Month: September 2009

Hello everyone! Welcome back! We’re continuing our Bible Study with the doctrine of the Trinity. We’re in the Pauline epistles and right now, we’re in the book of Ephesians. Btw, for our intents and purposes, we are treating this book as a Pauline letter even though that is still debated between scholars. Tonight, we’re going to be in Ephesians 3:14-19.

¹⁴For this reason I kneel before the Father, ¹⁵from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. ¹⁶I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Something great about Ephesians is all the praise that takes place in it. We really need to learn the act of praise. Too often when I go to pray, I don’t find praise to be what’s common. We can praise God through music in church services, but how often do we praise him with the words of our mouth minus music or just praise him with our minds?

First, Paul talks about the Father from whom the whole family in Heaven and Earth takes its name. Our identity comes from God. Some translations render this as fatherhood. What it is is that we can often say “I am a father and I have a son and I suppose the Trinity is like that.” We should not think like that. The reality is that the Father has a Son and fathers on Earth having sons are kind of like that. He is the archetype. We are merely poor attempts at copying.

It is also the prayer of Paul that we would be strengthened through the Spirit. There we have the third person of the Trinity. What’s the end result? The end result is that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

Notice that if this is the case, then both of these persons are being granted omnipresence. How else can it be that Christ and the Holy Spirit would dwell in our hearts unless they were seen to not be limited by time or space. If that is the case, they are deity. Again, keep in mind we have a Trinitarian text here.

Notice also the love that is emphasized in the next passage. It is the love of Christ. What view must Paul have of Christ if he is going to say the love of Christ instead of the love of God? The terminology he uses implies a boundless love. It is a love that cannot be measured.

What is the goal? To be filled with the measure of the fullness of God. What fullness? The preceding verses tell you. You don’t get the nature of God. Instead, you get the love of God. May you ever abound in his love.

To be in the love of God is to be Trinitarian.

Hello everyone. We’re back to our regularly scheduled Trinitarian Bible Study. Yes. We are correctly in the book of Ephesians. I appreciate the lack of a hard time on that one. Tonight, we’re going to be in the second chapter. Again, rather than just give one verse, I wish to give the context of the passage under study. We’ll be looking at verses 14-18, but our main emphasis will be on verse 18.

¹⁴For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, ¹⁵by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, ¹⁶and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. ¹⁷He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. ¹⁸For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.

Paul is describing the relationship between Jews and Gentiles, which was still a problem in that day. Christ was the one who came and broke apart the barrier that existed between the Jews and the Gentiles, which is a theme that we will see throughout this epistle. In him, the two are united.

What Christ did on the cross was to take the Law and meet all of its requirements. In so doing, he set up himself as the new man uniting the children of Abraham by faith and those that were of Jewish descent. Now all are united. Of course, I don’t mean that all who are of Jewish descent are saved in saying that.

The cross was the instrument that God used to put to death the hostility between the Jews and the Gentiles. There is no longer any favored position between the two. Now naturally, there was still some hostility going on as Paul was writing this letter. However, there is no longer to be any basis. Jews are not to look down on Gentiles or vice-versa.

Christ came and preached the message of peace. What was that message? It was not just that Gentiles and Jews can have peace with each other. It was that Gentiles and Jews can both have peace with God and both of them have peace with God on the same terms.

The end result? We have access to the Father by the Spirit. What a beautiful Trinitarian text we have here! We can reach the Father through the Son, by the Spirit. This is a consistent pattern that we find throughout the New Testament. When something happens it is the Father as the agent through the Son by the Holy Spirit. It is how God has come down to reach us. In the same way, it is how we are to reach back up to him.

Once again, we are reminded of how important the Trinity is in Christian doctrine. The Trinity is essential to our salvation in the way of God reaching down to us. It is also essential when it comes to how we reach back up to him.

Let us continue to rejoice in the triune God.

Okay. I’ve got the egg on my face. I goofed. In my haste to get to the Kenotic passage, I accidentally skipped over Ephesians, which I realized this morning. Well we’re going to backtrack today and go back to that book. There’s a lot of stuff to cover in it and my urgency to get to the kenotic passage will have to wait. *Grumble Grumble.* Oh well. If you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at? (Silly question however. You can laugh at everyone else which is tres amusing.)

So, we’re going to finish Philippians later and cover Ephesians for now and we’re going to be in the first chapter and looking at verse 3:

³Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.

This isn’t the only place this shows up in the text. Look at verse 17:

¹⁷I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better.

So what is going on in these passages? Is Paul denying the deity of the Son by saying that the Father is the God of Jesus?

This is again the error of unipersonalism that we have seen many times before. The assumption is that God is one person and in this passage, God is spoken of as the Father and since Jesus is not included in that, then obviously, Jesus is not God. It follows logically indeed if you accept unipersonalism. The question remains, “Why should we?”

What we have going on in these passages right now is rather a revelation about relation. The opening passage of Ephesians after the customary greeting and verse 3 is really one long sentence. The Greek experts I have spoken to have consistently spoken of what a run-on sentence it is. The grammar really doesn’t fit, but Paul is just so overwhelmed with praise that it seems he just can’t contain himself.

This chapter is about how God has revealed himself in Christ to bring about the salvation of mankind. Notice also that the Holy Spirit is not absent in the whole chapter. He is there and plays a part in salvation as the down-payment for us that seals us until the day of redemption. The Holy Spirit is the proof that God will keep the promises that he made to us in Christ.

What we sorely miss in the area of the Trinity so often is the wonderful relationship between the persons. We don’t realize how they interplay together so well. What is going on with the Father and the Son and the Spirit?

I recently had someone on the forum I debate on speaking about the core concept of God among Christians being “Maker of Everything.” I agree that God is the maker of all that is apart from him, but I don’t think this is the key concept. God is not just who he is in relation to creation, but who he is in relation to himself. I fear if we focus on just us, we miss that wonderful relationship in the Trinity we can learn so much from.

Again, my apology for the screw-up. We shall continue tomorrow however.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters. I hope many of you have been enjoying this look through the Bible as we study the Trinity. I had a friend describe it to me as a commentary on the Trinity. I’ll also state what I told him. I am being blessed just as much as I hope you are. This look through the Scriptures has been an eye-opening time for me. One thing you learn when you do any kind of teaching is that you learn more than you teach those you are teaching.

Tonight, we’ll be in the book of Philippians for the first time. We will definitely spend a lot of time looking at the Kenotic passage in the second chapter, which we will start tomorrow. Tonight, we’re going to be looking at verses 18b to 26 of chapter 1.

Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, ¹⁹for I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. ²⁰I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. ²¹For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. ²²If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! ²³I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; ²⁴but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. ²⁵Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, ²⁶so that through my being with you again your joy in Christ Jesus will overflow on account of me.

Paul is overflowing with his obsession with Jesus in this one. Go through and look how many times Christ is referred to. This is all he can talk about in this chapter as he seeks to glorify Christ. There is much we can get out of this chapter by looking at it.

Note that we have first the Spirit of Jesus Christ. This could be a reference to the Holy Spirit or just a way of referring to the person of Christ. If the former, we have some inter-relationships in the Trinity being revealed. If the latter, then we have an idea of the omnipresence of Jesus.

Note also the exaltation of Christ in this passage. Paul wants Christ to be exalted above all be it in life or in death. This is also one of the interesting passages that shows our continued existence after death. Paul equates death with being in the presence of Jesus in some way. Do we know exactly what this way is? No. But we must believe it for the Scriptures speak it.

What is the result of his ministry? Fruitful joy in Christ Jesus. Once again, for Paul, it is all about Jesus. Now is this explicitly Trinitarian? No. But let us consider what drives a Jew to speak this much about someone who would be just a man. I can think of no such thing. It makes perfect sense to believe that Paul saw Jesus as God.

I hope this has been helpful. Tomorrow, we shall start looking at the kenotic passage.

Hello everyone. We’re going to continue our study of the doctrine of the Trinity as it is revealed in Scripture. I’d like to point out something based on something I heard this morning. I heard a speaker talking about a doctrine and told us how it was more systematic than biblical. There won’t be any explicit statement of the doctrine. I was concerned with that statement as to say a doctrine is systematic is not to say it is biblical. Very few doctrines are based on explicit statements. Your soteriology, eschatology, ecclesiology, etc. will often be based on the whole of Scripture. So it is with the Trinity. Now our task would be a lot easier if there was one chapter and verse, but there is not. We look at the Bible as a whole.

Tonight, that look at the whole will wrap up the book of Galatians. I’d like to read Galatians 6:11-18.

¹¹See what large letters I use as I write to you with my own hand!¹²Those who want to make a good impression outwardly are trying to compel you to be circumcised. The only reason they do this is to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ. ¹³Not even those who are circumcised obey the law, yet they want you to be circumcised that they may boast about your flesh. ¹⁴May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. ¹⁵Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is a new creation. ¹⁶Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule, even to the Israel of God.

¹⁷Finally, let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.

¹⁸The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen.

These are the words that Paul is to have written with his own hand, as he often used a scribe for his writing. I find it extremely relevant that he refers to Jesus as the Lord Jesus Christ, which is a phrase that has not been used since the opening of the gospel.

What all does this entail? It entals first off that he is deity. He is the Lord and this has been seen to be the understanding of Paul thus far in the epistles. To call Jesus Lord was to include him in the divine identity and give him ontological equality with YHWH.

Now we do realize that it is a heresy to deny the deity of Christ, but we often forget that it is just as much heresy to deny his humanity. If you have a Jesus who is not God, he cannot save. If you have a Jesus who is not human, he cannot save as he cannot be our representative that grants us that salvation. Jesus had to be made like us in order to bring about our salvation. The name of Jesus was common in the time of Jesus and this reminds us that Jesus is fully human.

The final term is Christ. We are to be reminded that Jesus is the Christ, the messiah. All of these would have been relevant in the Galatians debate. Jesus as Lord would have meant that he is the source of salvation. Jesus as human would have meant that he was the one who bore the curse for us. Jesus as Messiah would have meant that he was the fulfillment of the promise of salvation to Israel.

For Paul, all three are needed. We need a Jesus who is Lord, human, and messiah. Should we settle for anything less?

Hello everyone. We’re going to return again to our Trinitarian study tonight as we continue through the book of Galatians. This book is largely about the message of salvation and who exactly is included in the new covenant. However, Christology is still a large part of that. A Christ who is less than divine can not give a divine salvation. Our passage tonight will be Galatians 4:1-7, with an emphasis on verses 4-5. Let’s go to the text:

¹What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. ²He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. ³So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. ⁴But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, ⁵to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. ⁶Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” ⁷So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir.

Salvation wasn’t an accident according to Paul. There was no plan B for God. This was the plan from the beginning. Salvation would be by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Paul has been demonstrating that point by saying that not even the Law overcame this.

Not only was Christ the plan from the beginning, when he came was also part of the plan. The world was in a state of looking for salvation. There was a universal language of Greek and there was a travel system of roads set up for people to get from place to place easily. The world was in the perfect position to receive a savior.

Note that the Son was sent. The Son pre-existed, which is a high Christology for a letter that is early and is definitely Pauline. Pauline doctrine of the Son has no place in it for an adoptionistic theory. The Son was there in the bosom of the Father.

While we know the Son was sent, we also know he went willingly, and there’s no reason we should think that these two contradict each other. We can picture the Son offering himself to go and save fallen humanity and then the Father preparing the way so that the Son could fulfill his mission.

What did happen? The plan worked. Salvation came at the fulness of time when it was meant to be. What about those who came before and what about those who never heard? Those are separate blog posts, but I will say at this point that the judge of all the Earth will do right and we who believe the Scriptures and in the God who is revealed in them can simply say that we trust him in that regards.

Yes. The salvation of man was no accident and the Son had always been willing. What are we doing for such a great savior?

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters where we dive into the ocean of truth. Tonight, we’re going to be continuing our study into the doctrine of the Trinity. We will be looking at a passage tonight that’s not about the Trinity, but brings up a point that I’ve brought up numerous times, and that’s the point that Christ became a curse for us on the cross. Our main verse will be Galatians 3:13, but we will look at verses 10-14 to get the surrounding context.

¹⁰All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.” ¹¹Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, “The righteous will live by faith.” ¹²The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, “The man who does these things will live by them.” ¹³Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.” ¹⁴He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.

Paul is talking about how righteousness comes about through the Spirit and faith in Christ and not through works of the law. His point is that in the law, everyone who is hung on a tree is said to be under God’s curse, and this is what happened to Christ. Christ became that curse for us.

I’d like you to picture being a Jew in the first century and going to talk to another Jew about this new movement you’ve joined called Christianity. He starts asking you questions about this person called Jesus and what his life story was and then you get up to the passion week.

You: And so Jesus entered Jerusalem for the final conflict between him and the Sanhedrin.

Friend: And he overcame them?

You: Actually, no. They crucified him.

Friend: Oh. Nice talking to you.

You: Wait! Don’t you want to hear anything more?

Friend: He was crucified. That’s all I need to know.

This is why Paul said in 1 Cor. 1 that this is a stumbling block for Jews and Gentiles both. How could a king be crucified? How could the Messiah hang on a cross? How could God come and have that happen to him? That’s not the way a true leader and messiah acts.

We need to really grasp this. Once the crucifixion point came in the story, most people would be turned off. Yet that is when we need to see the miracle of the resurrection. That was when God took all the claims that Christ made and vindicated them.

The resurrection explains it all. Either all that Christ said was false and he was the most wicked man who ever lived and the crucifixion was the most righteous act of all, or what he said was true and he was the greatest man who ever lived and putting him to death was the most wicked act of all.

Yes. He took on the curse for us. He didn’t leave it. That is what makes Christianity unique and that is why we must take the claims of Christ seriously.

Are you?

Hello everyone. Welcome to the Deeper Waters blog again. Tonight, we’re continuing our dive into the ocean of Scripture as we study the doctrine of the Trinity. Last night, we wrapped up the book of 2 Corinthians with a look at the beautiful benediction that closes that epistle. Tonight, we’re going to be reading Galatians 1:6-9, a passage that all counter-cult types should know.

⁶I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! ⁹As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!

It’s interesting how angels seem to make appearances at times. An angel is the one who gave a message to Muhammad allegedly. The angel Moroni came to Joseph Smith allegedly and told him where to go to find the golden plates.

We often come with this assumption that if something is spiritual, that it must be good. New Age teachers delight in this. There’s a reason authors like Sylvia Browne sell numerous books. If you are hearing something from the other side, well it must be good!

The Word of Faith movement has this same idea as well. So many people think that if you are quoting the Bible and talking about Jesus, well it must be good. No one wants to be said to be going against the Spirit after all. If you are having all these miracles and such going on and people are getting excited and feeling happy, well it must be of God.

Paul points in this passage to what is of God. The gospel. Forget all the other stuff. If the gospel is not right, then it’s not of God. Even if it were an angel from heaven giving something that was contrary to the gospel, let him be eternally condemned.

What is essential to the gospel is who Jesus is. Paul has stated that in 2 Corinthians. If someone is preaching another Jesus, they are preaching another gospel. Is Jesus the spirit brother of Lucifer? Then that is another gospel. Is Jesus just a man who was the Messiah but never claimed to be God? Then that is another gospel.

It’s not much of a shock that a lesser Jesus leads to a lesser salvation. A Jesus who is God can cover everything someone does and make them into reflections of himself. A Jesus who is fully deity is a Jesus who can fully save. In other religions, there is a strong emphasis placed on works. Now we as Christians are not against works. We are just against works being for salvation. There is no problem with orthopraxy, right living, but it must be backed by orthodoxy, right beliefs. After all, if you believe right, your living should follow accordingly.

As we go through this series, keep this in mind. Paul had the strongest of words for those who taught another gospel. Would that we had such a passion.

Hello everyone. We’re going to return to our walk through the Bible now as we study the doctrine of the Trinity. We’re in the book of 2 Corinthians right now and seeing as we’re looking at the last verse in that book tonight, we will be moving on tomorrow to the book of Galatians. Our verse will be in the benediction of 2 Cor. It’s 13:14 and is seen as one of the major Trinitarian texts in Scripture:

¹⁴May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

So let’s take a closer look at this text.

Grace. We’ve seen grace as a major theme throughout the New Testament in connection to Jesus. We are told in 8:9 of this book that it is by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ that he became poor for our sakes. Grace has been Christ reaching down to us. It is appropriate to attribute grace to him since he was the one who came down.

Grace was also spoken of in the gospel of John. We were told in the prologue that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. Grace has been called God’s Riches at Christ’s Expense, but let us always remember that this was something that Christ did willingly. He offered himself on our behalf so that we could be forgiven. He lowered himself to Earth so he could raise us up to the heavenlies, as is said in Ephesians 2.

Love. Love was a major theme for Paul in 1 Cor. 13. It is the love of God that he sent his Son to die for our sins. That was the good that the Father sought for all of us. He gave his Son so that we could live. The love of God is important to note in light of heresies that rose up early saying that the God of the  Old Testament was not the God of Jesus Christ. Paul would certainly have none of that. He always saw God as the God of love. Of course, he wasn’t limited to love and he still isn’t, but we dare not deny the love of God.

Fellowship. The fellowship of the Spirit. Again, Paul has written about this idea to the people in the use of spiritual gifts and the fellowship of the Spirit in 1 Cor. 5 in judgment. The Spirit is not absent from the letters of Paul, to which I recommend the fascinating study done by Fee called “God’s Empowering Presence.”

It is by the Spirit that we are all united in the body of Christ. What all believers share in common is the Holy Spirit within them leading them on in righteousness. If the work of the Holy Spirit is not present in our lives, then we are not in the body of Christ.

Paul puts all three of these together in Trinitarian format. It is the only place that he uses such a benediction, but it is a beautiful one and one that we should all consider as Christians.