SermonIndex Audio Sermons
SermonIndex - Promoting Revival to this Generation
Give To SermonIndex
Discussion Forum : Scriptures and Doctrine : Trinity and Hebrew grammar

Print Thread (PDF)

Goto page ( Previous Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 )
PosterThread
romanchog
Member



Joined: 2011/10/27
Posts: 338


 Re:

I will start by saying that I was not raised a Christian and therefore never believed that Jesus is God, and in fact was adamant against it, until the Lord saw fit to save me.

When the Lord saved me and I read the New Testament, the understanding that Jesus is God and that the Holy Spirit is God automatically came to me. I was not attending a church nor was anyone teaching me, so I was not "indoctrinated" with the understanding of the Trinity. It flows naturally from the New Testament. Yes, it is implied only, but it is clearly there. I never heard of the Hebrew grammar rules or any of these other "arguments" until much later in my Christian walk.

To provide one example, just one verse in the Gospel of John tells us he saw Jesus as God.

John 12:41- "These things Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him" (referring to Jesus).

John was talking about that famous passage in Isaiah Ch. 6 where Isaiah saw the LORD in heaven. which John says refers to Jesus:

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple.
2 Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one cried to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
The whole earth is full of His glory!”

4 And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.

5 So I said:

“Woe is me, for I am undone!
Because I am a man of unclean lips,
And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips;
For my eyes have seen the King,
The Lord of hosts.”
6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth with it, and said:

“Behold, this has touched your lips;
Your iniquity is taken away,
And your sin purged.”
8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying:

“Whom shall I send,
And who will go for Us?”
Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”

9 And He said, “Go, and tell this people:

‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
Keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’

10 “Make the heart of this people dull,
And their ears heavy,
And shut their eyes;
Lest they see with their eyes,
And hear with their ears,
And understand with their heart,
And return and be healed.”

I think that clearly shows that John says Jesus is God, and you can't get any closer to the beginning of the church than that.

The difficulty with this concept is that Jesus was also a man. So in reading the Word, we have to see that sometimes we only see Him portrayed as a man (which He was) but other times we see His Divinity. This is why the argument can stand to say : "Jesus did not claim to be God" or "Jesus was not portrayed as God." Those arguments cannot flow from the totality of scripture, only from the portions where only Jesus' humanity is portrayed.


In Christ,
Natalie


_________________
Natalie

 2016/9/17 22:51Profile
Yana2
Member



Joined: 2016/8/14
Posts: 21
Denmark

 Re:

I agree absolutely, sister Natalie, especially what you said about looking at the totality of Scripture regarding Jesus' divinity.

Not so long ago, I was "cornered" by a pair of Jehova's Witnesses, who tried to convince me that Jesus is not God. I found it shamefully difficult to support my trinitarian position, and I remember telling them that it is a great mystery how exactly the Father and the Son are one. And they answered that there are no mysteries in Scripture; that the Bible is clear on that and every subject. At that point a Scripture popped into my mind, and I didn't really understand the full significance of it then, but I feel like I have more clarity now.

Eph 5:30  For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
Eph 5:31  For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.
Eph 5:32  This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

So here Paul says of the unity between man and woman (Christ and church) that it is a great mystery. And the interesting connection is that the word used in the OT to say that they are one (flesh), is "echad", and that is the same word used for the oneness of God, even in the "Hear O Israel..." passage. So unity in plurality is not a foreign concept, even to Hebrew grammar. And if the unity between man and woman is a mystery, then what shall we say of the unity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit? God Himself is a mystery, nothing about him is really comprehensible to our puny minds. God cannot be contained in the heavens and the earth, and yet he made His home in a temple built by men in OT times, and now, under the New Covenant, this God who cannot be contained, this consuming fire, lives in us? So many paradoxical things are found in the nature of God, and it is for us to seek them out and behold in them the glory and depth of God... Even though we may never fully understand them until we see the Lord face to face one day, and even then I am not sure that we could behold Him in the ABSOLUTE fullness and totality of His being.


_________________
Yana

 2016/9/18 7:21Profile





©2002-2024 SermonIndex.net
Promoting Revival to this Generation.
Privacy Policy