Should Christ be worshipped?

[Hirohito18200]

At the risk of sounding reductionist, I'd say that the issue of trinity directly determines if Jesus is to be worshiped. This isn't to say that the HS is an afterthought, but it WAS included at a slightly later date (council of ephesus, don't quote me, but 30-70 years later). I am not familiar with any denominations past or present that worship Jesus as equal or part of God without accepting the traditional doctrine of Trinity. By this train of thought, your question would then be narrowed down to the divinity of Jesus, his fulfillment of the Christ proficies etc. within the context of examing the NT gospels for their validity(if this was already your starting place, sorry for wasting your time).

I'll leave you to reconcile these:
For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5)
This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time (2 Timothy 1:9)

 

[sojourner]

At the risk of sounding reductionist, I'd say that the issue of trinity directly determines if Jesus is to be worshiped. This isn't to say that the HS is an afterthought, but it WAS included at a slightly later date (council of ephesus, don't quote me, but 30-70 years later). I am not familiar with any denominations past or present that worship Jesus as equal or part of God without accepting the traditional doctrine of Trinity. By this train of thought, your question would then be narrowed down to the divinity of Jesus, his fulfillment of the Christ proficies etc. within the context of examing the NT gospels for their validity(if this was already your starting place, sorry for wasting your time).

I'll leave you to reconcile these:
For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5)
This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time (2 Timothy 1:9)

If, as John asserts, Jesus was with God in the beginning, and that it was the utterance of Jesus the Word that brought about creation, then Jesus cannot be just a man. If Philippians is correct, then Jesus left his equality with God to take on human form. If these are correct, and the nature of worship is to interact in God's creative process with us, then we do worship Christ.

 

[Krie]

I thik that you should worship whoever you want. I think that whoever makes you feel the most powerful and safe that is your choice if it is Christ so be it

 

[Katzpur]

BUT... according to how I was taught by a Catholic professor, Jesus of Nazareth was a human being, wholely human, not God. He was crucified for his devotion to God. And God, being so pleased with Jesus and so displeased with the injustice of his crucifixion, ressurected him as Christ. According to this interpretation, Jesus was human up until his death. The resurrected Christ is divine.

Hi, lilithu.

That strikes me as an unusual point of view, coming from a Catholic professor. To me, there is one passage that seems to refute this opinion. It is John 10-17-18. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father."

It seems to me that in order to have had the power to raise oneself from the dead, Jesus would have had to be divine prior to His death. This passage is implying that Jesus did not have to rely on His Father to resurrect Him, but was able to do that of His own accord.

 

[Katzpur]

I am not familiar with any denominations past or present that worship Jesus as equal or part of God without accepting the traditional doctrine of Trinity.

Well you are now.

 

[may]

I am not a christian either (but I do play one on TV! Ha!) so take it for what it's worth but nowhere in the Jewish scriptures does it say one must worship, follow or even believe in the messiah in order to gain salvation or atonement. We are told more than once in the Jewish scriptures that 1) we are to follow and worship G-d and G-d alone, 2) G-d is not nor can He be a man, 3) the messiah will be a human man. Therefor to worship the messiah is to commit idolatry.

yes i agree we should worship the one and only true God psalm 83;18 and this God told us to listen to Jesus,
And a voice came out of the cloud, saying: "This is my Son, the one that has been chosen. Listen to him." luke 9;35
Jesus is not God , but Jesus was living in the heavens with his Father before being born on the earth as a man ,and he learned many things from his Father,so he teaches what is from God. good association leads to right conduct, so Jesus is the best teacher because he has wisdom from above to give us....

 

[Mike182]

A while ago, I was reading something on the Jehovah's Witnesses and I found out that they do not worship Jesus. They believe that God should only be worshipped. People who believe in the Trinity of Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit probably worship Jesus. However what of people who do not believe in the Trinity? I was wondering about how some of you thought about this. Thank you for your input. :bow:

God is God, high and unknowable - Jesus is a deity, stemming from God (as i believe God is the source of everything) but Christ is a deity in and of himself.... in otherwords, i believe Jesus was/is a deity, but is not part of a trinity with God - and i worship both the high, unknown God, and Christ (and other deities, but that's not for this forum )

 

[michel]

I don't know what you believe or not but as Protestant (Pentecostal) Christian, I do accept the Trinity. I personally have trouble understanding how other Christian denominations cannot but I do respect other denominations and feel that the difference in beliefs boils down to differences in scriptural interpretation.

I personally believe that God loved us so much that He came to earth in the flesh to show us how to live for Him and to show us how to seek and develop a Parent/Child relationship with Him. He then in LOVE sacrificed Himself for us...and illustrated via Christ...that to die in HIM...is to truly LIVE alongside God for eternity (Christ was resurrected and sits at the right hand of the Father).

As I've been instructed in the Bible to accept Christ as the means to be reconciled to my Father...I do pray and worship Christ...who is/was a manifestation of my God.

I do not view God and Christ simply as ONE in purpose. I believe that Christ WAS my God in the flesh. And when I accepted Christ as my personal Saviour...I received the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Father, Son and Holy Ghost...three separate manifestations of ONE GOD.

I am very slightly confused, Dawny. When you say

I believe that Christ WAS my God in the flesh

(with which I agree), was there anything of God 'elsewhere'? (confusing I know, but the way you posted sounded as if all of God, born as Jesus, was in that human body). Is that what you meant?

 

[[email protected]]

A while ago, I was reading something on the Jehovah's Witnesses and I found out that they do not worship Jesus. They believe that God should only be worshipped. People who believe in the Trinity of Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit probably worship Jesus. However what of people who do not believe in the Trinity? I was wondering about how some of you thought about this.

I do not believe in the trinity because I belive that the Holy Spirit is the power of God that emanates from God the Father and Jesus Christ, but I worship Jesus Christ because the Bible is clear that Jesus is God.

 

[uu_sage]

Jesus could in no way be considered God. The man from Nazareth to me was a Jewish mystic, a social and political revolutionary who had awakened the spark of the divine within him. He was executed at the hands of an oppressive empire for being a heretic and for preaching radical love and inclusion.

 

[James the Persian]

This isn't to say that the HS is an afterthought, but it WAS included at a slightly later date (council of ephesus, don't quote me, but 30-70 years later).

I know this is old, but i just saw it. This is not correct. By added later, I assume you are referring to the Nicene Creed (because the Holy Spirit was certainly mentioned by ante-Nicene Fathers and so belief in Him can't be said to have been added, other than to a formal Creed, by any council.

In any case, the Holy Spirit was mentioned in the original wording of the Creed as produced at Nicea, it just was not elaborated on because nobody was questioning belief in Him. When they later did (the Pneumatomachists), there was a necessity to further refine the Creed to defend Him (all the coucils were called to defend the Church against new heresies, not to define new doctrine). This elaboration, however, (which resulted in the wording the Orthodox use today, the filoque being added later in the west resulting in the RC version) was made at the second Ecumenical Council, Constantinople I, not Ephesus (which was the third Ecumenical Council). This is why the Creed is more accurately referred to as the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed.

James

 

[may]

A while ago, I was reading something on the Jehovah's Witnesses and I found out that they do not worship Jesus. They believe that God should only be worshipped. People who believe in the Trinity of Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit probably worship Jesus. However what of people who do not believe in the Trinity? I was wondering about how some of you thought about this. Thank you for your input. :bow:

Jehovahs witness do not take on the trinity doctrine because it is not a bible teaching , and we believe that Jesus is Gods only-begotten son . but we do not belief that Jesus is God . the most high is Jehovah psalm 83;18

That people may know that you, whose name is Jehovah,​

You alone are the Most High over all the earth........................ Jesus plays a very big part in the outworking of Gods purpose for the earth . and it is vital that we take in knowledge about Jehovah God and about Jesus christ jOHN 17;3
This means everlasting life, their taking in knowledge of you, the only true God, and of the one whom you sent forth, Jesus Christ.

 

[Katzpur]

A while ago, I was reading something on the Jehovah's Witnesses and I found out that they do not worship Jesus. They believe that God should only be worshipped. People who believe in the Trinity of Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit probably worship Jesus. However what of people who do not believe in the Trinity? I was wondering about how some of you thought about this. Thank you for your input. :bow:

I don't believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, but I do believe in a Godhead comprised of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. I believe them to be physically distinct from one another, but "one" in every other conceivable way. I do worship Jesus Christ.

 

[xexon]

The answer to the question is NO.

Jesus was a human. Who had merged himself into the absolute.

He tried to tell people, in simple terms, how to do this themselves.

Religion, well meaning that it may be, has done nothing but track mud all over the message to the point it is now lost.



x

 

[sojourner]

If worship is to be what it's supposed to be, then yes. Christ should be worshiped. As part of the Trinity, Christ is God, just as the Father is God. Why would we worship one person of God and not another?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

If worship is to be what it's supposed to be, then yes. Christ should be worshiped. As part of the Trinity...

Very unorthodox terminology.

I can't remember the name of that heresy... I'm thinking modalism... anyway, I love to harrass professors and phd students for saying that God has "parts." It can turn an otherwise boring classtime into an uproar.

 

[Gary Anderson]

If you polk around my website you will see that my natural father was Jewish and I was raised as a gentile. I was adopted at three months.
I believe that Christ is the messiah prophesied in the Old Testament. I believe that he is worthy of worship, that he was subservient to the father only in his earthly form, but that he was not subservient in an eternal sense.
I do not believe that Jesus was begotten in some eternal generation taught by the Augustinians. I believe, however, that Christ was begotten at the ressurrection as Psalm 2:7 is fulfilled in Acts 13:32,33. I believe that the Protestants and Catholics, while not believing in a lesser Christ in the way the JW's do, still made Christ subservient in an eternal begatting that simply is not taught in scripture.
Only the Baptists of the First London Baptist Confession of Faith, 1646, spoke the truth regarding the equality of Christ.

 

[ἀλήθεια]

Hi, lilithu.

That strikes me as an unusual point of view, coming from a Catholic professor. To me, there is one passage that seems to refute this opinion. It is John 10-17-18. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father."

It seems to me that in order to have had the power to raise oneself from the dead, Jesus would have had to be divine prior to His death. This passage is implying that Jesus did not have to rely on His Father to resurrect Him, but was able to do that of His own accord.

I find it amazing that so many people who read the Bible don't know that the Triune God raised Christ from the dead:

Acts 10 : 39-40 — God raised Christ from the dead.
1 Thessalonians 1 : 10 — God the Father raised the Son from the dead.
Romans 8 : 11 — God the Spirit raised the Son from the dead.
John 2 : 19-22 — God the Son raised Himself from the dead.

 

[ἀλήθεια]

A while ago, I was reading something on the Jehovah's Witnesses and I found out that they do not worship Jesus. They believe that God should only be worshipped. People who believe in the Trinity of Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit probably worship Jesus. However what of people who do not believe in the Trinity? I was wondering about how some of you thought about this. Thank you for your input

Would Jesus have allowed Himself to be worshiped if He were not God?

Remember there is only One God:

Hebrews 1 : 1, 2, 8 — God the Father calls the Son, "God."
Acts 5 : 3-4 --Peter calls the Holy Spirit, "God."
John 6 : 27 --Jesus calls the Father, "God."

An angel would tell a man not to worship him. Jesus would allow a man to worship Him.

Revelation 1 says that Jesus is the first and the last:
17And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last:
18I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

Isaiah 44 says that God is the first and the last:
6Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.

 

[ἀλήθεια]

Very unorthodox terminology.

I can't remember the name of that heresy... I'm thinking modalism... anyway, I love to harrass professors and phd students for saying that God has "parts." It can turn an otherwise boring classtime into an uproar.

But modalism isn't another term for trinitarianism.