Month: October 2009

Welcome again everyone to Deeper Waters. I do seem to be recovering so thanks to those of you who have been praying. I did have a skeptic come to my blog today shocked that I asked people to pray and I believe it works. Well, I do. Do I need more faith in prayer? I’d say so. I also thank you for the prayers in the other area in my life I’m not sharing right now for reasons I wish to keep secret.

Tonight, we’re going to finish up the book of Titus. We’ll be in the third chapter tonight and looking at verses 4-7. Let’s go to the text:

⁴But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared,⁵he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, ⁶whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, ⁷so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

This is a passage describing sanctification and it is, well, bathed in Trinitarian terminology as it describes our being bathed in the regenerative work of the Trinity. Now as to what the washing of rebirth means in this passage, I’m going to leave the baptism debate to you all to work out amongst yourselves.

How does Paul start? He starts with the statement of the appearing of the kindness of God our savior. As we go through this text, it will become apparent that he means God the Father. So for now, I ask the reader to simply assume God the Father for the time being.

However, the Father does not do this work alone but he does it by the Holy Spirit. Again, the baptism aspect is for you to figure out, but the transforming power of the Holy Spirit is at work no matter how one views the subject of baptism and whether it relates to this passage or not. Washing could refer to literal baptism or it could refer to a sort of purification using the imagery of water in a metaphorical sense to speak of how we’re cleansed from our sins. The main point we wish to see is that the Holy Spirit is at work.

Now we see why this is talking about God the Father. The text says that He poured out the Holy Spirit on us through Jesus Christ. Notice that the Spirit is also referred to as a whom and the one through whom this is done is Jesus Christ. We see again the way the persons of the Trinity relate to each other.

The end result of this is that we would become justified by grace and have eternal life. Notice however that this is a Trinitarian process. It is God the Father by the Spirit through his Son. All three persons are at work in the Trinity and this passage makes perfect sense in a Trinitarian framework.

No Trinity. No justification.

We shall move on tomorrow.

Welcome back everyone to the Deeper Waters blog. I appreciate your prayers for my recovery. I woke up at 4 AM this morning with a sore throat. I did get back to sleep but I’m wondering if this is going to be a “symptom of the day” thing. I have been taking on a much more normal schedule. I also appreciate prayer in the other area I spoke of. I’ve found some areas that need a lot of work. I suppose it’s God doing a work of healing and it’s sure nothing pleasant. (By the way, this isn’t physical healing I mean.)

Anyway, we now continue our Trinitarian commentary with a key verse. We’re going to be in Titus 2:13 tonight. Enough chat! Let’s skip to the text!

while we wait for the blessed hope—the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,

Some of you might be wondering about the name of this blog post. It comes from a Greek grammarian who came up with a rule that has held strong. James White of Alpha and Omega ministries describes the rule in this way:

Basically, Granville Sharp’s rule states that when you have two nouns, which are not proper names (such as Cephas, or Paul, or Timothy), which are describing a person, and the two nouns are connected by the word “and,” and the first noun has the article (“the”) while the second does not, *both nouns are referring to the same person*.

This is the same layout that we see in this verse which means that great God and savior refers to Jesus Christ. However, when we come to what the Jehovah’s Witnesses have in their translation, we see this:

while we wait for the happy hope and glorious manifestation of the great God and of [the] Savior of us, Christ Jesus,

The Watchtower changes this to the appearing of two persons. That’s problematic in itself as I know no place where we are supposed to see God appear, especially since men cannot see God. What is going on in this case is a violation of the Granville Sharp rule. Of course, if they’re wanting to see the Father and the Son, for all we know, maybe they’re wanting to become Mormons.

In the orthodox view, we can see this as a high Christology once again. Paul is speaking about the hope of all Christians which would be the appearance of the glory of Jesus Christ. Now how you are going to relate this eschatologically again is up to you, but all views of Christianity which are orthodox would hold to this.

What is going on with the Watchtower I contend in this and many other passages is a deliberate attempt to hide that which is taught in the text. Greek grammarians throughout time have understood that this is a reference to Jesus Christ alone and the Granville Sharp rule helps point that out. We should be thankful for the great minds that have gone before us in helping us understand the biblical languages and the great truths they reveal about Christ

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome once again to Deeper Waters. I thank you all for praying for me in my recovery from the flu. Last night was a kind of horrid night in some ways, but after reading D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones on spiritual depression, I think I found some spiritual truth for my own life and it ended up being an epiphany.

Tonight, we’re continuing our Trinitarian commentary by starting the book of Titus. We’re going to be looking at the first chapter and verses 3-4. I’ll be starting at verse 1 to get the context:

¹Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ for the faith of God’s elect and the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness— ²a faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time, ³and at his appointed season he brought his word to light through the preaching entrusted to me by the command of God our Savior,

⁴To Titus, my true son in our common faith:
Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior.

What I find most interesting is the comparison between verses 3 and 4 in this passage. God has been referred to as savior in the Pastoral epistles before, notably 1 Timothy 1:1, but here, we have God listed as savior and then we have Christ listed as savior.

When we come to the pastorals, it seems that Paul is willing to use the terms savior practically interchangeably. What does this tell us? It tells us that Paul sees the divine identity involved fully in the role of the salvation of man and Paul does not hesitate to attribute to Jesus that which is attributable to YHWH.

In the OT, there were some who were saviors, but never in the sense that Jesus is in the NT. Other saviors would come and save Israel from her physical enemies, such as Ehud in the book of Judges. In the NT, it is Christ who saves us from the enemy of sin.

It was always YHWH however who was the one who saved peoples souls from Sheol. It was he who removed the sins of others. No priest would have ever claimed to have been the savior of Israel in saving them from sins. However, Jesus readily accepts that he is the savior of Israel and even in the Samaritan village, that he is the savior of the world.

Jesus can be called the savior because he does not carry the taint of sin first off. Second, he is one who is able to become like us in our nature. Third, he is the one who is in his divine nature the standard of holiness and can truly act as a judge. Angels do not act as judges.

It is important then that Paul does not hesitate to put Jesus in this divine role and the two so close together implies that Paul wants us to notice this connection. He wants us to see that Jesus and YHWH are necessarily linked in salvation.

We shall continue Titus tomorrow.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters. I appreciate your continued prayers and it seems again that there is something else to pray for. As I write this blog, I am currently battling the flu. No. I don’t have swine flu. I have the regular flu. It’s nothing pleasant however.

Tonight, we’re going to be finishing up 2 Timothy with a passage from 2 Timothy 4. Our text will be the first verse of that chapter. Tomorrow, we shall go to the last pastoral epistle, the book of Titus.

¹In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge:

What is noteworthy for our purposes here is how Christ is described as the one who will judge the living and the dead. He is also seen as the one that charges of the faith are made before and as everything being in his presence, which would point to his omniscience.

The idea of Christ as judge however is taking a prerogative that belonged to YHWH in the Old Testament. After all, YHWH was the one who determines our fates. He is the only one who is holy so only He has the right to judge.

We see this idea of Christ as the judge later on in verse 8:

⁸Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.

Once again, righteousness is connected with judgment. Because Jesus is righteous, he can judge. Anyone who is less than pure holiness in his nature could not judge the way God judges. Now we all do have to make some judgments, but the eternal destiny of someone cannot be determined by our judgments because we’ve already fallen short as well.

This concept is also in the Old Testament. Most notably in the book of Ruth:

“The LORD bless him!” Naomi said to her daughter-in-law. “He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead.” She added, “That man is our close relative; he is one of our kinsman-redeemers.”

The concept here is of the living and the dead both being seen as blessed. What’s important is that Ruth is a chiastic book where the main point is right in the middle and if there is one point the author wanted the reader to know, it was this one.

I do realize this is something said of Boaz also, but I believe that Boaz is acting out of the covenant between God and Israel and he is not forgetting the living or the dead because of the promises of YHWH. In the same way then, Jesus is seen in that same relationship to the living and the dead as YHWH. He is the righteous judge who can determine the eternal destiny of someone. In the Old Testament, that is something that belongs to YHWH alone. That Christ has that prerogative in the NT shows the way Paul viewed it.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. Again, I appreciate the prayers that are being offered up on my behalf as it seems things are getting along better, but there is still a continual up and down as I do find areas in my life that I need to work on, but they shall all be overcome with the help of God.

Tonight, we’re going to continue our Trinitarian commentary with a look at 2 Timothy 2:19. To get the context for this verse however, we are going to start at verse 14. Let’s go to the text:

¹⁴Keep reminding them of these things. Warn them before God against quarreling about words; it is of no value, and only ruins those who listen. ¹⁵Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. ¹⁶Avoid godless chatter, because those who indulge in it will become more and more ungodly. ¹⁷Their teaching will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, ¹⁸who have wandered away from the truth. They say that the resurrection has already taken place, and they destroy the faith of some.¹⁹Nevertheless, God’s solid foundation stands firm, sealed with this inscription: “The Lord knows those who are his,” and, “Everyone who confesses the name of the Lord must turn away from wickedness.”

Paul is exhorting Timothy on how to live and how to handle those who cause division in the church. He is to be a student who is well studied and knows sound doctrine, something I wish more pastors knew today. It’s my conviction that there are a lot of pastors who have no business being pastors. They have no study in sound Christian doctrine but just an idea that they were “called to preach.”

Paul also warns him about those who are teaching doctrine that is heretical. We know this because it has destroyed the faith of some. We are in an age where heresy needs to be dealt with as more and more people are falling prone to it. Now I realize there are teachings that are just aberrant and some that we can justifiably divide over, but Christians need to learn about essential Christian doctrine.

Timothy need not fear however because Timothy is in the covenant which is the point of our passage tonight. We are told that the Lord knows those who are his. Paul also says that everyone who confesses the name of the Lord must turn away from wickedness. The Lord knows who belongs to him and those will be they who also have lives of righteousness.

The first reference comes from Numbers 16 with the rebellion of Korah where God knows who belongs to him. In the same way, those who are pretending to be teachers of righteousness but are really apostates will be found out. Korah’s followers aren’t praised much in the NT. They’re just as much condemned in Jude.

What is of interest is the idea of the Lord knowing those who are his. The Lord as we have said most often refers to Jesus. I believe further mandate is found for this based on those who confess the name of the Lord, which is echoing what we have seen in Philippians 2 and Romans 10.

What this would mean is that the Lord of the covenant would then be Jesus, which would of course make Jesus be considered to be within the divine identity of YHWH. If my interpretation is correct, and I don’t see reason to think it isn’t, then we have a very high Christology indeed.

We shall continue 2 Timothy tomorrow.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters. I do appreciate your continued prayers on my behalf if you’ve been given them. There’s a lot of learning going on, though not necessarily of the academic kind. Still, the continued prayers are both needed and appreciated.

Tonight, we’re going to start our study of 2 Timothy in our Trinitarian Bible Study. We’re going to be emphasizing verses 9-10 of chapter 1 tonight, but to get the full context, I’m going to quote verses 8-12.

⁸So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God, ⁹who has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, ¹⁰but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. ¹¹And of this gospel I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher. ¹²That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day.

Paul is telling Timothy to not be ashamed of the gospel, a lesson we all need to learn. The gospel is never seen as an accident. The cross of Christ is never described as a “plan B.” It is what was intended all along. Paul speaks of the grace of Jesus given before the beginning of time.

This could then also be a reference to the pre-existent Christ, but not just pre-existent, but existent before there was any time whatsoever. Before anything began, there was the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together.

The appearing is an interesting concept as this comes as a contrast to the pagan gods. We will see about the appearing of Jesus as savior in Titus, but here, the idea of his appearing as savior refers not to his return but to his incarnation.

Most noteworthy is that Jesus brought life and immortality. This is interesting due to the fact that it is along the lines of first off, what John says in his prologue when John tells us that in Jesus was life. The next point is that Jesus brings immortality, which he has in himself. This is especially relevant in light of the blog post we had yesterday where God is said to be the one who alone possesses immortality. Note also that not only do these belong to Jesus but we are also told of the grace of Jesus, contrast to what we would usually expect to hear concerning the grace of God.

Finally, to bring to light is not an accidental phrase I believe. The Hebrews had a strong emphasis on light in that Jesus, according to Isaiah, was a light to appear to the Gentiles and that the Lord was seen as the light of the Hebrews. The light pointed to the revelation of salvation and there is no difference here. Jesus is the light that brings salvation to all who come. He gives life and immortality for he possesses these fully in himself as the God-man.

We shall continue 2 Timothy tomorrow.

Hello everyone. I’ve had a fun evening. I do still ask your prayers. There’s a lot going on and I’m having to come to grips with a lot and it’s a lot of emotional upheaval especially. I don’t want to go into the details, but I do seek your prayers.

I now wish to move on to our Trinitarian commentary and tonight, we are going to finish up 1 Timothy and we’ll be in chapter 6. We will be looking at verses 15-16 with mainly starting at verse 11. Let’s go to the text.

¹¹But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. ¹²Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. ¹³In the sight of God, who gives life to everything, and of Christ Jesus, who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you ¹⁴to keep this command without spot or blame until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁵which God will bring about in his own time—God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, ¹⁶who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen.

I was quite surprised when I had Jehovah’s Witnesses at my apartment recently and they quoted verses 15-16 and they said that that was a description of Jesus. I’m not convinced that it is. I think this could be praise to God the Father, but let us consider what it says.

Note how he is described as immortal. This has shown up in 1 Tim. 1:17

¹⁷Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen

Note also how he is called the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. If this is referring to the Father, then this is interesting as this would be an ascription of deity then and this is what Jesus is called in the book of Revelation.

Yet what gets me to thinking it is God the Father the most is that this is one who is described as one who no one has seen or can see. This is the same terminology that is used of God the Father in John 1:18. Obviously, people saw Jesus and it is the hopes of Christians that we will see Jesus.

Now of course, I don’t hold to a modalistic concept and if the Witnesses want to say this is Jesus, then I think they will be in trouble with the concept of him possessing immortality, particularly in light of 1 Timothy 1:17 which is clearly talking about God the Father as it is in contrast to Christ. However, even if this is about the Father, we again have the carry over of Jesus being included in the divine identity which also makes him the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. In either case, we have an affirmation of who Jesus is and who the Father is.

Hello everyone! Welcome back to Deeper Waters. I’d like to ask first off for your continued prayers, first off on the situation I’ve mentioned, and second off in the case of my grandmother. I’ve heard word that she’s not doing too well. I’d appreciate your prayers. Tonight, we’re going to be continuing our Trinitarian commentary and we’ll be in the book of 1 Timothy. We’re emphasizing 1 Timothy 4:10 today, but I want to start at verse 9. I’m actually going to give a verse that I don’t think argues for the Trinity, but I want to give what I believe is a correct interpretation of.

⁹This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance ¹⁰(and for this we labor and strive), that we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, and especially of those who believe.

Okay. What’s going on in this passage? Is universalism being taught? How so? How can God be the savior of all men but especially of those who believe. Is this saying that God saves those who believe but at the same time that he also saves those who do not believe? It would seem that we have universalism then.

Or, is this talking about Jesus? After all, isn’t Jesus the savior? If Jesus is the savior and we’re saying God is the savior here, then do we have a slam dunk? Is this an unequivocal way of referring to Jesus as God?

However, as we have routinely seen and we do see in this letter, Lord usually refers to Christ.  God routinely refers to the Father. I do not believe there is any reason to think any differently in this case. We have seen a few isolated incidents where Jesus is referred to as God, and we will see a few more, but this is not the norm.

Furthermore, we have the first verse of this epistle:

¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope,

Where there is a clear distinction between Christ Jesus and God and God is listed as savior.

So what is going on in this passage? God is seen as the living God which means he is the one who is real and he is the one who is active. He is the one who is overseeing the world and making sure that all runs according to plan.

What I believe is going on then, to which I am in agreement with Guthrie on in the Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, is that this is saying that God is the preserver of all men. We have too many passages that do indicate that some people do sadly die without Christ and they do face never-ending consequences for that. Savior in this context then means that God is the preserver of all men as all men live because of him, but God does have a special eye  on those who are in the family of believers.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are continuing our Trinitarian Bible Study. We are in the Pauline epistles now and tonight, we’re going to be looking at 1 Timothy 3:16. This is a passage that has much debate over the wording in the manuscript, but I think it can easily be agreed it shows a high Christology. Let’s go to the text:

¹⁶Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great:
He appeared in a body,
was vindicated by the Spirit,
was seen by angels,
was preached among the nations,
was believed on in the world,
was taken up in glory.

So what’s the textual question? The question at the beginning is if the “He appeared in a body” refers to Christ or God as some manuscripts do have God. It is most likely, however, that the word is really “os” and is referring to Jesus.

We will go with this interpretation, however, it would lend to a stronger argument for the identity of Jesus if it did say “God”, but we can’t go with a reading just because we like it. We need to go by what is most likely in the text and it seems most scholars of the text would agree that it should be “He.”

The first statement that we have is that he appeared in a body. This should tell us that it is not the natural mode of existence of the one who appeared in a body, and Jesus being fully God does not naturally dwell in a body. Instead, he willingly took one on to complete the divine mission. This was already a form of humility that brings to mind the Philippians kenotic passage.

The vindication of the Spirit would refer to the being made alive in the Spirit. Jesus was vindicated in the face of his oppressors. While they accused him of blasphemy, God approved of the work that he did and thus verified all of his claims. In response to the same he experienced on Earth, he was honored by the Father. The honor/shame paradigm is rich here.

He was seen by angels. There are mixed opinions on what this means. Some think it refers to fallen angels to whom Jesus appeared in triumph to. I would instead think that it would refer to holy angels who were witnesses of the incarnation. We can also remember that angels were there at the resurrection.

He was preached among the nations as well. His message spread all around the world. This is just a few decades after the resurrection event and already, the gospel had spread amongst the nations. I do not know of any scholar of the time period who would deny how far the Christian message had spread.

It was preached successfully as he was believed on in the world as well. The gospel had spread far and had many converts. We know that there was an expulsion from Rome within a few years of the events of the resurrection.

Finally, he was taken up in glory. What does this mean? Could it refer to the ascension? It could. It could also mean his glorification as a result of the preaching of the gospel to the nations. Or, it could be some combination of both.

Either way, we have a high Christology and the fact that this is a hymn sung in honor of Christ should show that he was seen in a high light in the early church.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are continuing what has been called our Trinitarian Commentary on the Bible. We started this a long time ago, such that I can’t even remember the exact date, and today, we have made it to the book of 1 Timothy. Tonight, we’re going to be in 1 Timothy 2 and looking at a verse that has been used to argue against the deity of Christ. Our text today is 1 Timothy 2:5:

For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,

In their booklet Should You Believe In The Trinity?, the Watchtower says the following:

The disciples viewed Jesus as the “one mediator between God and men,” not as God himself. (1 Timothy 2:5) Since by definition a mediator is someone separate from those who need mediation, it would be a contradiction for Jesus to be one entity with either of the parties he is trying to reconcile. That would be a pretending to be something he is not.

http://www.watchtower.org/e/ti/article_05.htm

I find this an incredibly odd statement. One wonders if when the Governing Body needs a mediator to settle a dispute if that means they somehow have to track down a non-human in order to represent each of them. Now we could say it would not be proper for one person to be both mediator and to be one being mediated.

I also wonder if the Witnesses are denying that Jesus is a man in this passage since Jesus is the one mediator between God and man.  If Jesus cannot mediate for us if he is God, then it would seem just as much that he cannot mediate for us if he is man. Last I checked, I have not come across any Jehovah’s Witnesses however who deny the humanity of Christ, especially since they have a book out called The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived that is, of course, about Jesus.

However, this does fit in just fine with the doctrine of the Trinity. We see that Jesus is the mediator, which will be further expounded on when we look at the book of Hebrews. Jesus comes on behalf of the Father and represents what the Father desires to do on the Earth. In that sense, he pronounces forgiveness on those who have sinned, but also in that sense, when he is directly sinned against, such as at the crucifixion, he asks forgiveness for those who are sinning against him.

The humanity of Christ in this case is emphasized because he is our mediator and as Hebrews says, Jesus needed to be made in every way like his brethren. In an ironic twist, it is the doctrine of the Trinity that in fact explains this verse the best. Jesus can mediate on behalf of man because he does bear the nature of man. He can also mediate on behalf of God because he has the full nature of God. God can use go-betweens like angels or even humans for many actions, but as one who would directly represent him, anyone who is less than him could not accurately fulfill that role.

In the end, Jesus is indeed the one mediator and there can be no reconciliation with the Father apart from him. Why? Because of the unique status of who Jesus is. He is God coming to us and he is man before God. Only the God-man can be a mediator.

We shall continue tomorrow.