What is a false christ ?

[Jane_Doe22]

This is it in a nutshell. I was a former Calvinist for several decades and have recently reexamined those beliefs in light of Gods nature/character within the eternal relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

What began this journey was the Calvinist doctrine I once believed for over 40 years called the Penal Substitution theory of the Atonement ( PSA ) where the Son was the recipient of Gods wrath ( anger, retribution ) from the Father and was forsaken( the Father turned away from the Son for hours ) and the Father left the Son ( abandoned ) Him. At this point the relationship with Father/Son was severed.

Now I reject this teaching in light of Gods eternal/Immutable nature/character because of Gods primary and core attribute which is Love. God is love. Gods nature as love is perfect and is relational/experienced between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit before there was a creation when only there was the Eternal and Unchanging Tri-Unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

When I was a calvinist I only viewed and studied the Bible through a calvinist lens/systematic. That would not allow me to learn anything new and on the forums I would only be defending calvinism. I had a bias , I was closed minded to others beliefs. So the past 2 years I fell as though I have been set free, I can see things fresh and new because I'm not reading and studying the bible with a bias and calvinistic view. I'm learning and growing again and its exciting. That first love I experienced over 40 years ago is now stronger than ever. I have fallen in love all over again with God and His word and I'm excited to see what God will show and teach me on a daily basis. Gods word has literally become alive again in my life and I can see things fresh/new and I have no systematic/dogmatic to defend like I had for years prior.

So I'm excited about this journey I'm not on and each day is a new day where God is teaching me.

That is AWESOME to hear. Thank you for sharing.

 

[Bob Estey]

Most Christian-based cults distort Christ by compromising His deity. Jehovah’s Witnesses teach that Jesus was a created being the archangel Michael prior to His human birth. Mormons deny the virgin birth; Jehovah’s Witnesses and Armstrong’s Worldwide Church of God, the bodily resurrection

Defective Christology. Cults usually deny the true Deity of Christ, or the true humanity of Jesus. Some, such as Mormons, deny the virgin birth. They say that God the Father had sexual relations with Mary. I John 4:1-3 gives a scriptural litmus test for false teachers.

Among the most common feature of these cults is a defective view of Christ. Defective views of Christ are not new, they go back to the early days of the church. One of the apostle Paul's principal reasons for writing his letter to the Colossian Church was to combat a heretical view of Christ that was being taught there. During the second century the church had to battle against the heresy of Gnosticism, which denied the true humanity of Christ. In the fourth century the church battled against the Arian heresy which denied the true deity of Christ. Most modern day cults follow in the footsteps of their predecessors. For example, the Jehovah's Witnesses are simply a modern version of the Arian cult. Like the Arians of the fourth century, the Jehovah's Witnesses deny that the Son is co-eternal with the Father. Like the Arians, the Jehovah's Witnesses regard the Son as being created by the Father. Christian Science is another cult which has a defective view of Jesus Christ. They do not believe in the existence of matter - to them the material world is an illusion. So according to their teaching Jesus Christ did not have a real body. In this they repeat the same heresy of the Gnostics, who denied the real humanity of Christ. The Mormons also have a very defective view of Christ in that, they regard Jesus Christ the first-born among the spirit children of God. They do not believe that Jesus is the eternal Son of God. Rather they regard Him as the offspring of a mortal mother and an immortal father.


A Defective Christology
"Who is Jesus Christ?" This is the most important question a person can ever ask. Our deepest joys on earth and hope of eternal life rest upon our answer to that question. Because this is so, the primary activity of Satan must surely be to obscure as much as possible the true nature and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Satan knows that an improper or incomplete understanding of the person and work of Christ makes salvation impossible.
Early heresies such as Cerinthianism denied the humanity of Christ (John 1:14; 1 John 1:1-3; 4:1-3). Arianism denied the deity of Christ (John 1:1, 8:58). Others denied the union of his two natures in one person. Gnosticism taught that there were many spiritual levels and mediators between earth and heaven of which Jesus was merely one (Colossians 1:16, 2:3-23). Most cults today follow in one of these errors. The most insidious cults which insist on extra-biblical revelations and esoteric and mystical experiences of God are simply the children of the Gnostics.

The central doctrine of Christianity is Christology, the doctrine of the nature of the person of Jesus Christ as revealed in space-time history. Any teaching that compromises the humanity or deity of Christ and His uniqueness as the only God-man, destroys the efficacy of the atonement, the work of Christ on the cross, and thereby the basis of the gospel.

Jesus said "I am the way, the truth and the life. No once comes to the Father but by me." (John 14:6). If Jesus was not fully God and fully human, he had no authority to say so. John 1:14 tells us that Jesus was "full of truth." In John 1:18 we are told that no one has ever seen God, but the unique Son "has made Him known." Anything after the words of Jesus Christ would be anticlimactical, a descent from the mountain top of revelation. Jesus was the only one qualified to reveal to humanity the truth about God. Jesus perfectly fulfilled that mission (John 17:6-8,14).
In the closing days of the earthly ministry of Christ, he took the Apostles aside to prepare them for His departure. The narrative in John 14:7-10 is very instructive in helping us to discern the error many cults make with regard to the sufficiency of Christ's revelation of God. To comfort His disciples Jesus reminds them that through Him, they now knew the Father and had seen Him. But Philip was not satisfied. He begs for one glimpse of the Father (John 14:8) believing this would suffice. He may have felt that they had not quite got as close as Moses who got to see the back of Almighty God. If only he could have a similar experience. But notice that Jesus was clearly distressed by Philip's request.
"Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'?" (John 14:9)
Philip's search for something more, a deeper revelation of God than Jesus had given was an insult to Jesus, and received a rebuke. How could a vision of God be more thrilling than to talk with God's Son? In the words of Jesus Christ we have the full revelation of the Father's will. Everything Jesus had learned from the Father, He had made known to them, and through them to us (John 15:15, 16:12-15). To believe that the revelation of Christ in Scripture is insufficient is to hold a defective Christology.

It cannot be overstated that biblical doctrine, that is, what we understand about the way God has revealed Himself in history and supremely in Jesus Christ is of vital importance in perpetuating orthodox Christianity and withstanding heresy.

hope this helps !!!

Anybody calling himself Christ would have difficulty convincing me that's who he was. He'd have to be very similar to the Christ described in the four Gospels. Any deviance from his teachings in those four Gospels would give him away.

 

[The Learner]

Interresting thread, If I offended anyone, I apologize

 

[Scott Downey]

I believe in the Impeccability of Christ .

Evil can tempt you to sin, can tempt God, God though can not sin or fall into the temptation. This is actually another proof of Christ's divinity, that Christ was sinless and perfect before God the Father in the sight of all.

Mark 1:13
And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.

Luke 4:1

Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
being tempted for forty days by the devil. And in those days He ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, He was hungry.

Luke 4:12
And Jesus answered and said to him, “It has been said, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”
Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time.

 

[Scott Downey]

And Jesus answered and said to him, “It has been said, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”

This verse has far reaching doctrines, Tempting God is a sin. God will not fall into temptation as He has decreed and created all things and has a purpose for them all, and is far above in power and authority from all creatures He has made. Tempting God can also be a person willfully sinning against God and thinking God impotent, or God does not see or care, that He will do nothing in response.
But He says, Vengeance is mine, I shall repay.
Tempting God to act shows yourself to be an evil person to all who are in heaven.

 

[Scott Downey]

1 Corinthians 10
8 Nor let us commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell;

9 nor let us [a]tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents;

10 nor complain, as some of them also complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer.

 

[Scott Downey]

Anybody calling himself Christ would have difficulty convincing me that's who he was. He'd have to be very similar to the Christ described in the four Gospels. Any deviance from his teachings in those four Gospels would give him away.

When you see Christ, it will either be when you die and go to be with Him in heaven at the judgement seat of Christ, or when Christ returns from heaven with the resurrected saints in Christ who had died, then you will be caught up to be with Him in the air.
You wont see Christ any other way.

I also think Christ talking about false christs also refers to false religions. They come in his name saying they are him as if they are true.

 

[The Learner]

rh

 

[ChristisGod]

Evil can tempt you to sin, can tempt God, God though can not sin or fall into the temptation. This is actually another proof of Christ's divinity, that Christ was sinless and perfect before God the Father in the sight of all.

Mark 1:13
And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.

Luke 4:1

Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
being tempted for forty days by the devil. And in those days He ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, He was hungry.

Luke 4:12
And Jesus answered and said to him, “It has been said, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”
Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time.

God was tempted numerous times in the OT by the Israelite's. Same word tested/tempted.

 

[Karl Peters]

I really like the OP and the post right after it that ties into the OP.

I would like to point out that Jesus Christ, as the Word of God, took on flesh. I know that theologians like to say 'Jesus is fully God and fully Human' - and I agree, but He was not always fully human! We don't fully understand the going to the cross effect on the Son of God. It is the difference between Sympathy and Empathy, and it has a great effect on Him!!

It is very noticeable when you talk to Him and when you talk to the angels, He sends to minister to you. The angels can sympathize with you but they cannot empathize with you. The angels in heaven don't know pain. They don't know disappointment. The angels are very sharpe and very understanding, but they don't know what it is like to be human. From the beginning our Lord God Jesus Christ has from the very beginning been God! However, though all things were created through Him including men, though He knew all about men and men were created in His image, He still did not fully understand what it was like to be a man here on earth until He took on flesh. Now He does and it effects the way He communicates with us and feel for us! Theologians often miss this very important bit of understanding, or they wouldn't just say that He was fully God and fully man. It should probably be written something like: He is fully God and now is fully man.

And there is one other thing I think should be mentioned - and this is the real important part. And that is the applying the OP and the post after it. It is one thing to understand as a theologian, it is another thing to experience the relationship with the One correctly described in the OP. And it is the relationship which is the important part!!

We are really never going to fully know Jesus Christ and how He feels, so we are never going to fully understand who He is. In fact, we are not even going to get to know Him when we get to know Him - because He does and says only what the Father tells Him. So we actually get to know the Father through Him, and not Him.

Of course, as you spend more and more time talking back and forth with Him, you get a better understanding of who He is. I mean you don't really know someone unless you talk with them, do you?

For example: I once was talking with Him and He asked me 'who I thought had a better understanding of Him; Abraham or a Theologian?'

I thought about it and answered, "Abraham"

He responded by saying something like 'So to knowing a person comes through a relationship more than a study.'

Therefore, perhaps the best statement from Christophany about who Jesus Christ is in the prior post:

So I'm excited about this journey I'm not on and each day is a new day where God is teaching me.

It is not that the OP and the post added to the OP are not correct and valuable to know, but rather that the statement I quoted above show more discernment of who Jesus Christ actually is!!

He is the Teacher who talks to you personally and gets you excited about the journey He has you on!!

Still, I love the posts Christophany wrote. Nice job of explaining who Jesus Christ is.