tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post2857029712798956482..comments2024-03-28T13:07:51.025-07:00Comments on Winging It: The Doctrine of the TrinityStanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-9674510695890873272019-01-02T18:18:33.062-07:002019-01-02T18:18:33.062-07:00Mr. Anonymous,
I know that Stan has covered a lot...Mr. Anonymous,<br /><br />I know that Stan has covered a lot of ground and no longer desires to continue in a discussion, but I had a few thoughts I wanted to add...The idea of plurality within the Godhead has strong support in the Old Testament, as I demonstrate plainly here:<br /><br />https://rationalchristiandiscernment.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-hebrew-roots-of-trinity.html<br /><br />If Jesus is not God, then how could He rightly claim to be Lord over the Sabbath (Matthew 12:6-8)? How could He tell His Jewish audience that He was greater than the temple? Why would the Pharisees conspire against Christ, if what He had affirmed about Himself did not imply that He was divine (Matthew 12:14)? If the Lord Jesus Christ is only a created being, and He is the wisdom and power of God (1 Corinthians 1:24), then would that also mean that God had no wisdom and power prior to Him creating His Son (which is absurd in the highest degree)? Also, would you be willing to call Christ an idolater, since He was worshiped on multiple occasions throughout the four gospels?<br /><br />No mere man could have invented a doctrine as sophisticated, yet so profound, as that of the trinity. Trinitarian monotheism is the most rational expression of monotheism.Jesse Albrechthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01349321905468957335noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-85392307379395118342019-01-02T17:47:56.498-07:002019-01-02T17:47:56.498-07:00I'm sorry you failed to understand. We're ...I'm sorry you failed to understand. We're done here. Argue your case somewhere else.Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-23609343463832879742019-01-02T11:03:55.547-07:002019-01-02T11:03:55.547-07:00No one has changed the meaning of "one"....No one has changed the meaning of "one". I've said it already; you just ignore it. That's what makes for a useless conversation. We're not discussing "3 gods"; we're discussing One God. But you won't accept that. We <i>agree</i> that we're talking about One God; we simply disagree about the nature of that One God.<br /><br />You require "father" to mean "father" in a narrow sense. I suspect, if I ask you specifics, you'll back off that narrow sense. For instance, "father" in English can simply refer to "sperm donor". Is that your understanding of God's relationship to Christ? Of course not. So you've already applied a different definition to "father" than that easiest of all definitions from English. Paul refers to Timothy as "my true child in the faith" (1 Tim 1:2). Does that mean that Paul gave Timothy life, created Timothy, was even his actual father? No. It means Paul was his mentor, his teacher and trainer. But you won't accept that easy understanding of "father" either. "I will only allow <i>in this particular discussion</i> a very narrow -- my very narrow -- definition of 'father' which allows for none of the other standard uses of the term." You define the terms in such a way to necessarily exclude what the rest of Scripture teaches and then twist the rest of Scriptures to agree with your version. And then you deny the justice of God. Understanding that God is the Father and Jesus Christ is the Son is easy, clear, and precise, but you've understood it <i>entirely</i> different than the rest of the Scriptures and the rest of Christianity has.<br /><br />Clearly your goal is <i>not</i> to understand, but to rewrite. You ignore <i>all the Scriptures</i> that attribute divine attributes to Christ and revise all the Scriptures that equate Him with God and consider your job finished. Clearly we have different Gods and Christianity. As in the other discussion, we're finished here (Titus 3:10).Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-18043943767359481502019-01-02T10:46:13.058-07:002019-01-02T10:46:13.058-07:002 of 2
Salvation is for all, not just the 'be...2 of 2<br /><br />Salvation is for all, not just the 'best' or the 'brightest'. It comes from hearing the word and believing it, so if we change the meanings of the words that God uses we are not only making it difficult for anyone to understand but we are losing that possibility of salvation. Changing the meanings of words results in failure to communicate. God has given us his word the Bible so that anyone can understand it, clever or not. It's not impressive to think that anyone has 'figured it out'. It's sad to think that its message is hidden in confusion. <br /><br />To answer your points, the NT was written in Greek, so no translation was required. And a dictionary is only used when we find complicated words that we don't understand, not to look up easy words which we already know the meaning of, like Father and Son for example. <br /><br />If I deny the deity of Christ, I don't eliminate any possibility of salvation for the human race. We know that God, the Father of Jesus Christ, couldn't die for our sins because he is God. He can't sin and he can't die. We need someone else to endure these essential acts. Salvation comes in the form of Jesus Christ, not just a 'guy like any other', but truly the Son of God, not God because he was both able to sin (but chose not to, and remained sinless until his death) and to die (cease to exist). So the possibility of salvation isn't eliminated, it's made possible through Jesus Christ, and, crucially, can be understood and believed by anyone. We all know what death means – we cease to exist. Jesus died. It's important we understand the meanings of these words because if we change them to mean something different it is impossible to believe and be saved. (Romans 10:9) <br /><br />Trying to comprehend the trinity is like wearing pink lensed glasses. We think everything is pink. Trying to fit our beliefs into a Bible which uses language that contradicts them means we either need to change the meanings of those words or remove our glasses. Man does the former, but rarely the latter. <br /><br />Understanding that God is the Father and Jesus Christ is the son is easy, clear and precise. Jesus Christ performed the work of God having been given the Holy Spirit after his baptism; a crucial event that it happens in all 4 gospels. Armed with this simple understanding we can now read the Bible in a clear manner and tackle any problem passages using the simple framework of understanding that God has given us. Our very salvation depends on it. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-78211290075081273712019-01-02T10:45:17.026-07:002019-01-02T10:45:17.026-07:001 of 2
'One' becomes a problem when its m...1 of 2<br /><br />'One' becomes a problem when its meaning is changed. Moses said 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one!' so there is no other way to understand what he is talking about other than one single God. Problems arise when man changes this to mean something different to that which Moses was saying. <br /><br />So why is this important? Because we then know that all of those people in the OT believed in a single, all powerful God. This is because there was, and is, only one, single all powerful God! In Mark 12:29 Jesus himself says “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one”. So Jesus is acknowledging this fact and reiterating it. Jesus and Moses had the same belief, neither were secretly trinitarians. Moses knew there was one God, 'The LORD would speak to Moses face to face just as a man speaks with his friend' (Exodus 33:11)<br /><br />The discussion began over the terms 'Father' and 'Son' because God specifically uses them to describe the relationship between himself and Jesus. He gives us easy, indisputable words so that we can understand his word of truth, the Bible. Why do we need to understand? Because John 3:16 says 'For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life'. The Father / Son relationship is mentioned in the most famous verse in the whole Bible, and so is the fact that believing in them is essential for our salvation. Life or death itself. We can't then say they are not Father and Son and hope for everlasting life.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-6762366026915318412019-01-02T07:29:49.124-07:002019-01-02T07:29:49.124-07:00"One" is your problem? So you have diffi..."One" is your problem? So you have difficulty with "one team" made up of a <i>group</i> of people or "one nation" made up of a <i>group</i> of states or "one Bible" made up of a whole bunch of books? Is your "one" so absolutely limited?<br /><br />Judaism of the Old Testament had no Jesus, had no "indwelling of the Holy Spirit", not even the grace of salvation by faith apart from works. The Judaism of the Old Testament was Christianity in the womb, developing, growing, becoming. Christianity is the Judaism God originally intended, not something new and separate. And "one" doesn't require the extreme limited definition you're trying to impose.<br /><br />Look, you started these arguments over "Father" and "Son". You continued them over "ekklesia" and "logos". Now it's "one". In the midst of it all, you assured me that "marriage" meant "having undergone any kind of marriage ceremony". What we have here is a failure to communicate. What we have here is a 21st century First World English speaker who thinks, for reasons unknown, that he/she can grasp the clear meaning of Greek terminology using Strong's and also apply nuanced or radically altered English terms to full-bodied biblical terminology. Mostly, I'm just impressed that you think, "I've figured all this out when the best and the brightest, the centuries and millennia of genuine believers, couldn't."<br /><br />You do so <i>ignoring</i> the fact that 1) you can't translate the Bible from a Strong's Greek Dictionary, and 2) if you deny the deity of Christ, you eliminate any possibility of salvation for the human race. If Jesus is a creature, a creation, a guy like any other, and <i>not</i> God Incarnate, then He <i>might</i> have lived a sinless, perfect life and died for sin, but that sinless, perfect, <i>human-only</i> payment would cover only one sinful debt, not all. For the debt of all sinners to be covered, the payment would have to be infinite, not finite.Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-63638362689010595192019-01-02T01:18:13.685-07:002019-01-02T01:18:13.685-07:00No, I'm talking about Judaism, the belief in o...No, I'm talking about Judaism, the belief in one God. The Jews in the time of Moses were therefore following a monotheistic religion. As they only believed in one God, and not three persons in one God, when Moses spoke those words he could only have been referring to a single God. <br /><br />So why has the meaning of the word 'one' now been changed?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-20896615639461249402019-01-01T12:50:25.230-07:002019-01-01T12:50:25.230-07:00You're thinking Tritheism, the belief in three...You're thinking Tritheism, the belief in three gods. Christianity is a monotheistic religion. The Trinity is One essence in three persons, with "persons" being more at "persona" than "individuals." You'll find these personas in the Old and New Testaments. It's not new to 4th century or something.Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-34566498934811364122019-01-01T11:01:50.055-07:002019-01-01T11:01:50.055-07:00Hi Stan,
In Deuteronomy 6:4 Moses says 'Hear,...Hi Stan,<br /><br />In Deuteronomy 6:4 Moses says 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one!' At that time, according to the following link, the Jews only believed in a single God and therefore were following a monotheistic religion. <br /><br />https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrahamic_religions<br /><br />Can you clarify why the meaning of the word 'one' is now being defined as 'as one' or 'in one' or in such a way that loses the fact that their original belief was monotheistic?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-79442252228813323402018-08-07T22:40:41.857-07:002018-08-07T22:40:41.857-07:00Here's a proof for the deity of Christ:
"...Here's a proof for the deity of Christ:<br /><br /><i>"and after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them." (Acts 16:7)</i>Jesse Albrechthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01349321905468957335noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-41574471899736012812007-12-18T14:08:00.000-07:002007-12-18T14:08:00.000-07:00Thank you Stan. This is very helpful :)Thank you Stan. This is very helpful :)Samanthahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17105798104658916579noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-9237953489441167492007-12-17T20:22:00.000-07:002007-12-17T20:22:00.000-07:00Excellent post! Jives nicely with the reading I'm...Excellent post! Jives nicely with the reading I'm doing about the character of God in Grudem's Systematic Theology text. Great stuff!Science PhD Momhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03927647627619995276noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-90198133211561161462007-12-16T14:22:00.000-07:002007-12-16T14:22:00.000-07:00Looks like your site is worth reading for awhile, ...Looks like your site is worth reading for awhile, too. Thanks for pointing it out.Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04523232247971115247noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30006406.post-17478986661281235232007-12-16T11:43:00.000-07:002007-12-16T11:43:00.000-07:00Thanks Stan! This is a very useful overview which ...Thanks Stan! This is a very useful overview which to which I hope many readers devote some study time.<BR/><BR/>-Jeff<BR/><A HREF="http://www.didacticworship.com" REL="nofollow">www.DidacticWorship.com</A>Jeff Barretthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12389883972241777125noreply@blogger.com