My question is why would Jesus find it important to baptize any believer through all three persons and not only God the Father?
The Son and Holy Spirit each are significant in their own right without any need to be God Almighty. The Son carried out the Father's will perfectly, sacrificing himself for all of us. He has thus been given all power and authority, except over God himself. He is the mediator between God and men. It is only natural, therefore, that he be invoked in the baptism.
The Holy Spirit guides us and connects us to God, and serves as our seal of salvation. He takes our prayers and communicates them too God. In fact, the act of Baptism is the process by which one receives the Holy Spirit. So, again, it's only natural that the Holy Spirit be invoked in the baptism as well. And, once more, no need for the Holy Spirit to be God Almighty to explain the Holy Spirit's significance here.
This is the beginning of Jesus' ministry with the baptism by John the Baptist. Why did Jesus find it necessary to reveal himself this way? He was revealing that He received approval from the Father and the Holy Spirit and was not acting on his own. (In a sense they were all working together)
We can agree that Jesus, here and elsewhere, never acted as if he came in his own authority or name. He always deferred to God - he is the one sent by God to do God's will, he does nothing but what God shows him to do, he is lesser than God, etc. This all merely supports my position that Jesus is obviously not God himself.
I think Jewish Pharisees and Sadducees who studied the scriptures their entire life knew exactly what Jesus was implying, hence they wanted to kill him.
Time and time again, Jesus conflicted and corrected the Pharisees and Sadduces that confronted him. He often rebuked them. They clearly weren't as knowledgeable as you like to think.
Let us review one such place where Jesus was confronted by Jews who wanted to stone him because they *thought* what he was saying was blasphemy.
John 10:33-36 “We are not stoning you for any good work,” they replied, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.” 34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are “gods”’d]">[
d]? 35 If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be set aside— 36 what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’?
There are three important take aways from Christ's reply here.
1. He points out that the scriptures call the Jewish people "gods" - the very thing they are claiming to stone him for. So even if he made such a claim, it would not be blasphemous - that is what the scriptures state of the Jewish people. Clearly the jews in question were lacking in their understanding of the scriptures, despite however many years they may have studied.
2. He states his
actual claim: that he is God's Son (not God), correcting their false understanding of who he claimed to be
3. Given these two corrections, he asks "Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy?" Jesus did not consider what he said to be blasphemous in the least. So, again, the jews in question did not have a proper understanding of the scriptures or of who Christ claimed to be - else they would not have accused him of blasphemy.
I've heard Muslims quote this verse time and time again. Yes, the Son was subservient to the Father in person, but not in nature. For example the human child is subservient to their parents, but that does not make the child any less human than their mother or father. Likewise even if Jesus was subservient to the Father, it did not make him any less God.
It is a Trinitarian fiction to assert that Jesus was not less than the Father. Jesus always makes clear that he is subservient to the Father, and all the rest of the New Testament scriptures support this notion. Again, look at the OP where I quote 1 Cor 15 for a good example of this.
The apostle Paul writes:
'Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. ' Philippians 2:5-11 (KJV)
What is Paul saying? He is saying that though Jesus was the very incarnation of God, he chose to revoke any godly privileges and humbled himself as a human being. However after the crucifixion, God the Father gave Him the Name that is above Name and devoted all worship to Jesus.
Paul is describing how Christ, though made in the perfect image of God, took upon the role of a servant, and the form of man and was obedient to God to the point of death upon the cross. God then rewarded him by exalting him above all else. All of this simply serves to differentiate Jesus from God. To add to this, let us look at a similar passage Paul wrote:
1 Cor 15:20-28 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. 22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 23 But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. 24 Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26 The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27 For he “has put everything under his feet.”c]">[
c] Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that
this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28 When he has done this, then
the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.
Here Paul is even more explicit about the distinction and subordination of the Son to God.
Again in Hebrews, the author writes:
'But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. ' Hebrews 1:8 (KJV)
The Father clearly calls His Son, God.
But it does establish that the Son is on the same level as the Father.
You should read things in context before quoting them. I even explicitly quoted this passage in the OP:
But of the Son He says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
And the righteous scepter is the scepter of His kingdom.
9 “You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness;
Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You
With the oil of gladness above Your companions.”
While the Son is addressed as God here, it simultaneously speaks of the Son's God. So we are back to the issue presented in the OP: why should we interpret the term "God" literally when applied to Christ despite the fact that such verses clearly differentiate the Son from God Almighty, and when the term has been applied to many others without a literal interpretation.
