byronarnold

Yes, I left and came back. Decided I wanted that web hosting again. lol. I love AoE II and Chess. Right now I am addicted to C-Evo. The BEST Civ 2 knock off ever, Lol. I have been posting. I am already a step ahead of ya. I have been posting. Haven't caught the Xisto addiction yet though. Lol.

Both games are freeware, based upon Civilization II. I personally like C-Evo better. Although I can never win at either! Lol.

A lot of newbs are overwhelmed by how big the boards are. I advise you not to try to keep up with everything that goes on here. Pick the forums that interst you the most, and just watch those boards. For example, I am usually to be found on the Religion and Spirituality boards.

Simplicity is indeed a thing that is often taken for granted. Look at the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for example. The modern church heaps so much under the "Gospel", but the Gospel is really quite simple: Jesus came to take away the sins of the world through his blood shed. There were people saved in the Book of Acts, long before the New Testament was written, and a long LONG time before the modern Chrurches complex theology of what the "Gospel" is. Give me that "Old Time Religion", the Religion that Peter and James taught long ago.

I was listening to "Amazing Grace" earlier on Youtube and now I am listening to "Just a Closer Walk". I had forgotten that even the old hymns can touch the soul so deeply.Don't get me wrong, I love contemporary worship music. "I can Only Imagine" by MercyMe speaks to my soul just as much. But in my zealousness to find copntemporary music to worship with, I forgot that the old hymns could do just a good job.I am definately going to have to mix it up and include music of both in my personal worship!

Hello, I am Byronarnold. I live in western Ohio. I am a nerd who loves strategy games and loves reading and studying. I am a Christian-Universalist. I believe that, through the blood of Christ, all men will eventually be reconciled to God. While I do believe in punishment for sins (both in this life and after we die), I do not believe that any punishment is eternal, except for Satan and his demons. The punishment for man is corrective punishment (that is the meaning of the Greek word the New Testament uses for punishment; kolasis means corrective punishment), afterwards we will be reconciled to God. I believe in both evolution and creation. I believe in the Gap theology, and believe evolution happened during the gap and that everything was destroyed during Satan's fall, and the creation story of Genesis 1:3-2:3 was God re-creating the heavens and the earth. I believe in soul sleep. After we die, it is like sleep for us. We know nothing and are completely unconcious until the Resurrections in the Last Days. I love science-fiction. My favorite tv shows are Star Trek TNG and Star Trek Enterprise; Stargate SG-1 and SG-Universe. My favorite movies are all the Star Trek movies and Star Wars. My favorite Book (besides the Bible, of course) is Battlefield Earth and the Foundation series. I also love the 2001 series by Arthur C. Clarke. Well, thats me. I am just a religious nerd, I guess. Lol.

I believe in Evolution. I believe in Creation. Yes, I believe in both. How? You may ask? The secret is in Genesis 1:1-2. Lets take a look at the Scriptures. . The word translated "was" from the Hebrew is better translated as "became". Most of the time, when you see "was" or "is" in your Old Testament Bible, it was supplied by the Translators for clarity. They were not in the oroginal Hebrew, because they are implied by the language. The fact that this word "was" actually in the original Hebrew text should give us a clue. Anyways, verse two is better translated as "The earth became without form and void..." So why would the Earth become desolate? I believe it was the Fall of Satan. I mean, we can clearly see that Satan rebelled before the Creation story in Gensis 1:3-2:3. After all, we see him in the Garden of Eden leading Adam and Eve to sin. So the Creation story in Genesis 1:3-2:3 is actually a RE-Creation story rather than a creation story. God is re-creating the world after God's judgement against Satan and his fallen angel comrades. So where does Evolution come in? There's a reason that just about every scientist (95% of all scientists, and over 99% of scientists in the Life sciences [such as biology]) believe in Evolution. There is quite a lot of evidence in several different fields of science that attest to evolution. So when did it happen then, to fit with the Bible? I believe it was between the creation of the Universe (the Big Bang and following events) in Genesis 1:1 and Satan's Fall and God's judgement against the Earth in Genesis 1:2. I believe that the majority of time of the known universe (several billion years) exist within this time frame, and this is when life evolved over the course of billions of years and thats when God destroyed everything as part of his judegement. Then he recreated everything as described in the first creation story. Yes, I know there is no biblical support that evolution happend during the "gap" between Genesis 1:1-2 (and most Gap theologists deny evolution ever happening), but the writers of the Bible had no clue about evolution, so God didn't mention it when he inspired the writing of the Bible. With the evidence of evolution, it had to have happened sometime. I think it best logically fits there. ~"Gap Creationism", Wikipedia

There is a phrase that Jesus uses throughout Matthew (13:39, 49; 24:3; 28:20): the end of the aion. Obviously, if aion has an end, it cannot mean eternity. Aionios is the adjective form of aion, referring not to eternal but to a time period covered by aion. Hence the translation I offered above: age-enduring. Yes, Christ's action was necessary for the justification of all men. I never denied that. I in fact agree with Paul when he says: I also agree with Paul when he says: Paul says that all it takes to be saved is to confess and believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord. He also says that everyone will do that. Obviously, then, everyone will be saved! I am not saying that there won't be judgement in the Lake of Fire for those who have died in their sins, but I am saying that that judgement is not eternal for anyone except Satan and his fallen angels! Those of us who accept Jesus in this life will bypass that punishment for our sins. Those who don't will go through that punishment. But after that there will be no doubt in their minds that Jesus is Lord, and that he died so that they may eventually be reconciled to God. They will, at that moment, confess with their mouth that Jesus is Lord, to the Glory of God If he is patient, then why must that patience end at death? I mean, what is the point in a kolasis (Greek for corrective punishment) after death if it is not to rehabilitate the soul and lead to its reconciliation with God?

The Grek word for "eternal" (and its cognates such as "forever") does not signify "eternal". There is no Biblical Greek term that matches with our conception of "eternal". The Greek word is "aion" which signifies an undetermined amount of time. A better translation than "eternal" is "age-enduring" (compare the Young's Literal Translation of the Bible. Also, see this page for more information on "aion"). What most translations translate as "eternal punishment" is better translated as "age-enduring correction", since in the Greek the word for punishment (kolasis) refers to corrective punishment. This makes sense, since God is our Father. A Father does not punish children just to punish them, but to correct and teach them. Romans 5:18, which I quoted above, seems to me very clear as supporting Christian Universalism. The context (Please read Romans 5:12-21) shows that they are talking about all human beings , not just those in Christ. And, according to this passage, Jesus' "one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men."

The Bible does not support any dates for the end of the world. Not 2012, nor 2000 years after his death. In fact, hear the words of Jesus: It is super clear that no date for the end of the world can be supported by the Bible. The 2012 hoax comes from pagan sources, the Mayans. And its not even the ned of the world according to them. Only the end of an age. Please, people, start reading your Bibles. Do not fall into paganism, or you will face the judgement after your life has ended.

There is a judgement after death for those who have not achieved salvation. The New Testament makes that very clear. But, in light of the scriptures that say that all will be reconciled to God, I believe that this judgement is only temporary. I personally believe it to be based upon your sins. For example, Hitler will have a greater punishment than a common thief. The thief will have a greater punishment than someone who just told fibs here and there. After the punishment, they will be reconciled to God. Here are some more verses that support Universalism:

We are all sinners. But God loved us so much that he gave his only begotten son as a ransom for the sins of the world. By his blood, by his cross, we are all forgiven of our sins. That is not to say that we are free to sin. There is a judgement for all. But by Christ's blood the judgement has already been taken care of for us.

(Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV).) Christian Universalism says that by God's grace through Jesus Christ's sacrifice, ALL will eventually be saved. This was a prevalent view in the early church, and many of the church fathers believed it. But orthodoxy was established in 325 C.E. at Nicea. And since then, it has been heresy to believe in Christian Universalism. But lets take a look at what the Bible says about it. Please notice the word "all" in the following scriptures: ALL means ALL. I don't think there is anyway to limit its meaning to just "some". I think from these scriptures its pretty clear that God plans to save everyone! This is only a sampling of the scriptures found that support the idea of Christian Universalism. For more, watch this video: http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

I currently don't have the time to keep up with this forum and a website in addition to my job. So, how would I delte my hosting account? I don't want to delete my Xisto forum account, I like the discussions here, and I may want to try a website gain someday, but right now I don't have the time. Is it possible to keep my forum account but have my hosting account deleted?Thanks for any and all info!!!Byron Arnold

Who says believing in life after death is optimistic? To me, its pessimistic, for the simple reason that the vast majority of humans who have ever lived is, according to most religions, going to hell!!! To me, its more optimistic to say that all are equal in death (i.e., they all face the same fate, nonexistence after death), just as they should have been in life.