Deeper Waters

Hello everyone! Today is being a really good day! There have been two compliments, one of which was a very friendly endorsement I just found out about! It is such a joy when you know that what you are doing in ministry matters. Enough time later on to celebrate however! Tonight, we’re going to be looking at 2 Thessalonians 2:13-17. Let’s go to the text.

¹³But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. ¹⁴He called you to this through our gospel, that you might share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. ¹⁵So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter.¹⁶May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, ¹⁷encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.

I hope that those of you who have been reading this blog for awhile have noticed the need to look for Trinitarian passages.  I also hope that any new readers will also notice that need. I chose this passage tonight because it is thoroughly Trinitarian.

Notice that the thanks go to God at the beginning, so here we have the Father being referred to. What is next? They are loved by the Lord. By the Lord, we of course have  learned that this normally refers to Jesus and we have no reason to think otherwise in this passage. Finally, there is the mention of sanctification through the Spirit. The Spirit is the one that comes and brings about holiness in the lives of the believers.

Paul continues mention of the work that is going on. Believers are the ones who are called by God. God is the subject of this section, but the Holy Spirit and the Lord Jesus Christ are not absent. This was done so we could share in the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe this means that when the time comes that Christ is exalted before all the world, that it will be a known reality for all the world. We will participate in it in that we will be giving glory to Christ and he will honor us for honoring him.

Finally, Paul asks that our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God the Father encourage the believers in Thessalonica. The Lord Jesus Christ himself refers to the unique position that Jesus holds in the thought of Paul. Jesus himself is to be the one who is encouraging. Note also that Paul speaks of God the Father, which is a point we’ve noticed numerous times. There was a distinction that was being made. Paul doesn’t say “God and Lord” as that could refer to one person, but he takes both titles of deity and applies one to Jesus and one to the Father.

Once again, we see that in even a basic encouragement, Trinitarianism is essential for Paul.

Good evening everyone. Things have gone well for me today. I’m in a really good mood as we start off tonight and let’s hope it lasts. I appreciate everyone who has been praying for me as I do believe as I ponder it that those prayers are being effective. Those who know me know that I depend on the support of those closest to me in many ways.

Moving on to the blog, we’re going to be starting 2 Thessalonians tonight and we’re going to look at the 1st chapter. Our verses will b2 6-10:

⁶God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you ⁷and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. ⁸He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. ⁹They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power ¹⁰on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you.

I spoke yesterday of the need to abandon the constant idea we have of gentle Jesus meek and mild. Now in some ways, Jesus is meek and mild. That’s to sinners who are repentant and come before him seeking his love and mercy. For those who refuse him however, he does not have any such attitude.

Notice how Jesus is the one who comes as judge rather than YHWH in this case and he is surrounded by fire. In the OT, fire was a constant symbol for the judgment of God. Our God is said to be a consuming fire. Fire is also used as a picture of Hell, which is spoken of in this passage as everlasting destruction. (I do hold to the traditional view of Hell as everlasting torment, but that is not the point here.)

The reason for this is the rejection of his gospel. It is his good news. He is the one who is the focal point of the gospel. The gospel tells of all that God did in Jesus and through Jesus. It is the gospel that God sent his Son and let his Son be crucified on a cross and raised his Son from the dead in vindication. In this way, to deny the Son is certainly to deny the Father.

Note also what happens. This will be the day he comes to be glorified among his holy people. In the OT, it was always about the people of YHWH who were to be holy. In the NT, it is about Jesus and his people. His people are the ones who are to be holy and instead of YHWH being glorified, it is Jesus. As Trinitarians, this is what we expect to see.

We are not surprised at all by this passage but rather find that it fits in perfectly with Trinitarian thought. Jesus is the focal of the gospel and he is the one who is to be glorified and the one who has a holy people amongst whom he will be revealed. How is it one can miss the connection between this and YHWH In the Old Testament?

Hello everyone. Thank you again for the prayers and I do ask that you all keep praying for me. I am working hard on making some needed changes in my life. It will be a process and a painful one, but it is one that needs to be done. For tonight however, we are going to finish the book of 1 Thessalonians by talking about the Day of the Lord. I will be quoting verse 2 of the fifth chapter:

²for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.

Now once again, I wish to remind you readers that we are not going to get into eschatology tonight. I instead wish to focus on the topics that all Christians agree on. I wish to bring up this passage because in the Old Testament, the Day of the Lord is a frequent appeal and we find that that hasn’t changed in the New Testament.

When the prophets spoke about an event called the Day of the Lord, they were making reference to the idea of a king who would be so powerful that he would defeat all of his enemies in a single day. Now I don’t believe that the Day of the Lord necessarily always refers to the same day, but it did refer to a time when YHWH would vanquish his enemies.

When we move over to the New Testament however, it is Jesus who is seen as the Lord. In the fifth chapter and in much of 1 Thessalonians, the Lord refers to Christ and it is the day in which he comes and defeats his enemies.

What this tells us is that Paul had no hesitancy to take this imagery of YHWH and apply it to Jesus. Just as YHWH in the Old Testament would be the one who came and defeated his enemies, in the New Testament, it is Jesus who comes and defeats his enemies. Now how you handle that eschatologically will be up to you. This blog does not go into that.

This should also reveal to us something of how Paul saw Jesus as a judge. Too often, we have thought of gentle Jesus meek and mild. Jesus is the good shepherd, yes, but the good shepherd is the one who comes and deals with those who are attacking the flock. Do not forget for a moment that he is the Lion of Judah.

Throughout the rest of the chapter in fact, we see a constant reference to the Lord Jesus Christ and to his wrath. He is the one who is the judge and we know from John that judgment has been entrusted to the Son. He is the one before whom all will bow someday. 1 Thessalonians should help remind us of that. When we come to Jesus in the text, we must remember that he is not just loving but he is also just and that he does take sin seriously and that he does have wrath.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters. I wish to thank everyone for praying for me this weekend and for my safe travels. Those who know where I was know that I had an awesome time and have decided to work harder on being the man I ought to be. I ask everyone continue to pray for me as I believe there is much that I need to work through.  For now, we are going to return to 1 Thessalonians and continue our study of the deity of Christ. Tonight, we’re going to go to a passage that the Jehovah’s Witnesses use to demonstrate that Jesus is Michael the archangel. We will be reading 1 Thess. 4:16.

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.

Now I know some of you might have a hard time believing it, but I plan on discussing this verse without getting into eschatology. If you want to talk about when you think the rapture will occur, then you’ll have to go somewhere else. We are only looking at this passage insofar as it relates to who Jesus is.

I’ve not heard this one used often by Jehovah’s Witnesses, but I do want to bring it up as some do. Now I don’t think it’s heretical to believe Jesus is Michael. Some Christians have been open to that. It’s my understanding that even John Calvin held to that.

Of course, if one holds to this, this is okay provided that they do not deny who Jesus is in his deity. I personally do not believe that Jesus is Michael, but I am not going to think someone is cut off from the body if they think that because  a number of strong Christians throughout history have thought that.

Now how do the Witnesses use this verse? They will look at it and say that if Jesus is returning with the voice of the archangel, then it is obvious that he is the archangel Michael. When I heard this in a class at our church, I raised my hand and made a point and only found out that I had jumped the gun. Now my answer didn’t come straight from me to be fair, but it was in the memory, which I say to remind you that few of us will come up with original answers and we should all be willing to learn from those who have gone before us.

The question to ask is “Then doesn’t having the trump of God make him God by the same standard?” The Witnesses seem to routinely interpret part of a verse how they want and then ignore the other part and refuse to interpret it the other way since that will go against their doctrine.

Now does this passage prove the deity of Christ? No. I’m not saying it does. Part of what we need to do however is not just present the positive side but give the answers to the negative side. Remember all in apologetics that it is important to do both. Build a positive case and be ready to answer criticisms. On the flip side, if you can destroy they the case against the deity of Christ but not make one for, you’ve only done half the job. We as Christians must always be prepared to do both.

Welcome everyone to Deeper Waters. A word before I forget in doing tonight’s blog. I will be out of town this weekend so after tonight, there will not likely be another blog until Monday.  I ask my readers for their prayers this weekend. It will be a big one and I want it to be a really good one as well. I’ve spent some time learning about myself in preparation for this weekend and I pray I’m the man I am supposed to be.

Tonight, we’re going to start our look at 1 Thessalonians, which is accepted to be a genuine Pauline letter. We’re going to be in the first chapter and looking at verses 4-10. Let’s go to the text:

⁴For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, ⁵because our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake. ⁶You became imitators of us and of the Lord; in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. ⁷And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. ⁸The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore we do not need to say anything about it, ⁹for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, ¹⁰and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

I chose this passage because it is thoroughly Trinitarian. All throughout this passage, we have references to God, to Jesus, and to the Holy Spirit. Some items worthy of mention include the imitation of the Lord, a reference to Christ of course as only Christ walked the earthly life, but this common reference to him as the Lord is what is noteworthy. We already see at work this usage of Lord in reference to Jesus and God to the Father, as if there needed to be an explanation already.

Note also the message given by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one who inspires the gospel and it is his message that is being conveyed in the preaching of the gospel. This would lean towards a high view of the Spirit which has already been seen as the one who empowers even the very delivery of the message in verse 5.

Note also that Jesus is identified as the Son of God at the very end as the one who delivers from the wrath to come. Now I’m not going to enter into an eschatological debate, but what the wrath is is clearly a divine judgment in some sense and Jesus is seen as the one who delivers us.

There is also the reference to the living and true God. What does this mean for Trinitarianism? Not a problem for sure. As a Trinitarian, I can speak of any one person of the Trinity as being in the true and living God. The only problem would be if the assumption of unipersonalism was in play. Since it is not, I do not have a problem.

There is much in here and I urge readers to look over this passage. If you’re one who marks in your Bible, you could consider three different colors of highlighers and going through and using a different color to reference a different person of the Trinity. This might be an interesting exercise to do with the whole of Scripture.

Okay! Pray for me this weekend! See you all Monday!

Hello everyone. Welcome back to the Trinitarian Commentary here at Deeper Waters. We are in the Pauline epistles now and tonight, we’re going to finish up Colossians. We’ll be in the fourth chapter and we’re looking at the third verse. This isn’t about the deity of Christ per se, but it brings  it all together. We will simply quote the verse and give a synopsis of what this book has said about the person of Jesus Christ. Having said that, let’s go to the text:

³And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains

How have we come through this book? We began looking at Jesus in his role in relation to creation. (I always feel so odd saying “relation to creation.”) We saw that Jesus has the supremacy in everything. We also saw the problem with saying that Jesus is created in that it makes one fall right into the heresy that Paul is writing this letter against.

Because of that, we saw the problem with the Jehovah’s Witnesses teaching and that ironically, this passage supports the idea of Jesus as the center of all. We saw that all things in existence (Other than God of course) depend on Jesus for their existence. He is the sustainer of all that is.

The next day, we saw that Jesus is the focal point of the world in that he is the one through whom God has revealed himself. We saw that all knowledge lies in Jesus and that this must be a monotheistic belief system as well so that no other lesser gods could be allowed, another blow to the heresy Paul was disputing with and a counter to the Witnesses.

We also saw that Paul is not against philosophy in what he said and I encouraged you dear readers to read the philosophers. I believe every Christian should be familiar with the great philosophical thought that has taken place throughout the ages.

We finally saw that Christ breaks apart political and social barriers as well. We saw that all class distinctions fall apart in him and all racial distinctions. This means for us that all are invited to approach him equally and he will receive all who come.

What do we get from all of this looking at what Paul says in this letter. We get a very dynamic picture of who Christ is. Now I will grant that many scholars do not see this as an authentic Pauline letter. If it is however, it is one of the most amazing letters with a high Christology at a very early time.

I will also say what some have asked me about this study. This has been a blessing to me as well. I have been learning just as much going through here and now see after this study how much depth is in this letter on the person of Christ that I never noticed before and look forward to the next time I can discuss it with a JW.

Tomorrow, we shall begin 1 Corinthians.

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters as we continue our Trinitarian Bible Commentary. We’ve been going through the book of Colossians looking at one chapter a night and tonight, we’re going to be in the third chapter. Our focus verse tonight will be verse 11. However, I am going to start my quote at verse 5 so all can see the context of the passage:

⁵Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. ⁶Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. ⁷You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. ⁸But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. ⁹Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices ¹⁰and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. ¹¹Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

Paul is talking about righteous living and as usual, this is going to be connected to Christ. This should remind us that for the early church, holiness mattered a great deal. The basis for all righteous living in each case was the new revelation of Christ. Because of him, all were called to live holy lives and all were capable through him of living holy lives.

Christ is also the one that shatters apart the boundaries. Consider the types of people Paul lists. We might look at that list and not see the big deal. Let us consider some modern ties that might help make it clear.

What if we were talking about someone of Jewish descent and someone converted from Islam who had both become Christians in the Middle East?

What if we were talking about a black man and a white man in South Africa who were both Christians?

What if we were talking about a Protestant and a Catholic in Northern Ireland who were both Christians?

That’s getting the idea. The ethnic identity of someone made a big deal back then and Paul is taking that which most people took pride in and saying  “As far as it pertains to being in Christ, that counts for absolutely nothing.” Because you are in Christ, you are no longer to use race as an excuse to not acknowledge your fellow human being who is in Christ.

Christ is said to be all and in all. In other words, everything depends on Christ, which is a carry-over from Colossians 1 as this whole letter is about the supremacy of Christ, hardly a fitting letter to talk about Christ being a lesser god. This is also not pantheism. Christ is all in that he is supreme and Christ is in all in that by his very existence, he holds all other existence together. Nothing could exist if it were not for the existence of Christ.

Because of that, all life you see is that which is somehow touched by Christ, even if it refuses to acknowledge him. Christ overshadows all of life and this is his world. This is a lesson we as Christians should take to heart and reminds us of the importance Trinitarianism has on practical living. Because of who Christ is, we are to live differently

Are we living as Trinitarians today?

Welcome everyone to the Deeper Waters blog. For the past few months, we’ve been going through a Trinitarian Bible Study. That is, we’ve been going through the Bible and trying to understand the wonderful doctrine of the Trinity. We are in the Pauline epistles now and in the book of Colossians. Tonight, we’re going to be studying verse 9 of chapter 2, but to get the surrounding context we’ll be looking at 8-10. Let’s go to the text:

⁸See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.

⁹For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, ¹⁰and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.

To begin with, we are told to stay away from deceptive philosophy. Paul is not speaking about philosophy in general. I would even argue Paul was quite the philosopher himself and had read many of the philosophers, as is shown in his ability to debate and speak on Mars Hill in Acts 17.

In fact, all Christians should have some understanding of philosophy. I would that every Christian knew the basic thought at least of many of the great philosophers, particularly Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Augustine, and Aquinas.

The vain philosophies I believe are the false teachings that were going around, some of which we discussed yesterday in our look at the firstborn passage. These involved a sort of pantheon of lesser gods and the attempt to gain secret knowledge, which would blossom into full Gnosticism.

All of these are inadequate because of who Jesus is. Paul isn’t writing a letter and then suddenly deciding “You know, I think I should just drop in here something about the deity of Christ.” The deity of Christ is central to his argument. It is also important that it is a monotheistic system.

There is no pantheon of gods for Paul. You do not get just part of the deity in Jesus, as if such a thing were possible. Jesus is not just one of many. Jesus is not just one who represents one side of a supreme being. The fullness of deity dwells in the person of Jesus Christ.

In saying this, Paul is indeed giving an argument for the full deity of Jesus Christ in connection with the one God who exists. He is stating that this one God who exists has revealed himself in Christ and Christ is not lacking in being fully deity, that is, in having the nature of the one God. To make this anything less is to actually make the case for the opponents that Paul is arguing against.

What’s the end result? We aren’t captive by vain philosophies because all knowledge lies in Christ and we are in him. We are in the one who claimed to be the truth and there can be no knowledge of reality that contradicts the revelation that has been given in Christ.

For Paul, the deity of Jesus is not peripheral. It is essential.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. It seems hard to believe that we’re in another book of the Bible. When I began this Trinitarian commentary, I had no idea it would last this long but lo and behold, it has. We are continuing our walk through the Pauline epistles and tonight, we start the book of Colossians. Right off the top, we’re going to deal with one of the Jehovah’s Witnesses favorite prooftexts against the Trinity, Colossians 1:15-20.

¹⁵He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. ¹⁶For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. ¹⁷He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. ¹⁸And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. ¹⁹For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, ²⁰and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

Firstborn! See?! Jesus is firstborn! That means that he’s created!

Not quite. First off, note that Jesus is the image of the invisible God. We as humans are made in the image, but Jesus is the image. As long as God has been, his image has been as well. An image is not a copy after all.

The firstborn passage does not refer to a chronological firstborn. One indication of this is in the Watchtower’s own New World Translation. In this passage, they add the word “other” four times. There is no basis for doing such except to support their dogma. One would think that if the New Testament clearly did not teach the deity of Christ, it would not need to be changed so much.

Firstborn instead refers to a place of pre-eminence. We can see this also because of Jesus being the firstborn from among the dead. He was certainly not the first one to come back from the dead, but he is the most eminent one as his resurrection is the basis for the resurrection of the rest of us.

This whole passage places Jesus in a supreme position above all things. This is the point of verses 16-17. James White gives an interesting look at this in his book “The Forgotten Trinity” stating that a proto-Gnostic heresy was going around that was believing in multiple lesser gods called aeons. Now the Gnostics were happy to accept Jesus as a being worthy of worship. He’s just an aeon however, a lesser god.

Paul will have none of that. Jesus is supreme. He is the one to whom honor and worship are owed, which is fitting since this passage could very well be yet another Christian hymn.

Note also that verse 17 says that in him all things hold together. What I like to ask JWs is that if this is true, and if Jesus ceased to exist on the cross when he died, how did all things hold together? Jesus is seen as the basis for all reality. How can he be anything less than God if all things are held together in him?

For further on this, many books can give you insights into the Greek of the text. As one who does not know Greek, I make it a point not to speak on that level, but I encourage it for all who are interested.

My conclusion is that the Witnesses have no basis in using this verse. The context as a whole speaks of the full deity of Jesus and to misunderstand one word and base the whole argument on that is entirely fallacious.

We shall continue this study of Colossians tomorrow.

Welcome back everyone to Deeper Waters. Another comment was posted in reply to my review of Loftus’s argument on Natural Evil and I wanted to say I really appreciated that one. I’m not sure of the identity of the one who made the comment, but I do appreciate it. However, we are going to continue our study now on the Trinity in the book of Philippians. The passage I am going to use tonight is the one I wrote a paper for on my Hermeneutics class. Now while I read the commentaries on this passage, I didn’t see anyone making the reference I was. Thus, I again present this as speculation, but I think there could be something to it of course or else I wouldn’t be saying it. The passage will be Philippians 4:4-9:

⁴Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! ⁵Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

⁸Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. ⁹Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.

I wrote on this passage due to the way it deals with the problem of anxiety we so often have. I am one who would be far better off in this world if I could follow my own advice. Tonight will not be about dealing with anxiety per se, but I hope the idea I have on this passage will help with that.

When we look at the start of the fourth chapter, we find that there are a couple of members having an argument in the church. This is something to keep in mind. Be careful of how you’re behaving. After all, imagine that what we know first about these people for all history is that they just couldn’t get along in church.

However, the goal of this is to get the peace of God from the God of peace. Have we considered what it means for him to be the God of peace however? What peace is lacking in this area in the church is the peace of good fellowship between the persons.

What if we put a Trinitarian idea in there? The God of peace is the one who has perfect fellowship in himself which is possible with a God who is triune. The peace that we as Christians are supposed to have is the peace that exists amongst the persons of the Trinity. Many of our problems come from not understanding how our fellow man sees something and maybe we should just stop and look and say “Maybe I should see where he is coming from.” Of course, I also believe that this peace is to be between believers. I don’t think there can be peace between light and darkness, good and evil, God and satan, etc.

My contention is that this peace makes the most sense with the doctrine of the Trinity. The peace that is to exist between the members of the body is to be that peace which is found in the very nature of the Trinity.

Tomorrow, we shall begin looking at Colossians.