Trinity Comments: 1998

Trinity Comments -1998

Below are assorted, short e-mails I received in 1998 on the items listed at The Doctrine of the Trinity. The e-mailers’ comments are in black and enclosed in "greater than" and "lesser than" signs. My comments are in red.

>Greetings,

I was discussing the subject of the Trinity and a friend asked me; what is a practical reason for believing in the Trinity. I was looking in my library and found a few articles and surfed the 'Net and I found your site.

So the question I will ask is the same; what is a practical reason for believing in the Trinity?

P.S. I believe in it since the Bible teaches it but I would love to see what can be said about the practical aspect of it.

Thank you and God bless!
J.P.C.
7/3/1998<

Good question! I discuss this subject in my article Forgiveness, Salvation, and the Trinity. See also the second part of the Scripture Study More on the Trinity found in my Scripture Workbook. I hope this helps. And keep discussing these important topics!

>This issue [#32 of Darkness to Light newsletter] was very interesting, specially the article about the Deity of Jesus ["Jesus Christ is Not God"]. Please let me point out to an excellent site.

This is called "Luther Land" and is mantained by Robin Vogsland, a Confessional Lutheran who has written a book on the subject called "Rediscovering the Trinity" You can download from here the chapters that deal explicitly with the Deity of Christ and you can also order a hard copy of the entire book. Currently I'm trasnlating Robin's excellent work to Spanish.

About Jesus as God / Son of God. Let me point out that the Bible does use the Hebrew and Greek terms for God (El, Elhoim and Theos) to refer to beings other than Jehovah, Satan included. These are scarce and in each and every instance it is clear that this is some kind of mocking and/or condemning, i.e. they are LESSER and FALSE gods, not coequal to Jehovah. Jesus is called God much more frequently and never is this Deity limited in any form, the Deity of Jesus is simple, true and absolute Deity.

Even if you bypass this verses that refer to Jesus as God/god, you can not overlook that the Bible explicitly says that Jesus is "the God" in John 20:28 where Thomas calls Jesus ho Kyrious mou kai ho Theos mou "the Lord of me and the God of me". A sttuborn JW will also bypass this one, but the Bible goes further (less explicitly, though) to teach that Jesus is not only God and not only The God, but that Jesus is Jehovah (not only Jesus, the Father is also Jehovah and the Holy Spirit is also Jehovah). This is what the book is all about.<

Thank you for the kind comments about the most recent issue of E-DTL. I will check out the site your mention. As for your other comments, they are very well put.

>BTW. I'd like to know if I can abuse of your kindness with a couple of verses that I'm having problem with:

Acts 20:28 refers to "the Church of God, which He bought with his own blood". But I've seen it rendered also as "the Church of *the Lord*, which He bought with his own blood" or as "the Church of God, which He bought with *the blood of His own Son*" Why all these variations? How would you render it?<

To answer you last question first, if I was translating this passage I would follow the Majority Text and render this passage: "the Church of the Lord and God which He purchased through His own blood."

The reason for the differences in versions is there are two different textual variants in this passage. A discussion of these difference and why I prefer the above would require an entire article. Maybe someday. In the meantime I will simply say that generally speaking I follow the Majority Text, as opposed to the Critical Text, or even the Textus Receptus. For my reasons thereof, see The Majority Text vs. the Critical Text.

The differeing Greek texts (transliterated into Englsih letters) are:

Textus Receptus: thn ekklhsian tou theou hn periepoihsato dia tou idiou aimatos
Majority Text: thn ekklhsian tou kuriou kai theou hn periepoihsato dia tou idiou aimatos
Critical Text: thn ekklhsian tou theou hn periepoihsato dia tou aimatos tou idiou

>Also:
John 1:34 "I have seen and I testify that this is the Son of God" is also translated as "I have seen and I testify that this is *God's Elect*" Any help with this one?

Thank you very much.
Shalom, G.R.
4/6/1998<

Here is a minor textual variant. The vast majority of manuscripts have "Son." Only a very few have "elect." All the above mentioned, published Greek texts have "Son" so there is really no reason why a Bible version should have "elect."

>Jesus never taught about a trinity. If you would stick with the Bible and the Bible only. You would find that Moses never taught trinity, Abraham never taught trinity, no one in the old testament or new did they teach trinity NO. The word of GOD (JESUS) will stand for ever, and nothing that man can do will change it.<

On my Web site there are now 22 pages discussing the doctrine of the Trinity from every conceivable angle. Now I do not have an article specifically addressing "one-ness" teaching just yet; but I do address the idea in various places on my pages. But somehow I got a feeling that it wouldn’t matter if I did.

From your letter you give no indication that you actually read anything that I have written. You apparently just saw that I believe in God’s "three-in-oneness" and fired off an angry letter. Well, if you had taken the time to read my articles, and especially my Scripture Studies, you would have seen that I reference hundreds of verses. If hundreds of verses is not enough to establish a doctrine as being Biblical, then I don’t know what is.

>People stand on there soap boxes shouting how their denomination is right and the other is wrong, well if they do not line up with the WORD (JESUS) they are blowing smoke. Denominations with names like reformed and new and improved, what’s that all about. The WORD (JESUS) stays the same. You can't re-form it and you won't add nothing new and you can not improve on something that is so perfect.<

Yes, it would be nice if we could just say we are "Christians" or followers of Jesus; but, as your letter demonstrates, two people who call themselves "Christians" can have radically different viewpoints on who Jesus is and what the Christian faith entails.

So by saying I approach the Christian faith from a "Reformed" perspective, I am identifying exactly what I believe the Christian faith entails to anyone who understands the meaning of the word. For those who don’t, I have an article explaining the term. See Reformed-Baptist Perspective.

>GOD is one and his NAME is ONE. Jehovah is a title, Eloheem means the many facet nature of GOD, Eloheem is a title, Father is a title, Son is a title, Holy Ghost is a title, Word is a title, Bread of Life is a title, Light of the world is a title. He is ONE GOD with many titles, But there is ONLY ONE NAME. ONE NAME which men can be saved by ONE NAME.<

Actually "Jehovah" is a proper name; Eloheem is a general descriptive noun; the terms "Father" and "Son" indicate relationship and can be used for a name; "Holy Spirit" is a name indicating His nature, the rest are analogies.

But you are correct, for our age we are to call on the name of Jesus to be saved. In OT times, the Israelites were told to call on the name of Jehovah (Joel 2:32).

>Read the book of ACTS chapter 10:22 AND THEY SAID, CORNELIUS THE CENTURION, A JUST MAN, AND ONE THAT FEARETH GOD, AND OF GOOD REPORT OF ALL THE JEWS, WAS WARNED WARNED WARNED WARNED WARNED FROM GOD BY AN HOLY ANGEL TO SEND FOR THEE INTO HIS HOUSE, AND TO HEAR WORDS OF THEE. The centurion was WARNED and he and his whole household was filled with the Spirit of GOD (JESUS) and they were COMMANDED COMMANDED COMMANDED COMMANDED COMMANDED to be Baptized in the NAME of the LORD which we know is JESUS. For more information contact Dominick Check out our Homepage! http://www.kenlodge.com
Mark
2/9/1998<

All of the SHOUTING, ranting, and raving, is simply not necessary. I will simply say that Jesus commanded us to baptize "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." Why the disciples did not follow this exact formula we could debate until doomsday. Moreover, by "in name of" is meant "in the authority of" - so it is one authority with three names. Three-in-one.

But personally, I don’t think having the words exactly right really matters. What matters to God is the state on one’s heart.

Lastly, I did check out the URL you have in your letter. But I did not see anything even remotely related to the doctrine of the Trinity.

>This is an awesome site! Thank you so much for posting it.<

Thank you for the kind comments.

>I was a recently converted (about to become Un-converted) LDS. There is much that the missionaries and others hid from me and out-right lied about regarding the true nature of LDS beliefs, and it is only by attending services and hearing people speak that the light dawns.<

Interesting. And God bless as you make the, I am sure, difficult transition.

>Your article on the Trinity is wonderful. I have always had trouble explaining logically what I knew in my heart. Thank you again.

Keep up the good work.
Sincerely,
Lucinda
1/26/1998<

Thanks again.

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