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The Trinity in Luke 2:40-56

rrobs

Well-Known Member
You could try to answer, and then determine whether or not I was showing some form of "bias" based on how I responded at that time. To assume I would at this point seems just a tad premature.

What I said in all that which I posted can be summarized thusly. You showed how silly it was to take the language of theology and superimpose it on what was in Luke, "God's mother," and such. But my point was is any belief about God, and any doctrine or such about God, can be shown to be utterly absurd too. Point in hand, the Christian view of God as Omnipresent. Do you believe that is true?

If you do, then I could quite easily do the same thing you did in the OP and show how absurd it is that Christians speak of God "outside" of themselves. How is that possible? How can God be Infinite, and yet finite? Yet that is how you think of God, in contradictory terms.

It is therefore no different that the self-contradicting things you made fun of, such as how can Jesus be both a man and God at the same time, and such. The sauce for the goose, which you prepared, is equally sauce for your gander. Does this make more sense now?

I look forward to your response.
Point taken about me thinking you are biased against me. I'll keep an open mind next time.

The only scripture that mentions the words "God" and "infinite" are in Psalm 147:5 where it says God's understanding is infinite, but there is nothing about God Himself being infinite anywhere in the scriptures. You have to go to church tradition, which I reject in the strongest terms possible, to find that idea. I prefer the scriptures themselves as my sole source of truth and practice.

Ps 147:5,

Great [is] our Lord, and of great power: his understanding [is] infinite.​

What Christians think and what the Bible says are often at odds. While it may be popular church opinion that God is everywhere, that is not what the scriptures say. God dwells in a very specific place, namely in all born again believers.

John 14:23,

Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we (God and Jesus) will come unto him, and make our abode with him.
Besides this verse, 2 Corinthians 5:19 says God was in Christ, and Colossians 1:27 says Christ is in the born again believer. So it is God in Christ in all born again believers. Wherever their is a believer, there is God. So unless some believer can be omnipresent, God is hot omnipresent. The premise of God being omnipresent is therefore false to begin with.




 
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rrobs

Well-Known Member
If Jesus prayed to the Father that is good enough for me. We should pray to the Father but in Jesus name. Jesus is our go between and will carry the prayer to the Father.
1Tim 2:5,

For [there is] one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;​
 

nPeace

Veteran Member
1) the doctrine does have its basis in scripture — or it wouldn’t be doctrine.
2) your argument was that Jesus was born human. That sent at odds with the doctrine — or with the Bible.
What doctrine are you speaking of? :confused: please explain yourself.
 

rrobs

Well-Known Member
I agree. I understand the use of the word "one" pretty much as you do.

You're not exactly making sense here. You're saying that we all have a sinful nature but that neither Adam nor Jesus did, that both of them came into the world without sin. I believe that each and every one of us came into the world without sin. We are predisposed to being sinful, but we are not guilty of anything until we actually do wrong. And by the time we have reached a point where we can understand the difference between right and wrong, we will have done wrong, and will continue to do wrong. The pull of sin is simply too great for us to withstand.
Gen 1:31,

And God saw every thing (including Adam) that he had made, and, behold, [it was] very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Adam was created perfect. Part of that perfection included free will. Apparently God didn't think it good to make robotic people. Part of Adam's perfections included the ability to obey God or not. God was forthcoming when He told Adam what would happen if he disobeyed (Gen 2:17). Adam disobeyed anyway, and lost his God given perfection. That imperfection was transferred to all people via seed, which seed was corruptible. That is why all die.

There is a verse that speaks of the two types of seed in 1 Peter.

1Pet 1:23,

Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
The seed we get when we were first born is corruptible because of Adam's sin. Genesis makes a point of saying that a seed contains the very nature of the father which gets passed on to the son. If Adams seed was corrupted, then so was Seth's, enos', Cainan's, etc, right on down to you and I. The first few chapters of Romans spells out in some detail why we have this sin nature, which, as you said makes it impossible for anyone with corruptible seed to live a sin free life. Dog's bark, cats meow, cows bellow, and people sin.

But, unlike every other person, including Mary, Jesus did not inherit that corruptible seed from Adam. His seed came directly from God, what you call the immaculate conception. That term is not actually in the scriptures, but I suppose it carries the same idea. Thus, Jesus, just like Adam, started out with innocent blood. But unlike Adam, Jesus never disobeyed God and his blood remained innocent. Judas understood that.

Matt 27:4,

Saying, I (Judas) have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What [is that] to us? see thou [to that].
The Passover required the sacrifice of a lamb without blemish. Jesus, himself without blemish, thus qualified to be our Passover lamb.

1Cor 5:7,

Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:​
Now you're insisting that Jesus is not divine, but fully human (if I'm understanding you correctly). I assume this is because He was conceived by and born to a mortal mother. Since you're not Catholic, you apparently don't believe in the Immaculate Conception, which states that Mary, like her Son, was free from "Original Sin." If Mary was a mortal like the rest of us, Jesus Christ, like all of the rest of us, was also a descendant of Adam. And who exactly do you believe His Father to have been, if not God? I'm simply asking you how a man born as a human being to a mortal mother could be any different from any other man unless His Father was divine and He shared in His Father's divinity (which I believe was the case).
With the exception of Mary being without sin, I think I've shown that what you said is in perfect alignment with the scriptures. Since Jesus is called "the son of God" almost 50 times in the scriptures, I'd be a fool to say God is not his father. I think you misunderstood. Jesus did indeed possess the nature of his father. Every son shares in the nature of their father, so that's nothing unusual. Of course the nature of Jesus' father was different than the nature of my earthly father. Going back to 1 Peter, it is clear that the seed I got from my earthly father is corruptible, whereas the seed I got when I was born again is incorruptible.
My belief is that He inherited His mortality from His mother, a mortal, and His divinity from His Father, who was God. He would therefore have both the qualities and characteristics of both of His parents. From His mother, He would have received a mortal body, subject to pain, disease, injury and death; He would also have received from her the ability to be tempted and the ability to sin. From His Father, He would have received the ability to "have life in himself," i.e. to have power over death, the power to "take [His life] again" after having laid it down. Speaking of "big deals," that's a pretty enormous one. How many men like you and I have that power? Only a Deity could do that. And acknowledging that power which He had in and of Himself, is giving Him the credit He deserves.
It wasn't necessary, indeed not possible, for a god to redeem us. If you read Romans you will see that sin came by man and it had to be a man who redeemed us. It took another man to die with innocent blood to redeem us. While Jesus did have a divine nature because his father was God, it didn't actually make him God. We are born again with the same seed Jesus started out with. We are born again of incorruptible seed, which gives us the same nature Jesus inherited from his father.
I don't get your point of your question here. Yes, the Plan required a Redeemer. It wouldn't have mattered whether Jesus Christ came down to fulfill that role 3000 years before He did, when He did, or 1500 years later. He was the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." He alone could do this because He alone was perfect, as His Father was perfect.
God never forces people into anything. He is not interested in robotic worshipers. The only thing He could do was speak to mankind. That would be the Old Testament. Jesus had something real interesting to say about the Old Testament scriptures.

John 5:39,

Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
When Jesus said this, the only scriptures God had given to mankind was the Old Testament. In other words, the subject of the entire OT is Jesus. They explained exactly what the redeemer would have to do to redeem us sinners. Before Jesus came on the scene, lot's of people read them, but nobody was able to actually follow them and thus become the redeemer. When Jesus was born he, like the rest of us knew absolutely nothing about anything. His mind was a blank slate. He had to learn about life and God the same way every other man learns, by being taught things and by study. Jesus studied the scriptures and realized who he was and what he had to do. He could have said, "yeah" or "nay." Like every other man he had free will. But as I said above, unlike every other man, Jesus had innocent blood and thus had a chance at following God's will to the jot and tittle. As you know, he went with God 100%.

The reason God had to wait was simply because He had to wait until Moses came along so He could give him part of the story. There was simply not anybody before Moses who believed enough to write what God told him to write. In a similar way, God had to wait for every writer of the OT to come along so they too would believe enough to write the words. Those words were Jesus' instruction manual. If Adam had enough believing, God could have given him the entire OT which Seth could have possibly read, understood, and obeyed. Then Seth would have been our redeemer. As it was, it took a long time for God to convince enough people to believe enough to carry out His plan. That's the real genius of the "logos" of John 1:1. The word "logos" means a plan of action or a reason for why somebody does something.
Are you saying that God convinced Jesus to do what He did, and that this happened after He was born, and that this role was not His in the beginning? Wow. I just can't buy that. Sorry. I believe that Jesus Christ was with His Father before our world was ever created and that He, in fact, created it under His Father's direction. I believe He was chosen before the Creation to be our Savior, and that despite the fact that He had it within His power to refuse to do His Father's will, He could have reneged on His promise. Rather than do so, He willingly gave up His life for us, proving that He and His Father were, indeed "one in will, purpose, mind and heart."
Not exactly. It was Jesus role from the beginning, but whether of not he carried it out was not known until the end. Jesus could have sinned at any time in his life and thus pollute his blood and disqualify him from being our Passover Lamb without blemish.

I have met very few Christians who understand that Jesus could have failed. God gave Jesus the same free will He gave the rest of us. Jesus was no more robotic than the rest of us. It's a good thing Jesus aligned his will with God's will 100% of the time!

Jesus was with God in the beginning in the same way you and I were with him.

Eph 1:4,

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
Well that ought to put a spring in your step!
 
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David T

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
If Jesus is God, Luke 2:40-56 could (should?) be read as,

"Now the parents of God went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the Passover. And when God was twelve years old, they went up according to custom and when the feast was ended, as they were returning, God stayed behind in Jerusalem. The parents of God did not know it, but supposing God to be in their company they went a day's journey, and they sought God among their kinsfolk and acquaintances and when they did not find God, they returned to Jerusalem, seeking God. After three days they found God in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions and all who heard God were amazed at the understanding of God and His answers. And when they saw God they were astonished and the mother of God said to him, "God, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been looking for you anxiously." And God said to them, "How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be in the house of my Father?" And they did not understand the saying which God spoke to them. And God went down with them and came to Nazareth and God was obedient to them and the mother of God kept all these things in her heart. And God increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man."
Whats this trinity thing you are talking about.? No where does the word appear im the text at all that i can see.

On a side note i can hardly wait for deadpool 3.
 

rrobs

Well-Known Member
Whats this trinity thing you are talking about.? No where does the word appear im the text at all that i can see.

On a side note i can hardly wait for deadpool 3.
The OP was pure sarcasm. That's why it makes no more sense than the trinity.
 

rrobs

Well-Known Member
I believe I pray to Jesus not to God for now the name is above all names. That should tell you why it is the way it is.
Excellent observation!

1Tim 2:5,

For [there is] one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
Thanks for the input.
 

rrobs

Well-Known Member
I don't get your point of your question here. Yes, the Plan required a Redeemer. It wouldn't have mattered whether Jesus Christ came down to fulfill that role 3000 years before He did, when He did, or 1500 years later. He was the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." He alone could do this because He alone was perfect, as His Father was perfect.
Besides the thing I wrote as to why God had to wait, there is the little matter that He had to wait for some woman to say, "Be it done unto me according to thy word." It's easy to see why it took so long. How many women do you know who wouldn't balk at God telling them they'd conceive the redeemer while still virgin? I can easily understand a woman like that would come along only every 4,000 years or so! In fact, it's a miracle a woman like Mary ever came on the scene. But God needed to have the redeemer born of a virgin so that the baby's seed would not be corruptible like the rest of mankind. The redeemer had to have innocent blood which only God could create in Mary. No earthly man could have put incorruptible seed into Mary's womb.
 

nPeace

Veteran Member
The only part of this that I dispute is that I believe He was physically resurrected. Is this not what scripture says? What am I missing? You're trying to point something out to me where you believe I'm wrong, but I'm not sure what it is.
Recall...
You said:
To me, what's clear is that if He had a divine Father, He was divine as well as mortal. Mary was indeed His Mother; God was indeed His Father. The word "Father" is not a meaningless label. Jesus Christ was the "Only Begotten Son" of God, and God did not beget any other human beings.
Perhaps I am not understand you then.
What do you mean by "He was divine as well as mortal."?
Do you mean Jesus was a godlike one on earth, being at the same time mortal?

I am saying that I don't see any scriptural support for that idea.
The scriptures say, the only begotten son of God, was sent by God to the earth, and was born, or begotten, as a human - according to the scriptures.
John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Philippians 2:8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross.

So although a begotten son - that is, brought forth by God in heaven, he was also begotten by God, on earth - as a human.
Is this what you are agreeing with?

According to the scriptures, Jesus died as a human, and was raised as a spirit - incorruptible, immortal.
1 Corinthians 15:20-50; 1 Peter 3:18-20; 1 Timothy 3:16

Maybe you could show me which parts are out of harmony with scripture.
 

David T

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
The OP was pure sarcasm. That's why it makes no more sense than the trinity.
Exactly!! But this trinity nonsense does point to An interesting fact. smart folks and this trinity nonsense developed over time by intellectuals Babbling on and on philosophically. They can be very idiotic collectively when left unchecked. This is relevant to science as well because it is not exempt , Very smart people babbling on philosophically may disagree.
 

nPeace

Veteran Member
I thought we were discussing the doctrine of the Trinity?
Well I was discussing how the doctrine of the Bible refutes the doctrine of the trinity, Still you need to explain yourself, since you haven't given me anything to go on.
 

rrobs

Well-Known Member
Thank you. I hope this means you agree with me. I do appreciate your views.
You are welcome. I do agree with what you said, but only because what you said lines up the the scriptures.

While it is nice to hear that someone appreciates my views, I have a word of caution. Not being perfect or all knowing, my views may not always line up with the scriptures. I try my best, but I'm only human and subject to error. I humbly suggest you appreciate God's views over any of man's views. He never gets it wrong! Still, I know what you mean, and thanks.

I have a feeling you are less of a lost and wandering soul than your screen name suggests. You sound like you are on the right track. We can talk face to face in the new heavens and new earth (Rev 21:1). I look forward to it!
 

sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
Besides the thing I wrote as to why God had to wait, there is the little matter that He had to wait for some woman to say, "Be it done unto me according to thy word." It's easy to see why it took so long. How many women do you know who wouldn't balk at God telling them they'd conceive the redeemer while still virgin? I can easily understand a woman like that would come along only every 4,000 years or so! In fact, it's a miracle a woman like Mary ever came on the scene. But God needed to have the redeemer born of a virgin so that the baby's seed would not be corruptible like the rest of mankind. The redeemer had to have innocent blood which only God could create in Mary. No earthly man could have put incorruptible seed into Mary's womb.
Except that Mary probably wasn’t a virgin. First of all, the term isn’t “virgin” — it’s “young woman.” Mary was a teenager (not unusual in those days). Second, since the narrative of “Virgin Mary” is found in Matthew, Matthew makes extensive use of “outsider women” in his genealogy of Jesus, so it stands to reason that Mary could have been not virginal, and thus an “outsider,” which would put her right in line with the genealogy. Third, the birth narrative (indeed, much of the Christ myth) was lifted directly from that of Augustus — including the “virgin birth” part.

The most reasonable interpretation is that Mary was not a virgin. Despite the lyrics to Silent Night.
 

lostwanderingsoul

Well-Known Member
You are welcome. I do agree with what you said, but only because what you said lines up the the scriptures.

While it is nice to hear that someone appreciates my views, I have a word of caution. Not being perfect or all knowing, my views may not always line up with the scriptures. I try my best, but I'm only human and subject to error. I humbly suggest you appreciate God's views over any of man's views. He never gets it wrong! Still, I know what you mean, and thanks.

I have a feeling you are less of a lost and wandering soul than your screen name suggests. You sound like you are on the right track. We can talk face to face in the new heavens and new earth (Rev 21:1). I look forward to it!
Again you sound like a very wise man. We all have limitations on our understanding of complex subjects and religion is one of the most complex.
 

Katzpur

Not your average Mormon
Perhaps I am not understand you then.
What do you mean by "He was divine as well as mortal."?
Do you mean Jesus was a godlike one on earth, being at the same time mortal?
I mean that He had divine parentage as well as mortal parentage. It's a simple as that. He was not the Son of Mary and some other human being; He was the Son of Mary and God. Just as Mary was His literal mother, God was His literal Father.

I am saying that I don't see any scriptural support for that idea.
The scriptures say, the only begotten son of God, was sent by God to the earth, and was born, or begotten, as a human - according to the scriptures.
John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Philippians 2:8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross.
The scriptural support is that He was the Only Begotten Son of God. He wasn't just some man who managed somehow to get through life without sinning.

So although a begotten son - that is, brought forth by God in heaven, he was also begotten by God, on earth - as a human.
Is this what you are agreeing with?
I'm saying that His Father was God. I don't know any other way to put it.

According to the scriptures, Jesus died as a human, and was raised as a spirit - incorruptible, immortal.
1 Corinthians 15:20-50; 1 Peter 3:18-20; 1 Timothy 3:16

Maybe you could show me which parts are out of harmony with scripture.
He was raised with a body of flesh and bones, which He clearly pointed out to His Apostles. That doesn't mean that His risen body was corruptible or mortal. It was not. His resurrected body was incorruptible and immortal, just as you say it was, but that doesn't mean that it was incorporeal. He could not possibly have been more clear in asking them to prove to themselves that He was still a corporeal being. He wasn't playing games with His Apostles. He appeared to them exactly as He was.

The bottom line: Corporeal does not necessarily mean corruptible or mortal. It merely means tangible.
 
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lostwanderingsoul

Well-Known Member
Except that Mary probably wasn’t a virgin. First of all, the term isn’t “virgin” — it’s “young woman.” Mary was a teenager (not unusual in those days). Second, since the narrative of “Virgin Mary” is found in Matthew, Matthew makes extensive use of “outsider women” in his genealogy of Jesus, so it stands to reason that Mary could have been not virginal, and thus an “outsider,” which would put her right in line with the genealogy. Third, the birth narrative (indeed, much of the Christ myth) was lifted directly from that of Augustus — including the “virgin birth” part.

The most reasonable interpretation is that Mary was not a virgin. Despite the lyrics to Silent Night.
And yet Mary tells the angel that she has not been with a man and does not understand how she could be with child. So maybe the actual word virgin is not used but it sure sounds like that is what is meant. This is what happens when people try to translate words in a way that follows their beliefs instead of letting their beliefs follow what is said.
 
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