Are We God's Elect?

Thank you for usual deeply insightful commentary on Pascal's Wager/Gambit. I think you've pulled out a key point when you say that the wager does not take into account the true cost of making the bet.

The God's Elect issue is a tough one. It's mentioned all over the place, even in the Dead Sea Scrolls (http://www.openscrolls.org/4q534.html).

I guess, as I mentioned before, that the word "before" doesn't mean anything to one who is outside of the timeline. So if God sees all of time at once, it is hardly surprising that he knows who will make it to Heaven and who will go to the other place, before we are born. The tricky point is that He has chosen some and not others.

Now whether this is true or not, we cannot know. But we can discuss why this particular part of the doctrine was revealed to us. I mean, God could have kept this election business a secret but didn't. And, thinking about it, there is a benefit to The Believer in knowing that he or she is elect. I think it is similar to how cults like the Davidians and the Moonies work, by making you feel special. Christianity at some point would have been a cult (but is certainly not now of course!)

The discussion in my head goes something like: "If I am "Elect" then I am very glad that I've been chosen by God to go to Heaven. If, on the other hand, you have not been chosen to go to Heaven then you are not one of the elect and I am sorry for you (but it's your own fault really). God elected me and not you so I must be better than you in some way."

This gives the cultist a good reason to stay in the cult and to hold strong during the hard times of eventual persecution.

Now, I tried that Staples argument ("one can't ignore Jesus") on some friends and got blown away. In fact, your post was better than the book because to start with you list three options, you allow the fraud option -- that Jesus might have been lying. So I tried the three options on my buddies:

1. Jesus was telling the truth so you cannot ignore him
2. Jesus was a nutcase, don't tell me he was a good preacher and all round good chap
3. Jesus was lying, for power reasons (I mean what a legacy!) So don't tell me he was a good preacher and all round good chap

The answer came back:

"We believe Jesus was a good preacher and all round good chap"

So my response was:

"What, how can you not follow mine and Staples logic??"

And their response was:

"Oh, we don't believe what The Bible reports actually happened. That is how we ignore Christ. We believe that he did live, was a good preacher, but was hyped up by people who wanted to make money out of keeping the masses in line. I mean c'mon, you believe The Bible? Just look at Genesis".

I gave all the usual arguments about Jesus' life being well documented, why would someone do this etc, but they were not having it. So their point is, one has to believe that the Bible is telling the events as they happened .... and with The Bible there is a lot of room for doubt. If one doesn't believe The Bible then Christ can indeed be ignored. I myself read (pronounced "reed") the Gospels thinking, did this really happen? I mean John wasn't there when Jesus was talking to Pilot etc.

So I think people ignore Christ because they don't believe that The Bible is accurately portraying past events. They are not elect. Perhaps being "elect" really means being one of God's creations that has the power, the capacity, to believe that The Bible does accurately represent the past?

One day we'll find out, until then, we have to have Faith :-)

Current song: "Faith" -- George Michael