Subject: Does this explain Trinity? |
Bible Note: I did re-read it, and the question I asked was NOT address in what you said. According to Hebrews 1:8, who is God calling "God"? And according to Hebrews 1:10, what did the Lord Jesus do? Speaking of Christ, John writes "All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being." NOTHING came into being apart from Christ. If Christ is a part of creation, then this verse testifies that Christ created himself, which is illogical nonsense. So, who is the creator, God (Genesis 1:1) or Christ as we see in the verses above? The answer is Trinitarian. Colossians 1:16 does indeed say that Christ is "the image of the invisible God," which loses a lot of its theological punch if that just means that he reveals attributes of his creator. After all, you yourself said that we were made in the image of God. Why would Paul need to make the point if what he was intending to say is that Christ is just like us in this respect. By the way, this understanding of Christ's representing God's nature simply does not jibe with the context of Paul's extended treatment of Christ's nature in Colossians 1. The idea that "Jesus being in the image of God and having the authority of God is allowed to be God in only a sense" contradicts every monotheistic passage in the Bible as well. How many God's are there is God the Father "lets" Jesus (an entirely separate being in your view) have the attributes of deity? In addition, the term translated "firstborn" in many translations does not necessarily mean the first one out of the womb. If can also mean "heir," or the one possessing the birthright. We see this in the Old Testament where Isaac was the heir of God's promise to Abraham, even though he was not the oldest; and how Jacob received the blessing, not Esau; and how Solomon became David's successor even though HE was not the oldest. In the same way, taken in context with the rest of Scripture (such as John 1:3 above and the two verses following Colossians 1:15 -- CONTEXT), Jesus is the uncreated heir of all things. I AM being open-minded, Elijah, and I think that you should be open-minded enough to question why in 2000 years that the unique view of Christ presented in your post has hardly ever been articulated, if indeed it ever has. Also, I would suggest you being open-minded enough to check out the book I recommended in my previous post, since the ironclad arguments for the Trinity are much too numerous to present in a bulletin-board format. If you have responses to White's thorough analysis of the Trinity which takes into account the entire body of Scripture, I will be more than happy to look at them with an open-mind! --Joe! |