Featured Do our systems of thought teach that Jesus is really the One True God?

Perhaps this isn’t the thread, but because the atonement has been discussed perhaps this added distinction needs to be inserted.



When discussions on atonement and God in Christ reflect upon the temple folks must keep in mind human aspects.

A short list:

Humans raised the sacrifice.
Humans set aside the sacrifice for a period of time for testing.
Humans inspected and tested the sacrifice daily during that time to judge purity.
Humans pronounced that sacrifice as pure.
Humans inflicted the wound that poured out the blood some collected in a bowl, some not.
Humans placed the animal upon the alter they built.
Humans generated the fire and sustained the fire that consumed the sacrifice.
Humans discarded the unnecessary items of the sacrifice.
Humans lead the procession to deliver the scapegoat to the wilderness.

However, perhaps a sacrifice to what God performed is that of Abraham.

The human lambs had no choice - Isaac was given no choice.

God provided the lamb of His choice, that He raised and kept for that purpose, who secured the lamb that humankind would take the lamb and sacrifice...

The crucifixion better fits the sacrifice Abraham offered, rather than that of the temple.

Unless one keeps in mind that Christ pictured in all aspects as the temple, the furnishings, methods the even the clothing of high priest, the animals.... every aspect was a picture of the work of the Christ.

Perhaps then one might see the Abrahamic sacrifice as a picture of earthy view of the crucifixion, while the temple sacrifice is a picture of that seen from heaven.

A bit off topic, but some may find it a worthy read.

Such does effect how the crucifixion is considered in terms of God’s wrath, and the topic of the op.

 

God did not stop Abraham from killing the sacrifice. The change of sacrifice showed substitution and continued life (resurrection). Jesus used the threefold "God" in reference to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Why did he just stop with Jacob? He was the God of Joseph, David, ect. He stopped with Jacob because those three were types of the Godhead and the everlasting covenant of redemption. Abraham is called "our Father" while Isaac was his only begotten Son offered up but still continued to live. Jacob beget the 12 tribes (type of all the elect).

 

Agreed! As to their persons they all equally share what God is or the attributes that make God to be God without being three different Gods. However, the humanity of Christ is not eternal or immutable or does it share any attribute that makes God to be God. At one time there was no humanity (Jn. 1;14)

 

However, Abraham did kill the offering. The exchange provided the type for substitution and continuation of life a type of resurrection.

So you believe that the Father stopped the sacrificial killing of His Son on the cross in keeping with how you interpret this type?

I find this conclusion very odd! You are confusing deity with the design and role of humanity. "Thou hast prepared a body" for that very end rather than making deity the object of wrath. That does not demand different God's, but it demands a full complete nature in addition to God that serves as the object of wrath against sin and in the place of sinners. Just because God the Son indwelt the human Jesus does not make the humanity deity.

 

Sorry, I don't get your point. God did not stop Abraham from killing the sacrifice. The exchange perfectly fit the type as it demonstrated the truth of substitution and continued life (resurrection) but there was no stopping of the type of God (Abraham) from killing the ultimate type of the Son - the substitutionary sacrifice.

 

The "fullness of God" does not mean that Christ is the Father and the Spirit incarnate without distinction of Person! It means that the pleroma or all attributes that make God to be God dwells incarnate. The Son prayed to the Father and spoke to the Father as the Father did the Son and so the Father was not incarnate nor the Spirit. I don't believe that each is a third of God but each is fully God or without division of being.

 

Agreed!

The problem here as I see it, is not just wrong termonology but confusion of humanity with deity. The Father (God) is not wrathful to the Son (God) but he is wrathful toward sin and sinners of which the man Jesus legally stands in their position as humanity in the place of humanity, not deity in the place of humanity. His humanity has a beginning (Jn. 1;14) and is not not deity but "was prepared" for that very sacrificial object of wrath due to legal subtitution.

Again, I think you are confusing deity with humanity as they are two separate and distinct natures that cannot be combined in so much any distinction is blurred or erased.

 

So you believe that deity "grew in wisdom and in knowledge"? You believe that omnipotent deity grew tired and wearied? If they cannot be divided then is that not what you are forced to conclude or else you are forced to make some kind of division.

So how do you explain the human Jesus sitting down on the "right hand of the Father" if all the Godhead, the fullness is inseparable from the humanity of Christ? Should not he be the one sitting on the throne alone since the "fullness" dwells in that body? There is no issue if the Greek word pleroma refers simply to all attributes that make God to be God are coequally shared by three distinct Persons without division of being. Are you not trying to rationalize a view of God that ultimately ends up to be nothing different than modalism as you ultimately confine deity within the human body of Jesus??

So, in essence you confine the Father and the Spirit within the incarnate body of Jesus from Nazareth for eternity as the "one true God"???? How do the attributes of eternal and immutable fit with God becoming inseparable from a human nature? Is the preincarnate word the same in nature as the incarnate word? Does deity become flesh in the sense of union of God and humanity as one nature?

 

This is where we have to be very, very careful. The Son is true God and 'it pleased that all the fulness should dwell in Him,' but He is not the Father and not the Holy Spirit. This was the point of my post #67.

I'm sure that @Biblicist will come back shortly to declare that he does not consider Himself Reformed. But this remark is just one of the careless, unfounded side-swipes to which you are unfortunately prone. The Reformed Confessions, which constitute Reformed Theology are entirely orthodox. If you disagree with them it may possibly say more about you than about them.

 

I think you are attempting to rationalize what cannot be rationalized. When we see the Son we see the full expression of what makes the Father to be God as the same attributes that make the Father to be God are the very same attributes that make the Son to be God. The God attributes are coequally shared by three Persons without division of substance. However, he did not say I am the Father as there is a division between Persons and not merely as three distinct seats of conscience but also three distinct manifestations of Persons (e.g. at the baptism of Jesus, the throne in heaven, etc.). You are attempting to rationalize the irrational with regard to human mental capacity.

However, your attempt to rationalize distorts the truth of the Godhead in my opinion especially when it comes to the incarnation as your logic leads you to incarnate the Father, and the Spirit with the Son as this is your view of the "fullness of the Godhead BODILY."

Hence, if your view is correct the Son should not be standing before the One on the throne or sitting at his right side but should be on the throne as the entirety of the Godhead is inseparably united to humanity.

 

Let me reword your statement above to more accurately represent my view - "I see you as viewing God punishing sin in MAN but not in Deity. The body is the visible expression of true humanity legally in position of fallen humanity and thus the legal object of wrath against sin and sinners being completely satisfied."

I am not saying this in ridicule but in how I perceive what must be the case if I follow your logic. So again, your incarnate God is not immutable as was the preincarnate God was omnipotent and omnicient but the incarnate God grows in wisdom and in knowledge and can be impotent, helpless and weak? Did not you say the incarnation was the inseparable union between deity and humanity?