Every human being having attained an age of reason and accountability possessing at least a modicum of cognitive acuity intuitively knows our Universe, Earth, human genome, are all created entities by an omnipotent God though mankind differs on their idea of who God is. Human kind was created to worship, to hope, to look beyond ourselves and we all intuitively possess a longing for something else…we know that what constrains us via physics is NOT all there is to this life…religions attempt to provide an answer to the human condition and fill that void, that chasm, in our longing for more and our search for purpose…
Humanity did not kill God…God is Spirit (John 4:24) and has no genesis or finality…Jesus is God having temporarily manifest in flesh (Philippians 2:8; John 1:14) to destroy the works of the Devil (1 John 3:8b) for your benefit and my benefit and the death of the human body He inhabited in order to interact within Time and with His human creation was given as a sacrifice for our sin so that we could have the opportunity to be forgiven of sin and live with God, forever (John 3:16-18). It was only the temporary body of flesh that the Jews had murdered by the Roman authorities, not God…as God is everlasting from everlasting (Psalm 90:2).
Question was asked: “Is there a Purgatory in the Bible or anything like Purgatory?”
Christian response,
There is no Purgatory, a Catholic doctrine for money-making and holding parishioners in bondage to the Catholic Mass hoping to pray their dead relative, spouse or friend out of Purgatory and into Heaven via the lighting of candles, prayers of intercession for the dead, indulgences – money given to the Catholic Church. This is heretical Catholic dogma/doctrine.
Is there something like “Purgatory” in the Bible?
There is an intermediary place of the dead taught by Jesus (Luke 16) and the Holy Spirit in Scripture. In the Hebrew Scriptures this place of the dead is called Sheol and in the Greek Scriptures, Sheol is referred to as “Hades.” This place of the dead is neither the Kingdom of God nor is it Hell/the Lake of Fire. According to Jesus as per Luke 16, Sheol/Hades is divided into two-large sections/regions with an impassable chasm dividing the two regions. The Old Testament dead who died rejecting God, their spirit, upon death of the body, was and remains interned in Sheol-Torments and will remain there until the coming Great White Throne Judgment manifesting subsequent to the Millennial Reign of Jesus Christ (Revelation 20:11-15).
According to Jesus as per Luke 16, those in the Old Testament who expressed faith in God and found righteousness (a right standing) with Him by faith (Hebrews 11), these, upon death of the body, their soul/spirit was detained in Sheol-Paradise/AKA Abraham’s Bosom. These “righteous” dead were detained in Sheol-Paradise because the acceptable sacrifice for sin, the coming Messiah promised in Scripture, had not manifest and we know that nothing impure is permitted to enter the Kingdom of God (Rev 21:27).
Though these Old Testament saints found righteousness with God by faith, they could not enter the Kingdom until such time their iniquity was atoned for by the blood of Messiah as faith in Jesus as Lord is the ONLY Way to the Father (John 14:6). Subsequent to Messiah Jesus’ atonement for sin, the Holy Spirit teaches that while Messiah’s body laid in the tomb, Jesus, in Spirit, entered Sheol-Hades/Paradise, preached liberty to the captives there and personally escorted them into the Kingdom awaiting the resurrection of the righteous. Subsequent to the extrication of the righteous saints from Sheol-Paradise by Jesus, that region of Sheol remains completely empty as anyone who dies having trusted in Jesus as Lord in the New Covenant established in Messiah’s blood now transitions directly into the presence of our Lord in spiritual form (2 Corinthians 5:8) and will remain in the presence of our Lord awaiting the resurrection of the righteous and service in the New Jerusalem.
According to Jesus and the Holy Spirit, Hades-Sheol/Torments remains inhabited by the spirits of the unrighteous dead and even today, in the New Covenant, those who die rejecting Jesus as Lord, their spirit is interned in Hades-Sheol/Torments (NOT HELL) and will remain there with the Old Testament unrighteous dead awaiting the resurrection of the condemned (John 5:29) where they will receive a resurrected body of corruption and stand before Jesus to be judged in accordance with the deeds done in the body while the body was constrained by the Realm of Time and physics. These unrighteous dead will ultimately be adjudicated “guilty” for sin and lose both body and soul in the “second death” in the Lake of Fire, forever (Revelation 20:11-15).
The Holy Spirit teaches me that the unrighteous dead will suffer in the Lake of Fire commensurate with the evil done in the body and they will then be consumed and suffer the “second death” which is a complete annihilation of all life, remembrance, forever.
Statement was made concerning Israel and salvation: “If you’re not grafted into Israel, you are lost.” Is this true? Can Israel save?
Christian response,
No, Israel has nothing to do with my salvation other than Messiah having entered Time through the Tribe of Judah giving His life to pay my sin-debt I could never pay; it is my faith in Jesus as my Messiah that is my salvation and assurance of eternal life; truth is, a majority of Jacob’s children will die the “second death” in Hell as a result of their rejection of Messiah Yeshua as Savior. I love Israel and his children but they are blind, stiff-necked, obstinate and filled with self-righteousness as they cling to a Law that can never save them (Romans 9:30); a Law that only defines sin void atonement (Romans 3:20) while Messiah stands before them ready and willing to forgive their sin and offer them eternal life (John 3:16). By faith I am grafted into the promises made to Israel concerning salvation; the difference being, I honor the Father by believing in what the Son, Jesus Christ, has done for me; an overwhelming number of Israel’s children deny their Messiah and blaspheme His deity and sacrifice.
Question was asked: Why was Satan extricated from the Kingdom?
Christian response,
Satan was extricated from the Kingdom, as were the angels who followed Satan in his rebellion against God, because sin, nothing impure, is permitted to exist in God’s Kingdom (Rev 21:27) and the destructive nature of Satan’s sin was removed and Jesus was commissioned by the Father (John 1; Hebrews 1; Colossians 1; John 3:35) to take elements from the unseen Spiritual World and fashion those elements into matter (Hebrews 11:3) and create the Heavens and the Earth with haste (six-literal days-YOM) and Satan, the fallen angels, were placed upon this Earth some 6022-years ago to be dealt with by God through selfless love as per Genesis 3:15-21; 1 John 3:8b)…this is why Jesus entered the created realm of Time as Jesus tells us that His Kingdom is NOT of this World (John 18:36).
Our entire creation pertaining to Time and Matter and Physics is the resultant of Satan’s rebellion and God’s desire to maintain volitional love with His faithful angelic creation that He loves beyond human understanding…this love is contingent upon free will and free will, volitional love, is God’s desire.
All of the evil and suffering and death that has transpired over the previous 6000-years is the resultant of a cosmic war having been removed from the Spiritual Kingdom and placed upon this Earth constrained by Time and Physics to be dealt with apart from the Kingdom and we are players, participants, in this war and we choose whom we will serve through our loyalty to God the Father through faith in Jesus or faithfulness to the Devil in unbelief. We will be judged accordingly and the allies of Satan will be destroyed in the “second death” (Revelation 20:11-15) and the allies of God will receive life in the New Jerusalem and serve Jesus Christ, forever (2 Timothy 2:12).
Every man and woman having attained an age of reason/discernment/accountability intuitively knows God exists…even the atheist who lies to you and me and himself…knows God exists as God has made this undeniably apparent through the Creation; therefore, anyone with a modicum of cognitive acuity believes in a God whether or not they acknowledge same…the question is, does one know the true and Living God and His righteous requirements and His Plan for Time and Eternity and mankind?
Jesus is God, Elohim, I AM, Messiah, Creator, Judge, and Jesus declared this truism repeatedly and was ultimately murdered for it. Jesus warned that unless you believe He is I AM…you will die in your sins (John 8:24). The one who is redeemed from sin by faith in Jesus having received the Holy Spirit as Guarantor of Covenant with the Father (Ephesians 1:13-14), this person redeemed by faith in Jesus will know and understand the necessity for Messiah’s deity as the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth (John 16:13), reveals these things to the one who loves God and trust in Him, alone (1 John 2:27).
Concerning the rich young ruler (Matthew 19), the Law, Messiah’s dialogue…a response,
The young ruler had asked Jesus what he must do to inherit or earn eternal life and Jesus responded (under the Law) to keep the Commandments; this, in response to the young man’s self-righteousness thinking himself sufficiently “good” to enter the Kingdom…Jesus reminded the young man that no one is good but God…Jesus at this point asked the young man if he recognized Jesus as God as this would have been key to salvation…but the young man insisted that he was sufficiently righteous to earn his own salvation…then…Jesus pointed out the hypocrisy and sin of the young man by commanding him to follow Jesus and sell all that he had and give it to the poor…the young man could not obey because the young man loved his wealth, his money and possessions more than God thereby violating the Greatest Commandment of all.
Jesus knows that we cannot keep the Law sufficiently to earn our own salvation as the Law mandates perfection (James 2:10; Galatians 3:10; Deuteronomy 27:26) and we’re under the condemnation of sin as we’re all sinners (Romans 3:20-23) and Jesus understood that only by trusting in Him as Messiah would the young man find righteousness (a right standing) with the Father and eternal life (John 3:16-28;14:6).
Jesus provided the young man no less than two-opportunities to find eternal life through Him, Jesus as Messiah, but the young man did as most Jews and Christian cults do today, they trust in their own righteousness to save them and deny the righteousness of Christ offered them by faith in Him as their Messiah who died for them (2 Corinthians 5:21).
So God did what the law could not do. He sent his own Son in a body like the bodies we sinners have. And in that body God declared an end to sin’s control over us by giving his Son as a sacrifice for our sins. 4 He did this so that the just requirement of the law would be fully satisfied for us, who no longer follow our sinful nature but instead follow the Spirit.
My statements are under girded by commonsense, natural law, God’s law, experiential relevance by observation, 31-years of policing and policing the homosexual community on four-different shifts. LGBTQ is a vile and demonically-based spiritual and mental illness that destroys mind, body, soul, within the Realm of Time and in Eternity…it is the fool and naive individual deluded by destructive liberalism, narcissism, ignorance, that will not see this truism. God does not create a homosexual or a lesbian or a trans or a queer…God created human kind as male and female and though there are rare cases of genetic malformations concerning the sexual genitalia, 99+% of mankind is born male or female (physiologically and psychologically)…and to subvert God’s will is sin and arrogance and deception and lest one repent of this immoral nastiness and trust only in Jesus Christ as Lord, they will die in their sin (John 8:24) and die the “second death” in Hell (Rev 20:11-15).
Twitter is replete with demonically deceived representatives of the Democrat-Communist Party in America. Some even preface their deception with “Christian.” Twitter is certainly representative of the hopelessness, defilement, waywardness, of American society. What a show!
"RickeyD" Holtsclaw 