Hi Ariel,
The answers you get on this forum are from many different perspectives and you take them all together or one answer may speak to you more than another.
But the question of this thread was, Where are they now? In the parables we can see that very 'few' continue on to be faithful to the end. Instead of this being a discouragement, it should spur you on to stay in the race.
1Co 9:24 Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.
Also I this question seems to be asking can we lose the Holy Spirit once it is given. As the parable of the sower indicates that all that receive the truth do NOT stick with it. This does address what happens to some and with that is mind in March '08 Ray had a Bible study
'CAN WE LOSE GOD’S SPIRIT AND EONIAN LIFE?' Is “once saved always saved” - Scripturally true or false? And what does it matter? Are not all saved ‘anyway’? Here is an excerpt from the transcript.
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,7047.0.html -----
1 John 3:15 Whosoever hates his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal (eonian or age lasting) life abiding (the Greek is “staying or “REMAINING”) in him.
So the Greek is staying or remaining. Now if you just read that without all the background that I’m giving you, then you get the feeling that, well he won't be given God’s abiding life. No, he already has it. The only way something cannot stay in you or not remain in you, is if it’s in you. Do you follow that? It’s in you.
He’s not talking to Barbarians here or infidels, he’s talking to the congregation who have the spirit of God. But he says if you hate your brother the spirit of God will no longer stay with you, it will no longer be in you. If the Spirit of God is not in you, you are no longer His. Then you are going to the judgment. That’s just how simple that is. All through these Scriptures if you read carefully, maybe it doesn’t have it just like this, but this is just a poor translation. But if you read Concordant and Rotherham and all, they will tell you to ‘stay’ - ‘remain.’ It means to remain, but it won’t remain. You see it’s there, but it’s coming out.
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There are so 'few' that even accept this truth in the first place, but this is not a guarantee of the first resurrection. So we need to strive to be one of the faithful that do make it to the end.
Here are a few emails that Ray expresses, the chosen are the very few.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,2931.0.html --------
[1] I am not "MANY" but one person. I have a staff of ONE--my Web Master.
[2] I know of no one who is teaching what I teach on the worldwide web.
[3] I assure you that not MANY follow my teachings. MANY read our site, but very very FEW live by it. There are so few in fact, that if I had a dollar for everyone who has read our site and then turned to God and accepted Jesus as the Saviour of their wretched carnal selves, and began living godly, and righteously, and forsaking the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life....if I had a dollar for every one of them, it would not be enough to pay my utility bills for one month.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,2059.0.html -----------
Those whom God has foreordained to be the elect will always be the elect. The chosen elect cannot be lost. But you and I do not know exactly who is and who isn't an elect. Only God's knows those who are His, and therefore, we can never let down our guard, because we might only think that we are elect. I have seen and witnessed this with my own eyes where those who appeared to be elect, turned and now blaspheme the name of the Saviour they claimed to worship a short while back.
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,7390.0.html --------
Mat 7:13 "Enter through the cramped gate, for broad is the gate and spacious is the way which is leading away into destruction, and many are those entering through it. Yet what a cramped gate and narrowed way is the one leading away into life, and few are those who are finding it."
I quoted it from the Concordant Literal New Testament so as to get the tense proper. Notice that it is the broad way that the many "are entering." This is still going on, and it is through the narrowed way that "few are finding." This is nothing more than Jesus' statement that "many are called but few are chosen." But this pertains to this life only. In Judgment all will be judged as God's "House of God" is BEING judged NOW (See I Pet.4:17; I Cor. 11:31-32, etc.).
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I hope this is helpful and not discouraging.
mercy, peace and love
Kat