A little over a year ago the Lord mercifully spared our home, which is about 30 miles from Galveston, from a hurricane. We did evacuate, and when we evacuated, the Lord gave me a week long break from normal duties, during which I wrote the bulk of this review of Terrance L. Tiessen’s book, Who Can Be Saved? The review will appear in the spring 2007 issue of Trinity Journal, but I have received permission to post a pre-publication draft here.
Jim,
On September 11 this year, there was a meeting of this sort in Irving. Christians, hindu, muslim, bahai and jew coming together to accept unity and tolerance. 14 members from 6 religions. Some christian pastors were women. (Presbyterian and Disciples of Christ.)
Dr. Hamilton,
What conclusion(s) did you draw from the review? I thought the arguments from church history and the early fathers were interesting, but as he rightly notes, the question is primarily biblical, not philosophical.
The argument of the probability (likelihood?) that God has elected people simply not capable of understanding the gospel is as good of (and maybe a better) question than that of those who have not heard but could understand the Gospel.
Just thinking…
Allen,
Thanks for your note.
I’m not sure I follow your questions–I wrote that review, and so my conclusions are stated at the end of it.
I think Tiessen’s proposals are unbiblical.
Hope this helps!
JMH
Sorry Dr. Hamilton, I misunderstood the paragraph below the photo of the book. For whatever reason, I thought you were posting someone else’s review on your blog.
I was simply noting that Tiessen’s position is unbiblical, no matter what philosophical arguments we could make in “what if” cases, as in those who will not/do not ever hear the gospel. In my post, I was saying that a better question for us to discuss is What happens to those who are incapable of understanding the gospel.
It’s nice to know that you agree with yourself! I would hope that will always be the case…