Religious Affiliations, Beliefs and Bible Preferences

On your poll the question on the Universial Fatherhood of all question, I found it hard to decide. I do believe that because we are all created by the will of God and all people are loved by God, there is the idea in the scriptures that we are adopted into the family of God and we are given power to become the children of God. I truely believe God's loves everyone, but not everyone is born of the spirit yet. Not everyone believes yet. Yet every knee will bow before Him and confess him. In that promise is the greatest hope. Alice

"Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us?" (Mal. 2:10)

"For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device." (Acts 17:28-29)

"One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all." (Eph. 4:6)

Hosea Ballou wrote concerning the father hood of God in 1866 and said there is a sense in which God is not the Father of all. Below is part of the article. The complete article can be read at: http://www.auburn.edu/~allenkc/fatherhood.html

"We do not forget that there is one sense in which God is not the father of all. There are many who have not been spiritually born of him, or regenerated, and who are not, in this moral or religious sense, his children, that is, they do not resemble God in their character. Christ said to the Jews, for instance, ''If God were your father, ye would love me." " Ye are of your father the devil, and the works of your father ye will do." And so in several other passages of Scripture, God is spoken of as the father only of those who believe and obey. But in all these cases the meaning is too obvious to need illustration. We know they relate only to religious character, not to the persons themselves. What we wish to say is, that, underneath this moral or religious relationship of mere character, there must be a natural relationship that binds all mankind to God. If he were not really their Father, how could he require them to serve him as dear children? If they really belonged to the "adversary," it would be enough for them to obey their own father. But if God created them all in his own image, he is of course their father in the natural sense. "One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all."

========== In Reply To ========== On your poll the question on the Universial Fatherhood of all question, I found it hard to decide. I do believe that because we are all created by the will of God and all people are loved by God, there is the idea in the scriptures that we are adopted into the family of God and we are given power to become the children of God. I truely believe God's loves everyone, but not everyone is born of the spirit yet. Not everyone believes yet. Yet every knee will bow before Him and confess him. In that promise is the greatest hope. Alice

========== In Reply To ========== "Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us?" (Mal. 2:10)

"For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device." (Acts 17:28-29)

"One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all." (Eph. 4:6)

Hosea Ballou wrote concerning the father hood of God in 1866 and said there is a sense in which God is not the Father of all. Below is part of the article. The complete article can be read at: http://www.auburn.edu/~allenkc/fatherhood.html

"We do not forget that there is one sense in which God is not the father of all. There are many who have not been spiritually born of him, or regenerated, and who are not, in this moral or religious sense, his children, that is, they do not resemble God in their character. Christ said to the Jews, for instance, ''If God were your father, ye would love me." " Ye are of your father the devil, and the works of your father ye will do." And so in several other passages of Scripture, God is spoken of as the father only of those who believe and obey. But in all these cases the meaning is too obvious to need illustration. We know they relate only to religious character, not to the persons themselves. What we wish to say is, that, underneath this moral or religious relationship of mere character, there must be a natural relationship that binds all mankind to God. If he were not really their Father, how could he require them to serve him as dear children? If they really belonged to the "adversary," it would be enough for them to obey their own father. But if God created them all in his own image, he is of course their father in the natural sense. "One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all."

====================================== Thank you for your reply to my post. I agree and rejoice in this above post and look forward to the time when God our Father is all in all. Thanks again for your reply. Alice Woodard