Prior Book | Prior Chapter | Prior Verse | Next Verse | Next Chapter | Next Book | Viewing NASB and Amplified 2015 | |
NASB | John 3:16 ¶ "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | John 3:16 ¶ "For God so [greatly] loved and dearly prized the world, that He [even] gave His [One and] only begotten Son, so that whoever believes and trusts in Him [as Savior] shall not perish, but have eternal life. |
Subject: Who is Jesus' God? |
Bible Note: part 2 6 tells us that those ‘brothers’ (spiritually speaking) of Jesus are referred to as “sons of God.” The Scriptures never refer to the conquering Christians as “sons” to Jesus Christ. (Heb 2:11 and Matt. 12:50 and 25:40 show them as “brothers” not “sons” of Jesus Christ. Revelation 22:12-13 too should be understood to refer to Jehovah, the Father and God of Jesus. This verse contains phrases such as “the first and the last“, obviously another way of saying the “Alpha and the Omega”, likewise “the beginning and the end”. The Alpha and the Omega begins speaking in verse 12 and notice how he continues to identify himself as one who is coming on down through verse 15. Then in verse 16 the question is whether or not the speaker changes or stays the same. If it does not change then the Alpha and the Omega would reference Jesus. Does the simple conclusion that verse 16 begins with the first-person singular “I” followed by the identification of the speaker, “Jesus,” mean that the previous verses are also the words of Jesus? Two examples from this same Bible book show this does not necessarily mean that that must be the case. Rev 1:9 is one example where if we concluded such has to be the case then the apostle John would have to be the Alpha and the Omega. But I know of no one that argues that this is the case. The second example is Rev 22:8. Would anyone argue that John is the one “coming quickly” in verse 7? So, there are indeed sudden changes of speakers in the book of Revelation since Rev 1:1 says, “A revelation by (1) Jesus Christ, which (2) God gave him, . . . And he sent forth his (3) angel and presented it in signs through him (3)(angel) to his slave (4) John.” Consider the thought that the “angel” of verses 12-16 of chapter 22 might very well be speaking for both “the Alpha and the Omega” and Jesus Christ in verses 12-16, read the dialogue between John and one of God’s angels found in Rev 21:9-22:11. Notice in whatever Bible version you read these verses the various breaks for changes of speakers are provided by punctuation in the English language, since it was not there originally. There are many examples in the OT where angels speak for God and even referring to themselves as Jehovah.-Ex 3:2-6; Ac 7:30 “The First and the Last” an expression found three timesin the book of Revelation. Rev 1:17-18 identifies Jesus as the “First and the Last”. Rev 2:8 likewise shows by its context that Jesus is the “First and the Last”. Both of these are in relation to his death and unique resurrection by his Father and interestingly, is the reason for his being called the “firstborn from the dead” as in Rev 1:5 and Col 1:18 Also, notice that the “Alpha and the Omega” is Not used in conjunction with this “the First and Last” in these two places and neither is the phrase “the beginning and the end”. Now notice how an ancient manuscript helps to draw an accurate conclusion. Just a couple hundred years after John’s writing the book of Revelation the Codex Alexandrinus reads “firstborn,” instead of “first,” at both Revelation 1:17 and 2:8; but in 22:12 where the “Alpha and the Omega” is lacking and would be dying and coming to life again, we find “first”, not “firstborn”. This shows that the scribes of Codex A saw a |