Thank you so much, @HSong, for this tremendous work that you are doing!
I'm glad I can help you in your studies. Thank you as well for your replies, it puts me in good spirits knowing that I'm able to help people out there understand The Almighty Lord's plan of Universal Salvation for everyone.
You mention a good point, of "Translation Tunnel Vision". My mistake starting out was only looking at the King James Version, which I'd call "King James Bible" and ignoring other versions. But now, as I've started to read different translations, I've begun to understand more of God's truth.
For example, here's my personal rankings of a personal favorite verse of mine, Titus 2:11. I frequently use this passage when evangelizing people to believe in Jesus Christ with faith alone and proving Universal Salvation is true, so I looked through all it's versions and chose the one I liked the best.
You're probably wondering, where's 10/10? Well, that's how I would rate the original Greek manuscripts containing this verse, it's always best to check the original source.
English Standard Version, ESV: For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,
9/10 = "bringing" I find is much more powerful translation than "offer". It's like if I said I'm offering you a $100 versus I'm bringing you $100.
New International Version, NIV: For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people.
8/10 = Now it's "all people" which is better. But, some ECTers may falsely say that "Oh, it's only an offer of salvation, not the real thing".
New King James Version, NKJV: For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men,
7/10 = The Old English "eth" and "th" has been removed, which is an improvement. However, while I understand that "all men" means everyone, like mankind, I've seen some people confuse "all men" to falsely meaning "all of the male gender", when meanwhile all genders will be saved, all men, all women, all humans.
King James Version, KJV: For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,
6/10 = Good for its time, 1611, but its age has begun to show. The English language has changed over time, and similarly to how Jesus chose to speak Aramaic, we must show the Gospel in a way where it's easily understandable to the most people as possible.
These translations were taken from the following link:
https://biblehub.com/titus/2-11.htm
(Though, there are plenty more translations out there that I did not cover)
For
γὰρ (gar)
the
ἡ (hē)
grace
χάρις (charis)
of God
Θεοῦ (Theou)
has appeared,
Ἐπεφάνη (Epephanē)
bringing salvation
σωτήριος (sōtērios)
to all
πᾶσιν (pasin)
men.
ἀνθρώποις (anthrōpois)
Think of antropology, the study of humanity, mankind. Adam = Man. Mankind meaning, all of the descendants of man.
All this highlights the difference between knowing about Christ and being in Christ.
:dsunny: Agreed. Many of my family members are in "Christian Churches" and consider themselves "Christian", yet they falsely believe that you have to have your good deeds outweigh your bad deeds to go to Heaven.
Matthew 10:21-23 Brothers will turn against their own brothers and hand them over to be killed. Fathers will hand over their own children to be killed. Children will fight against their own parents and will have them killed. 22 Everyone will hate you because you follow me...
I've tried to tell them about having faith alone in Jesus Christ to be saved, but they reject the idea. Like you mention, all I can do is support them like a family member does and hope that they can learn the truth eventually.