Jesus - First Born?

[amazing grace]

The thing is that I cannot give examples of where the angel of the Lord spoke and was not speaking as God. The Angel of the Lord is the odd one out. All the other angels spoke as angels.
The prophets did not speak as God but gave quotes of what God told them to say, and usually starting with "The Lord said", or something like that.

The Angel of the LORD, sometimes referenced as the Angel of God is just that - the Angel of the LORD/God - An angel sent by God. I agree that sometimes in the OT scripture the Angel of the LORD spoke in the first person AS God so there seems to be a blending together of when God was speaking, and His angel was speaking.
God chose to speak through or by the prophets because of the fear the Israelites had when He spoke to them giving the Ten Commandments. The Israelites asked for God not speak to them lest they die so from that point on God chose prophets to speak FOR Him - the words were FROM Him so in that sense - they spoke FOR God AS God, in God's stead.

It's not as if there is any list given in the other places where it says that through Jesus all things were created. All things means all things. It is just that in Col 1 there is a list of some invisible things which are not just confined to the New Heavens and New Earth.

And that is your mistake - "all" carries the meaning of either "all with distinction"(in a limited sense) or "all without distinction".
There is also a figure of speech used in this verse 16 called "encircling" - the verse begins with "For by him all things were created" and ends with "all things were created through him and for him" indicating the context of the things that were created "in heaven and earth, visible (earth) or invisible (heaven) whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities". (E.W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech Used in the Bible)
There are strong parallels in this verse with Ephesians 1:21, 22 - "that he (God) worked in Christ when he (God) raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church which is his body"

Nodody is good but God alone.
Jesus is good
Jesus is God.

Nobody is comparable to God.
Jesus is comparable to God
Jesus is God

All judgement is given to the Son and the Father judges nobody.
YHWH is coming to judge the earth
This YHWH must be the Son.

If anything, Mark 10 distinguishes Jesus from God.

Those verses in Isaiah about "who is comparable to God" is in relation to idols. . . . . Isaiah 40:18 To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? AN IDOL! A craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains.
Isaiah 46:1 Bel bows down; Nebo stoops; their idols are on beasts and livestock; . . . 5) To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike? 6) Those who lavish gold from the purse, and weigh out silver in the scales, hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a god; then the fall down and worship.

For the Father (God) judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, (John 5:22) And he (God) has given him (Jesus) authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. (5:27)
Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father (God) who sent me. (John 8:16) Again, Jesus is clearly distinguished from God.

Adam was created and became a living soul.
Jesus was a life giving spirit and became a man.
The natural first and then the spiritual.
(1Cor 15:44-46)
Adam did not become a living soul at his resurrection.
There is nothing about "became" said about Jesus.
It is just showing that the natural, the created fleshly Adam came first and then the spiritual, the man from heaven who was first a life giving spirit and then stepped into the created flesh body to become a man, the firstborn of creation.
1Cor 15:47The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. 48As was the earthly man, so also are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven.…

Jesus became a life giving spirit after his resurrection - he was "sown a natural body", i.e. "the natural" first, and "raised a spiritual body", i.e. then the "spiritual". Adam is awaiting the resurrection from the dead. If Adam has been resurrected, then Jesus is not the "firstborn from the dead" or the "firstfruits of them that sleep".
The first man was of the dust of the earth (flesh), the second man from heaven, i.e. from God. "from heaven" is synonymous with from God who is in heaven. And as Jesus is in heaven in his resurrected body so will all those bear that image upon resurrection -
(1 Cor. 15:52b) For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable; and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality - there is the difference between a natural body and a spiritual body.

Nobody has seen the invisible God but people have seen the body and resurrection body of Jesus.
Humans start their existence in the womb but not so with Jesus. It is not so with Jesus, He is the man from heaven (1Cor 15:47) so we cannot say that He began His existence in the womb,,,,,,,,, just that He began His existence as a man in the womb. So Jesus was not created, it was just His body which was part of the creation, but He is the man from heaven.

Nobody has seen the invisible God - Jesus Christ came to declare Him, i.e. make him known.
The second statement is a lie - Jesus was totally human and started his existence in the womb of Mary.
1 Cor. 15 is totally about the resurrection!!!
Jesus is the man from heaven - He came from God who is in heaven. God sent him in that he came into existence in the womb of Mary via the power of the Most High.

 

[Brian2]

The Angel of the LORD, sometimes referenced as the Angel of God is just that - the Angel of the LORD/God - An angel sent by God. I agree that sometimes in the OT scripture the Angel of the LORD spoke in the first person AS God so there seems to be a blending together of when God was speaking, and His angel was speaking.
God chose to speak through or by the prophets because of the fear the Israelites had when He spoke to them giving the Ten Commandments. The Israelites asked for God not speak to them lest they die so from that point on God chose prophets to speak FOR Him - the words were FROM Him so in that sense - they spoke FOR God AS God, in God's stead.

How many messengers are called THE Angel of YHWH (or of God)? I would think that THE indicates only one messenger called that. That one is the one who speaks as if He is God and who is identified as God by those who saw Him.

And that is your mistake - "all" carries the meaning of either "all with distinction"(in a limited sense) or "all without distinction".
There is also a figure of speech used in this verse 16 called "encircling" - the verse begins with "For by him all things were created" and ends with "all things were created through him and for him" indicating the context of the things that were created "in heaven and earth, visible (earth) or invisible (heaven) whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities". (E.W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech Used in the Bible)

In Col 1 the all things is not limited by anything, and "in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible" pretty much describes all things (the heavens being made from the save things we find on earth). Then Col 1:16 goes on to describe some invisible things in the heavens that were created through Him.

There are strong parallels in this verse with Ephesians 1:21, 22 - "that he (God) worked in Christ when he (God) raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church which is his body"

So this rule and authority and power and dominion existed already before anyone was creating the new heavens and new earth.

If anything, Mark 10 distinguishes Jesus from God.

That is what ant trinitarians say without realising that they are thereby saying that Jesus was not sinless and that He was not exactly like His Father.

Those verses in Isaiah about "who is comparable to God" is in relation to idols. . . . . Isaiah 40:18 To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? AN IDOL! A craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains.
Isaiah 46:1 Bel bows down; Nebo stoops; their idols are on beasts and livestock; . . . 5) To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike? 6) Those who lavish gold from the purse, and weigh out silver in the scales, hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a god; then the fall down and worship.

Sure it includes idols but there are places where idols are not mentioned at all. Nobody is like God,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, but His Son is exactly like Him.

11 Bible verses about Who Is Like God

A topical Bible which shows the most relevant Bible verse for each topic

bible.knowing-jesus.com

For the Father (God) judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, (John 5:22) And he (God) has given him (Jesus) authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. (5:27)
Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father (God) who sent me. (John 8:16) Again, Jesus is clearly distinguished from God.

John 8:16 is speaking about Jesus while on earth 2000 years ago.
John 5 is speaking about the coming judgement of all people and nations.

Jesus became a life giving spirit after his resurrection - he was "sown a natural body", i.e. "the natural" first, and "raised a spiritual body", i.e. then the "spiritual". Adam is awaiting the resurrection from the dead. If Adam has been resurrected, then Jesus is not the "firstborn from the dead" or the "firstfruits of them that sleep".

Adam has not been resurrected. He waits in Hades for that.
But why do you think that 1Cor 15:43-44 is speaking about the whole person when it even tells us that it is speaking about the body, which is buried and raised. You deny the scriptures here for your beliefs.
I suspect you think that because you have been taught that a human is just a body with a spark of life (spirit) which is extinguished at the death of the body.
You seem to deny Matt 10:28 and the mention of souls in heaven (in Revelation)
Don't you realise that this body is referred to as a tent.
2Peter 1:13 I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of my body, 14 because I know that this tent will soon be laid aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. 15 And I will make every effort to ensure that after my departure, you will be able to recall these things at all times.…

The first man was of the dust of the earth (flesh), the second man from heaven, i.e. from God. "from heaven" is synonymous with from God who is in heaven. And as Jesus is in heaven in his resurrected body so will all those bear that image upon resurrection -

Yes we all are resurrected in a body that is like the one Jesus has it seems. But again in order to justify your beliefs you seem to think you have the right to change the words of God, in this case, as also in other places, from "From heaven" to"from God". And even that is not enough. When it is pointed out that "from God" means that Jesus was alive with and in God, in heaven, you want to say that Jesus existed only in the mind of God.
But that of course means that He did not come from God at all.

Nobody has seen the invisible God - Jesus Christ came to declare Him, i.e. make him known.
The second statement is a lie - Jesus was totally human and started his existence in the womb of Mary.
1 Cor. 15 is totally about the resurrection!!!
Jesus is the man from heaven - He came from God who is in heaven. God sent him in that he came into existence in the womb of Mary via the power of the Most High.

He was not sent from heaven of from God if He came into existence in the womb of Mary.
But I understand why you do not see that or other things.

 

[Soapy]

We don't know what the Father or Son were called in eternity, or if they used names.

There is only one true God and therefore there is no need for Him to have a name.

But when there are many who are claimed to be [a] God there needs to be a way of identifying which God is being spoken of.

It was at this point, regarding Moses and the Israelites, that God gave Himself a name to distinguish Him from the pagan foreign Gods whom the Israelites encountered among tribes and nations amongst whom which they often dwelt. The Israelites were over-fascinated by the many Gods of these pagans and jealous that these Gods had identifiable personal names so each could be prayed to and worshipped specifically. The God of the Israelites was simply referred to as ‘Lord’, or ‘El’, or similar terms WHICH ARE TITLES not a personal name.

At no time ever was there any request nor declaration of a name for a ‘Son’ of the God of the Israelites because there was no such entity in existence - and certainly not one mentioned by the God of the Israelites.

What I say is that Jesus has been identified as God and YHWH who laid the foundations of the earth and spread out the heavens,,,,,,,,,,,,,, whatever their names were then.

There was no identification of any entity other than the God of the Israelites in regard to the creation of the world. The one true God of the Israelites states that it was He, and He alone, who created all things, laying the foundation of the world and spreading out the heavens.

Most certainly, ‘I and I alone’ cannot be a third party player who is never mentioned to the people from the Old Testament times.

The human Son of God, the one to whom God said "You will be my Son and I will be your father" (Psalm 2) did as humans do and inherited things from His Father. But of course He already owned those things (John 16:15) which in a human sense He was going to inherit.

The false claim that it was Jesus, NOT GOD, who created all things, is made by at least 3rd century Bible writers of a trinitarian leaning who needed to justify a three person God. They did a very poor job since Jesus, himself, says he can do nothing except what his Father FIRST shows him to do… this would mean that God first created and showed Jesus… where is that FIRST GOD creation?

Moreover, Jesus is to INHERIT what God has created. How is Jesus inheriting what he is supposed to have created and therefore already owns?

In eternity there was no need for the Father to actually father His Son who was as powerful and knowledgeable etc as He anyway. It was as a man that the Father actually became His Father, having begotten Him and taught the Son stuff etc.--was to Him, a father.

You just made up all that you just said. The term ‘Father’ in regard to God, is not about PROCREATION. It is about CREATION.

Spirit cannot procreate. Spirit can only CREATE.
God CHOSE the man, Jesus, as His very own and consecrated him by anointing Jesus with the holiest of holy oils: His very own SPIRIT (which most call, the Holy Spirit). This anointing gave jesus the glorified title of ‘CHRIST’, which means, ‘Anointed One’. It also EMPOWERED Jesus to be able to do the great things that Jesus did (See Acts 10:37-38). And just to show it wasn’t a one of for a supposed pre-existent person, many believers were also anointed with the same said ‘Holy Oil’ at Pentecost in the upper chamber. These ones also went about doing great deeds and astounding onlookers just as jesus did.

I am just pointing out that death of our body does not mean that we go out of existence and also does not mean that out spiritual soul dies when the Body dies. (Matt 10:28)
Jesus tells us that in Matt 10:28 but you want to ignore that.
Anyway when Jesus body died, His soul still lived.
It's a matter of understanding what "death" means.

Brian2, no amount of squirming can get you away from the fact that no one ever said that the spirit of a person does not die. DEATH is a separation of the Spirit out f the body of a person. The body then has no way to sustain itself and begins to decay back to dust. The Spirit of the person goes to rest, inert, uncommunicative, dormant, with God.

What you are trying (or not trying) to say is that the person is NOT DESTROYED!! A person that is destroyed CEASES TO EXIST. NO ONE IS EVER DESTROYED, not even errant demonic angels, until the END OF TIME. All must be first judged before a destruction order can be carried out of it be deemed so. For humanity only, those whose spirits sleep with God will be AWAKENED, brought back to sensation in a human body and then judged. This could only be so if the person, the Soul, still existed.

I notice that Trinitarians always use the same ruse that turns ‘Death’ into ‘Nonexistence of the person/Soul’. I say to you now, and once again, ‘Death’ is a human term for ‘A separation of the spirit of the person from the body of the person’, resulting in a non-communication state of a living person with a dormant person - spirit resting with God. It does not mean ‘Nonexisting’. The dormant spirit cannot, and has no ability to, communicate with anyone or anything.

The very fact that you use the term, ‘Nonexistent’ in respect of the dead absolutely shows you knew you were writing wrongly. This was nothing but a futile childish idea to attempt to sidestep the reality. Surely you know by now that these things do not work with me!!! Better that you do not answer than to present a deceitful response… I warn you again that your soul is in danger - not now, not immediately, but in the future at the judgement seat! If you were (but I know it’s not!) just mistaken or misled by your belief then that is one thing but no! You knew you were writing wrongly!!

It's clear that the quote in Psalm 102 is about God, and it is clear that this is applied to Jesus in the New Testament.

You CORRECTLY state that ‘He is the same yesterday, as today, as tomorrow’ (paraphrased) is applied to almighty God… That is what ‘YHWH’ is meant to convey. The God of the Israelites is ONE GOD who ‘ALWAYS IS’… He never changes.

So how do you claim that this is applied to Jesus despite the many ‘Changes’ I pointed out to you? Even a single change defeats your claim…:

• ‘BECAME A MAN’…
• ‘WAS MADE IMMORTAL NEVER TO TASTE DEATH AGAIN’
• ‘WAS GRANTED TO BE JUDGE OF ALL MANKIND’
• ‘WAS GRANTED TO HAVE LIFE IN HIMSELF’
• ‘GREW IN STATURE AND KNOWLEDGE’
• DIED - WAS DEAD - WAS RAISED UP AGAIN
• WAS CLAIMED BY GOD AS SON: ‘This day I have BECOME YOUR FATHER’

It is saying what other NT passages say, that Jesus was involved in the creation, as the Son of God. And of course since the OT tells us that it is YHWH who did those things alone, (Isa 44:24) then Heb 1:10-12 is telling us that Jesus is YHWH.

‘Involved’….??!!! Trinity claim is that ‘HE’ did it all by himself… You are changing the scripts… (nothing new there for a trinitarian!)

‘Involved [with]’ does not make ‘ALONE’ work!
Two, or three… does not make ‘ALONE’ work!!
‘Through [another]…’ does not ‘ALONE’ work!!!

Of course you have to claim that trinitarian translations are wrong even though the Jehovah's Witness translation has the same thing.

That is sheer desperation on your part. What Jehovah witnesses say or claim has nothing to do with what I am saying - I am not Jehovah Witness and you know that!

The man Jesus was made perfect because His fleshly body was raised to be His resurrection body. But it was and is the same Divine Son of God with the same nature and glory etc of His Father who was with the Father in heaven before coming to earth and who came to earth and is not back in heaven,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, unchanged, still having the unchanging nature of His Father.

‘Do not put new wine in old skin’. God cannot exist in a human flesh body. That is why it is His reflection that was put into a flesh body - FIRST AS ADAM… then AS JESUS!… the SECOND ADAM - THE LAST ADAM!
‘The FIRST man BECAME a LIVING SOUL…’
‘The SECOND [BECAME] a life giving Spirit’

You deny that the word ‘Became’ is missed out from the statement regarding the second man… but how is the statement meant to be read without it? The first must comply with the second… again, another trinitarian deletion!

(JESUS WARNED ABOUT ADDITIONS and DELETIONS (IRREVERENT AND DECEITFUL MODIFICATIONS) IN THE SCRIPTURES!)

It is you who seems to be saying that the angel of the Lord was pretending to be God and that those who identified Him as God were just wrong.
Neither Michael nor Gabriel speak as if they are God and are not identified as God, it is only the angel of the LORD and the angel of God's Presence for whom this is reserved.
So NO, Michael and Gabriel DO NOT speak and act as if they were their sender.

There is no way I am saying that the Angel of the LORD is pretending to to YHWH. Even the simple fact that ‘LORD’ is a misnomer - a non-word - an irreverent SUBSTITUTION for what is meant to say, ‘YHWH’, shows IT IS NOT YHWH who is the angel.

Set another way, it reads, ‘The angel SENT FROM YHWH’. And this is true that YHWH SENDS HIS ANGELS TO DO HIS BIDDING… The Angel speaks or acts (or both) that which YHWH SENDS IT TO SAY AND/OR DO. Therefore the angel speaks EXACTLY what YHWH tells it to say:

• ‘The angel of YHWH appeared to Moses in a bush as a burning flame…’

Then the angel speak exactly what YHWH told him to say just as YHWH told him to say it. But the angel could have said,

• ‘The LORD GOD says to taken off your sandals as the ground you stand on is holy ground… etc.!’

Bug that would make the impact of the message convoluted. God chose to speak THROUGH (via / by means of) the Angel to make the message more impactful.

Moreover, Brian2, you do know the verse that says:

• ‘To which of the angel did God ever say…’??

You turn your Jesus-God into an angel and call him ‘YHWH’??

Brian2, may God help you on judgement day!!

 

[Soapy]

The Angel of the LORD, sometimes referenced as the Angel of God is just that - the Angel of the LORD/God - An angel sent by God. I agree that sometimes in the OT scripture the Angel of the LORD spoke in the first person AS God so there seems to be a blending together of when God was speaking, and His angel was speaking.
God chose to speak through or by the prophets because of the fear the Israelites had when He spoke to them giving the Ten Commandments. The Israelites asked for God not speak to them lest they die so from that point on God chose prophets to speak FOR Him - the words were FROM Him so in that sense - they spoke FOR God AS God, in God's stead.

And that is your mistake - "all" carries the meaning of either "all with distinction"(in a limited sense) or "all without distinction".
There is also a figure of speech used in this verse 16 called "encircling" - the verse begins with "For by him all things were created" and ends with "all things were created through him and for him" indicating the context of the things that were created "in heaven and earth, visible (earth) or invisible (heaven) whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities". (E.W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech Used in the Bible)
There are strong parallels in this verse with Ephesians 1:21, 22 - "that he (God) worked in Christ when he (God) raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church which is his body"

If anything, Mark 10 distinguishes Jesus from God.

Those verses in Isaiah about "who is comparable to God" is in relation to idols. . . . . Isaiah 40:18 To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? AN IDOL! A craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains.
Isaiah 46:1 Bel bows down; Nebo stoops; their idols are on beasts and livestock; . . . 5) To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike? 6) Those who lavish gold from the purse, and weigh out silver in the scales, hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a god; then the fall down and worship.

For the Father (God) judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, (John 5:22) And he (God) has given him (Jesus) authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. (5:27)
Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father (God) who sent me. (John 8:16) Again, Jesus is clearly distinguished from God.

Jesus became a life giving spirit after his resurrection - he was "sown a natural body", i.e. "the natural" first, and "raised a spiritual body", i.e. then the "spiritual". Adam is awaiting the resurrection from the dead. If Adam has been resurrected, then Jesus is not the "firstborn from the dead" or the "firstfruits of them that sleep".
The first man was of the dust of the earth (flesh), the second man from heaven, i.e. from God. "from heaven" is synonymous with from God who is in heaven. And as Jesus is in heaven in his resurrected body so will all those bear that image upon resurrection -
(1 Cor. 15:52b) For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable; and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality - there is the difference between a natural body and a spiritual body.

Nobody has seen the invisible God - Jesus Christ came to declare Him, i.e. make him known.
The second statement is a lie - Jesus was totally human and started his existence in the womb of Mary.
1 Cor. 15 is totally about the resurrection!!!
Jesus is the man from heaven - He came from God who is in heaven. God sent him in that he came into existence in the womb of Mary via the power of the Most High.

You know you are dealing with deceitful beliefs when this senseless logic is used:

• Nobody is good but God alone.
• Jesus is good
• Jesus is God.

‘Good’ is a relative term… Is the ‘GOOD Samaritan’ then God? No! because the comparison is imbalanced. In fact, Samaritans were defiled Jews whom even Jesus Christ tended to avoid - not even stepping into Samaritan territory until he was rejected by the ‘Good’ Jews!!!

Jesus got !!!ANGRY!!! at the people defiling the temple. But suppose we all exhibit righteous anger towards things pertaining to God. Do we think that God could not have struck these people with His own hand. I’m not ‘listing impotent sins of Jesus’ but I’m showing that God did not authorise Jesus to act on His behalf … in the way (sorry to say) that I hear of Muslims taking things into their own hands and having uprisings just for someone speaking ill of Mohammed, prophet of Allah! REMEMBER that in Isaiah, it was said that the SERVANT OF GOD would: ‘Not raise his voice in the street’!!
Also, Jesus faultered the night before he was to die. He wept bitter tears at the thought that God might not raise him up again… but recovered himself quickly: ‘If there could be another way, … but let your will, o Father, not mine, be done!’
The flesh is the weakness. God is not flesh and there is no weakness. Jesus was tempted by being weakened in the flesh … God has no flesh to be weakened by - so in relative terms, only God is Good. EVEN IF… even if Jesus was ‘God in the flesh’, it still means ‘Jesus’ had flesh that was a weakness to sin / EVEN IF he did not succumb to sinfulness… GOD cannot be tempted by sin since sin is the desire to gain what is not yours already by wrongful means!
(That was way more than ever should be needed to express what Jesus meant but because of the hardness and wayward desperation in thinking of Trinitarians it had to be extrapolated!)

• Nobody is comparable to God.
• Jesus is comparable to God
• Jesus is God

No one should ever be comparing anyone else to God… It’s already been said by YHWH:

• ‘Who is like me that they should be compared to me!’

And yet here we have Brian2 claiming that Jesus (who is EMPOWERED BY YHWH) should be so compared TO YHWH that we are supposed to declare that Jesus IS YHWH! Isn’t that exactly what Satan wants us to do… to temp Jesus to take the throne of God and be worshipped by mankind as he fatally tried to do?

• All judgement is given to the Son and the Father judges nobody.
• YHWH is coming to judge the earth
• This YHWH must be the Son

It’s a strange thing to read and hear trinitarian teachings. I listen on a Sunday to a church sermon and am constantly taken aback by things I hear. I wonder that the congregation does not stand up and say: ‘WHAT??!!’

Here (bulleted above) GOD GRANTS Jesus to be the judge of creation SO THAT Christ is shown as pre-eminent. God DELEGATES the judgement to the SON OF HIS LOVE (The FIRSTBORN SON OF HIS LOVE) … but such a direct declaration is lost on the trinitarian, like Brian2, who says, ‘Because Jesus Christ is [deflagrated as] Judge of the world, Jesus MUST BE GOD!!

Yet scriptures shows us examples do we are not deceived:

• Was Moses, ‘God’, when GOD said, ‘I will make you as God to Pharoah’?
• Was Joseph, ‘Pharoah’, when Pharoah said, ‘I will make as Pharoah to them so no one may step here of there unless you say so’ (paraphrased)
• Was Mordeciah, ‘King’, when King Xerxes gave Mordeciah his signet ring and told him to make any edict he wanted in his (king Xerxes’) name and it will be upheld as though it were Xerxes himself making it?

Answer: No! Absolutely not.

And furthermore, just as with Jesus Christ, when the conditions of rulership AS THAT RULER were fulfilled, each individual GAVE BACK the power and authority to him who gave it to him in the first place and that ruler took back full rulership over his kingdom (I.E. They became ‘ALL-in-All’).

But here is the problem: Though I write all that, and though it can be checked and found completely true, the eyes of the trinitarian and the ears of the trinitarian, and the hearts and minds of the Trinitarian, will not accept it…

I write it for your sake and in the hope that at least one other will accept it.

 

[amazing grace]

How many messengers are called THE Angel of YHWH (or of God)? I would think that THE indicates only one messenger called that. That one is the one who speaks as if He is God and who is identified as God by those who saw Him.

But isn't it true that one cannot see God and live? The angel of the LORD/God is an angel. The angel of the LORD/God is/was NOT Jesus (which is what you want to say - why not just say it!). In some cases, people "saw" the angel of the LORD/God and lived - if they lived then the angel was NOT God - they saw the messenger of God. They did not see the Almighty God who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see.

In Col 1 the all things is not limited by anything, and "in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible" pretty much describes all things (the heavens being made from the save things we find on earth). Then Col 1:16 goes on to describe some invisible things in the heavens that were created through Him.

So this rule and authority and power and dominion existed already before anyone was creating the new heavens and new earth.

That is your understanding.

That is what ant trinitarians say without realising that they are thereby saying that Jesus was not sinless and that He was not exactly like His Father.

If I say that Mark 10 distinguishes God from Jesus that is what is meant. I am in no way saying that Jesus was not sinless but I do say that Jesus was not EXACTLY like God his Father - in that slight reproof Jesus was not indicating he was God or else he would have complimented the man on his perception, as he did Peter when he asked Peter "Who do you say that I am?".

Sure it includes idols but there are places where idols are not mentioned at all. Nobody is like God,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, but His Son is exactly like Him.

11 Bible verses about Who Is Like God

A topical Bible which shows the most relevant Bible verse for each topic

bible.knowing-jesus.com

It's not the fact that it "includes idols" - idols are the to "whom can you compare me"; "who is like me", etc. that God is using as the comparison.

John 8:16 is speaking about Jesus while on earth 2000 years ago.
John 5 is speaking about the coming judgement of all people and nations.

It doesn't matter how long ago it was - This is what he told the Pharisees: You judge according to the flesh; I judge no one (according to the flesh). Yet even if I judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father (God) who sent me. In your Law it is written that the testimony of two people is true. I am the one who bears witness about myself and the Father (God) who sent me bears witness about me.
It is God his Father who has GIVEN all judgment to the Son - If the Son were God, then what is the purpose of God giving God all judgment?

Adam has not been resurrected. He waits in Hades for that.

You said: Adam did not become a living soul at his resurrection. "Hades" was the Greek word used to represent the Hebrew word "sheol", which was the state/place of being dead. (hadēs of Greek mythology, ruled by the god Hadēs, i.e. hell) Yes, he is in the grave awaiting the resurrection.

But why do you think that 1Cor 15:43-44 is speaking about the whole person when it even tells us that it is speaking about the body, which is buried and raised. You deny the scriptures here for your beliefs.
I suspect you think that because you have been taught that a human is just a body with a spark of life (spirit) which is extinguished at the death of the body.
You seem to deny Matt 10:28 and the mention of souls in heaven (in Revelation)
Don't you realise that this body is referred to as a tent.
2Peter 1:13 I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of my body, 14 because I know that this tent will soon be laid aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. 15 And I will make every effort to ensure that after my departure, you will be able to recall these things at all times.…

I don't deny scripture for my beliefs. The body/tent is the outside covering which contains a person's breath, emotions, thoughts, all that animates the body. When the body dies, what animates the body also dies and there is nothing left of that person, i.e. the person is dead.
I haven't and I don't deny Matt. 10:28. I don't need to add to what I have already said I believe the verse to say.
As for Revelation - it is a vision of the future and "souls" is use in the same sense as in 1 Peter 3:20 "when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls (KJV), people (ESV) were saved, i.e. in the ark. In Revelation, by way of John's vision, he saw people, the ones who had been beheaded for the witness of Christ, the martyrs.

Yes we all are resurrected in a body that is like the one Jesus has it seems. But again in order to justify your beliefs you seem to think you have the right to change the words of God, in this case, as also in other places, from "From heaven" to"from God". And even that is not enough. When it is pointed out that "from God" means that Jesus was alive with and in God, in heaven, you want to say that Jesus existed only in the mind of God.
But that of course means that He did not come from God at all.

I am not changing the words of God - comes from heaven is the same thing as saying something came from God. For instance, the manna - God gave them bread from heaven to eat. Who gave them the bread and where did it come from? I am the living bread that came down from heaven . . . As the living Father (God) has sent me . . . Jesus came down from heaven - who sent him? If it comes from God it comes from heaven in that God sent it.

He was not sent from heaven of from God if He came into existence in the womb of Mary.
But I understand why you do not see that or other things.

Jesus could not be sent from heaven or from God if he came into existence in the womb of Mary? That is what you think even though that is exactly what scripture says happened? Jesus wasn't sitting around in heaven waiting for the opportunity to be sent, i.e. born.

 

[amazing grace]

You know you are dealing with deceitful beliefs when this senseless logic is used:

• Nobody is good but God alone.
• Jesus is good
• Jesus is God.

‘Good’ is a relative term… Is the ‘GOOD Samaritan’ then God? No! because the comparison is imbalanced. In fact, Samaritans were defiled Jews whom even Jesus Christ tended to avoid - not even stepping into Samaritan territory until he was rejected by the ‘Good’ Jews!!!

Jesus got !!!ANGRY!!! at the people defiling the temple. But suppose we all exhibit righteous anger towards things pertaining to God. Do we think that God could not have struck these people with His own hand. I’m not ‘listing impotent sins of Jesus’ but I’m showing that God did not authorise Jesus to act on His behalf … in the way (sorry to say) that I hear of Muslims taking things into their own hands and having uprisings just for someone speaking ill of Mohammed, prophet of Allah! REMEMBER that in Isaiah, it was said that the SERVANT OF GOD would: ‘Not raise his voice in the street’!!
Also, Jesus faultered the night before he was to die. He wept bitter tears at the thought that God might not raise him up again… but recovered himself quickly: ‘If there could be another way, … but let your will, o Father, not mine, be done!’
The flesh is the weakness. God is not flesh and there is no weakness. Jesus was tempted by being weakened in the flesh … God has no flesh to be weakened by - so in relative terms, only God is Good. EVEN IF… even if Jesus was ‘God in the flesh’, it still means ‘Jesus’ had flesh that was a weakness to sin / EVEN IF he did not succumb to sinfulness… GOD cannot be tempted by sin since sin is the desire to gain what is not yours already by wrongful means!
(That was way more than ever should be needed to express what Jesus meant but because of the hardness and wayward desperation in thinking of Trinitarians it had to be extrapolated!)

• Nobody is comparable to God.
• Jesus is comparable to God
• Jesus is God

No one should ever be comparing anyone else to God… It’s already been said by YHWH:

• ‘Who is like me that they should be compared to me!’

And yet here we have Brian2 claiming that Jesus (who is EMPOWERED BY YHWH) should be so compared TO YHWH that we are supposed to declare that Jesus IS YHWH! Isn’t that exactly what Satan wants us to do… to temp Jesus to take the throne of God and be worshipped by mankind as he fatally tried to do?

• All judgement is given to the Son and the Father judges nobody.
• YHWH is coming to judge the earth
• This YHWH must be the Son

It’s a strange thing to read and hear trinitarian teachings. I listen on a Sunday to a church sermon and am constantly taken aback by things I hear. I wonder that the congregation does not stand up and say: ‘WHAT??!!’

Here (bulleted above) GOD GRANTS Jesus to be the judge of creation SO THAT Christ is shown as pre-eminent. God DELEGATES the judgement to the SON OF HIS LOVE (The FIRSTBORN SON OF HIS LOVE) … but such a direct declaration is lost on the trinitarian, like Brian2, who says, ‘Because Jesus Christ is [deflagrated as] Judge of the world, Jesus MUST BE GOD!!

Yet scriptures shows us examples do we are not deceived:

• Was Moses, ‘God’, when GOD said, ‘I will make you as God to Pharoah’?
• Was Joseph, ‘Pharoah’, when Pharoah said, ‘I will make as Pharoah to them so no one may step here of there unless you say so’ (paraphrased)
• Was Mordeciah, ‘King’, when King Xerxes gave Mordeciah his signet ring and told him to make any edict he wanted in his (king Xerxes’) name and it will be upheld as though it were Xerxes himself making it?

Answer: No! Absolutely not.

And furthermore, just as with Jesus Christ, when the conditions of rulership AS THAT RULER were fulfilled, each individual GAVE BACK the power and authority to him who gave it to him in the first place and that ruler took back full rulership over his kingdom (I.E. They became ‘ALL-in-All’).

But here is the problem: Though I write all that, and though it can be checked and found completely true, the eyes of the trinitarian and the ears of the trinitarian, and the hearts and minds of the Trinitarian, will not accept it…

I write it for your sake and in the hope that at least one other will accept it.

Sometimes it's hard for an individual (any individual for that matter) to change their way of thinking when for so long something has been thought to be true.

Some have been taught that their salvation is based upon their belief that Jesus is God, i.e. the Trinity in order to not lose their salvation - they stick doggedly to what they have been taught. When the bottom line is - our salvation is given through faith in Jesus Christ the Son of God, because of who he is and what he accomplished by his life, death and resurrection.

 

[Oeste]

I don’t get your take on this. You are stuck on thinking that ‘Son of God’ means ‘Is God’. That’s why you do not understand what is going on!

What do you think “Son of God” means ??

While "Son of" can mean offspring, I think in this context "Son of Man" means "of the order of man", and "Son of God" means "of the order of God". The term "Son of God" does NOT mean "of the order of Man", and "Son of Man" does NOT mean "of the order of God".

It’s really that simple.

Both titles describe the nature of Jesus. We went through this before, with the thought experiment I posted earlier (#124), which resulted in a post of yours being removed. Here it is again:

The only begotten son of frog is frog.​

​

The only begotten son of dog is dog.​

​

The only begotten son of man is man.​

​

The only begotten son of God is _____?​

Post 124

I think most would agree with me that the vast majority of fifth graders can complete this thought experiment through simple, logical deduction.

But it was also my opinion that your particular doctrine (and not any inherent logic), would "bans" you from completing what to others seems a rather obvious chain of deduction.

In this regard, I believe I was correct, as neither you or @amazing grace were able to complete the blank.

Your solution was to "correct” and change my thought experiment by adding the letter "A", but even after applying your own correction and change, you STILL could not bring yourself to solve the experiment.

Here was your change:

The only begotten son of A frog is a frog.​

​

The only begotten son of A dog is a dog.​

​

The only begotten son of A man is a man.​

​

The only begotten son of A God is _____?​

But even with these changes, you still couldn’t bring yourself to fill in the blank Soapy!

BTW, even the pagans understood the son of “A God” is “A God”. For example, when the mythical Zeus and Hera begat, it produced Ares, another mythical God, but not a dog or a man. IMO, this makes it even more difficult to understand an underlying basis where “the only begotten Son of God” or “the only begotten Son of a God” is “man”.

@amazing grace approach was to state “Son of Man” and “Son of God” are titles:

The "Son of Man" and the "Son of God" are considered titles. The Son of Man and the Son of God are one and the self-same Jesus of Nazareth. The Son of Man and the Son of God, aka Jesus, always did his Father's will or IOW always did what the Father told or commanded him to do.

While this is great to know, it brings the reader no closer to completing the thought experiment or understanding what these titles mean in scripture. It’s akin to telling us “Man” and “God” are considered nouns and that Jesus always did the will of God.

So, at the end of the day, as a Unitarian I would be unable to answer a basic question of logic in any meaningful way, and no way to explain the illogic of why a "Son of God" would be a man anymore than why a "Son of Dog" would be a frog.

I had lots of questions when I started my scriptural inquiry, but I found the Trinity doctrine provided a richer, fuller, and more rigorous Christology, allowing readers to interpret scripture in a more logical and responsive manner than was possible under Arianism or Unitarianism.

In short, with Trinitarianism I can “fill in the blanks”, like the one above, easily and with logical consistency, whereas with Unitarianism I would struggle to give any answer at all.

However, if this changes at any time, please let me know.

 

[Oeste]

In my reply (#124) to Amazing Grace, I stated the following:

You state "Jesus was never equal to God", and as the Son of Man, this is correct. Jesus as the Son of Man is not equal to God. But as Son of God your answer is incorrect, and we can demonstrate this with the same "proof texts" you put forth:​

​

“Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise." John 5:19​

​

If the Son of Man can do nothing of his own accord, then he could not possibly have been tempted, and the whole temptation account was just a scam, and the prophets were wasting our time when they wrote about it. Why? Because he just told us. He can do nothing on his own accord and would have to first see the Father sinning before he himself could sin.​

​

But we know from scripture that the temptation of Jesus was actual, real and not imagined. I believe we are on one accord in at least this small respect, correct?​

Amazing Grace answered with the following (Post #125):

When Jesus spoke "the Son can do nothing of his own accord" - it was in the context of healing. Jesus received what he was taught from his Father - a theme that Jesus taught over and over in John, that he had not come on his own and that he was not acting on his own initiative or from his own power.​

In the context of healing?

John 5 1:14 speaks of Jesus healing by the pool. By John 5:14, the invalid has already been healed, asked to pick up his mat, and was sent on his way. So verse 5:19 is NOT in the context of healing.

At 5:16 Jesus is persecuted for his actions on the Sabbath. At 5:17 Jesus mounts his defense explaining “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working”. 18 For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

Now we come to verse 19:

Jesus gave them this answer L “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can only do what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.

So Jesus was not simply speaking in the context of healing but of doing any good work, thus “breaking“ the Sabbath according to the Jews.

What are these works?

ANY good work Jesus sees his Father doing, but ONLY those works he actually sees. This would include healing, but by this time Jesus has already healed.

So what does this tell us?


1. Jesus cannot be man because man can not peer in on the Father. Jesus can SEE what the Father doing! No dark shades, no averting of the eyes, no blinding light that obscures the vision…he actually observes and SEES the Father.

2. Jesus can DO what the Father does! What man who is only man can do that??? The prophets and people of Israel saw the Father do many fantastic miracles. Who claimed they were able to duplicate the Father's works?

3. Jesus cannot Sin! Why? He can ONLY do what the Father does! This wipes out and negates ANY possibility that Jesus could sin. Jesus could only sin if he saw the Father sinning first.

This not only raises concerns and inconsistencies in the Unitarian narrative, it also raises inconsistencies in their timeline:

Early in Jesus’ ministry, at the time of Jesus’ temptation, we are told that Jesus was EMPOWERED. So much so that he had to be careful with it:

Jesus Christ is EMPOWERED with the POWER OF GOD. That means that Jesus must exercise caution in how he uses that power since it is not his but his father’s.

Not only empowered, but he could act on his own initiative to sin:

Why couldn't you resolve a man turning stones into bread? What about the things Moses did by the power of God working with him? Have any trouble with those?

But here, much later in his ministry we are told Jesus could NOT act under his own power nor could he act on his own initiative:

Jesus received what he was taught from his Father - a theme that Jesus taught over and over in John, that he had not come on his own and that he was not acting on his own initiative or from his own power.

So which Jesus is it, and when and how did Jesus lose both his initiative and his empowerment between the Temptation and his healing the invalid at Bethesda? Does Christ's initiative or the power of God fade over time?

All in all, we appear to have been presented not only with a confusing timeline and narrative, but a rather confusing Jesus.

I'll post again when I have time, and I have a lot of "catch up", but excellent discussion.

 

[Oeste]

Jesus is the Son of God and is a man and probably it is good to realise that when reading the verses you gave, and that means seeing them in context to get the best meaning.

Hi Brian2,

I wish I had the time to catch up with your ongoing commentaries as I believe they are excellent.

One of the major problems I had with Unitarianism (I briefly considered their Christology) was their inability to answer fully or respond contextually. I was told long ago: If the plain text makes sense, seek no other sense.

But with Unitarianism, it's as if "the plain text makes no sense" so some other sense is sought.

 

[Brian2]

Hi Brian2,

I wish I had the time to catch up with your ongoing commentaries as I believe they are excellent.

One of the major problems I had with Unitarianism (I briefly considered their Christology) was their inability to answer fully or respond contextually. I was told long ago: If the plain text makes sense, seek no other sense.

But with Unitarianism, it's as if "the plain text makes no sense" so some other sense is sought.

Yes the plain meanings of the texts are denied because of pre existing beliefs and then the texts are twisted to mean something else.
The pre existing beliefs are held so tightly that for Soapy, he is willing to say that the Bible text was changed by trinitarians and also to say that Jesus actually sinned in the pages of the gospel.
With amazing grace, he/she thinks that his/her teachers know more about Bible than anyone else and is willing to come up with very strange interpretations indeed to justify pre held beliefs.
I did stop replying at one point and may do it again. It hurts to bang my head against a brick wall and it can be a time waster, but I have more of an understanding of the unitarian beliefs now.
It is amazing how the same misinterpretations of passages crop up in a variety of non orthodox teachings, but just combined in different ways to make variations of wrong doctrines.

 

[amazing grace]

@amazing grace approach was to state “Son of Man” and “Son of God” are titles:

While this is great to know, it brings the reader no closer to completing the thought experiment or understanding what these titles mean in scripture. It’s akin to telling us “Man” and “God” are considered nouns and that Jesus always did the will of God.

So, at the end of the day, as a Unitarian I would be unable to answer a basic question of logic in any meaningful way, and no way to explain the illogic of why a "Son of God" would be a man anymore than why a "Son of Dog" would be a frog.

Logically, to be hold the title "Son of God" one has to be a being who is NOT God.

I had lots of questions when I started my scriptural inquiry, but I found the Trinity doctrine provided a richer, fuller, and more rigorous Christology, allowing readers to interpret scripture in a more logical and responsive manner than was possible under Arianism or Unitarianism.

In short, with Trinitarianism I can “fill in the blanks”, like the one above, easily and with logical consistency, whereas with Unitarianism I would struggle to give any answer at all.

However, if this changes at any time, please let me know.

If it is logical for you to believe that God is one, that He alone is God yet He actually exist as a three-in-one being; and if it is logical to you that God lowered His status as Almighty God and as Creator and became one of His created; and if it is logical to you that God came to earth in the flesh to pay Himself for the sins of mankind and that is what gives you a more rigorous, richer, fuller Christology then I am happy for you.

 

[amazing grace]

In my reply (#124) to Amazing Grace, I stated the following:

You state "Jesus was never equal to God", and as the Son of Man, this is correct. Jesus as the Son of Man is not equal to God. But as Son of God your answer is incorrect, and we can demonstrate this with the same "proof texts" you put forth:​

​

“Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise." John 5:19​

​

If the Son of Man can do nothing of his own accord, then he could not possibly have been tempted, and the whole temptation account was just a scam, and the prophets were wasting our time when they wrote about it. Why? Because he just told us. He can do nothing on his own accord and would have to first see the Father sinning before he himself could sin.​

​

But we know from scripture that the temptation of Jesus was actual, real and not imagined. I believe we are on one accord in at least this small respect, correct?​

Amazing Grace answered with the following (Post #125):

When Jesus spoke "the Son can do nothing of his own accord" - it was in the context of healing. Jesus received what he was taught from his Father - a theme that Jesus taught over and over in John, that he had not come on his own and that he was not acting on his own initiative or from his own power.​

In the context of healing?

John 5 1:14 speaks of Jesus healing by the pool. By John 5:14, the invalid has already been healed, asked to pick up his mat, and was sent on his way. So verse 5:19 is NOT in the context of healing.

At 5:16 Jesus is persecuted for his actions on the Sabbath. At 5:17 Jesus mounts his defense explaining “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working”. 18 For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

Now we come to verse 19:

Jesus gave them this answer L “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can only do what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.

So Jesus was not simply speaking in the context of healing but of doing any good work, thus “breaking“ the Sabbath according to the Jews.

What are these works?

ANY good work Jesus sees his Father doing, but ONLY those works he actually sees. This would include healing, but by this time Jesus has already healed.

So what does this tell us?

1. Jesus cannot be man because man can not peer in on the Father. Jesus can SEE what the Father doing! No dark shades, no averting of the eyes, no blinding light that obscures the vision…he actually observes and SEES the Father.

Jesus mentally perceives or knows (sees) what his Father is doing through OT scripture and the character of his Father or as in Jesus receives revelation from God his Father. This is not referring to a vision nor actual "sight".

2. Jesus can DO what the Father does! What man who is only man can do that??? The prophets and people of Israel saw the Father do many fantastic miracles. Who claimed they were able to duplicate the Father's works?

3. Jesus cannot Sin! Why? He can ONLY do what the Father does! This wipes out and negates ANY possibility that Jesus could sin. Jesus could only sin if he saw the Father sinning first.

This not only raises concerns and inconsistencies in the Unitarian narrative, it also raises inconsistencies in their timeline:

Early in Jesus’ ministry, at the time of Jesus’ temptation, we are told that Jesus was EMPOWERED. So much so that he had to be careful with it:

Not only empowered, but he could act on his own initiative to sin:

But here, much later in his ministry we are told Jesus could NOT act under his own power nor could he act on his own initiative:

So which Jesus is it, and when and how did Jesus lose both his initiative and his empowerment between the Temptation and his healing the invalid at Bethesda? Does Christ's initiative or the power of God fade over time?

All in all, we appear to have been presented not only with a confusing timeline and narrative, but a rather confusing Jesus.

I'll post again when I have time, and I have a lot of "catch up", but excellent discussion.

Anything else can be addressed by the following:
"but now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God" [John 8:40] "do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'?" [John 10:39] What needs to be remembered is that these conversations are being held with unbelieving Jews; those who did not believe he was the Messiah, the one prophesied to come.

"Men, of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know----this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. . . .This Jesus God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing . . . Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified." [Acts 2]

The works that Jesus did, the things that Jesus said, he received from God his Father, the only true God, then one who sent him.
My eternal life does not result from believing in the doctrine of the Trinity (which Jesus never taught) but rather is the conclusion of hearing the gospel of the kingdom of God and recognition that Jesus of Nazareth is the anointed king of Israel (Christ/Messiah), the Son of God, the one promised by Moses and the prophets.

 

[Brian2]

There is only one true God and therefore there is no need for Him to have a name.

But when there are many who are claimed to be [a] God there needs to be a way of identifying which God is being spoken of.

It was at this point, regarding Moses and the Israelites, that God gave Himself a name to distinguish Him from the pagan foreign Gods whom the Israelites encountered among tribes and nations amongst whom which they often dwelt. The Israelites were over-fascinated by the many Gods of these pagans and jealous that these Gods had identifiable personal names so each could be prayed to and worshipped specifically. The God of the Israelites was simply referred to as ‘Lord’, or ‘El’, or similar terms WHICH ARE TITLES not a personal name.

I don't think you know whether God gave Himself a name in Exodus 3 or just revealed it.
It appears in Exodus 6:3 that YHWH was His name but He just did not reveal it to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

At no time ever was there any request nor declaration of a name for a ‘Son’ of the God of the Israelites because there was no such entity in existence - and certainly not one mentioned by the God of the Israelites.

And you are certain that the Son of God did not exist?
Proverbs 30:4 Who has ascended to heaven and come down? Who has gathered the wind in His hands? Who has bound up the waters in His cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name, and what is the name of His Son— surely you know!
The Son of Man has descended from heaven and so also in pre Jesus days the He also has ascended to heaven.
John 3:12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? 13 No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.

There was no identification of any entity other than the God of the Israelites in regard to the creation of the world. The one true God of the Israelites states that it was He, and He alone, who created all things, laying the foundation of the world and spreading out the heavens.

Most certainly, ‘I and I alone’ cannot be a third party player who is never mentioned to the people from the Old Testament times.

Most certainly the identification of the Son as the one who laid the foundations of the earth and spread out the heavens (Heb 1:10-12) means that He must be YHWH.

The false claim that it was Jesus, NOT GOD, who created all things, is made by at least 3rd century Bible writers of a trinitarian leaning who needed to justify a three person God. They did a very poor job since Jesus, himself, says he can do nothing except what his Father FIRST shows him to do… this would mean that God first created and showed Jesus… where is that FIRST GOD creation?

IMO the Father showed the Son what to do by speaking. "Let there be heavens. Let there be earth. Let there be light. etc" Thus the Son/The Word who was with the Father, knew it was time to go into action.

Moreover, Jesus is to INHERIT what God has created. How is Jesus inheriting what he is supposed to have created and therefore already owns?

God created all things through the Son and they were created through and for Him and the heir owns them and takes full possession when He gets His inheritance.

You just made up all that you just said. The term ‘Father’ in regard to God, is not about PROCREATION. It is about CREATION.

It is the person of the Messiah, the precious cornerstone laid in Zion, that many stumble over and He is called the stone of stumbling and rock of offence. The Jews also stumbled over Jesus and could not accept whom He said that He was, the Son of God, equal to God, the procreated Son therefore.

Spirit cannot procreate. Spirit can only CREATE.

God begat a human Son who was already alive with Him in heaven and agreed to obey His Father and become a human (Phil 2) instead of trying to grasp or grab equality (His Father's authority) and refuse to become a man. He obeyed and waited to be glorified with His Father in heaven, where He had been before the earth was made, and to gain His full inheritance as the owner and ruler of all things then. I have scriptures for all of this. Plain scriptures that you and @amazing grace deny and twist to make them mean something else.

God CHOSE the man, Jesus, as His very own and consecrated him by anointing Jesus with the holiest of holy oils: His very own SPIRIT (which most call, the Holy Spirit). This anointing gave jesus the glorified title of ‘CHRIST’, which means, ‘Anointed One’. It also EMPOWERED Jesus to be able to do the great things that Jesus did (See Acts 10:37-38). And just to show it wasn’t a one of for a supposed pre-existent person, many believers were also anointed with the same said ‘Holy Oil’ at Pentecost in the upper chamber. These ones also went about doing great deeds and astounding onlookers just as jesus did.

As I have shown you probably many times, Jesus was Lord and Christ when He was born. He had been chosen and anointed before the world was created. (Luke 2:11)
He was a baby Lord and Christ and grew into an adult Lord and Christ and when the time came for His ministry He received the Holy Spirit to empower Him in what He had to do.

Brian2, no amount of squirming can get you away from the fact that no one ever said that the spirit of a person does not die. DEATH is a separation of the Spirit out f the body of a person. The body then has no way to sustain itself and begins to decay back to dust. The Spirit of the person goes to rest, inert, uncommunicative, dormant, with God.

What you are trying (or not trying) to say is that the person is NOT DESTROYED!! A person that is destroyed CEASES TO EXIST. NO ONE IS EVER DESTROYED, not even errant demonic angels, until the END OF TIME. All must be first judged before a destruction order can be carried out of it be deemed so. For humanity only, those whose spirits sleep with God will be AWAKENED, brought back to sensation in a human body and then judged. This could only be so if the person, the Soul, still existed.

Yes the soul does not die at the death of our body, as Jesus said (Matt 10:28) It still exists and sleeping, dormant whatever you want to call it, it is still alive.

I notice that Trinitarians always use the same ruse that turns ‘Death’ into ‘Nonexistence of the person/Soul’. I say to you now, and once again, ‘Death’ is a human term for ‘A separation of the spirit of the person from the body of the person’, resulting in a non-communication state of a living person with a dormant person - spirit resting with God. It does not mean ‘Nonexisting’. The dormant spirit cannot, and has no ability to, communicate with anyone or anything.

Since I say and probably all trinitarians (except maybe the Seventh Day Adventists) say that the soul lives on at the death of the body, it appears that you are not telling the truth here about trinitarians.

The very fact that you use the term, ‘Nonexistent’ in respect of the dead absolutely shows you knew you were writing wrongly. This was nothing but a futile childish idea to attempt to sidestep the reality. Surely you know by now that these things do not work with me!!! Better that you do not answer than to present a deceitful response… I warn you again that your soul is in danger - not now, not immediately, but in the future at the judgement seat! If you were (but I know it’s not!) just mistaken or misled by your belief then that is one thing but no! You knew you were writing wrongly!!

This is what I said.
Brian2 said:
I am just pointing out that death of our body does not mean that we go out of existence and also does not mean that out spiritual soul dies when the Body dies. (Matt 10:28)
Jesus tells us that in Matt 10:28 but you want to ignore that.
Anyway when Jesus body died, His soul still lived.
It's a matter of understanding what "death" means.
This was in response to what you said
Soapy said:
If Jesus did not die then how can there be a resurrection of him? Do you believe the scriptures that says that YHWH raised up Jesus Christ from the dead? Yet you say Jesus didn’t die? Brian2…..!!!?

And I said what I said because you were both saying that I said that Jesus did not die and denying what Jesus said at Matt 10:28.
Matt 10:28 And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.
In case you don't understand what Jesus said, He said that when they killed His body they did not kill His soul. Not only did it exist but it was still alive. His body died but His soul was still alive. That is the same with all humans. When their body dies their soul is still alive.

 

[Brian2]

You CORRECTLY state that ‘He is the same yesterday, as today, as tomorrow’ (paraphrased) is applied to almighty God… That is what ‘YHWH’ is meant to convey. The God of the Israelites is ONE GOD who ‘ALWAYS IS’… He never changes.

So how do you claim that this is applied to Jesus despite the many ‘Changes’ I pointed out to you? Even a single change defeats your claim…:

• ‘BECAME A MAN’…
• ‘WAS MADE IMMORTAL NEVER TO TASTE DEATH AGAIN’
• ‘WAS GRANTED TO BE JUDGE OF ALL MANKIND’
• ‘WAS GRANTED TO HAVE LIFE IN HIMSELF’
• ‘GREW IN STATURE AND KNOWLEDGE’
• DIED - WAS DEAD - WAS RAISED UP AGAIN
• WAS CLAIMED BY GOD AS SON: ‘This day I have BECOME YOUR FATHER’

You keep saying that trinitarians must have changed the scriptures because they say things that you don't agree with. Maybe it is just that your beliefs are wrong.
For me, I believe Jesus was the same exact image of His Father from the days of eternity, when He was a man, before He was a man, after He died, after He rose.

‘Involved’….??!!! Trinity claim is that ‘HE’ did it all by himself… You are changing the scripts… (nothing new there for a trinitarian!)

‘Involved [with]’ does not make ‘ALONE’ work!
Two, or three… does not make ‘ALONE’ work!!
‘Through [another]…’ does not ‘ALONE’ work!!!

With God being one God, with the Father and Son being one thing etc, it works.

‘Do not put new wine in old skin’. God cannot exist in a human flesh body. That is why it is His reflection that was put into a flesh body - FIRST AS ADAM… then AS JESUS!… the SECOND ADAM - THE LAST ADAM!
‘The FIRST man BECAME a LIVING SOUL…’
‘The SECOND [BECAME] a life giving Spirit’

You deny that the word ‘Became’ is missed out from the statement regarding the second man… but how is the statement meant to be read without it? The first must comply with the second… again, another trinitarian deletion!

(JESUS WARNED ABOUT ADDITIONS and DELETIONS (IRREVERENT AND DECEITFUL MODIFICATIONS) IN THE SCRIPTURES!)

"Became" is an addition and the translators might have thought it appropriate but they never met you or @amazing grace.
You want the addition to have been in the original text, but it is not.
The passage is about Adam having become a living soul and Jesus having always been a life giving spirit. We will bear the image of the second Adam as we bear the image of the first. The natural first and then the spiritual.

1Cor 15:43 It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. 44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. 46 But it is not the spiritual that is first but the natural, and then the spiritual. 47 The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. 48 As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. 49 Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.

There is no way I am saying that the Angel of the LORD is pretending to to YHWH. Even the simple fact that ‘LORD’ is a misnomer - a non-word - an irreverent SUBSTITUTION for what is meant to say, ‘YHWH’, shows IT IS NOT YHWH who is the angel.

Set another way, it reads, ‘The angel SENT FROM YHWH’. And this is true that YHWH SENDS HIS ANGELS TO DO HIS BIDDING… The Angel speaks or acts (or both) that which YHWH SENDS IT TO SAY AND/OR DO. Therefore the angel speaks EXACTLY what YHWH tells it to say:

• ‘The angel of YHWH appeared to Moses in a bush as a burning flame…’

Then the angel speak exactly what YHWH told him to say just as YHWH told him to say it. But the angel could have said,

• ‘The LORD GOD says to taken off your sandals as the ground you stand on is holy ground… etc.!’

Bug that would make the impact of the message convoluted. God chose to speak THROUGH (via / by means of) the Angel to make the message more impactful.

The passage actually says that YHWH spoke from the bush. I take that to mean that the Presence of YHWH was there and that is what made the ground Holy.

Moreover, Brian2, you do know the verse that says:

• ‘To which of the angel did God ever say…’??

You turn your Jesus-God into an angel and call him ‘YHWH’??

Brian2, may God help you on judgement day!!

As you know "Angel" means "messenger". The Angel of YHWH was not a created angel but was a messenger from YHWH, who was also YHWH.
Sounds similar to YHWH alone having laid the foundations of the earth and in the NT we see Jesus did this.
Same principle.
More than one person in the One God.

 

[amazing grace]

Hi Brian2,

I wish I had the time to catch up with your ongoing commentaries as I believe they are excellent.

One of the major problems I had with Unitarianism (I briefly considered their Christology) was their inability to answer fully or respond contextually. I was told long ago: If the plain text makes sense, seek no other sense.

But with Unitarianism, it's as if "the plain text makes no sense" so some other sense is sought.

I was taught that the unclear verses should be taken in light of the clear concise verses. There are MANY clear concise text that specify Jesus was God's anointed king; Jesus was God's servant; Jesus was miraculously conceived by the power of the Most High; Jesus was sent by God; Jesus came from God, i.e. from heaven; Jesus was a man consistently compared with humanity, etc.

@amazing grace deny and twist to make them mean something else.

This is totally ironic!!!

 

[Brian2]

I was taught that the unclear verses should be taken in light of the clear concise verses. There are MANY clear concise text that specify Jesus was God's anointed king; Jesus was God's servant; Jesus was miraculously conceived by the power of the Most High; Jesus was sent by God; Jesus came from God, i.e. from heaven; Jesus was a man consistently compared with humanity, etc.

This is totally ironic!!!

It is ironic that you give an example of plain passages that you twist and make them mean something else.
You said that it is clear and concise that Jesus came from God, ie from heaven;
What you have done is take all the passages that show that Jesus came from heaven and say that they mean that He came from God.
Then when I point out that if Jesus came from God it means He was in heaven with God.
But that is further twisted so that you say that Jesus existed only in the mind of God, not in reality.
So a couple of twists that change the plain meaning into something that you say agrees with your preconceived beliefs.
1Cor 15:47 The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.
John 6:51 I am the living bread ethat came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
John 17:5 And now, Father, glorify Me in Your presence with the glory I had with You before the world existed.
Phil 2:6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
John 1:1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
(The Word was with God, maybe even in the mind of God, but this Word was God--qualitatively like the God He was with, and that includes being alive)
Then there are all the places where the pre existence of Jesus is shown through all the places that tell us that through Him all things were made and the various ways you twist the plain meaning of those into something that is strange indeed.
It is also ironic that your first sentence is that the unclear verses should be taken in light of the clear concise verses. But when I ask for a clear and concise verse that says Jesus did not pre exist, you have none.
It is also strange that the rest of what you said above about clear and concise passages are about things that I agree with and I suppose you put them there because you think that I and @Oeste do not agree with those passages.

 

[amazing grace]

It is ironic that you give an example of plain passages that you twist and make them mean something else.
You said that it is clear and concise that Jesus came from God, ie from heaven;
What you have done is take all the passages that show that Jesus came from heaven and say that they mean that He came from God.
Then when I point out that if Jesus came from God it means He was in heaven with God.
But that is further twisted so that you say that Jesus existed only in the mind of God, not in reality.
So a couple of twists that change the plain meaning into something that you say agrees with your preconceived beliefs.

If something comes from heaven, does it not come from God? I can't help it if "came from God" carries the same meaning as "from heaven" and since it carries the same meaning I am not twisting and making it mean something else.

1Cor 15:47 The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.

1 Cor. 15:42 So, it is with the resurrection from the dead. Then verses 42b, 44 is what happens to the natural body: sown perishable, sown in dishonor, sown in weakness. How it becomes a spiritual body: it is RAISED imperishable, raised in glory, raised in power. - [44b] If there is a natural body and there is also a spiritual body. Thus it is written, "The first man Adam became a living being, the last Adam became a life-giving spirit." (Jesus being raised = the spiritual body) But it is not the spiritual that is first but the natural THEN the spiritual. And actually this proves that Jesus did not preexist as a "spirit" because the natural comes first THEN the spiritual.

Now still in the context of the resurrection: "The first man was of the earth - perishable, dishonored, weak; the second man - imperishable, raised in glory, raised in power - is from heaven, i.e. Jesus received his spiritual body from God. . . . Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven, i.e. sown a natural body and raised a spiritual body.

If you go back to 1 Cor. 15:35 - "How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?" - But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body . . . the rest of 1 Cor. explains that question asked.

John 6:51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

"For the true bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."
Does the verse say that Jesus was in heaven? How did Jesus "come down from heaven"? In the same manner as manna came from heaven; i.e. from God, God sent manna to the Israelites - God gave the true bread from heaven; the true bread was sent by God.
In anyway does that change the meaning from what is read? Only to those who believe in the preexistence of Christ.

John 17:5 And now, Father, glorify Me in Your presence with the glory I had with You before the world existed.

Yep, this verse can be used and is used to prove the Trinity doctrine. But there is a way to understand it also from a Unitarian perspective. Jesus was praying that he would have the glory the Old Testament foretold, which had been in God's foreknowledge since before the world began, and which future glory would come into concretion. Remember, just two verses before in this same prayer Jesus says "this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, AND Jesus Christ whom you have sent" (Jesus could not have prayed that while at the same time thinking he was God too.) and then later in this same prayer he prays for the ones who would believe in him and for his disciples, "the glory that you have given me I have given to them". When was Jesus glorified - upon his resurrection and ascension? Before he poured out the promised Holy Spirit on Pentecost?

Phil 2:6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
John 1:1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
(The Word was with God, maybe even in the mind of God, but this Word was God--qualitatively like the God He was with, and that includes being alive)
Then there are all the places where the pre existence of Jesus is shown through all the places that tell us that through Him all things were made and the various ways you twist the plain meaning of those into something that is strange indeed.
It is also ironic that your first sentence is that the unclear verses should be taken in light of the clear concise verses. But when I ask for a clear and concise verse that says Jesus did not pre exist, you have none.
It is also strange that the rest of what you said above about clear and concise passages are about things that I agree with and I suppose you put them there because you think that I and @Oeste do not agree with those passages.

Yes, Jesus was in the image of God and IF he was God there would be no reason for him to grasp at equality with God. He emptied himself of any reputation he could have drawn from (king, messiah) but stayed humble as God's chosen servant being born in the likeness of men.
Does it say: In the beginning was the Son, and the Son was with God, and the Son was God? Who is twisting and changing the meaning?
"but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot, He (Christ) was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. [1 Peter 1:19,20]

I pointed out clear and concise points NOT because I did not think you did not agree with those passages but it is those clear and concise passages that are contradictory to the other passages you keep bringing up.

 

[Soapy]

Sometimes it's hard for an individual (any individual for that matter) to change their way of thinking when for so long something has been thought to be true.

Some have been taught that their salvation is based upon their belief that Jesus is God, i.e. the Trinity in order to not lose their salvation - they stick doggedly to what they have been taught. When the bottom line is - our salvation is given through faith in Jesus Christ the Son of God, because of who he is and what he accomplished by his life, death and resurrection.

I had to laugh sadly at a trinitarian preacher who tried awkwardly to answer the question:

• ‘Who in the Godhead should we pray to… Should we pray to the Spirit of God (Holy Spirit)’?

The preacher skirted around praying to the spirit of God without actually saying believers should do so… he didn’t hold back on God and Jesus… oh, sorry, ‘The Father’ and Jesus!!

He ended up saying that it doesn’t matter which one we pray to and he himself often says ‘a little prayer’ to the ‘holy spirit’ at times…. Not exactly rubber stamping ‘Pray to the spirit’!!

What’s funny about it all is that he mentioned the verses with the prayer from Jesus which we call, ‘The Lord’s Prayer’… you know the one:

• ‘This, then, is how you should pray: “’Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, …” (Matt 6:9)

which goes along with:

• ‘Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.’ (John 4:23)

It is to be strongly noted that at no time EVER did Jesus say to pray TO HIM. He did say to ‘PRAY IN MY NAME’, which means

• ‘Righteousness, in honesty, in reverence, in truthfulness and unselfishness’

In effect, all things that represent the character and nature of Christ Jesus. It means far more than simply adding:

• “In Jesus’ name”

at the end of a prayer TO THE FATHER.

Jesus, it must be reminded to Trinitarians, is the GATEWAY to the Father, the MEDIATOR between God and Man. Our prayers are TO THE FATHER through Jesus Christ… in other words, Jesus FILTERS OUT untruthful, impious, irreverent and dishonest prayers so ALMIGHTY GOD; the Father: YHWH, does not hear them. Viable prayers Jesus passes on to God and relevant responses are acted upon by Jesus… Thus it is that:

• ‘Whatever you ask IN MY NAME (see above) I will do for you!’

Imagine a king in his chambers and a … who bring him only pure honest reverent requests. The king decides how or if and when to action the request and passes it back outside to the … who carries out what the king decides.
——————————

And notice also that the spirit of God is never mentioned as a subject of worship from mankind. It’s no wonder that that preacher could neither announce up front where from scriptures, nor declaration from Jesus, that mankind should pray to the spirit … and indeed, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anyone pray to the spirit of God!

How then is the tri-person Godhead an equally worshipped, equally powerful, equally knowledgeable ‘GOD’… even Jesus Christ says that the Spirit FROM the Father will ‘TAKE OF WHAT IS MINE AND GIVE IT TO YOU!’. Doesn’t this means that Jesus Christ has something the spirit doesn’t have?

But what does ‘Equality’ mean to a trinitarian when they believe that someone who is ‘EQUAL’ to God, IS GOD but yet is an IMAGE of GOD?

Who teaches them such things?

 

[Soapy]

Phil 2:6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,

Can you explain what exactly the verse here means.

Explain:

1. What is the form of God
2. Did not count equality with God as something to be grasped

Isn’t ‘Grasping’ meaning ‘reaching out to take hold of’. So the verse, to me, says Jesus did not think of reaching out to take hold of equality with God!!!

But you say Jesus WAS EQUAL to God!

And, ‘in the form of God’ only means that Jesus had the power of God - which was when he was anointed with the spirit of God…

So, though Jesus had the power of God, he did not think to reach out to grasp equality with God… BUT INSTEAD set himself as a man of no reputation and took the form of a servant.

Jesus chose NOT TO USE HIS GOD-GIVEN POWER to boast and glorify himself, make himself GOD to the people and become the earthly king that the people were expecting.
Isaiah 42:1-3 strongly declares as a prophesy this very fact:

• ‘Here is my servant, my beloved whom I have chosen. I will put my Spirit on him and he will do my bidding. He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice;”

Who is the ‘Servant’, and the ‘He’, that YHWH God is speaking of?

What is the ‘Bidding’ that this servant will do?

 

[Soapy]

But when I ask for a clear and concise verse that says Jesus did not pre exist, you have none.

This is a typical trinitarian deceitful question.

How can anyone produce a verse saying Jesus didn’t pre-exist if there was no pre-existence.

It is the same as a trinitarian asking for a proof verse that Jesus did not call himself ‘God’.

Well, since no one ever thought Jesus was ‘God’ there would never be a verse DISCLAIMING Jesus saying he was not ‘God’.

This type of ‘Prove the negative’ is only used when the asker knows he is being deceiving! There is no other reason for such ‘reverse logic’!!!