[Serious] Literal and Not Literal

[Acrobat]

Well, the Bible DOES in fact say that God wants some to be saved and not others.  How would you address this contradiction?

I hate to keep hammering on this fact, but if people view God differently that how the Bible describes God, what use is the Bible?  If I were so inclined, I could get as much spiritual guidance from 'The Tempest' or 'Moby Dick'.

The view of God evolves considerably throughout scripture, from the tribal deity of Jews, to the God of all humanity, from a God that's fairly distant, to God the Father, or God as Love. From a God so otherly human, to a God who reveals himself in human flesh.

I'm not an inerrantist, so I have no problem viewing the writers of scripture to be wrong about certain things, just like I might say of the writing of Buddhist, and other religious text.

As a theist, and like pretty much all theist Christian and otherwise, i view God as one, as an eternal, unchanging, non-contingent being, a position held as fundamental. I'm also of the view that the writers of scripture held this view, but if they say things that appear at face value to contradict this fundamental nature, they were either wrong, or expressing a simile, bumping against the limits of their own language in expressing something about an eternal and unchanging god.

It's sort of like the use of design/teleological language when describing evolution, which is difficult to avoid. It's not meant to be taken literally, but as similes. Because it's difficult to describe much of evolution without using the language of design.