Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
People have difficulty understanding God's triune nature. And because of their inability to comprehend the trinity, many people, rather than simply believing what the Bible has to say about it, choose to reject the reality of God's nature. They can't make sense of the fact that with God, 1+1+1=1.
1+1+1 always equals 3.
1X1X1 always equals 1.
In the Word: YHWH is the uncreated self existing "Breath/Life" who made all things; and in YHWH are 3 Persons; and each Person in YHWH is a separate Person; and each Person is equally God.
Biblically: there is no difficulty in understanding persons in a kind when one understands their own kind, Adam, is a multiplicity of 1, also, but a created 1.
Genesis 5:2 "Male and female made He them, and called their name Adam.."
Adam is a created, multiplying in the male and female persons, single/ one, kind/spirit.
YHWH is the uncreated "LIFE/BREATH"; the SPIRIT existing in a multiplicity of exactly 3 -and only 3- Persons. YHWH has only One image, and the One image is God the Word, who is come in human being flesh of the second creation, as brother to Adam, so as to be legal Kinsman/Redeemer to Adam.
Actually...I believe the Egyptians started the triune nonsense (they always had three main gods)...they just never actually gave it that name. Plato just expounded on the theme and we all know where it was actually given a name.
Actually, the Egyptians worshipped the "One true God" as the Amen, the hidden God in heaven, just as He was revealed to be, by Enoch, pre-flood.
In the Revelation of Jesus Christ, Jesus states that He is indeed, "The Amen", the same "Amen" once worshipped as the "hidden God in heaven", who was "a mystery, hidden", who would be revealed -and is now revealed in Christ come in flesh.
Quote:
Rev 3:14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness..."
Rom 1:21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified [him] not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: Rom 1:25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever [the] Amen [indeed]
Quote:
from Enoch Chapter 48
1 And in that place I saw the fountain of righteousness
Which was inexhaustible:
And around it were many fountains of wisdom:
And all the thirsty drank of them,
And were filled with wisdom,
And their dwellings were with the righteous and holy and elect.
2 And at that hour that Son of Man was named In the presence of the Lord of Spirits,
And his name before the Head of Days.
3 Yea, before the sun and the signs were created,
Before the stars of the heaven were made,
His name was named before the Lord of Spirits.
4 He shall be a staff to the righteous whereon to stay themselves and not fall,
And he shall be the light of the Gentiles,
And the hope of those who are troubled of heart.
5 All who dwell on earth shall fall down and worship before him,
And will praise and bless and celebrate with song the Lord of Spirits.
6 And for this reason hath he been chosen and hidden before Him,
Before the creation of the world and for evermore.
7 And the wisdom of the Lord of Spirits hath revealed him to the holy and righteous;
For he hath preserved the lot of the righteous,
Because they have hated and despised this world of unrighteousness,
And have hated all its works and ways in the name of the Lord of Spirits: For in his name they are saved,
And according to his good pleasure hath it been in regard to their life.
Paul preached Christ from Enoch, as the Egyptians also knew Him to be, in Corinthians 2:7 -literally;
Taken from "The Egyptian Book of the Dead," E.A. Wallis Budge,
God is one and alone, and none other existeth with Him – God is the One, the One who hath made all things – God is a spirit, a hidden spirit, the spirit of spirits, the great spirit of the Egyptians, the Divine spirit – God is from the beginning, and He hath been from the beginning...
He hath existed from old and was when nothing else had being. He existed when nothing else existed, and what existeth He created after He had come into being...
He is the Father of beginnings – God is the Eternal One, He is eternal and infinite and endureth forever, and yes – God is hidden and no man knoweth His form. No man hath been able to seek out His likeness; He is hidden to the gods and men, and He is a mystery unto His creatures...
No man knoweth how to know Him – His name remaineth hidden; His name is a mystery unto His children. His names are innumerable; they are manifold and none knoweth their number...
God is truth and He liveth by Truth and He feedeth thereon. He is the king of truth, and He hath stablished the Earth thereupon – God is life and through Him only man liveth. He giveth life to man, He breatheth the breath of life into his nostrils – God is father and mother, the father of fathers and the mother of mothers. He begetteth, but was never begotten; He produceth, but was never produced; He begat himself and produced himself. He createth, but was never created; He is the maker of His own form and the fashioner of His own body.
God Himself is existence He endureth He endureth without increase or diminution,God hath made the Universe, and He created all that therein is; He is the Creator of what is in this world, and of what was, of what is, and of what shall be. He is the Creator of the Heavens, and of the Earth, and of the deep, and of the water, and of the mountains.
God hath stretched out the Heavens and founded the Earth – what His heart conceived straightway came to pass, and when He hath spoken, it cometh to pass and endureth forever – God is the father of the gods; He fashioned men and formed the gods – God is merciful unto those who reverence Him, and He heareth him that calleth upon Him. God knoweth him that acknowledges Him; He rewardeth him that serveth Him, and He protecteth him that followeth Him.”
In the Word: YHWH is the uncreated self existing "Breath/Life" who made all things; and in YHWH are 3 Persons; and each Person in YHWH is a separate Person; and each Person is equally God.
Biblically: there is no difficulty in understanding persons in a kind when one understands their own kind, Adam, is a multiplicity of 1, also, but a created 1.
Genesis 5:2 "Male and female made He them, and called their name Adam.."
Adam is a created, multiplying in the male and female persons, single/ one, kind/spirit.
YHWH is the uncreated "LIFE/BREATH"; the SPIRIT existing in a multiplicity of exactly 3 -and only 3- Persons. YHWH has only One image, and the One image is God the Word, who is come in human being flesh of the second creation, as brother to Adam, so as to be legal Kinsman/Redeemer to Adam.
It's necessary to distinquish between the Persons of the Godhead and the identical essence they all have.
1 Person + 1 Person + 1 Person = 3 Persons with 1 Essence = One God.
1+1+1 = 1 refers to the essence of God. His attributes = One God.
1+1+1 = 3 refers to the Persons of the Godhead = One God.
Yes I heard you say that already. Jesus was God-man but the man died not God... actually God left him when the time came to die so God didn't even get to experience the level of pain and suffering that Jesus did... kinda makes you wonder. So how do you say that God died for our sins as Jesus when God didn't die? Some say that if the sacrifice had not been God himself then it would not have been right.. yet here you are saying that God wasn't the sacrificial lamb but the human part of Jesus was. I just wish someone would give a straight forward, coherent answer to who was sacrificed to whom and for what purpose...
Until then I will reject that which I cannot understand. Accepting something without thought is not in my nature, otherwise I'd still believe in the tooth fairy.
So are you saying that Christ didn't have the same number of chromosomes as we have? Because an egg (from a woman) only contains half of that number... where did the other half of the chromosomes come from? Does God also have sperm with chromosomes? In light of science, I could see a virgin giving birth... things happen. However, you are saying that Jesus had only half the chromosomes of a normal human being or that God had chromosomes to give. Even if God gave those chromosomes that would still make the same amount and type as you and I....
Fact is that if Jesus is human as we are then he is HUMAN AS WE ARE... you failed to show the necessity in scripture for a god-man in the first place.
I reject a lot of things. I am waiting patiently for someone to answer my questions in a straight forward manner that makes sense. I may have a long time to wait!
I believe that by worshiping the man - Jesus - you have set yourself up an idol that is not God and are guilty of idolatry. Jesus never required others to worship him but God alone. So rather than fall into idolatry I will only ascribe to a doctrine if it is clear that it is true and has a foundation in reality.. unfortunately the trinity has neither a foundation in reality or scripture... thus it is not true IMO.
I will say this again - if someone would just answer the questions rather than making excuses as to why they DON'T need to answer or beating around the bush then I may come to believe Jesus is God... but until then I will err on the side of ignorance in the matter as I refuse to become an idol worshipper!
Mike... I will read it and respond. Be back later! I am sure I will have tons of questions! AND - Thanks for the opportunity to get all these burning questions answered!
Actually, the Egyptians worshipped the "One true God" as the Amen, the hidden God in heaven, just as He was revealed to be, by Enoch, pre-flood.
The Egyptians worshipped Amen Ra (The Sun God)...Not the biblegod. And I've read the Book of the Dead....the name God (the biblegod) is never mentioned.
I realize that you probably didn't write the article but here are my thoughts:
In the introductory paragraph it is evident that the author assumes that Jesus claimed to be God and that he was not psychotic. I would agree with the psychotic part LOL but how can you 'prove' Jesus is God when you already assume that he claimed to be?
The second portion is trying to establish that God is revealed in Jesus... I would agree that God was revealed in Jesus. I would agree that seeing Jesus was seeing God... however, while the author assumes this makes Jesus God.. I would have to disagree. Coca-cola is a huge company with many representatives... However in talking to any one of them you are talking to Coca-cola. Attorneys speak for an represent companies and individuals and can rightly say that if you see them you see the person or company they represent. This is in no way proof that the representative is the person represented. I take it at face value and in keeping with the fact that Jesus was sent to mediate - ie to represent both man to God and God to man...
So far the article is not very scholarly but extremely biased.
If you try to prove something by first assuming it is true... you will only reinforce it as truth even if it is not. Does that make sense?
Then the article establishes what is meant by the 3 in 1 statement... that is great but not proof that Jesus is God by any means.
Here is my fave part:
Quote:
Why Would God Become a Man? How can finite human beings such as ourselves understand an infinite God? It would be hard for any of us to comprehend abstractions like truth, goodness, or beauty apart from visible examples of them We come to know beauty as it is seen in a beautiful object, goodness as it is focused in a good person, and so forth. But what about God? How could anyone grasp what God is like? We could to some extent if somehow God focused Himself in a form that human beings could understand – by being another human. Although that man in his lifetime would not express the eternalness and omnipresence of God (there would be neither time nor space for that), that man could visibly express the nature of God.
That is the message of the New Testament. Paul said that in Christ "all the fulness of Deity dwells in bodily form (Colossians 2:9). Jesus became human so that human beings could have some understanding of the infinite God. A second reason God chose to become a man was to bridge the gulf between God and humankind. If Jesus had been "only" a man or a created being, then the hugeness of the gulf between God and humanity – the infinite and the finite, the Creator and the created, the Holy and the unholy – would have remained. For us to be able to know God, God had to step down to us. No created being could have bridged the gigantic gap between God and human beings, any more than a piece of clay could aspire to understand and reach the level of the sculptor. Out of love, God took that step down to us. He wanted to open a way that all might come to know Him
The bold above is really just saying nothing... we could and have been able to understand God from humans. The whole OT was about humans (some who understood and some who didn't) telling humans about God.
The second reason given above (underlined) is IMO beating around the bush... There is ample information in the OT that God reached out to and saved humans by simply using other human prophets. Some listened and some didn't just the same as today!
The fact is that if God sent his son to represent him then the son cannot be God as then there would be no need for representation.
Also the article doesn't address that Jesus is called the mediator, the man, who mediates between God and man. Therefore to God, Jesus represented all men (son of man) and to man Jesus represented God (son of God) similar to how Moses was God's representative to Pharaoh, and we know that Moses was very much a human... don't we?
To sum up... is there another article that actually goes into why there is a need for God to be 3 in 1? I don't really see anything in that link that answers any of my questions. I am slightly disappointed by the lack of scholarly thought contained therein.
The Egyptians worshipped Amen Ra (The Sun God)...Not the biblegod. And I've read the Book of the Dead....the name God (the biblegod) is never mentioned.
Jesus says He is "the Amen", in Rev 3.
All nations are descendants of Enoch, through Noah, and all nations once knew the truth, and all nations have changed His truth into a lie. So states Paul in Romans 1.
The Amen worshiped by the ancient Egyptians was learned of by the Egyptians only forty years after the fall of the tower of Babel, from Abram [whose name was changed to AbraHAm as a sign of the Spirit of promise who would be given to all believers in the season of the fulfilled Atonement], who read to the wise men of Pharaoh from the book of Enoch when they asked him to teach them wisdom, values, and truth.
They worshiped Him in truth whose created heavenly dwelling/temple is set in the created the sun, according to the Word of God.
Truth has a way of getting trampled when men forget God, but in spite of the severe chastising of Egypt through the centuries, Egypt will be returned to know the One True God, who is "the Amen", now come in flesh to be revealed as promised, whom they once worshiped in truth.
[SIZE=2]But after those five years, three men who were princes of Egypt [came … …] of Pharaoh Zoa[n] about my affairs and about my wife, and they presented [me numerous gifts and aske]d m[e to teach them] values, wisdom, and truth. So I read in their presence the [book of] the words of [En]och[/SIZE]
Egypt then began the worship of the one true God, who is revealed in Enoch as "the hidden God in heaven" -the Amen; and gradually, they backslid and "changed His image into that of the creature".
It's necessary to distinquish between the Persons of the Godhead and the identical essence they all have.
1 Person + 1 Person + 1 Person = 3 Persons with 1 Essence = One God.
1+1+1 = 1 refers to the essence of God. His attributes = One God.
1+1+1 = 3 refers to the Persons of the Godhead = One God.
3 Persons with 1 essence or nature = 1 God
Mike, Adam is one nature/spirit/kind. There are many multiplied billions of male and female Adam persons, but there is only one Adam kind, as to nature/spirit/being -essence is a bit fringy to define the nature/spirit, of being.
YHWH is one nature/Spirit/Kind. There are exactly three Persons in YHWH, making YHWH a multiplicity of 1X1X1 =1 YHWH. You do not add persons in Adam [to make another, different kind other than the one Adam kind] when they multiply, for Adam is one Adam, but many Persons exist in the one Adam.
You do not add persons in YHWH, who is a multiplicity, to make other, different kinds/Spirits/Beings who are other than the One, for YHWH is One YHWH. -He said so. Deu 6:4 Hear, O Israel: YHWH our Elohym [is] one YHWH:
The Father is YHWH, the Son is YHWH, and the Spirit is YHWH, and these three are one YHWH, as to kind/nature/spirit/being.
This is what we understand about Adam, also, from Scripture: Male and female made HE them, and called their name Adam.
Adam is one Adam,and exists as male and female persons, but one Adam: and Adam is a multiplicity of many billions of persons, but each seed of Adam is written in the Book of Life to come forth in its season, into its being, and already existed in the Book of Life and was created as seed in the loins of the Adam, when the Adam was created. That is why the Bible [Hebrews 7] says Levi "paid tithes in Abraham", for he was in the loins of Abraham when Abraham paid tithes to Melche-Zedek [Shem]. Hbr 7:10
Mike, Adam is one nature/spirit/kind. There are many multiplied billions of male and female Adam persons, but there is only one Adam kind, as to nature/spirit/being -essence is a bit fringy to define the nature/spirit, of being.
YHWH is one nature/Spirit/Kind. There are exactly three Persons in YHWH, making YHWH a multiplicity of 1X1X1 =1 YHWH. You do not add persons in Adam [to make another, different kind other than the one Adam kind] when they multiply, for Adam is one Adam, but many Persons exist in the one Adam.
You do not add persons in YHWH, who is a multiplicity, to make other, different kinds/Spirits/Beings who are other than the One, for YHWH is One YHWH. -He said so. Deu 6:4 Hear, O Israel: YHWH our Elohym [is] one YHWH:
The Father is YHWH, the Son is YHWH, and the Spirit is YHWH, and these three are one YHWH, as to kind/nature/spirit/being.
This is what we understand about Adam, also, from Scripture: Male and female made HE them, and called their name Adam.
Adam is one Adam,and exists as male and female persons, but one Adam: and Adam is a multiplicity of many billions of persons, but each seed of Adam is written in the Book of Life to come forth in its season, into its being, and already existed in the Book of Life and was created as seed in the loins of the Adam, when the Adam was created. That is why the Bible [Hebrews 7] says Levi "paid tithes in Abraham", for he was in the loins of Abraham when Abraham paid tithes to Melche-Zedek [Shem]. Hbr 7:10
God is not a multiplied deity. He is three Persons who have all have the same essence. Three in Person and One in essence. The three Persons of the Godhead have eternally existed co-equally. In nature or essence, there is no distinction between them.
1+1+1=1 refers to the fact that all three Persons of the Godhead have the exact same essence. Essence refers to the fact that all three members of the Godhead have the exact same Sovereignty, Righteousness, Justice, Love, Eternal Life, Omniscience, Omnipresence, Omnpotence, Immutablity, and Veracity. God is a Unified One.
The Persons of the Godhead are not being added. 1+1+1=1 is simply a teaching aid to show that the three Persons of the Godhead are still one God. God in three Persons. Unfortunately, many people still don't understand it.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I am sure I will have tons of questions! AND - Thanks for the opportunity to get all these burning questions answered! 
