In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:14 (King James Version)
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
I think that is pretty clear.
I can never understand the desire to reduce the power of God outside of a need to tame him for ulterior motives.
That the dumbest garbage that I've heard yet. I send my husband to the store. Does that make him less than me?
You people strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
First by failing to accept and worship Him as God. This is what He taught Himself as well as His disciples. If they are going to reject this fundmental teaching, they are not 'following' Christ, but are following the teachings of a false teacher. As I pointed out in my previous post - the Person of Jesus is completely altered by JWs from what the scriptures clearly teach. Please take the time to go back and re-read those points. On the whole, JWs reject the fundamental teachings of Christ and scriptures
Where does the Bible explicitly or implicitly say that Jesus is God?
In many places, here are but a few
John 1:1-3 and 20:28, Phil 2:6-11, Heb 1:1-5, Rom 9:5, 2 Peter 1.1
"The Father is greater than I am"
Ah, yes FOE, standard strawman construct. There are 7 passages that have strong parity wording: Mt 16.27; Lk 24.49; Jn 3.17; 5.17ff; 8.17; 10.15; 10:38.
Since the Bible is clear that Jesus is God, let us be clear too that the Bible is very clear that there is only ONE God, not 2 or 3 or more. Lets look at the context of this statement since you are drawing this (uncited) from John
Jhn 10:28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any [man] pluck them out of my hand.
Jhn 10:29 My Father, which gave [them] me, is greater than all; and no [man] is able to pluck [them] out of my Father's hand.
Jhn 10:30 I and [my] Father are one.
Whose hand are we actually in, then?
Many scriptures saying that Christ was "sent". That shows that there was one who did the sending. They cannot be co-equal if that is the case.
You are assuming that a representation of submission implies inferiority of nature, not supported by scripture. Jesus made it clear that He cooperated with the sending and that He also initiated it within the realms of that cooperation - Jn 5:22, Jn 10:14 and others.
And then there is the whole point of Jesus being the only begotten, which means his being created instead of co-eternal.
Here is a total misunderstanding of the term only "begotten". John 1:18 refers to Jesus as the "only begotten God" (NASB), begotten only in that Jesus was born as the God-man. Jesus was with God and was God from eternity past (John 1:1-3) and still is God - eternity future. Co-eternal.
And where does it teach that the soul is eternal?
Where doe it say it isn't? John 3:16 ". . . shall have everlasting life".
God told Adam that if he sinned he would die.
Once again, you seem to want to cherry pick. God told Adam that if he sinned he would die, and he eventually did - denied the eternal life origionally established in the garden.
If there is a burning hell and the soul will burn there forever, than God is a liar by not telling Adam what the consequences of his sin would be.
God did not withhold His answer, in Eve's exchange she was well aware that death was something to be avoided. Furthermore, the bible is clear that hell was origionally for the devil and his angels - not intended for man. Further, the literal Hebrew says, "Dying you shall die," which does indicate a "progressive" death. That, plus the CONTEXT of the passage - no, they didn't die immediately, but were removed from the garden.
Those are the two major sticking points here, Jesus being part of a Trinity, and the immortal soul?
I have only scratched the surface of Jesus and the Trinity (books have been written on the subject). What you have to do is examine the WHOLE record of the bible on the subject and not selected passages in isolation from other passages that clarify or better define Jesus's relation as God the Son.
Same goes for your immortal soul issue. Consider this - IF the soul was not immortal then Jesus wasted His life trying to SAVE souls that were just going to go 'poof' upon death.