Christian Universalism is Biblical

Sovereign vs. moral desirePro dropped his original argument for universalism in the previous round, but he picked it back up in this round. Recall that I attacked his argument by showing it committed the fallacy of equivocation, and I gave two arguments for why God's desire for the salvation of all was a moral desire rather than a sovereign desire.Pro denies that there is a distinction in God's desires and seems to believe that all of God's desires are sovereign desires. But he ignores my arguments to the contrary. I showed, from Proverbs 21:3 and Ezekiel 33:11 that God has desires that are not actualized, which proves that they are not sovereign desires (since sovereign desires are actualized).I argued that God's desire for the salvation of all people cannot be a sovereign desire, but a moral desire, because in fact not all people are saved. Salvation and wrath are diametrically opposed. As I demonstrated from 1 Thessalonians 5:9, Romans 5:9, and 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, a person can be saved, or they can suffer the wrath of God, but they cannot do both. To be saved is to be saved from the wrath of God, so if a person has to suffer the wrath of God, then that person is not saved.Pro responds by saying, "God or [sic] course has not yet accomplished this desire or will but God will accomplish this in the future in due time." But as I showed in the last round, even if God does eventually reconcile everybody to himself, it is still the case that not everybody was saved from his wrath. To be saved is to be saved from the wrath of God, so if a person suffers the wrath of God, then they were not saved. Universal salvation is false.Pro's proof textsPro cites several scriptures in an attempt to show that all people will be saved. Even if we take these scriptures to mean what Pro thinks they mean, it will still not result in universal salvation. At best, all it will do is give us temporary punishment followed by eventual reconciliation. Pro has already admitted that some people will suffer the wrath of God in judgment. That means they will not be saved.Pro's interpretation of Romans 5:18 fails to take into account Paul's whole argument in Romans 5. Paul is contrasting those who are in Adam with those who are in Christ. Verse 9 makes it clear that those who are in Christ will not suffer the wrath of God, yet Pro and I both agree that some people will suffer the wrath of God. It follows that not all people are in Christ. What verse 18 is saying is that through the one transgression of Adam, there resulted condemnation to all men who are in Adam, and through the one act of obedience of Christ, there resulted justification to all men who are in Christ. The context makes this clear. If Paul meant to say that all people whosoever are justified, then nobody would suffer the wrath of God. That is clearly not what Paul meant.Paul makes the exact same point in 1 Corinthians 15:22. He says, "For as in Adam, all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive." All of those in Adam will die, and all of those in Christ will be raised to eternal life. But as we saw in Daniel 12:2, John 5:28-29, and Matthew 7:14, some will be raised to eternal life, and some will be raised to judgment, so Paul cannot mean in 1 Corinthians 15:22 that everybody will be saved, i.e. made alive, raised to life, etc. Notice what he says in the very next verse, when he expands on "all we will made alive." He says, "But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ’s at His coming, then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and power." This is only referring to the resurrection to eternal life for those who are in Christ, not the resurrection of all people. So when it say in the next verse that the last enemy to be destroyed is death, Paul is talking about the last enemy of those who are in Christ. If we took Paul to mean that all people will find life, we would be explicitly contradicting what Jesus said in Matthew 7:14. He said, "For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it." Pro ignored that passage even though it completely refutes universal salvation.It is curious that Pro would try to use 1 Timothy 4:10 as a proof text for universal salvation. It says Jesus is "the savior of all men, especially to believers." If universalism were true, then Jesus would be the savior of all men period. He wouldn't be a savior of one group in a different sense than he is a savior to the other group. Jesus is the savior of believers in the sense that he saves them from the wrath of God, so in what sense is he a savior to all men? In two senses: (1) in the sense that God delays his wrath against them because they are scattered among those who will be saved (Matthew 13-29-30), and in the sense that there is "no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). Jesus is mankind's only savior, whether he actually saves all people or not.None of the passages Pro cites to support universal salvation are sufficient to establish his case. Moreover, Pro never refuted my argument that the salvation Jesus died for was a salvation from the wrath of God. Instead, he seemed to think that salvation means you won't suffer the wrath of God forever (though he never substantiated that definition of salvation). Since he acknowledges that people will suffer the wrath of God in judgment, it follows that universal salvation is false.ConclusionThank you for coming to tonight's debate, and thank you rjohnson741 for the debate. BTW, you said you'd have to learn how to separate your comments into paragraphs. All you have to do is hit the enter button twice when you get to the end of a paragraph. Then you can start your new paragraph. Good luck on your future debates and welcome to DDO!