"The word was a god"?

[ScottA]

Jesus is eternally the Son of God. He did not become the Son of God. He did become the Son of Man (in addition to already being the Son of God).

Ultimately, those two terms are titles.

This is a great mystery that God has revealed in both a multitude, but also in and as One man and One God.

By that revelation God has shown by creation (which is to be understood as mere manifestation, a showing), as Him extending or expanding the pegs of His tent. It is in that showing that He reveals order. God is a God of order.

God also shows that from the [seemingly] least to the Greatest it is He, if only at (or in) times, by "image." Wherein, it is most correct to call Jesus God, for even the Son of Man is born of image.

Which, back to the original post title, no, the Word did not become a "god", but God became image "and the Word was God"...written, "on earth as it is in heaven."

 

[Pierac]

Ultimately, those two terms are titles.

This is a great mystery that God has revealed in both a multitude, but also in and as One man and One God.

By that revelation God has shown by creation (which is to be understood as mere manifestation, a showing), as Him extending or expanding the pegs of His tent. It is in that showing that He reveals order. God is a God of order.

God also shows that from the [seemingly] least to the Greatest it is He, if only at (or in) times, by "image." Wherein, it is most correct to call Jesus God, for even the Son of Man is born of image.

Which, back to the original post title, no, the Word did not become a "god", but God became image "and the Word was God"...written, "on earth as it is in heaven."

Son of God - This title for Jesus has been given meanings and attributes that were never intended. People have erroneously used the human father-son relationship to describe this title of Jesus’. They have thought that since a human son has the actual essence (made of the same matter) of his father, that therefore, this title implies that Jesus being the Son of God is of the same essence of God. This conclusion will lead you right into the Doctrine of the Trinity. This is the formula they adopted at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD when they said:

"The Son is of the same substance as the Father."

It was at this council that Jesus was first made God. The Holy Spirit interestingly enough was not included in the formula. It was included fifty-six years later at another council. Let’s see what this title really means:

Son of God - In the Old Testament Israel is described as God’s first-born (Exodus 4:22) and is called His son. There is therefore precedence for calling the Messiah "Son of God" for he is Israel’s representative par excellence (ZEB, vol.4, pg.203-204).

"Son of God" denotes an intimate relationship with the Father. It is obvious that sonship must not be understood in a crude pagan way. This bears out Dalman’s contention that the Hebrew concept of "son" does not denote an extensive circle of relationships" (ZEB, vol.4, pg. 205). Adam was called the "son of God" (Luke 3:38), God calls King Solomon His "son" in 1 Chronicles 28:6.

For Paul, "Son of God" is essentially a Christological description expressing "the Son’s solidarity with God" (ZEB, vol.4, pg.204). Closeness to the Father is the basic meaning of "Son of God"(Ibid). This closeness was a relationship that was shared by God’s anointed kings of Israel. Since Jesus is the ideal king of Israel, he is naturally the ideal Son of God. This is how the term came to be synonymous with Messiah and king of Israel. They are all different ways of saying the same thing.

The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible vol. 4 pg. 204 states:

"The last chapter of the first epistle of John makes every possible emphasis upon the principle that Sonship is the mark of Messiahship. The same is the case with the fourth gospel where the Son of God is synonymous with Messiah and occurs more frequently than any other title. Haenchen maintains that the same equation:

Messiah = Son of God = Son of Man

applies to Mark’s gospel. The same can be said of the rest of the New Testament."

Aspects of Monotheism pg.90 states:

"The notion that the Davidic king was the son of God is well established in the Hebrew Bible in 2 Samuel 7:14 and in Psalm 2:7. It was only natural then that the coming messianic king should also be regarded as the Son of God. To say that the king was the son of God, however, does not necessarily imply divinization."

This is the meaning of the title "Son of God." Messiah = Son of God = king of Israel = Son of Man. The Messiah does have the closest and most intimate relationship with the Father. Let’s take a look at some verses to confirm this.

"The kings of the earth rise up, and the princes conspire together against the LORD and His anointed (Messiah)"… "I myself have set up my king on Zion (Israel)"… "The LORD said to me, "You are my son" (Psalm 2:2,6-7).

Here we see God speaking of the Messiah using all three titles; Messiah, king of Zion, and son.

"He first found his own brother and told him, "We have found the Messiah"…"Rabbi, you are the Son of God: you are the King of Israel" (John 1:41& 49).

John cannot be clearer on this title; the Son of God is the King of Israel. This is the Jewish meaning of "Son of God." Any other definition will take away from the true meaning of the title into something that was never intended by its Jewish author.

 

[Pierac]

Jesus Prays To, Praises, and Distinguishes Himself from God​

The Gospel record reveals that Jesus prays to God, praises God in the assembly (Hebrews 2:12), obeys God, and consistently distinguishes Himself from God. When John’s Gospel defines true worshippers, it defines them as those who worship the Father (John 4:23-24). These are not peripheral observations but a recurring pattern in what Jesus says and does across the Gospels.

The prayer of John 17:3, quoted at the opening of this chapter, is the clearest instance: Jesus calls the Father the only true God and distinguishes Himself as the one whom God has sent. The language naturally evokes relationships such as sender and recipient, father and son, or principal and agent, leading many readers to interpret the passage within an agency framework.

Mark 10:18 (ESV) Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.

At minimum, the reply is not a straightforward self-assertion of deity. Whether it denies an attribute that belongs to God alone or presses the young ruler to consider what calling Jesus “good” implies remains debated, and this passage should not be asked to carry the argument by itself. The traditional reading proposes that Jesus speaks here from His human nature or in a mode of humility, an inference the passage does not itself supply.

John 20:17 (ESV) I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.

Yet if encountered for the first time, the wording raises an obvious question: in what sense does the risen Jesus still speak of the Father as “my God”? Even after what tradition calls the completion and vindication of His earthly work, Jesus still calls the Father my God, language that does not suggest a temporary subordination dissolved after the cross.

John 14:28 (ESV) The Father is greater than I.

John 5:19 (ESV) The Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing.

John 6:38 (ESV) I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.

Modern readers often approach this language differently from how it likely sounded in its original Jewish context. In the idiom of Israel’s Scriptures, saying that something came from heaven meant it came from God, that God was its source and sender, not that it had been residing in heaven before arriving on earth.

When God rained bread from heaven in the wilderness (Exodus 16:4), the text does not require manna to have preexisted in the heavenly realm; rather, the phrase presents God as the source and sender. [1] When Jesus says in John 6:38 that He came down from heaven, the language can be read through this convention: I have been sent by God, whose purposes I embody and whose will I enact, and the rest of the sentence supports that reading: the one who came from heaven came “not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.” The language of sending is the language of agency, a principle Chapter Eleven examines in detail.

This reading exists in tension with the prologue of the Gospel of John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1, ESV), a passage many interpreters understand as supporting genuine pre-existence. The “from heaven” language alone does not require pre-existence.

---

[1] For the rabbinic convention of speaking of what is foreordained as already existing in heaven (a conceptual or ideal preexistence in the mind and purpose of God), see George Foot Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era: The Age of the Tannaim. The application of that convention to the Johannine ‘from heaven’ language is the argument of the main text (see the discussion of John 6:38), not a claim Moore himself makes about John.

 

[Pierac]

The Witness of the Father and the Apostles​

Jesus is not the only voice to describe this relationship in these terms; the other voices of the New Testament do so as well. This matters because it weighs against the possibility that Jesus was being modest or accommodating when He spoke of the Father as greater.

At Jesus’s baptism and transfiguration, God speaks as Father, identifying Jesus as Son, distinct from Himself: “You are my Son, whom I love” (Mark 1:11, NIV). The Father does not describe the scene in the later language of divine persons. He speaks about His Son as one distinct from Himself, and the distinction is not incidental but structural.

The Apostle Peter, preaching at Pentecost just weeks after the resurrection, declares that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah (Acts 2:36, NIV). The one who confers and the one who receives are plainly two distinct actors. But the verb Peter chose, made, claims more than a distinction, and it is the hinge this chapter finally turns on.

Acts 3:13 (NASB) The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified His servant Jesus.

God glorified His servant, and the servant is not the same person as the one who glorifies Him. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, provides what may be the clearest single-sentence summary of the New Testament’s own framework:

1 Corinthians 8:6 (ESV) yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

One God: the Father. One Lord: Jesus Christ. These are two distinct identities, not two expressions of one identity. The Greek prepositions mark the distinction precisely: from (ek) the Father, meaning God is the source, and through (dia) Jesus Christ, meaning Jesus is the agent and mediator. The Father is the origin, Jesus is the means, and many readers will conclude that this language sits naturally within an agency framework.

One influential reading, associated with Bauckham and Wright, holds that Paul is reformulating the Shema itself, distributing its words God and Lord between the Father and Jesus to include Jesus within the divine identity. The agency reading answers that Paul’s prepositions assign the two names distinct roles, source and means, which is the very distinction the reformulation must explain.

Bauckham develops this most fully in Jesus and the God of Israel, arguing that Jewish belief in one God in Jesus’s day was defined not just by counting but by what only God does, ruling and creating all things, and that the New Testament deliberately includes Jesus in that. The reading advanced here does not require that Bauckham be mistaken; it argues only that the plain texts do not, by themselves, require his conclusion.

 

[Pierac]

The Resurrection as Appointment: What Acts 2:36 Actually Claims​

The Shema, agency, the titles of Jesus, and the distinction between Father and Son converge in one event. The resurrection of Jesus is the pivotal point on which everything turns, and what the New Testament says happened at the resurrection is more specific and more theologically decisive than most readers have been taught to notice.

One word from the apostolic preaching has been waiting since the beginning of this chapter. Peter’s Pentecost sermon ends with it.

Acts 2:36 (NIV) Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.

The Greek verb is epoiesen, made. Not “revealed,” not “vindicated,” not “disclosed.” The verb can mean both making and appointing. Whether the appointment confers a status not previously possessed or publicly manifests a status already true is the interpretive question. What cannot be evaded is that the text itself uses the language of conferral, and that fact must be given real weight.

Nicene interpreters have often understood the verb differently, arguing that Peter is describing the public manifestation or recognition of a lordship that already existed. Within the agency framework, however, the resurrection is understood as the decisive moment of appointment and exaltation. Jesus, having remained faithful and obedient even unto death, is raised and granted the name above every name.

Romans 1:4 states that Jesus was “appointed the Son of God in power” (NIV). The verb horizo can mean “to designate,” “determine,” or “appoint,” rather than merely “disclose” what was already eternally true. Moreover, the phrase “by his resurrection from the dead” appears to locate this appointment at the resurrection, rather than in an eternal generation from the Father’s essence.

Hebrews 5:8-9 likewise states that Jesus “learned obedience through what he suffered” and “being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation” (ESV). The traditional reading attributes this learning and perfecting to the Son’s assumed humanity: the eternal Son learned obedience as a human being.

The agency reading, however, asks whether the text itself marks such a distinction. Hebrews attributes the learning, the perfecting, and the resulting saving role to the one person, Jesus, without explicitly dividing these experiences between an eternal divine nature and an assumed human nature.

On the agency reading, the language of learning, becoming, and being made perfect describes genuine development: the faithful servant is tested through suffering, proves obedient, and is consequently perfected, commissioned, and exalted.

Acts 5:31 states: “God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior” (ESV), and Acts 13:33 is perhaps the most striking of all. Paul, preaching in Antioch, quotes Psalm 2:7, You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Many interpreters understand Acts 13:33 as applying this to Jesus’s resurrection; others distinguish the “raising up” of Jesus in verse 33 from the explicit statement in verse 34 that God raised Him from the dead. The application is important but disputed.

On this reading, the begetting of the Son is tied not to an eternal metaphysical event within the Godhead but to the resurrection, the moment God raised Jesus from the dead, in which the coronation psalm was fulfilled. The Son was begotten, appointed, enthroned, and exalted on that day.

First Corinthians 15 brings the argument to its logical conclusion. Verse 45 states that “the last Adam became a life-giving spirit” (NET). The Greek has no verb in this half of the verse; “became” is carried over from the first half, and the surrounding verses (15:42-44) tie the change to the resurrection. Verse 28 looks forward to the end of the age when “the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28, ESV).

The subjection of the Son to the Father is future, which the agency reading takes to mean that the Son’s reign on the Father’s behalf is temporary and delegated, and that His lordship is not inherent but conferred for a purpose: the reconciliation of all things, after which the Kingdom is handed over to the one from whom it came. Nicene interpreters read that final subjection as the closing of the Son’s office as mediator rather than a statement about His being; the agency reading takes the text’s own language of conferral and subjection at face value.

This is not the portrait of a co-equal divine person, but of a supremely faithful agent who receives everything from the Father, accomplishes everything the Father sends Him to accomplish, and renders everything up to the Father when the work is done.

If Jesus was co-equal Lord and God from eternity, the resurrection does not confer His divine status, and the empty tomb does not point to the moment of its conferral. On this reading, the New Testament does not treat the resurrection as a window.

It treats it as a door, as the threshold through which the faithful servant passed to the other side, where He occupies a position He did not occupy before. Something happened; God did something, and the word made in Acts 2:36 is not decorative. It is the point.

This makes the resurrection more extraordinary, not less. The resurrection is the moment when the God of Israel vindicated His servant, kept His promise, defeated death, and installed the second Adam as Lord over everything that the first Adam had lost. Its significance as the most important event in history does not depend on a Nicene council. It should be read as the New Testament’s own witnesses describe it: the moment God made Jesus both Lord and Messiah, as Peter proclaimed.

The portrait that emerges from these patterns is straightforward. The Father is the one God, as Jesus Himself affirms, as Paul repeatedly teaches, and as Israel confessed in the Shema. Jesus is God’s uniquely appointed Christ and agent, sent by the Father, empowered by the Father, obedient to the Father, and the one through whom all things ultimately return to the Father. The Holy Spirit, following what this chapter identifies as the dominant pattern of both Testaments, is most naturally understood as God’s own power and active presence, the ruach that animated creation and now dwells among God’s people.

This conclusion rests on cumulative textual patterns rather than a single proof text. The Nicene formulation of the Spirit as a distinct co-equal person represents one influential attempt to resolve that complexity. Yet this portrait can be stated without relying on later philosophical categories.

It requires only the posture Jesus Himself commended when asked the greatest commandment: the posture of the Shema, that the Lord our God is one and that there is no other besides Him. Jesus affirmed that confession.

Will You?

 

[ScottA]

Son of God - This title for Jesus has been given meanings and attributes that were never intended. People have erroneously used the human father-son relationship to describe this title of Jesus’. They have thought that since a human son has the actual essence (made of the same matter) of his father, that therefore, this title implies that Jesus being the Son of God is of the same essence of God. This conclusion will lead you right into the Doctrine of the Trinity. This is the formula they adopted at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD when they said:

"The Son is of the same substance as the Father."

It was at this council that Jesus was first made God. The Holy Spirit interestingly enough was not included in the formula. It was included fifty-six years later at another council. Let’s see what this title really means:

Son of God - In the Old Testament Israel is described as God’s first-born (Exodus 4:22) and is called His son. There is therefore precedence for calling the Messiah "Son of God" for he is Israel’s representative par excellence (ZEB, vol.4, pg.203-204).

"Son of God" denotes an intimate relationship with the Father. It is obvious that sonship must not be understood in a crude pagan way. This bears out Dalman’s contention that the Hebrew concept of "son" does not denote an extensive circle of relationships" (ZEB, vol.4, pg. 205). Adam was called the "son of God" (Luke 3:38), God calls King Solomon His "son" in 1 Chronicles 28:6.

For Paul, "Son of God" is essentially a Christological description expressing "the Son’s solidarity with God" (ZEB, vol.4, pg.204). Closeness to the Father is the basic meaning of "Son of God"(Ibid). This closeness was a relationship that was shared by God’s anointed kings of Israel. Since Jesus is the ideal king of Israel, he is naturally the ideal Son of God. This is how the term came to be synonymous with Messiah and king of Israel. They are all different ways of saying the same thing.

The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible vol. 4 pg. 204 states:

"The last chapter of the first epistle of John makes every possible emphasis upon the principle that Sonship is the mark of Messiahship. The same is the case with the fourth gospel where the Son of God is synonymous with Messiah and occurs more frequently than any other title. Haenchen maintains that the same equation:

Messiah = Son of God = Son of Man

applies to Mark’s gospel. The same can be said of the rest of the New Testament."

Aspects of Monotheism pg.90 states:

"The notion that the Davidic king was the son of God is well established in the Hebrew Bible in 2 Samuel 7:14 and in Psalm 2:7. It was only natural then that the coming messianic king should also be regarded as the Son of God. To say that the king was the son of God, however, does not necessarily imply divinization."

This is the meaning of the title "Son of God." Messiah = Son of God = king of Israel = Son of Man. The Messiah does have the closest and most intimate relationship with the Father. Let’s take a look at some verses to confirm this.

"The kings of the earth rise up, and the princes conspire together against the LORD and His anointed (Messiah)"… "I myself have set up my king on Zion (Israel)"… "The LORD said to me, "You are my son" (Psalm 2:2,6-7).

Here we see God speaking of the Messiah using all three titles; Messiah, king of Zion, and son.

"He first found his own brother and told him, "We have found the Messiah"…"Rabbi, you are the Son of God: you are the King of Israel" (John 1:41& 49).

John cannot be clearer on this title; the Son of God is the King of Israel. This is the Jewish meaning of "Son of God." Any other definition will take away from the true meaning of the title into something that was never intended by its Jewish author.

Are you meaning to say that Jesus, the Son of God, Messiah, is not God? Or are you just elaborating the terms/titles?

As for the "Jewish author", do you also mean to say that the words he/they penned were mere record and not the inspired word of God, meaning God is the actual author?

 

[ScottA]

Jesus Prays To, Praises, and Distinguishes Himself from God​

The Gospel record reveals that Jesus prays to God, praises God in the assembly (Hebrews 2:12), obeys God, and consistently distinguishes Himself from God. When John’s Gospel defines true worshippers, it defines them as those who worship the Father (John 4:23-24). These are not peripheral observations but a recurring pattern in what Jesus says and does across the Gospels.

The prayer of John 17:3, quoted at the opening of this chapter, is the clearest instance: Jesus calls the Father the only true God and distinguishes Himself as the one whom God has sent. The language naturally evokes relationships such as sender and recipient, father and son, or principal and agent, leading many readers to interpret the passage within an agency framework.

Mark 10:18 (ESV) Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.

At minimum, the reply is not a straightforward self-assertion of deity. Whether it denies an attribute that belongs to God alone or presses the young ruler to consider what calling Jesus “good” implies remains debated, and this passage should not be asked to carry the argument by itself. The traditional reading proposes that Jesus speaks here from His human nature or in a mode of humility, an inference the passage does not itself supply.

John 20:17 (ESV) I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.

Yet if encountered for the first time, the wording raises an obvious question: in what sense does the risen Jesus still speak of the Father as “my God”? Even after what tradition calls the completion and vindication of His earthly work, Jesus still calls the Father my God, language that does not suggest a temporary subordination dissolved after the cross.

John 14:28 (ESV) The Father is greater than I.

John 5:19 (ESV) The Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing.

John 6:38 (ESV) I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.

Modern readers often approach this language differently from how it likely sounded in its original Jewish context. In the idiom of Israel’s Scriptures, saying that something came from heaven meant it came from God, that God was its source and sender, not that it had been residing in heaven before arriving on earth.

When God rained bread from heaven in the wilderness (Exodus 16:4), the text does not require manna to have preexisted in the heavenly realm; rather, the phrase presents God as the source and sender. [1] When Jesus says in John 6:38 that He came down from heaven, the language can be read through this convention: I have been sent by God, whose purposes I embody and whose will I enact, and the rest of the sentence supports that reading: the one who came from heaven came “not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.” The language of sending is the language of agency, a principle Chapter Eleven examines in detail.

This reading exists in tension with the prologue of the Gospel of John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1, ESV), a passage many interpreters understand as supporting genuine pre-existence. The “from heaven” language alone does not require pre-existence.

---

[1] For the rabbinic convention of speaking of what is foreordained as already existing in heaven (a conceptual or ideal preexistence in the mind and purpose of God), see George Foot Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era: The Age of the Tannaim. The application of that convention to the Johannine ‘from heaven’ language is the argument of the main text (see the discussion of John 6:38), not a claim Moore himself makes about John.

Interesting to reflect upon.

However, it is important to not get lost in the times that are ultimately intended to be as simple as the Beginning and the End, the result of which is the same as it first was.

The scriptures...and history...do walk that all out line upon line, here a little there a little, giving each of our lives, each with our own details--if we are His--a meaning established and also finished by God. From and also to Him-- Just as the woman was taken out of the man, and a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh, man was taken out of God, seemingly separate, but becomes One again in the End. From which comes the practice and pattern of marriage, pointing to the greater separation and rejoining we have with God. Of which it is also written, "So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life." Genesis 3:24

The point being, sin separated us from God who also sent us out, and we too are to return to Him and be as One.

 

[ScottA]

This conclusion rests on cumulative textual patterns rather than a single proof text. The Nicene formulation of the Spirit as a distinct co-equal person represents one influential attempt to resolve that complexity. Yet this portrait can be stated without relying on later philosophical categories.

It requires only the posture Jesus Himself commended when asked the greatest commandment: the posture of the Shema, that the Lord our God is one and that there is no other besides Him. Jesus affirmed that confession.

Will You?

Again, you are speaking of details laid out as if in a desert place. If we examine them, bit by bit, or each precept individually without understanding the end...then we only dwell in places standing to accuse a brother along the way.

For instance, If I saw you in your front yard with your family, and someone said, "That's Mr. Ac"; and another time I saw you at work, and someone referred to you as "Mr. Er"; and then I met you and you said, "Hi, I am Pi-er-ac"--is anyone actually wrong? Certainly, no one should consider you three different people...and granted, many do when it comes to God. But the real point is--all of those encounters of God are no different than someone encountering you in different settings--each One of whom would be correct to say "I am."

The error then of the children of God (along the way) is a simple matter of misunderstanding by children of little knowledge, which is no sin. But to deny The Son "I am" (One), is also without knowledge.

 

[Pierac]

Interesting to reflect upon.

However, it is important to not get lost in the times that are ultimately intended to be as simple as the Beginning and the End, the result of which is the same as it first was.

The scriptures...and history...do walk that all out line upon line, here a little there a little, giving each of our lives, each with our own details--if we are His--a meaning established and also finished by God. From and also to Him-- Just as the woman was taken out of the man, and a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh, man was taken out of God, seemingly separate, but becomes One again in the End. From which comes the practice and pattern of marriage, pointing to the greater separation and rejoining we have with God. Of which it is also written, "So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life." Genesis 3:24

The point being, sin separated us from God who also sent us out, and we too are to return to Him and be as One.

Thank you for sharing those thoughts. I appreciate your emphasis on God's purpose to reconcile humanity to Himself. I agree that Scripture points toward a time when God will restore what has been broken by sin, and that our ultimate hope is to be united with Him.

I think 1 Corinthians 15:24–28 speaks beautifully to this, particularly when Paul describes Christ handing the kingdom over to God the Father, so that "God may be all in all."

My focus here is simply on understanding how Scripture identifies Jesus and His relationship to the Father. I believe we can recognize Jesus as God's uniquely appointed Son and Messiah, through whom God accomplishes His purposes, while still recognizing the Father as the one true God (John 17:3).

I appreciate your perspective, and I think we share an important point: everything ultimately comes from God and returns to Him.

 

[Pierac]

Again, you are speaking of details laid out as if in a desert place. If we examine them, bit by bit, or each precept individually without understanding the end...then we only dwell in places standing to accuse a brother along the way.

For instance, If I saw you in your front yard with your family, and someone said, "That's Mr. Ac"; and another time I saw you at work, and someone referred to you as "Mr. Er"; and then I met you and you said, "Hi, I am Pi-er-ac"--is anyone actually wrong? Certainly, no one should consider you three different people...and granted, many do when it comes to God. But the real point is--all of those encounters of God are no different than someone encountering you in different settings--each One of whom would be correct to say "I am."

The error then of the children of God (along the way) is a simple matter of misunderstanding by children of little knowledge, which is no sin. But to deny The Son "I am" (One), is also without knowledge.

I appreciate your thoughts, and I agree that we should always keep God's ultimate purpose in view. But I don't think carefully examining what Jesus and the apostles said is getting lost in details. Those details are how we come to understand God's purpose.

I understand your analogy, but there seems to be an important difference. In your example, one person is being identified by different names. Yet in Scripture, Jesus isn't simply using another name for Himself when He speaks of the Father. He prays to Him, obeys Him, receives authority from Him, and even after His resurrection calls Him "my God" (John 20:17).

So my question is a simple one: If the Father and Son are merely different ways of identifying the same individual, who is Jesus speaking to when He prays to the Father?

As for "I am," I don't deny that Jesus uses those words. The question is what He means by them in their particular context. We should allow Scripture to answer that rather than assume every use carries the same meaning.

I don't see our discussion as accusing anyone. We're simply trying to understand what Scripture tells us about God and His Son. Surely we can do that as brothers in Christ, even when we reach different conclusions.

 

[Pierac]

Regarding "I AM," I certainly don't deny that Jesus used those words. The question is what He meant by them.

The Greek expression ego eimi simply means "I am," and its meaning depends on the context. Interestingly, the blind man whom Jesus healed uses the very same expression in John 9:9 to identify himself. And in John 4:25–26, when the Samaritan woman speaks of the coming Messiah, Jesus responds with ego eimi, identifying Himself as that promised Messiah.

Even in Exodus 3:14, the Greek Septuagint uses ego eimi ho on ("I am the One who is"), rather than simply ego eimi. This doesn't settle every question about John 8:58, but it does suggest we should be careful about assuming that the expression alone identifies Jesus as God.

In John 8:56, Jesus speaks of Abraham rejoicing to see His day. I believe that messianic context deserves consideration when understanding what Jesus means in verse 58.

My purpose is not to diminish Jesus. I believe He is the promised Messiah, the Son of God, and the one whom God has exalted above all. But I also believe we should take seriously Jesus' own words when He calls the Father "the only true God" (John 17:3).

I appreciate our discussion. We may understand these passages differently, but surely we can examine them together as brothers seeking to understand God's Word.

 

[ScottA]

I understand your analogy, but there seems to be an important difference. In your example, one person is being identified by different names. Yet in Scripture, Jesus isn't simply using another name for Himself when He speaks of the Father. He prays to Him, obeys Him, receives authority from Him, and even after His resurrection calls Him "my God" (John 20:17).

So my question is a simple one: If the Father and Son are merely different ways of identifying the same individual, who is Jesus speaking to when He prays to the Father?

Like us, Jesus as a Son of Man, born of a women, was born under that original creation...in the image of God. How you or any of us would define all that, isn't really the point or issue. The purpose is the point, and the means is in that same image, wherein Christ had/has a role. That role is greatly to lead by example...therefore, He came saying "Follow Me", and showed us many things on what that looks like...including how to pray, etc., etc.

But that existence, like us--being created in the image of God--is a great mystery, not to be explained away or confused as even being its own reality. The fact that this is all we have yet known, doesn't make it more than it actually is. No, but God called it "image." Just an image. Meaning, that we can look to heaven and pray as if speaking to someone or no one there...but even for Christ, the experience would be more like looking back through the mirror (or the glass darkly)--even at Himself--in a similar but strange act of what? Of actually looking within--as He said, "the kingdom of God is within you." My favorite, is "Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven?"

Meanwhile, this "image" world is passing away, and what was for a time (times, and half a time) was merely image and spirit, "but then face to face."

 

[rebuilder 454]

Regarding "I AM," I certainly don't deny that Jesus used those words. The question is what He meant by them.

The Greek expression ego eimi simply means "I am," and its meaning depends on the context. Interestingly, the blind man whom Jesus healed uses the very same expression in John 9:9 to identify himself. And in John 4:25–26, when the Samaritan woman speaks of the coming Messiah, Jesus responds with ego eimi, identifying Himself as that promised Messiah.

Even in Exodus 3:14, the Greek Septuagint uses ego eimi ho on ("I am the One who is"), rather than simply ego eimi. This doesn't settle every question about John 8:58, but it does suggest we should be careful about assuming that the expression alone identifies Jesus as God.

In John 8:56, Jesus speaks of Abraham rejoicing to see His day. I believe that messianic context deserves consideration when understanding what Jesus means in verse 58.

My purpose is not to diminish Jesus. I believe He is the promised Messiah, the Son of God, and the one whom God has exalted above all. But I also believe we should take seriously Jesus' own words when He calls the Father "the only true God" (John 17:3).

I appreciate our discussion. We may understand these passages differently, but surely we can examine them together as brothers seeking to understand God's Word.

QUOTE
"My purpose is not to diminish Jesus. I believe He is the promised Messiah, the Son of God, and the one whom God has exalted above all"

All watchtower agents such as yourself are here on a Christians site to DIMINISH JESUS.
You do so with clever watchtower teaching.
It reeks of nasty cult propaganda, hoping those that are unschooled, like yourself, will fall into that empty erroneous heretical religion.

The debate ends with your denial of WHO THE CREATOR IS, AND WHO GOD SAYS JESUS IS.

Your compilation of verses, and twisting anything not mentally palatable for your false doctrine is YOUR TRAINING.

It is DIABOLICAL AND EVIL.

 

[rebuilder 454]

The Resurrection as Appointment: What Acts 2:36 Actually Claims​

The Shema, agency, the titles of Jesus, and the distinction between Father and Son converge in one event. The resurrection of Jesus is the pivotal point on which everything turns, and what the New Testament says happened at the resurrection is more specific and more theologically decisive than most readers have been taught to notice.

One word from the apostolic preaching has been waiting since the beginning of this chapter. Peter’s Pentecost sermon ends with it.

Acts 2:36 (NIV) Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.

The Greek verb is epoiesen, made. Not “revealed,” not “vindicated,” not “disclosed.” The verb can mean both making and appointing. Whether the appointment confers a status not previously possessed or publicly manifests a status already true is the interpretive question. What cannot be evaded is that the text itself uses the language of conferral, and that fact must be given real weight.

Nicene interpreters have often understood the verb differently, arguing that Peter is describing the public manifestation or recognition of a lordship that already existed. Within the agency framework, however, the resurrection is understood as the decisive moment of appointment and exaltation. Jesus, having remained faithful and obedient even unto death, is raised and granted the name above every name.

Romans 1:4 states that Jesus was “appointed the Son of God in power” (NIV). The verb horizo can mean “to designate,” “determine,” or “appoint,” rather than merely “disclose” what was already eternally true. Moreover, the phrase “by his resurrection from the dead” appears to locate this appointment at the resurrection, rather than in an eternal generation from the Father’s essence.

Hebrews 5:8-9 likewise states that Jesus “learned obedience through what he suffered” and “being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation” (ESV). The traditional reading attributes this learning and perfecting to the Son’s assumed humanity: the eternal Son learned obedience as a human being.

The agency reading, however, asks whether the text itself marks such a distinction. Hebrews attributes the learning, the perfecting, and the resulting saving role to the one person, Jesus, without explicitly dividing these experiences between an eternal divine nature and an assumed human nature.

On the agency reading, the language of learning, becoming, and being made perfect describes genuine development: the faithful servant is tested through suffering, proves obedient, and is consequently perfected, commissioned, and exalted.

Acts 5:31 states: “God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior” (ESV), and Acts 13:33 is perhaps the most striking of all. Paul, preaching in Antioch, quotes Psalm 2:7, You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Many interpreters understand Acts 13:33 as applying this to Jesus’s resurrection; others distinguish the “raising up” of Jesus in verse 33 from the explicit statement in verse 34 that God raised Him from the dead. The application is important but disputed.

On this reading, the begetting of the Son is tied not to an eternal metaphysical event within the Godhead but to the resurrection, the moment God raised Jesus from the dead, in which the coronation psalm was fulfilled. The Son was begotten, appointed, enthroned, and exalted on that day.

First Corinthians 15 brings the argument to its logical conclusion. Verse 45 states that “the last Adam became a life-giving spirit” (NET). The Greek has no verb in this half of the verse; “became” is carried over from the first half, and the surrounding verses (15:42-44) tie the change to the resurrection. Verse 28 looks forward to the end of the age when “the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28, ESV).

The subjection of the Son to the Father is future, which the agency reading takes to mean that the Son’s reign on the Father’s behalf is temporary and delegated, and that His lordship is not inherent but conferred for a purpose: the reconciliation of all things, after which the Kingdom is handed over to the one from whom it came. Nicene interpreters read that final subjection as the closing of the Son’s office as mediator rather than a statement about His being; the agency reading takes the text’s own language of conferral and subjection at face value.

This is not the portrait of a co-equal divine person, but of a supremely faithful agent who receives everything from the Father, accomplishes everything the Father sends Him to accomplish, and renders everything up to the Father when the work is done.

If Jesus was co-equal Lord and God from eternity, the resurrection does not confer His divine status, and the empty tomb does not point to the moment of its conferral. On this reading, the New Testament does not treat the resurrection as a window.

It treats it as a door, as the threshold through which the faithful servant passed to the other side, where He occupies a position He did not occupy before. Something happened; God did something, and the word made in Acts 2:36 is not decorative. It is the point.

This makes the resurrection more extraordinary, not less. The resurrection is the moment when the God of Israel vindicated His servant, kept His promise, defeated death, and installed the second Adam as Lord over everything that the first Adam had lost. Its significance as the most important event in history does not depend on a Nicene council. It should be read as the New Testament’s own witnesses describe it: the moment God made Jesus both Lord and Messiah, as Peter proclaimed.

The portrait that emerges from these patterns is straightforward. The Father is the one God, as Jesus Himself affirms, as Paul repeatedly teaches, and as Israel confessed in the Shema. Jesus is God’s uniquely appointed Christ and agent, sent by the Father, empowered by the Father, obedient to the Father, and the one through whom all things ultimately return to the Father. The Holy Spirit, following what this chapter identifies as the dominant pattern of both Testaments, is most naturally understood as God’s own power and active presence, the ruach that animated creation and now dwells among God’s people.

This conclusion rests on cumulative textual patterns rather than a single proof text. The Nicene formulation of the Spirit as a distinct co-equal person represents one influential attempt to resolve that complexity. Yet this portrait can be stated without relying on later philosophical categories.

It requires only the posture Jesus Himself commended when asked the greatest commandment: the posture of the Shema, that the Lord our God is one and that there is no other besides Him. Jesus affirmed that confession.

Will You?

Where is this copied from and pasted?
What watchtower site.?
Show us the link.

 

[rebuilder 454]

Son of God - This title for Jesus has been given meanings and attributes that were never intended. People have erroneously used the human father-son relationship to describe this title of Jesus’. They have thought that since a human son has the actual essence (made of the same matter) of his father, that therefore, this title implies that Jesus being the Son of God is of the same essence of God. This conclusion will lead you right into the Doctrine of the Trinity. This is the formula they adopted at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD when they said:

"The Son is of the same substance as the Father."

It was at this council that Jesus was first made God. The Holy Spirit interestingly enough was not included in the formula. It was included fifty-six years later at another council. Let’s see what this title really means:

Son of God - In the Old Testament Israel is described as God’s first-born (Exodus 4:22) and is called His son. There is therefore precedence for calling the Messiah "Son of God" for he is Israel’s representative par excellence (ZEB, vol.4, pg.203-204).

"Son of God" denotes an intimate relationship with the Father. It is obvious that sonship must not be understood in a crude pagan way. This bears out Dalman’s contention that the Hebrew concept of "son" does not denote an extensive circle of relationships" (ZEB, vol.4, pg. 205). Adam was called the "son of God" (Luke 3:38), God calls King Solomon His "son" in 1 Chronicles 28:6.

For Paul, "Son of God" is essentially a Christological description expressing "the Son’s solidarity with God" (ZEB, vol.4, pg.204). Closeness to the Father is the basic meaning of "Son of God"(Ibid). This closeness was a relationship that was shared by God’s anointed kings of Israel. Since Jesus is the ideal king of Israel, he is naturally the ideal Son of God. This is how the term came to be synonymous with Messiah and king of Israel. They are all different ways of saying the same thing.

The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible vol. 4 pg. 204 states:

"The last chapter of the first epistle of John makes every possible emphasis upon the principle that Sonship is the mark of Messiahship. The same is the case with the fourth gospel where the Son of God is synonymous with Messiah and occurs more frequently than any other title. Haenchen maintains that the same equation:

Messiah = Son of God = Son of Man

applies to Mark’s gospel. The same can be said of the rest of the New Testament."

Aspects of Monotheism pg.90 states:

"The notion that the Davidic king was the son of God is well established in the Hebrew Bible in 2 Samuel 7:14 and in Psalm 2:7. It was only natural then that the coming messianic king should also be regarded as the Son of God. To say that the king was the son of God, however, does not necessarily imply divinization."

This is the meaning of the title "Son of God." Messiah = Son of God = king of Israel = Son of Man. The Messiah does have the closest and most intimate relationship with the Father. Let’s take a look at some verses to confirm this.

"The kings of the earth rise up, and the princes conspire together against the LORD and His anointed (Messiah)"… "I myself have set up my king on Zion (Israel)"… "The LORD said to me, "You are my son" (Psalm 2:2,6-7).

Here we see God speaking of the Messiah using all three titles; Messiah, king of Zion, and son.

"He first found his own brother and told him, "We have found the Messiah"…"Rabbi, you are the Son of God: you are the King of Israel" (John 1:41& 49).

John cannot be clearer on this title; the Son of God is the King of Israel. This is the Jewish meaning of "Son of God." Any other definition will take away from the true meaning of the title into something that was never intended by its Jewish author.

Here is one for your watchtower workbook;
Why did GOD, ( the deity Jesus), have to be crucified.
IOW, WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE GOD ON THE CROSS ?
WHY COULD IT HAVE NOT BEEN "A GOOD MAN" ON the cross?
AHEM...A CREATED BEING?

 

[Wrangler]

@Pierac, IMO, Christians are schizophrenic on theologically loaded words like god, lord, word, Jew, person, being. And the reason for this is not acknowledging different senses of these theologically loaded words.

A person and a being are synonyms. Obviously, a person and a word are not synonyms. A person is a living being; Words are action a being takes. It's nonsense to separate the authority of a person from their words. This is why people say things like "Truman dropped the bomb" or "Hitler killed millions" Literally speaking, Hitler killed no one and Truman dropped no bomb. It's simply that agents acted on their authority, command, words and ultimate responsibility rests with the one who has authority.

Of course, God's words are a god in that they carrier authority! It's no different than when you were a kid and said to your sibling, "Ma said it's time to come home for dinner." The speaker to the sibling is not the authority. The one who originally said those words is the authority and those words are authoritative. And we all know there are consequences for defying authority, be it one's mother, your boss, a cop who pulls you over, prophet's of God, messengers of God, the son of God, God the Father, Himself, etc.

 

[The Learner]

cool

 

[DavidB]

Three Persons, all in the one Godhead; so, is the Father God? Yes. Is the Lord Jesus Christ God? Yes. Is the Holy Spirit God? Yes. The three divine Persons constitute the one God. The "Trinity" is just shorthand for this truth.

How does restating the Trinity offer any proof of it?

 

[rebuilder 454]

How does restating the Trinity offer any proof of it?

How can some miss the fact of the trinity?
Non negotiable truths .
What other pillars of the faith do you not believe?

 

[Michiah-Imla]

How can some miss the fact of the trinity?
Non negotiable truths

Fact?

If it’s such a “non negotiable” issue why didn’t any of the inspired writers of the New Testament warn us about “Trinity” deniers?