Posted on 08/30/2015 10:04:00 AM PDT by CHRISTIAN DIARIST
“Who do men say I am?” Jesus posed the question to his disciples as they went out to the towns of Caesarea Philippi. John the Baptist, Elijah or other of the prophets, they answered.
“But who do you say that I am?” Jesus asked them. And while 11 of the 12 disciples were uncertain, Peter responded, “You are the Christ.”
This account, taken from the Gospel According to Mark, appears in slightly different form in Matthew and Luke, the other two synoptic gospels. What is noteworthy is that in none of the accounts does Jesus say He is other than the Son of God.
He does not say He is, at once, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
It is because of that ambiguity that in 325 AD the Roman emperor Constantine the Great – who reputedly converted to Christianity 13 years earlier – summoned some 300 bishops of the post-Apostolic church – including Philocalus of Caesarea Philippi – to the lakeside city of Nicaea to decide who the church believed Jesus to be.
And 1,690 years ago this past week, the so-called First Council of Nicaea concluded two months of ecumenical debate with the decision that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one and the same.
That bestowed the church’s official imprimatur upon the disputed doctrine of trinitarianism, leaving a mark on Christendom that endures to this very day.
Indeed, those who refused to accept the conclusions at Nicaea were condemned as heretics – like Arius, the Alexandrian presbyter who accepted the divinity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but who challenged the idea of a triune “godhead” made up of three coequal, coeternal supreme beings.
Arius believed God the Alpha and the Omega; the beginning and the ending; the One Who was, Who is, and is to come; the Almighty.
He believed Jesus to be, “the first born of all creation,” the “only begotten Son of God.” He held that Jesus and God were of like essence, but not the same essence. He also taught that Jesus was perfect and unchanging; that He was in all things subject and obedient to the Father; that He was sent to earth to take away the sin of the world.
As to the Holy Spirit, Arius did not think it an actual being, but the illuminating and sanctifying power of God, which was indeed divine, but unequal to either the Father or the Son.
In today’s Christian church, be it Roman Catholic or Protestant, those who bend towards the Arian view, who question the “mystery” of the Trinity – that “the Lord is one,” yet He manifests Himself as three distinct beings – are perceived as having theological views that border on the blasphemous.
But the Trinitarian doctrine is extremely problematic. It requires those who read the Word of God to convince themselves that it doesn’t really mean what it plainly says with respect to the relationship between God and the Son of God.
Indeed, if Jesus is God, and God Jesus, as most Christian churches espouse today, why did Jesus say, in the Gospel According to John, “I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I.”?
Why did Jesus advise his disciples, in the Gospel According to Mark, all would one day see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory, but that of that day and hour no one knows, “not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the father.”
Then there’s the passion of Christ, from the Garden of Gethsemane to the cross at Golgotha.
As the Lord prayed in the garden, He cried out, according to Mark’s gospel, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for You. Take this cup away from Me; nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will.”
Then on the cross, the Gospel of Matthew tells us that, about the ninth hour Jesus cried out, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
If Jesus and God were one and the same being, then the Lord need not have asked the Father to spare Him the ordeal that awaited. He could have decided so Himself. And he needn’t have asked God why He had forsaken Him. Because He would have been asking Himself why He had forsaken Himself.
Because the Trinitarian doctrine has been accepted wisdom in Christendom since the First Council of Nicaea nearly 1,700 years ago, we accept it today as gospel truth. But it is abundantly clear, not from church traditions, but from the words of Christ Himself, that the doctrine is wrong.
God is manifest in three persons, and the doctrine of the Trinity did take about 400 years for the early Church to get down in theology. They didn’t have as much theology presented to them and it took some time for them to figure it out. We don’t have that excuse.
If anybody doesn’t understand the Trinity, keep it simple.
God manifests Himself to us in three persons, all the same one God. In order to understand His Plan for us, we simply have too understand His Word. In order to understand His Word, we read the Bible where it is presented to us.
In studying the Word, it is obvious He is manifest to all humanity in three persons, but still one God. It’s really nothing more complex than that basic understanding.
A Scriptural study of each person of the Godhead is a great way to begin to understand His Plan for us collectively and individually.
Another doctrine parallel to the doctrine of the Trinity is the Doctrine of the Hypostatic Union, which might help in discerning His role for man in relationship to God the Father.
My apologies in having missed this from my remarks at #77.
Though IMHO, you’ve taken too much of the negativity in man from the Talmud and ascribed relative little to the word of God in Torah, and it’s “prophecies”, which can be attributed just as credibly in several different ways.
For example, not to imply that the Christian interpretations are necessarily wrong, yet the Hebrew expectations of “moshiach” are decidedly different in Jewish thought, and were not met in the “divinity” of Jesus.
Personally, I do not so deeply feel the conflict.
You're free to make these "credible" interpretations, and see if they hold up. They will not though.
For example, not to imply that the Christian interpretations are necessarily wrong, yet the Hebrew expectations of “moshiach” are decidedly different in Jewish thought,
Depends on the Jew, they didn't all have the same opinion.
God never came among us, He only sent a prophet named Jesus as far as they are concerned.
This is nothing but a halfway house to the Koran.
Do you feel that this thread focus on named individuals, and how much of a sinner they are in your opinion? Someone chose to express their opinion about ‘oneness’ Pentecostals in a, shall we say, unfavorable light. I pointed out the dark direction some of my kinfolk have chosen. You are welcome to express your opinion of your own kinfolk.
I quoted: “..I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.” John 14:28
You said: **Christ is here speaking of Himself as the Messiah-sent. In this capacity, as perfect man and mediator, He is lesser than the Father.**
Thank you for your personal opinion. That’s all it is. Because, you see, in just a few verses you’ve already forgotten how Jesus Christ defines the relationship with the Father:
“Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or believe me for the very works sake.” Jn 14:10,11.
**In His divine self, however, Christ is almighty:**
And then you go and quote Rev. 1:8, STILL forgetting that God the Father is IN Christ, just like he said.
**Christ made all things.**
Well, with your co-equal, co-powerful, separate and distinct ‘first’ and ‘second’ persons of God.........What pray tell did the Father make?
I mean, with you putting “God the Holy Ghost” (not a scriptural phrase) back in third place, when at least he made Mary conceive.
Jesus Christ explained that all of his divine power and wisdom (including the words that he spoke)was from the Father in him. (sure, his mortal man was complete with a will of the flesh). He went on to explain that the Spirit of truth (the Holy Ghost) does the will of the Father:
“Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall NOT speak of himself; but WHATSOEVER he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come.’ 16:13
**Eternally begotten, always proceeding from the Father. Christ is the Word of God and His Wisdom. The Father could never exist without the Son. There was never a time they were ever a part. Hence in “the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” This is the same God, but a separate person from the Father.**
You say all that, when God has no beginning (pretty hard to fathom). The Son credited all of the words that he spoke to being told him from the Father. Try again.
My words are not a separate and distinct person from me. They don’t come from my body. They come from my mind. God gave me a body to express the words that come to my mind.
God is a Spirit. He made a body (his Son) to express his words to man at man’s level. A living, breathing, feeling man; perfect in every way. Able to take the sins of the world upon himself, and redeem fallen man.
**Which would mean that Christ is not God, but a created being. But Christ is clearly God “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”,**
Keep in mind, the following is presented using your separate and distinct, co-equal Gods idea:
the Son is the Word, and the Father in NOT the Word. So did the Father just put the Son’s words in a hard drive somewhere, until the Son needed them? But then there’s that pesky problem about the Son saying repeatedly that the words that he spoke were not his, but the Father’s.
“Before Abraham was, I am,”
See, he’s speaking the Words that were given from the Father (that dwells in him).
“Unto the Son [God] saith, thy throne, O God, is forever and ever,”
There can only be one “thy throne”. Is the separate and distinct Father conceding ownership of the throne? No. The omnipresent Father now has image to dwell in, to actually, physically, sit on a throne. That image was obedient to the Father in all things, even unto death.
I will answer the others tomorrow. I must jam gears in six hours. Good night!
Let's think about this for a second. John 14 teaches that Christ is in the Father, and that the Father is in Him. But Christ also says here that we are in the Father as well.
Joh 14:20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
1) So Jesus is in the Father.
2) The Father is in the Son.
3) We are in the Son.
4) And the Son is in us.
5) And we are, consequently, in the Father also.
6) And the Father is in us.
Does this mean that I can declare myself to be Almighty? May I receive worship, as Christ constantly does (Mat_14:33, Mat_28:9, Mar_5:6 etc etc)? (Though Christ forbids worship to anyone but God alone in Matt 4:10.) May I forgive sins as only God does? May I be credited with creating the universe, as Christ is?
These questions make it pretty clear the folly of your shallow reading of those verses.
Well, with your co-equal, co-powerful, separate and distinct ‘first’ and ‘second’ persons of God.........What pray tell did the Father make?
This question is brought on as a result of confusion over the roles and distinct nature of the three persons. The Son is equal with the Father, but has the nature of being etnerally begotten and carrying out the perfect will of the Father. The Father decrees, and it is the Son who then goes forth and makes, "upholding all things by the word of His power" (Heb 1:4). The Holy Spirit, in turn, has the nature of eternally proceeding from both the Father and the Son (John 15:26, Romans 8:9, Galatians 4:6), and is called both the Spirit of God and the Spirit of the Son. He also had a role in creation, in creating life, and adorning the heavens (Job 26:13, Psalm 33:6).
So the answer to the question is, "what did the Father make?" The Father, Son and Holy Spirit all created the world. They just had different roles in that creation. I'll also add that having different roles-- for example, that the Son goes forth and fulfills the will of the Father-- does not make Him any less divine. The scripture is clear that Christ is uncreated.
My words are not a separate and distinct person from me. They don’t come from my body. They come from my mind. God gave me a body to express the words that come to my mind.
So we rightly cannot say that the Word of Zuriel is both with Zuriel and is Zuriel. But the scripture clearly teaches this of God, and trying to force God into a box by comparing him to your own limitations is absurd.
That said, I have often thought that a human being is a kind of trinity. We are Mind, body and soul. The mind decrees, the body is our image and the part of us that puts into action the will of the mind, and the soul grants us life and ability. Though this is not a correct metaphor, because the Holy Spirit does not grant life to the Father and Son.
So did the Father just put the Son’s words in a hard drive somewhere, until the Son needed them?
You're taking the word "Word" literally, as if Christ is literally some kind of sound vibration coming out of the Father's mouth. According to the Cambridge Commentary of the Bible, the word Logos "has its origin in the Targums, or paraphrases of the Hebrew Scriptures," and is the equivalent of God's Wisdom. In Greek, Logos would refer to the faculty of reason. Even here, however, I would hesitate to take it so literally, as neither wisdom nor the faculty of reason is itself a "Person," but Christ clearly is. Logos is simply yet another name of the Son.
See, he’s speaking the Words that were given from the Father (that dwells in him).
A completely ridiculous statement, with literally no logical reason to say it, almost like you are just making things up as you go along, vomiting up random words without care if they have any meaning. The phrase "I Am" is the name of God in the Old Testament, and expresses an eternal existence. That was why the Jews took up stones to kill Him as soon as He applied that name to Himself.
No. The omnipresent Father now has image to dwell in, to actually, physically, sit on a throne.
In other words, Christ must be a created being, or a created shell. But I've already demonstrated that Christ is eternal and uncreated.
Oneness Pentecostals are definitely damned and are not Christians. They not only deny the Trinity, which by itself is damnable, but they are overwhelmingly Pelagians. They are a cult that require strict adherence to their "standards", that is, no dancing, dressing in a certain way, no alchohol etc etc, as a matter of salvation; and one must also speak in tongues, and many other things, and if you cannot do it, you must purify yourself in order to receive it. IOW, Oneness Pentecostals make Grace the wage of Merit, and deny the sufficiency of faith in salvation.
This is why they are a cult. The amount of obscene and ridiculous control they take on their hapless followers is profound and incredibly damaging.
May God have mercy on you, like he did Saul. The following is from Acts 9.
Saul, “breathing out threatenings and slaughter,” was on his way to Damascus to persecute the disciples of the Lord, when “suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecuteth thou me?
Wrongheaded and headstrong, he thought these early church Pentecostals, like you, a damnable cult. What shock and awe to hear the answer from heaven when he asked, “Who art thou, Lord?”
Saul was expecting the one God of his Jewish religion to answer, but Greetings Puny Humans, since he believes the one God is not actually one but three separate and distinct divine people up in heaven, presumably would expect what? Which one of the three to answer? Perhaps all three answering in unison like an acapella trio?
No, none of the above, the answer from heaven was: “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for you to kick against the pricks.”
There resulted from this a dramatic change in Saul’s theology. Prompting him to get baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus for the remission of his sins, he was told by Ananias, “Why tarriest thou? arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord,” and to be filled with the Holy Ghost, Acts 9:17,18, 22:16.
The “cult” he was so cock sure about, that surely was so “damnable,” that held Jesus as their one Lord, that baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus for the remission of sins, became his one Lord. He, going on to become the great apostle Paul.
Arian sought to reduce Christian doctrine to a formula. The Council said, no. Because Arius’ theory was more congenial to the Emperor’s original; faith, that of the Sun God, he was ultimately brought back to court, and the heir became his advocate and upon ascending the throne imposed Arianism and semiarianism as the state religion. The Athanasian Creed gives us a better idea of what the issues were.
Well, they had a better idea of what Arius was saying. He did not invent the ideas he was promoting. He was a popular preacher who had come from the Levant and was in conflict with his own bishop, the Patriarch of Alexandria. He was trained as a sophist and dealt more in slogans and shibboleths than in deep theology. He even spread the word by popular hymns.
I've spend dozens of hours debating one of them. To him I am not even a Christian because I've not been baptized in the name of Jesus and I haven't spoken in tongues. He also believed if he left his denomination he'd loose his salvation.
“To him I am not even a Christian because I’ve not been baptized in the name of Jesus and I haven’t spoken in tongues. He also believed if he left his denomination he’d loose his salvation.”
Yeah, it’s a loony sect. It dates back only 150 or so years. Completely man-made.
I'm pretty sure that woman who drown her 5 kids then called her husband and said "you better come home" was one of them. This same friend of mine had had two wives and they were both bi-polar. He admitted that the AP Apostolic Pentecostal church was "a nut magnet". What a frustrating encounter it was, though they do have a handle on one very important doctrine. They are very powerful with their support of the deity of Christ.
Why your post to me about Arianism? I am as opposed to them as you are...if not more so. Though I don’t agree with the three divine people yet one God theory, I side with Trinitarians against Arians who deny the deity of Christ, and every other system of belief that does so. Nobody on earth has a higher view of Christ than Oneness Pentecostals, nobody has a stronger belief of the deity of Christ than they.
Paul preached the doctrine of the Trinity, and of Grace, and of faith, and of order and decency. Yours barks like dogs shrieking in your filthy churches as you tell people they are damned if they don't belong to your church and do not follow your obscure rules, kind of like the Pharisees.
Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
appears to me the ovum of Mary was necessary to fulfill prophesy.
You just confirmed you do indeed have a lot of things in common with Saul (not Paul yet). His thoughts were along the same lines as yours, as he was getting ready for his trip to Damascus...then he saw the light.
Luckily the light he saw wasn't that of works-righteousness and Oneness Pentecostal spittle.
Well said!
God bless!
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