God has a god.

[Checkpoint]

Scriptures tell us that God the Father is the God of His Son, Jesus Christ.

Anyone who has a god is not, by definition, God.

Therefore, Jesus Christ is not the one true God.

God the Father has no god.

He is therefore, by definition, God Himself, the only true God.

What say you?

Relevant scriptures

Psalm 45:7;Hebrews 1:9

You love righteousness and hate wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions
by anointing you with the oil of joy.

John 17:3

Now this is eternal life: that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

Mark 15:34

And at three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lema
sabachthani?" (which means "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

John 20:17

Jesus said, "Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, 'I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'"

2 Corinthians 1:3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,

Ephesians 1:3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms.

Colossians 1:3

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you,

1 Peter 1:3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By His great mercy, He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 217 by Checkpoint]

Hey, Checkpoint, I think your tags are a little off on the previous post. Can you fix them so I can respond? Thank you.

Hi Pinseeker,

What do you mean by "tags"?

Has my first attempt (at the end) been in the right direction?

Please bear with me!

[PinSeeker]

Your position is that Jesus is both God and man.

Absolutely it is. But only because this is what Scripture clearly conveys throughout. You disagree, as do all Jehovah's Witnesses, which is unfortunate, but no one is suggesting breaking fellowhip as a result.

According to your color illustration, that which is black is neither white nor any shade of grey.

You are mixing two totally different things, here, Checkpoint. You are intentionally creating a false absurdity. I anticipated that, actually; I knew it was coming at some point.

My position is that he is man, not God; black, not white, Yours is that he is both black and white.

All I was saying with the black/white thing was that if someone says one or the other of two opposing things/viewpoints is true, we can easily deduce the implicit statement that the opposite of the thing true is not true. In other words, a fact implies that its antithesis of that fact is not fact and in fact false. God and man, Checkpoint, are not opposites; we are, after all, created in His image. And one great day, we will be made like Him (although we will not BE Him). This is His wonderful promise, and all God's promises have their 'Yes' and 'Amen' in Christ Jesus.

You have shown which verses you think have implications that confirm your position, and then you have shown your explication process; one that leads straight to your chosen conclusion.

In your opinion, which I respect. Yes, I get it. Opinions are opinions, and not necessarily facts.

That is not the way I operate.

Well, neither do I, in the sense that you are saying that. I have shown what implications clearly follow from the explications made in Scripture. That you choose not to accept them is... okay with me; we can agree to disagree.

I take seriously the admonition to " not go beyond what is written" and follow Jesus example of "it is written".

So you accept the fact that what is clearly true is true, but don't accept that the opposites of those true things are not false but also true. Hm. Okay. Well, actually, regarding Scripture, you purposefully ignore those things that are necessarily false because their opposites are true so that you can hold to the false narrative you have chosen to align yourself with. Jehovah's Witnesses are not alone in this, though. Many, many other groups, whether they call themselves Christians or not, do the same thing, albeit in different ways.

Again, Grace and peace to you, Checkpoint.

[PinSeeker]

Hi Pinseeker, What do you mean by "tags"?

HTML tags. They format a quote. There should always be a beginning tag and an ending tag. I think when you first replied (before your correction), you had an extra beginning tag in there, resulting in everything looking like it was a quote from a previous post.

Has my first attempt (at the end) been in the right direction?

Yes. Your response was not separated from previous quotes/posts, so it was unclear what your response was. You corrected it well enough; thus my response above.

Grace and peace to you.

[Checkpoint]

Checkpoint said

Drawing conclusions based on what we
think is implicit, has its own problems, in my opinion.

Pinseeker replied

We can easily see implications in a whole lot of things, Checkpoint. To refuse to do so is to bury one's head in the sand. To say something is black is necessarily to say -- implicitly -- that thing is neither white nor any shade of grey.

Your position is that Jesus is both God and man.

According to your color illustration, that which is black is neither white nor any shade of grey.

My position is that he is man, not God; black, not white, Yours is that he is both black and white.

Checkpoint wrote

As I see it, only these expressions are explicit: Son of God, Son of Man, and "my God" and "my Father".

Pinseeker responded

Okay, I'll meet you exactly where you are on that. When Jesus says He is the Son of Man (the One who fulfills Daniel's prophecy), we can easily see the implication that there is no other Son of Man. Sticking stubbornly only to the explicit is to place an artificial limit on one's own understanding. But if you want to do that, then I'm okay with that; equally explicit are the following statements (among others) of Christ:

• * "Before Abraham was, I am."
  * "I am the way, the truth, and the life."
  * “Even if I testify about Myself, My testimony is true, for I know where I came from and where I am going... I am He who testifies about Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies about Me.�
  * "I am the light of the world."
  * "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end."

vbvbbv

Checkpoint wrute

So, is "Son of God" to only be taken as explicit, or also transposed into "God the Son" by saying this is implicit?

Pinseeker replied

Well, maybe by extension, but not p;[u directly, no. The direct implication would be something like, "Jesus is not the son of any counterfeit god." More relevant to this conversation, the clear implication is that "Jesus possesses all the attributes of God the Father." In the case that you present here, it just takes a little inductive reasoning. So then the proof (as in high school Geometry) goes like this:

• 1. Jesus is the Son of God.
  2. Jesus possesses all the attributes of God the Father.
  3. No one possesses all the attributes of God the Father except God.
  4. Jesus, in addition to being the Son of God, is God.
  5. Jesus is God the Son.

You have shown which verses you think have implications that confirm your position, and then you have shown your explication process; one that leads straight to your chosen conclusion.

That is not the way I operate.

I take seriously the admonition to " not go beyond what is written" and follow Jesus example of "it is written".

Checkpoint wrote

God bless and keep you, make His face to shine upon you, and give you His peace.

Pinseeker responded

And you also. Grace and peace to you.

As always, Pinseeker!

[This is a second later edit, as requested by Pinseeker][/b]

[Checkpoint]

Hi Pinseeker, What do you mean by "tags"?

HTML tags. They format a quote. There should always be a beginning tag and an ending tag. I think when you first replied (before your correction), you had an extra beginning tag in there, resulting in everything looking like it was a quote from a previous post.

Has my first attempt (at the end) been in the right direction?

Yes. Your response was not separated from previous quotes/posts, so it was unclear what your response was. You corrected it well enough; thus my response above.

Grace and peace to you.

See my second attempt; it should do the trick. I agree the original was quite unclear..

Looking forward to your reply.

Blessings.

[brianbbs67]

My position on Christ's divinity is still the same. Es machts nicht. It means nothing. Doesn't matter if he is God or not. God forgives, period. No help needed. He's got it.

[PinSeeker]

[Replying to post 224 by Checkpoint]

Checkpoint, about your latest reply... Can you cut out everything except your most current comments and/or questions? I'm not trying to be difficult or put you down at all, but because you don't really get the HTML tags thing I can't separate what is current from what is past without comparing it to a previous post; I really can't tell what is previously trodden ground and what is new. If you don't want to do that, that's okay. Thanks, man.

Grace and peace to you.

[onewithhim]

My position on Christ's divinity is still the same. Es machts nicht. It means nothing. Doesn't matter if he is God or not. God forgives, period. No help needed. He's got it.

Es IST wichtig!! Jesus himself said that we must KNOW God (the Father) and the one the Father sent, Jesus. That means we have to understand just who God is and what relationship He has with His Son and everyone else. When we know God, we know if He is three people [persons] or if He is one Person. It has to be one or the other. To say it is not important is copping out.

"And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." (John 17:3, KJV)

[PinSeeker]

My position on Christ's divinity is still the same. Es machts nicht. It means nothing. Doesn't matter if he is God or not. God forgives, period. No help needed. He's got it.

I understand; I get it. And I respect your saying that, your position. But the problem is, if Christ is not God -- not also of God...

• and we see that He is in what Gabriel told Mary in Luke 1 verse 35 ("The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God...")

in addition to being of man...

• and we know He is because He is born of a woman (Mary), as we see also from Gabriel's comments in Luke 1 verse 31 ("And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son..."

...then He is not qualified to be Mediator between God the Father and man -- and as Jesus's claim in John 14:6, that "...no one comes to the Father but through Me..." would be empty, which of course is not the case.

I agree with you; God forgives. Yes, and Jesus forgave sins, too, which only God can do (which was part of what I said before), and therefore, Jesus must also be God. You're right that there's no "help" needed, that He's got it, God the Father and God the Son (and God the Holy Spirit) have separate duties in providing salvation to man:

• * God the Father elects according to His will, not man's (Romans 9:16... though man's will certainly necessarily follows that of God)
  
  * God the Son, according to the will of the Father, paid the wages of sin on behalf of man to purchase our redemption; this is why Jesus, in John 19:30, just before His death, proclaims, "It is finished!"
  
  * God the Holy Spirit, according to the will of the Father, issues the inward call to man, thereby bringing man from spiritual death to spiritual life and helping him in his spiritual walk from that time forward.

So, it does mean something; actually, it means everything. If you are born again of the Spirit (and I have no real reason to think you are not), you -- and anyone else who is thinking along the same lines as you (if and when they are also born again of the Spirit) will come to see this in time. I just hope it is sooner rather than later.

The triune nature of God can't be FULLY understood in this life just because we, in our finiteness, cannot fully understand everything about God (His thoughts are higher than our thoughts, His ways higher than ours [Isaiah 55:9]; such knowledge is too wonderful for us, too high, and we cannot attain to it [Psalm 139:6] -- but it can be understood and accepted. In short, it is a mystery in that we can never fully understand it but we can grow in our understanding of it. Here's a couple of helpful ways to think of it:

• 1. An apple has three parts: the seeds, the flesh, and the skin. When you cut an apple in half, you can see that each of these three parts are different. The skin is like God the Father because He protects us. The flesh is like God the Son because Jesus Christ took on human flesh. The seeds are like God the Holy Spirit because through His power, we are reborn and grow in faith. Each of the parts of an apple are different, but they are ALL apple.
  
  2. From scripture we hear of Jesus spoken of as the “Word� of God and the Holy Spirit is often referenced as the “Breath� (“He breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit'� [John 20:22]). This analogy makes God the Father the Speaker. The Word that He utters is God the Son. And the “Breath� He uses to speak his “Word� is God the Holy Spirit. Of course, God has neither a mouth nor breath. The image is drawn from our experience of speaking, where spoken words cannot exist without breath: there can be no word without a breath and no breath without a speaker. Additionally, a word requires a speaker and a speaker needs breath to give voice to a word. When we apply this experience to God analogically, we can say that in God the Speaker, the Word, and the Breath are all united yet distinct.

Grace and peace to you.

[PinSeeker]

Es IST wichtig!! Jesus himself said that we must KNOW God (the Father) and the one the Father sent, Jesus. That means we have to understand just who God is and what relationship He has with His Son and everyone else.

Exactly! Wholeheartedly agreed.

When we know God, we know if He is three people [persons] or if He is one Person. It has to be one or the other. To say it is not important is copping out.

Well, God the Father is one Person, Jesus (God the Son) is one Person, and the Holy Spirit, is one Person. Together, they make up the One True God. There is a separation of duties in accomplishing the salvation of man, but They are One in substance and essence.

The two analogies I provided above to Brian my help you. Or course, you may reject them out of hand, and based on all these conversations we've been involved in to this point, I would fully expect you will, and that's understandable. Then again, God, by the work of His Spirit, may work in your heart as He did Peter's and reveal these things to you, thereby opening your eyes to His truth.

But it's exactly the opposite of a "cop-out." Scripture clearly teaches it; both the Son and the Spirit proceed from the Father [John 8:42, John 15:26]. A cop-out is to give up, to refuse to put any effort into something. By definition, to not try to understand the triune nature of our One True God is... a cop-out. But, as with Brian, I understand and respect your position and your right to stick to it.

Grace and peace to you, OWH.