Deeper Waters

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. Tonight, we’re going to be continuing our look at Hebrews 1. I’d first like to thank everyone for their continued prayers. I think I’ve made some major breakthroughs in that area in my life. Let us hope that the sun is once again beginning to shine. Going back to the Trinitarian commentary, tonight we’re going to finish up our look at Jesus in the first chapter of Hebrews by reading verses 13-14:

¹³To which of the angels did God ever say,
“Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies
a footstool for your feet”? ¹⁴Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

As far as I know, Psalm 110:1 is the most quoted Old Testament Verse in the New Testament and it’s no shock it’s used here. None of the angels were ever promised to either sit at the right hand of God or that he would make their enemies a footstool.

The verse is so important because it captured the deity of Christ to the early church and it showed his position as Messiah. This was the Messiah in the lineage of David who has ontological equality with the Father and is the judge of all the world.

This is done in contrast to the angels. The angels are but servants sent to those who will inherit salvation. Now Jesus did wash his disciples’ feet, which was the position of a servant, but he did so in a way that he showed was unnatural to one in his position. The angels however have been placed in a position where they are servants to us. In fact, we are told in 1 Cor. 6 that we will judge the angels. If we judge the angels, then in some way we are superior to them.

Of course, this is not to lower angels. I think angels are a fascinating topic of discussion and they are great creations of God, but something that I believe distinguishes us from them is that we are never told that angels have the image of God. We are definitely never told that Christ died for the sins of angels. The emphasis in Scripture is on God restoring men to him and not angels.

However, the contrast here is not about angels and ourselves but angels and the Son. In the system that the writer was writing to, angels were seen as mediators, which is understandable seeing as in Galatians 3 Paul says that the Law was mediated to us by angels. There was always a great tendency however to look to the means of something as being an object of worship, such as the bronze snake Moses made that later became an idol. I dare say most of us would be tempted to worship an angel if we saw one, but we must not do so.

However great these beings are, the writer wants one thing to be clear to his readers. Christ is greater. This is one of the explanatory passages in the book. Tomorrow, we shall begin looking at an argument that follows from this that counts as one of the warning passages and see what more we can learn about the Trinity from there.

 

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are continuing our Trinitarian commentary.  I also thank you for your prayers as it seems the light is breaking through in some ways now. This has been a learning and growing experience for me and I am a better man for it. Enough about me however. Tonight, we are continuing on our Trinitarian commentary in the book of Hebrews. I said last night that saying “Jesus is God” is not the pinnacle the Hebrews writer reaches in that first chapter. Let’s go to that pinnacle in verses 10-12:

¹⁰He also says,
“In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
¹¹They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
¹²You will roll them up like a robe;
like a garment they will be changed.
But you remain the same,
and your years will never end.”

How is this greater? God implies the concept of being deity, but remember that the Jews would have known about a Greek pantheon with several deities so being one in the class of deity, while impressive, would not be the end-all.

When we come to this passage, we reach something that includes deity in it, but is a more exclusive way of putting it. The word in this case is Kurios. In the previous verse, the word was Theos which was a normal word used for God. However, Kurios implies sovereignty with it as well. To be Kurios is not just to be deity, but rather to be a sovereign deity. When the Greek Septuagint translated the Hebrew into the Greek, they would translate YHWH into Kurios, showing just how highly the word is used.

Where does the quote come from? It comes from Psalm 102. I invite the reader to go to the Psalm and read it for himself. This is a Psalm about creation and praising YHWH for it. What the writer is saying is that this applies to Jesus.

Now in earlier verses, we could have said that kingship applies to Jesus without making him deity. In a sense, that is correct, although the wider context suggests otherwise. However, in this passage, we do not have kingship but the state of being the creator.

Note as well that the creation is described as the work of his hands. A study of the texts in the Old Testament reveals that whenever the term is used, it does refer to something that the person was directly involved in. In saying that creation is the work of the hands of Jesus, it is saying that Jesus was directly involved in creation. In saying that he is kurios, it is saying that he is the sovereign over the creation. If Jesus is the sovereign over the creation, then he is God.

Thus, we find that the Hebrews writer has been building on a pinnacle. Now he has reached his grand creation. Jesus is more than an angel. He is more than a king. He is more than just a god. He is the sovereign Lord of all that is. Indeed, let not just all God’s angels worship him, but all creation as well.

 

 

Hello everyone and welcome to Deeper Waters once again. I thank everyone again for their continued prayers as there is a lot to be learned in a certain area and I believe I will learn it. Tonight, let us continue our Trinitarian Commentary. Last time, I left us on a cliffhanger of sorts saying that the Son was superior to the angels in a certain way. What way is that? Well let us go to our text tonight. We will be looking at Hebrews 1:8-9. Let’s go:

⁸But about the Son he says,
“Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever,
and righteousness will be the scepter of your kingdom.
⁹You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions
by anointing you with the oil of joy.”

The Psalms were a favorite book for the New Testament writers to quote and the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews was no exception. This passage is also like Psalm 2, a passage to honor the king, yet all of a sudden in the text, we find the reference to God. What is going on?

Naturally, an Old Testament king was not God, however, they were in essence to have a godlike function. I believe the same is being said of the judges of Israel in Psalm 82. They were to lead Israel as God’s chosen person to sit upon the throne. There was also the Davidic promise that one of David’s descendants would forever sit on the throne.

The Trinitarian is fully prepared for the true fulfillment of this passage as while the others did function as gods, in the end, it truly is God who sits on the throne in the person of Christ. This is a psalm that ultimately is Messianic and looks forward to the age of the Messiah when the true king of Davidic descent would sit on the throne and as we saw in the question Christ stumped the Pharisees with on if the Messiah was the Son of David, this does end with the fulfillment of a human descendant of David who is both man and God.

How does a group like the Jehovah’s Witnesses handle this. They’re quite good at changing the Bible when it doesn’t fit with their doctrine. Here is what the New World Translation says:

But with reference to the Son: “God is your throne forever and ever, and [the] scepter of your kingdom is the scepter of uprightness.

There is no doubt the Witnesses are in the minority among Greek grammarians throughout the ages (Of course, I don’t believe any Greek grammarians really worked on the text of the NWT). It would be more likely however that if this was meant to be read in that way, that Ho Theos, for God, would have appeared first. The idea of interpreting it as “God is your throne” has been called a grotesque interpretation.

I would also point out that I find this concept makes no sense. In what sense is God a throne? God is not a place for another to sit. God will not relinquish his rulership to another forever and ever. The Christian concept does have explanatory power, it fits in with sound theology in the church for ages, and it has had the backing of grammarians for ages.

But the question is asked “If this is saying Jesus is God, then haven’t we reached the pinnacle? Wouldn’t this best be saved for last?”

We shall answer that tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. My thanks for the prayers through my recent sickness. I did sleep in until a little after 10, which I can do since I have Saturdays off. As for the other area, I’m learning and growing a lot more in that area and I believe some progress is being made. For now, let’s move to the text. Tonight, we’re going to be looking at Hebrews 1:4-7:

⁴So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.⁵For to which of the angels did God ever say,
“You are my Son;
today I have become your Father”? Or again,
“I will be his Father,
and he will be my Son”? ⁶And again, when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says,
“Let all God’s angels worship him.” ⁷In speaking of the angels he says,
“He makes his angels winds,
his servants flames of fire.”

The writer of Hebrews was dealing with a system that held to several mediators between God and men. There were angels, the high priest, Moses, and Melchizedek. We’ll see in this book that all of them are dealt with. The first is angels.

First off, the Son is superior to angels because he has inherited a superior name. That name is of course the name of YHWH. Inheritance doesn’t mean that he got it at a point in time, but rather that he showed himself to be the true bearer of the name by what has been said about him throughout time, meaning not just the incarnation but the Scriptures as a whole.

The writer demonstrates this by showing the truths that apply to the Son that do not apply to the angels. The first is asking to which of the angels did he ever say “You are my son; today I have become your father.” This is a statement that was said at the coronation of the new king of Israel, but it does apply to the ministry of Jesus.

The Son did not become the Son at a point in time, but rather was declared to be the Son of God by God’s approval of his ministry at the baptism and at the transfiguration. The final vindication of this of course was at the resurrection. No angel ever received such confirmation of his relationship to YHWH.

The second statement of “I will be his father; and he will be my son.” This is a passage again about the king of Israel and the covenant relationship being continued through the king, but established par excellence in Christ. None of the angels were ones that God made a covenant promise with. They could be mediators of that covenant, but they themselves were not the basis for the covenant.

Also, when the firstborn is brought into the world, all the angels are to worship him. No angel is the proper object of worship. (Readers are recommended to see my earlier series on the Angel of the Lord as an appearance of the pre-incarnate Christ.) The idea of Christ being worshiped should be sufficient to show his unique status.

Angels are also said to be servants. The Son is given a contrasting position even though he does willingly submit. What is that contrasting position?

That is what tomorrow’s blog is for.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. It looks like my flu could be in its last stages. Let’s hope so. I did manage to rest through the night but some Nyquil could have had something to do with that. As for the other area, it’s a work in progress, but I’ve not been one to give up on something worthwhile easily. I ask for your continued prayers.

For now, we continue our Trinitarian commentary with a look at Hebrews 1:3. Let’s go to the text:

³The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.

Early Christian apologists explained the relationship to the Father and the Son as to the sun and its light. What the sun gives off is what it is. The same can be said here as the Son is the radiance of the glory of the Father. God’s glory is shone through the Son and we know who the Father is by knowledge of the Son.

Most interesting for our purposes however is the idea that the Son is the exact representation of the being of the Father. The word used in the Greek for the exact representation is charakter. It is meant to give the idea of an engraving or stamping that is taking place. If you put a stamp down on wax, for instance, you could leave the charakter. It would be an exact representation of the stamp.

Jesus is just that to the Father. If the Father were to leave an impression of his very nature in a stamp, that would be seen as the Son. The Son does not just act like the Father in some ways nor does he just have the communicable attributes that we have. The Son is the exact representation. If it is an aspect of the nature of the Father, then you can be sure it will show up in the nature of the Son.

The Son also sustains all things by his powerful Word. It is because of the Son that you are now and it is because of the Son that I am able to type out this message. This is also on parallel with the Wisdom literature where it is by God’s Wisdom that the universe is held together.

We next have mention of the work of the Son in redemption. Jesus is the one who came and made redemption for us so that we could be free from the grip of sin and death. Notice however what he did when he was done. He sat down. Those words should be cause of excitement for everyone who is a Christian. It means Jesus’s works were done. This is a play we’ll see throughout this book as the author seeks to show Jesus is superior to the Old Covenant. In that covenant, the priest did not sit down. He always had work to do and after atonement was made one year, he would have to make it the next. Jesus, however, sat down. His work of purification was done for all time.

There is also the distinction between him and the Father in that Jesus sits at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. Jesus is not the Father, but the writer has no problem saying that Jesus is one who bears the exact same nature of the one he is with. Once again, we see the message of John 1:1 being brought out.

We shall continue our look at Hebrews 1 tomorrow.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I do ask for your continued prayers. Last night was a very difficult night for me and one that was quite painful. There are just some issues that I’m working through and again, due to the personal nature of them, I choose to not go into them on the blog. I just ask for the prayers of my readers.

Tonight, we’re going to start the book of Hebrews and I have been looking forward to this for awhile. I believe Hebrews is my favorite book of the New Testament and it is just loaded on who Jesus is. This book should hopefully take awhile to go through. We’re going to start tonight in the first chapter with verses 1-2:

¹In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, ²but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe.

One idea I want readers to keep in mind is that Hebrews has an underlying Logos doctrine where Jesus is to be understood as God’s Wisdom. An excellent look at this can be found in the book “The Gospel and the Greeks” by Ron Nash.

The book also comes from a historical perspective right from the beginning when it says “In the past.” This is in essence giving a Christian interpretation of history. The Jews were the people of the time who did not see the universe as cyclical but they rather saw that there was a story going on and that it was going somewhere.

The Hebrews writer refers to the prophets through whom God spoke. History in Judaism had a long line of prophets each building on the revelation of those before giving more and more clues to the story of the Messiah that was coming. They came at various times as the text says and they spoke in various way.

Quite different however is the last revelation spoken of through Son. Now some of you are wondering if I just used some bad grammar there. When I was in Bible College, I have never forgotten what one of the Greek professors said in that he said there wasn’t an article so it could be said that God spoke by Son. In other words, God spoke through the prophets, but the Son is his language. The Son is the eternal language of God.

This fits in with what we saw in John 1:18 with the Son being the one who exegetes the Father. The Son reveals the nature of the Father that we could not know on our own. In the same way, when the Father speaks, it is in the language of the Son.

This fits in of course with the overall prologue of John where the Son is referred to as the Word. It is by the Son that God creates and it is by the Son that his love for mankind is revealed. It is by the Son that we ultimately know God.

Again, the Son is the language of God.

We shall continue tomorrow.

Welcome back everyone. It has been an exhausting day. I didn’t get much sleep last night so right now I’m fighting to stay awake. However, I didn’t get much sleep because I was actually in a good mood. Odd how that works isn’t it? I do ask for your continued prayers in both areas I’ve asked for in the more confidential one, I believe I am likely to be somewhat of an iconoclast in a certain area but hey, we apologists can enjoy being iconoclasts.

Tonight, we don’t really have a text per se. We do of course, but it’s too long to quote and we’re not looking at one verse but rather the main theme of the whole book. That will be the book of Philemon, a book that’s only a chapter long in the New Testament. It’s the last Pauline epistle. (I do not consider Hebrews to be Pauline.) It is the story of Paul meeting Philemon’s slave Onesimus and getting him converted and sending him back to his master asking him to welcome him back as a brother.

The concept of slavery is interesting in this case however. When we think of slavery, we must not think of slavery that went on in England and America during the period it was practiced here. Slavery was often quite difficult and there were many great slaves such as the philosopher Epictetus and a slave had numerous rights that slaves in the more modern sense did not have. (Though slavery is no longer going on in our countries, any time it is referred to, it will be referred to as modern slavery.)

Paul saw himself as a slave of Christ in contrast to Onesimus being a slave of Philemon. He was the bondservant of Christ who was called to obey his master in all things. In the days of the Roman empire, the behavior of the slave reflected the behavior of the master. If someone was a good slave, it spoke little about the slave and instead spoke of the value of the master. This must be a master that one would willingly love to serve if the slave was a good slave.

Paul saw himself the same way as being a slave of Christ. He was the bondservant meant to be at the beck and call of his master. If Christ says to do something, well it is done. No questions are to be asked. The willingness Paul would obey his master would show the world around him how much he valued his master. It’s also noteworthy that Paul took on the title of slave, meaning he was willing to take on a lowly position in order to illustrate his obedience to Christ.

Paul did this showing Philemon that the position that Onesimus was in to him was to parallel the position that Paul was in to Christ in that Onesimus’s life was to be in Philemon’s hands. Philemon could have had Onesimus put to death for his trespass, and indeed, Christ would be just putting us to death for our trespasses.

This also tells us of course how Paul viewed Christ. Christ was the one Paul had placed his life into the hands of. Christ was the one who Paul was to obey the every command of. Christ was the one Paul was to show the world was his master. In essence, Paul would have had to have a high view of Christ in order to do this.

And could it be, a view that saw Christ as deity?

Why it just might have been.

I look forward to tomorrow when we start the book of Hebrews!

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.