of Chalke Talk. Steve explores how the New Testament is interpreted to suggest that when people reject God he then, in turn, because he loves them, grants them their own way. A sugar-coated way of saying let’s them “have it.”

This is completely contradictory to how Paul understood salvation. “Either Paul believes that eventually, ‘ALL’ will enjoy God’s presence because of Christ, or, if he doesn’t, he uses SUCH misleading language to tell us so - that it becomes impossible to take seriously a word of what he says anywhere else.”

So what do you think? How could parts of the church have got it all so wrong?