I don’t understand high level math, but I believe that it works because rockets fire and sky scrappers tower above cities for decades. Mathematics are used in engineering specifications and I can observe the result so therefore I believe that high level mathematics work even though I don’t understand it all. Someone who’s studied math more than I have understands.
And now a topic way more complicated and deep than high level math-the Trinity. I may not fully understand in my mind how there can be One God in Three Persons (The Father, The Son, The Holy Spirit), but I believe it because people who have this faith pray and get an answer and experience God in their lives. I believe because Jesus Himself told us and the Holy Spirit is telling us today. When you get born again, the Holy Spirit works in your life and can enlighten you about the Trinity and answer your questions. Though, some will understand better than others and I suppose none of us will understand fully until we go to heaven.
The scriptures don’t change to fit our minds, our minds should change (or be enlightened) to fit the scriptures. Some might say, ‘isn’t that foolishness?’ No, it’s not foolishness to believe something that’s true. God’s mind is higher than ours and it’s His will to reveal His secrets to those who are inclined toward His Son and His words, and more so to those who are humble and spiritually thirsty. Since He’s God He can decide who to reveal His secrets to… The wise and learned or people who are humble like little children. God can reveal Himself to the uneducated who can’t even read and the educated who have two PhD’s, but God will require a certain attitude from either one. So let us study God’s words with spiritual thirst, humility, openness, and an interest and affection for His Son Jesus Christ.
Let’s pray…”God please reveal your eternal power and devine nature to me. Let me understand that you are One God in Three Persons. Let me understand the Father, The Son, and the Holy Spirit deeply and accurately. Let me have knowledge of you.” (Keep praying something like that)
2 Corinthians 13:14 “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
Matthew 28:19 “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”
“and the love of God” means the love of God the Father. We can understand this better after having looked at all the verses in the New Testament to get a more accurate and panoramic view of single verses like this (that is where does this verse fit in when we look at all the verses about God in the Bible and especially in the New Testament with a panoramic view). Even reading the whole Gospel of John should help us know what to think when we read verses about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
So, before we establish that the Son is God, we first establish that God is Triune or (The) Trinity: One God, Three Persons. How do we know that? We know because the scripture tells us and the scriptures originate from God-the Holy Spirit in us testifies about this.
We are told in the Bible to be filled with the Holy Spirit, led by the Holy Spirit, that He will teach us all things and remind us of everything Jesus said to us… The Holy Spirit is still teaching people exactly the same way He was teaching about 2,000 years ago in the early Church. Believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ are influenced by the same Holy Spirit today as they were about 2,00 years ago. There is only One Holy Spirit who is always the same.
Nothing has changed. Since God is perfect, He doesn’t keep improving the way human technology does from generation to generation. God is already perfect so therefore He doesn’t improve and He doesn’t change. How can One who is completely perfect improve? We tend to see things in a human way and we tend to think in a human way, but we should start praying to see things God’s way.
This is not a new way, but the faith that was once for all entrusted to those who receive Jesus. God reveals to people now what He revealed in the early Church. If you think He is revealing more now, that can lead to false teachings and temptation. God may reveal something to you that He never revealed to you before during your life. God may do something in your life that He never did in your life before. God may reveal something in your Church He didn’t reveal before or do something in your Church He didn’t do before, but it is not an addition to God’s complete will that He revealed during the early Church period. That might not sound as exciting to some, but it can block some of the devil’s schemes to deceive the Church. Let us recover our first love and be excited about the gospel, about Jesus the Son, and about the Father and the Holy Spirit. We can enjoy other topics in the Bible, but let’s stay centered overall.
We can go deeper and deeper into these major topics of faith more of the time and into lesser topics of faith part of the time. God’s words are so deep and interesting that there is way more than enough there to keep a person learning with great interest for the rest of his or her life.
When we say “God” we can say this thinking that this word refers to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Let’s say it again, “God”. The Father is God, but is not separated from the Son or the Holy Spirit. The Son is God, but is not separated from the Father or the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God (we sometimes say the Spirit of God) and is not separated from the Father or the Son.
The Father was not the One who was incarnated, died on the cross, rose from the dead or who as seen and touched, it was the Son. The Son didn’t do His own will on earth, He did the will of the Father, spoke words the Father gave him to say, and did the works His Father wanted Him to do throughout His ministry on earth.
The Holy Spirit anointed the Son, led the Son (according to the Father’s will), filled the Son, and testified about the future coming of the Son through the people of the Old Testament.
The Holy Spirit has also been testifying about the Son having come to earth and completed the Father’s will through his ministry, death, and resurrection since the day of Pentecost which we read about in the book of Acts. The Son ascended to heaven and the Church received the promised Holy Spirit who is within the Church and leads the Church according to the Father’s will.
When we deviate from the Father’s will, we can run into trouble because only God knows how to successfully carry out our ministries. Even the Son Himself was led by the Holy Spirit. Being led by the Holy Spirit is not optional. It’s and important part of God’s will.
We can say we are doing the will of Jesus the Son or of the Father or of the Holy Spirit because they are in agreement and they are One. Jesus said “as the Father has sent me so I am sending you.” (John 20:21). In fact we usually just say, “God’s will” without specifying which Person of the Trinity.
The Father made the plan for the Son to follow and the Son incarnated and followed it. The Holy Spirit came upon the Son at beginning of His ministry showing that He is the King of Kings. The Holy Spirt was already with the Son before this happened from eternity, but it was fitting that the Holy Spirit should also come upon the Son in this way after Jesus was baptized at the Jordon river. Other ordinary people who were baptized at the Jordon river repented, but the Son’s baptism revealed His identity and anointed Him for ministry. Old Testament Kings like David were anointed with oil, but the Son was anointed by the Holy Spirit (Acts 10:38). Jesus is a much greater King than any of them.
The Son didn’t need to repent-He was there at the Jordon river for another reason. Repentance without Jesus means sinning less, but it doesn’t mean forgiveness. We need to repent and have faith in Jesus the Son for the forgiveness of our sins. People at the Jordon river were there to repent and then the Son was revealed. The way to forgiveness was revealed, but the Son would have to pay a heavy price for our forgiveness. We tend to hope for a good future with a nice house, a nice spouse, and a good job, but the Son knew His future-the cross…still He pressed on out of love for us and out of love for the Father.
The Holy Spirit indwells the Church and guides and manages the Church according to Father’s will. The Son ascended to heaven and sent the Holy Spirit from the Father to indwell and lead the Church. The Holy Spirit fills individual members of the Church (the universal Church-all believers), reminds them of everything the Son said, convicts their hearts that the Son is their Lord and Savior and that there is One God in three Persons-The Father, The Son, and the Holy Spirit. Let’s also keep in mind that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit love us.
The Holy Spirit inspired people during Old Testament and New Testament times to speak and write down things God wanted them to say (although, the Holy Spirit did not indwell people as God’s temple until New Testament times after Jesus paid for our sins with His own blood). The Holy Spirit indwells those who have accepted Jesus and have been cleansed by faith in His blood (by His blood) and indwells them and guides them as God’s beloved children. We are not higher than the Holy Spirit-not even close, but God loves us. The Holy Spirit loves us. We are supposed to respect the Holy Spirit and obey the Holy Spirit as well as the Father and the Son who always work together perfectly as One.
The Father was not the One who was born through Mary or who died on the cross or rose from the dead. The Father was the One who was in Jesus the Son (John 14:10), who supplied the plan (the will) for Jesus the Son to follow (John 14:31).
We cannot see the Father, but we know of the Father because of the descriptions in God’s words and because Jesus the Son is “the radiance of God’s glory and the exactly representation of His being” (Hebrews 1:3) that’s why when Philip said, “show us the Father and that will be enough for us” Jesus responded “anyone who has seen me and seen the Father” and “The Father is in me and I in the Father” (John 14:9-11). Jesus is the perfect image of God the Father, we cannot see the Father directly, but people could see the image of the Father who is the exact representation of His being (Colossians 1:15, John 1:18, John 6:46, 1 John 4:12).
But Jesus never said ‘I am the Father’–that would be a denial of the Trinity. Jesus never denied the Trinity He taught us about the Trinity.
Jesus the Son is not the Father that we can’t see directly, but He is the perfect representation of the being of the Father and He is the image of the Father (2 Cor. 4:4, Heb. 1:3, Col. 1:15). The Son came in humility and was raised in power and ascended to the right hand of God the Father. I think this means God’s most loved place, the highest place where Jesus is exalted and rules from as the King of kings and Lord of lords. I believe this is a special place that God the Father has set aside for the Son. Philippians 2:9a “Therefore God exalted him to the highest place…” This part of heaven where the Son now dwells with all authority and power.
Philippians 2:9-11 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
We confess Jesus is Lord to the glory of the Father. God the Father wants us to do it. God the Father is not upset that we are giving too much attention to Jesus the Son-He wants us to do it.
John 14:13b “…so that the Father may be glorified in the Son”
Kings in the world in ancient times had palaces and thrones-these things were designed for them. God the Father designed heaven and the throne for the Son before the world was made and the glory of that which is on earth is incomparable even among the rich and powerful kings of the past.
God ultimately wanted created humans to be with Him in heaven in the future, and though they fell into sin, God in His mercy still made a way for them to go to heaven and have an eternal relationship with Him. We who believe in Jesus are God’s family.
I think much of what humans created is some kind of copy of what is in heaven, thrones, books, ect. These things exist within the realm of possibly that God allowed. God can make things simple and He can make things complicated. He can do whatever He wants. Some might think, ‘if there is a God, surely He doesn’t like simplicity’, but I would say get to know God first because you were not born knowing what God is like. Jesus came in humility and God likes humility. The whole world is horribly messed up because people don’t know what God is like and don’t know how to follow Him. That’s why Jesus came, to get us back on track, to shepherd us. But some of us may need to get to know Him better before we can trust Him that much. Hopefully, you already know Him and trust Him if you are reading this part of the website.
Now let’s talk about how the Son is God as One person of the Trinity.
1 John 5:20 “We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.”
We see from reading this verse that He is the Son of God and He is the true God and eternal life. The Son was not created by the Father. The Son was not created at all. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit existed before anything or anyone else existed. Before heaven, before angels, before the Universe, before animals, before humans-before anything or anyone else existed, God existed as One God in three persons. He (the three in One) is unique, the only One who was not created and the only One who can create.
If you are having a hard time grasping this you are not alone, but studying the scriptures often and praying to be inspired by the Holy Spirit about this can enlighten you more and more. I’m still learning. God’s words are immeasurably deep when we are inspired by the Holy Spirit. But as you go deeper into God’s words and stay in the Holy Spirit as you do…what you can learn from the Holy Spirit 70 years later will match what what you learned from the Holy Spirit on the first day you knew God. And the things you learn that are new to you will only reinforce what you already learned from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will never contradict Himself. Even if it seems like He did. You can pray and ask God to clear things up and He can.
When I was a new Christian I was reading the Bible and I thought I saw some contradictions in the Bible. I thought some verses implied salvation only by faith and others salvation by faith and works. I prayed and one day a verse in Acts cleared it up for me (Acts 26:20). I realized we are saved only by faith, but if we are really saved works should follow automatically as a result of that faith. (And later I realized, a person that has no works and no change in their life, well, does that person have real faith and did he or she really get saved?) I could have given up at that point thinking God’s words contradict and walked away from the faith after only a few weeks or months as a Christian (consider the parable of the sower Matthew 13:1-23), but the Holy Spirit cleared things up for me. I had a lot of experiences like that when I thought something in the Bible seemed to be in contradiction.
This is why I really urge people keep reading the Bible, trying to get your questions answered, praying, going to Church and trying to live with God in your life. Staying with God and leaving God are very different roads. Continuing with Jesus or turning away (John 6:60-67). We can see both kinds of people in the gospels.
God is not a God of confusion or contradiction and neither does He lie. He does not say one thing about Himself in the West and a contrary thing about Himself in the East. He did not say one thing about Himself 500 years ago and say a contrary thing about Himself today because human technology advanced. Human technology is impressive to many of us, but it’s nothing compared to God Almighty who designed the Universe and the entire ecosystem of the Earth.
Please allow me to bring up something important now and then get back to the main point.
If the ecosystem were truly random as some assert, it would not have come together so perfectly in the first place, and if it somehow had, it would have surely have fell out of balance and collapsed a long time ago.
Submarines require specialized equipment and a crew to sustain life while under the ocean, space stations require specialized equipment and a crew that knows how to adjust the well designed life support systems. Astronauts (and engineers that make space shuttles) don’t say, ‘Yeah man, let’s just go up to space and everything will just randomly come together so we can survive.’
The Earth is far larger and far more complex than a submarine or a space station. Something only God can handle. This is one of the reasons why every person on Earth should be thankful to God no matter what their life is like. We all live and have at least some good things because of God. God provides this world for all of us even though we messed up and sinned and need His forgiveness. God is merciful and compassionate.
We have special days to acknowledge parents and veterans, but recently more and more people are against honoring God and giving thanks to God in public or on certain holidays like Christmas or Easter. If there were no God, this would not be a problem, but since God is absolutely real this kind of movement to remove God from public life divides more and more people from discussion about God, conversation about God, thoughts about God, ect. This makes younger generations different from past generations in some places. Younger generations are largely being deprived of God. What a horrible thing!
Some people can feel comfortable listening to every kind of fifth in secular song lyrics until the lyrics start to talk about God in a positive way and then some people start to freak out. God is so very Holy, He sustains life, frees people, helps people, and yet they treat “God” like a a dirty word that oppresses people. What utter disrespect! This is how some elements of modern culture deceives us and get’s it wrong. People are misled into doing what they think is right (removing God from public, from different forms media, and from culture), but they are actually doing something that hurts people tremendously. To some degree, I thought this way too before I knew God (‘God cancel culture’ ).
People have been trying to cancel faith in God from the times of the early Church until now, but they can’t. The faith keeps spreading anyway (Ex. 1:12).
We should not hate people who are against having God in public, but have mercy, love, compassion, and yet recognize what’s good for humanity and what isn’t. Just because the majority of people think to some degree that ‘God cancel culture’ is good doesn’t mean it really is good. They are absolutely not experts about God and hardly know anything about God at all. And with this lack of knowledge they make decisions for everyone regarding God. Sometimes we need to think outside the box and not be a part of the herd.
People came from far and wide to listen to Jesus, then one day the devil and the pharisees tried to turn the crowd against Jesus and Jesus was crucified. The world hasn’t changed so much in this respect. We should know God first before we decide whether or not public acknowledgement of God is good for people. But although ‘they’ tried murder Jesus and therefore end His teachings then, He was raised from the dead and His gospel spread to hundreds of millions, and so now ‘they’ will not be able to stop Jesus’ teachings from spreading to people who desperately need Jesus in their lives. They will only find themselves fighting against God (Acts 5:39).
Those who oppose God in public should dedicate some significant time to trying to find out if there is a God and if there is anything to Biblical scripture or not. Also, if there is anything to these multitudes of testimonies spoken by Christians who say they experienced God and say God helped them during their lives in modern times similar to the way God helped people during Biblical days.
Those who oppose God in public really should do that first before they try to take actions that (without God’s intervention) would make sure people hardly ever hear anything about God as they grow up. And before they try to make talking about God and Jesus a more forbidden topic and a more undesirable topic than any other.
That is, until it’s time for a funeral. Then people often talk about God for a short time, but it’s momentary and not an ongoing search for the truth of the matter. People often permit talking about God a little during funerals. But why not do it while people are still alive so they can live and die with confidence? You wouldn’t be as sad at the funeral and after the funeral if you would have more confidence about the person’s soul and about heaven.
Okay, back to the point. Jesus is the Son of God and He is God (as One Person of the Trinity).
John 20:24-29
24 Now Thomas (also known as Didymus[a]), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!”
But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
26 A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”
28 Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
29 Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Thomas who spent about 3 years with Jesus and knew Him well, identified Jesus when He started to believe again, “My Lord and my God”. Jesus corrected the apostles many times when they said something wrong. But Jesus didn’t say that Thomas’s proclamation was wrong, which affirms that it’s right. Thomas’s proclamation was that Jesus is his and our Lord and our God. Jesus the Son, is God. Jesus could have corrected Thomas and rebuked him for saying such a thing. Rather, Jesus explained that Thomas believed in Him as Lord and God because He saw Him resurrected, but those who believe He is their Lord and God without having seen Him physically are blessed. And we are blessed when we believe that Jesus is our Lord and our God. We also believe that the Father is God and the Holy Spirit is God and the Three Persons are One.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
In the beginning God was already there because no one created Him and because He Himself is the Creator. This is one of the things that makes God unique and can impress us and make us say, “He’s God”. In the beginning, before creation and at the time of creation, the Father and the Son (and the Holy Spirit) already existed and the Son was with the Father (Notice that it doesn’t say the Son is the Father, it says the Son was with the Father so the Trinity is kept). It also says “the Word was God” which reveals to us that the Son is God.
Notice the difference between “Word” with a capital W and “word” with a lowercase w in the New Testament. Word in John 1:1 and 1:14 is “Logos” (λόγοςin) in Greek (The New Testament was originally written in Greek). Logos is what Jesus the Son was called in John 1 before He was incarnated. After His incarnation He’s called “the Son of God” or “The Son of Man” in the Bible and in 1 John 5:20 He is called the true God and eternal life. In Greek, the word “rhema” (ῥῆμα) refers to the spoken words of God. This is “word” with a lowercase w throughout the New Testament. So in English we see “Word” and “word” and in Greek we see “Logos” and “Rhema”.
John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
What these words are saying is that the Word who is God (as One Person of the Trinity) became man and dwelt on earth where people could see His glory and recognize His identity. Not everyone recognized His identity since His physical appearance alone was that of a man, but some people came to recognize that He was not a mere created human like all the rest, but He came from the Father, and unlike other humans He was full of grace and truth. After becoming flesh (incarnating) He was and is called the “Son” or “the one and only Son” (and is still God as One Person of the Trinity and always will be).
Why does it say “the one and only Son”? The Son is unique. He’s the only the Son who was not created, was always with the Father when He was called the Word, and who incarnated and was among us, then died on the cross, and was raised from the dead. He is unique.
Moses served God well, but if Moses, Elijah or any of the prophets had tried to die on a cross for us we could not have been saved. They testified to the future coming of the One who would die on the cross for us. The apostle Paul served God well, but if Paul had tried to die on a cross for us this would not have provided forgiveness of sins. Many Pastors today serve God well, but if one of them would try to die on a cross for us it could never take any of our sins away. Paul and the other Apostles testified about Jesus as the One who made atonement for our sins. Faithful Pastors today (as well as believers who are not Pastors) testify that Jesus Christ made atonement for our sins once for all time and for all nations of people. Jesus is the One we must put our faith in for the forgiveness of our sins. Only He could make atonement for the sins of the whole world past, present, and future because only He is God who also became man and was sinless. The devil will do anything to hide this secret. It is in this secret that we are saved and the devil and all his schemes are completely defeated. The Father could have sent Jesus in great physical strength with a strong physical army, but instead Jesus came in humility and weakness not to force evil to stop being evil, but to save us, show us the right way, and separate the righteous from the wicked before the world ends. God would actually like for everyone to be saved. There’s a lot more to why Jesus came in humility than that, but that’s another topic.
We must recognize the difference between Jesus the One and only Son and us humans. Humans can be born again through God’s words of truth that were given to us through the One and only Son. They can become adopted children of God. Created humans, descendants of Adam, can receive the Spirit of adoption when they believe in Jesus as their Lord and Savior and then they can call God “Father.” God sees them as His beloved adopted children. We can become sons of God (or children of God, sons and daughters of God), but we cannot become “the one and only Son”.
Romans 8:15 “For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”
God made lowly humans’ flesh from the dust of the earth and after our bodies die they decay and go back to dust. But the Son is the Word became flesh and He wasn’t made at all. He died, but He could not decay and His body was raised from the dead and ascended to heaven. The One and only Son humbled Himself and dwelt among us, but we are not equal to Him at all. He is much greater than any of us. He’s God and we are not. He is within us believers because His name is in us and His words are in us and He can manifest Himself through us and work through us and influence our character, words, actions, ect. But we can never be Him. We must recognize the difference between Him and us and between ‘the One and only Son’ and those who are born again. He is unique and wasn’t created and we were created by Him, His Father, and the Holy Spirit. We can however, follow Jesus and obey Him.
There are lots of cults that confuse this teaching and say that humans can become Jesus the Son or equal to Jesus the Son.
The better we know the scriptures, the more we pray to know what they really mean, the more we are honestly seeking God’s truth, the more we are willing to admit our sins, the more we learn from the Holy Spirit, the more we learn from good Bible teachers who teach by the Holy Spirit, the easier it will be to distinguish the right interpretations of scripture from the wrong interpretations. One is spiritual life and the other is spiritual death.
Unfortunately, people who say that they can become Jesus (become God) will not be going to heaven with us unless they repent and start respecting God. Many cult leaders such as Mr. Moon who said they were Jesus, died and were not raised from the dead. If you open their coffins, you’ll find a dead body-as dead as their false teaching.
But about 2,000 years ago Jesus of Nazareth’s tomb was empty on the third day. The Christian gospel had opponents then, and it does now, but none of them ever found Jesus’ body. This is because He fulfilled the prophesies of the Old Testament prophets and was raised from the dead. Anyone who has deeply experienced the Holy Spirit knows that the One and only Son was truly raised from the dead because the Holy Spirit testifies to us about Jesus’s resurrection. The same Holy Spirit will tell us that all others are frauds.
Say you go to a pharmacy, and a good hearted employee who is qualified tells you what medicine you need to take to ensure that you are in good health. But, an evil employee in that pharmacy might tell you the medicine is poison and the rat poison is medicine. A naive employee that lacks wisdom might tell you to take the rat poison as well, because the evil employee convinced the naive employee. Now think of the world as the pharmacy.
Ah, the challenges of life of earth where we have to make wise choices to prepare for eternity. Serving God on earth and helping souls find and know God’s truth is a difficult, yet noble profession. Many will despise you for it, but not God. Many won’t want to take the time to look into the gospel of Jesus Christ (we read about in the Bible) carefully, but they will regret that choice later.
The latest trends in ideas are mostly about self gratification, satisfying subjective emotional inclinations, trying to distinguish oneself from others in a way that pleases ones ego, and so on. It’s not revelation from God. It’s rarely a sincere desire to know what’s really going on spiritually. It’s often indulgence, not discovery.
People tend to try to fill their identities up with something. Their style of clothes, their style of music, the subculture(s) they associate with, where they grew up, their hobbies, ect…and these things tend to become closely associate with their identities. They often make the mistake of choosing religious beliefs along this line of thinking. Something that appeals to their sense of style, something similar to what everyone else believes because they grew up being influenced by others, something they are not ashamed of…If we associate truth with our identity it’s eternal life for our souls and it’s good, but if we associate something that isn’t true, it’s worthless and it diverts us away from what we really need. We may be more popular with people in the world by clinging to ideas that are devoid of real spiritual truth, but if we do this our souls will not be taken care of or have eternal life within them.
A man was praying earnestly and fasting for me to believe in Jesus and one day I walked into a Church and believed even though I don’t remember actually considering becoming a believer. I had a lot of spiritual experiences with God on the day I got saved, but the emotional impact of it all started to ware off days later. I suppose the man had not prayed much about what I would be like days later. I had been trained all my life to find Christian Bible faith in Jesus to be uncomfortable and unappealing and at the time in my heart I didn’t want the Bible to be true and I didn’t want to live as a Christian. I wanted to go on believing in the things I was comfortable believing in and and doing my will rather than God’s will. But, the Bible appeared to be true because of the spiritual experiences that I had. So, I researched a lot and went to different Churches asking tough questions and interviewing the staff members there to try to feel them out and see if they had experienced the same God as me. I believed, but I didn’t like my belief at the time and I wanted to confirm that it was true if I would have to change so much. Eventually, I was able to confirm that it is true and I even got used to it and started to like it more and more. My identity came to be closely associate with faith in Jesus and God’s words.
Seeing as how I typed all this up. Can you imagine that there was a time that I was very antiChristian? Praise God! There is hope for your stubborn husband or your stubborn wife, hope for your lost friends or coworkers. Learn to pray for longer and longer periods of time until you can pray for hours. Then your are more likely to see God do amazing things. Jesus prayed all night, how long can you get used to praying for?
Faith in Jesus seems to many to be less appealing than some modern ideas. Jesus said, “The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that it’s works are evil.” (John 7:7) But lot’s modern trends in thinking teach people to think, ‘You’re not evil. Other people are evil. It’s mostly the other group and the other people.’ which seems more appealing but, if everyone thinks ‘others are evil’ then individual people don’t see their own sin and they don’t change. The world is filled with individual people so the world doesn’t change for the better either. But I am speaking of people who gave genuinely experienced Jesus, not of merely religious Christians who have yet to be touched by God’s truth through the gospel.
Jesus spoke the truth and He is the truth. It doesn’t mean the truth always appeals to us, but we need it as much as we need food-in fact we need it more than food because we are talking about eternity. We have to keep eating food to sustain the temporary life in our bodies. But we have to believe in Jesus Christ according to God’s words to have eternal life in our souls. This life continues forever long after our physical bodies have returned to the dust. Our souls will live on in heaven with spirit bodies (1 Cor. 15:44, 15:50) that don’t grow old, don’t experience suffering, and don’t experience temptation. But first we have to know that Jesus is God as One person of the Trinity and He is also the Son of God.
We also acknowledge that we are not God and we must discover truth with God’s help. We don’t try to make truth into what we want it to be. Rather, we should keep asking God, “show me the truth, show me eternal life, and show me the way”. God will point you to Jesus. He is good. Hopefully, you already know.
I’d like to add some more verses that reveal that Jesus the Son is God.
Exodus 3:13-14 Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.[a] This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’”
Notice that “I am who I am” refers to God. Then look at what Jesus says later.
John 8:56-58 Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.”
Jesus the Son is God (as One Person of the Trinity) and existed before Abraham was and before humans, animals, the earth, the Universe, heaven, before anything was created and Jesus was not Created He is the creator and nothing was made without Him (John 1:3).
Notice that after Jesu said “I am” referring to Himself that some of the Jews (who insist there is only One God) were ready to stone Jesus to death.
John 8:59 Then they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going[a] through the midst of them, and so passed by.
They were going to stone Jesus because He claimed to be God and they denied that Jesus is God. We can see this more clearly on another similar occasion.
John 10:30-33 “I and the Father are one.” Again his Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus said to them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?” “We are not stoning you for any good work,” they replied, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”
I think most of the Jews during that time had been taught the Old Testament scriptures by the religious leaders of the time and not by the Holy Spirit which is why they were not able to recognize the Old Testament scriptures themselves prove that Jesus is the Messiah (the Christ), the Son of God and is God as One person of the Trinity.
The Old Testament prophet Isaiah lived about 700 years before Jesus came and he prophesied by the Holy Spirit.
Isaiah 7:14 “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”
Immanuel means ‘God with us.’
The Old Testament prophet Ezekiel prophesied by the Holy Spirit around 600 BC. Ezekiel 34:7-12 “‘Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: 8 As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, because my flock lacks a shepherd and so has been plundered and has become food for all the wild animals, and because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock, 9 therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: 10 This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am against the shepherds and will hold them accountable for my flock. I will remove them from tending the flock so that the shepherds can no longer feed themselves. I will rescue my flock from their mouths, and it will no longer be food for them.
11 “‘For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. 12 As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness.
During Old Testament times God’s flock was scattered. They were gathered when Moses gave them the 10 Commandments and the Law. Later generations strayed from God’s words and were scattered among the nations and Jesus who is God as One Person of the Trinity came to gather not only the Jews, but people from all nations who would believe in God and repent and turn from their evil ways and follow the way of righteousness.
Isaiah 11:10 “And in that day there shall be a Root of Jesse, Who shall stand as a banner to the people; For the Gentiles shall seek Him, And His resting place shall be glorious.”
Jesus wept over Jerusalem because they did not recognize God’s coming to them.
Luke 19:41-44 41 As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42 and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43 The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. 44 They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.”
When people reject God’s guidance they leave themselves open to ruthless attacks from devil and from devilish people. Some people are more of a target then others and some experience stronger attacks than others, but the solution is live your whole live under the guidance of the one who is stronger than the devil and who came not only to save us from our sins and help us, but to destroy the works of the devil. It was God the Father’s will for the Son to come in humility, but though the Son deliberately came in the form of weakness (human flesh) He always won all the time and He always lived according to God’s own words without sinning even once.
1 John 3:8 The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.
Hebrews 2:14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,
The Son of God who is Himself God (as One Person of the Trinity) came and saved us from our sins and destroyed the works of the devil.
Everything of the devil is defeated by our faith in God’s words now and the devil and his angels will all go to the lake of fire (hell) later. Hell is a place God made to punish the devil and his angels-it is not the kingdom of the devil, but a place that God made and a place where the devil is to be punished (Matthew 25:41). The devil is not there yet. Destroying the devil (sending him to hell) and ending all sin is part of God’s plan. But before this would happen, first Jesus the Son would come and complete God the Father’s will to save us and remove sin from us; those who believe in Jesus would be sent out to preach the gospel to all nations… The devil would not go the lake of fire until after Jesus came… There is a process. Eventually all evil spirits and people who did evil and didn’t receive God’s forgiveness will go to hell and exist there forever (this is considered destroyed I think because it’s permanent). All sin and evil passes away, but God’s people shine like the sun in heaven forever thanks to Jesus.
God must punish sin. If He doesn’t punish sin that would be like making him unrighteous which is not possible. Even in this world, no one would respect a judge that would not punish criminals for their crimes. No one would respect a judge that would say it’s ok for them to keep committing crimes and hurting other people.
God created everything and created us. He made angels upright and gave them a good existence with Him, but He also gave them the ability to choose whether to obey him and do what’s right or not. Some turned away from God and became corrupted and then became extremely evil. I do not believe that God predestined the fall of angels or the fall of humans. Why? Because He is righteous and therefore would not predestine unrighteousness. Unrighteousness happened because angels and humans chose to turn away from God and they became more and more corrupt. Since God is indeed God, I believe He could really give angels and humans a choice even though He knows everything. The Bible says that God doesn’t remember our sins anymore when we believe in Jesus who died for our sins. God has power to forget and power to remember (If He wanted to) so I believe that in spite of the fact that God knows everything, angels and humans really had a choice then, just as we humans really have a choice now. You are reading this because you chose to. Not because God predestined you to do it. God gave us freedom. Free will. But angels an humans chose to abuse their free will and they trusted in themselves rather than trusting in God.
If we think of all the horrendous acts, genocide, unspeakable crimes, slavery, unbridled greed, and other sins in the history of this world we can see the result of what happens when angels and humans turn away from God. I suppose this is why only such a severe punishment as going to the lake of fire forever would do. This may seem hard for us to understand, but I think that if we would really have “eyes to see” as Jesus said we would see that this punishment is just. I also think it’s why only such an extreme act, the death of the One and only Son on the cross could save us. This was no small thing that God did for us. God was willing to go so far as to suffer so much humiliation, abuse, blasphemy and suffering in order to save us from hell. And anyone can be saved if they believe in Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Then they will never go to hell. It’s God’s will for every human being to be saved and go to heaven. That’s what God wants for you and for all of us. If didn’t want to save you, He wouldn’t have died for you.
Corrupted (fallen) angels however cannot be saved from hell. Their ‘fate is sealed’ so to speak. Some of us might wonder why God decided he would not provide a way for them to be redeemed. I’m not completely sure, but perhaps they are guilty of a greater crime. These corrupted angels temped humans to sin, but nobody tempted Satan. Angels were made by God in heaven whereas humans were made by God on Earth. I think that heaven is greater than the earth and is a place that is filled with the glory of God and sin had never been there (had never been any sin anywhere) since God created it and then Lucifer the arch angel committed a horrible sin (Isaiah 14:12-15) and was expelled from heaven as violently as a bolt of lightening (Luke 10:18) and his angels were expelled with him because I suppose they also used their free will to sin with him (Revelation 12:9). Since this happened he is called Satan or the devil and is sometimes referred to with other terms in the Bible. The terms Satan and the devil are used interchangeably in the Bible and the different verses describe the evil characteristics and actions of this creature. Of course, Jesus already defeated him so that he is condemned (John 16:11). The devil and his angels are in a way like death row inmates who’s fate has already been decided and it’s only a matter of time. So they are filled with rage because they know the time is short.
More thoughts on why perhaps God didn’t decide to save angels. Living human beings seem to have the capacity to change their ways and treat God and others better. Do corrupted angels have this capacity to change? I don’t think they do. There are no Biblical examples of this. Jesus said the devil came only to steal, kill, and destroy, and I believe that all evil spirits follow the same course throughout their lifeless existence. They device schemes to tempt people and influence people into greater and greater corruption for the purpose of stealing, killing, and destroying.
We know that people like Hitler who started and perpetuated wars were evil, but think about this-The devil and his angels were in the invisible background of every war in the history of the world. Every kind of evil, oppression and sin in the world is in some way tied to their temptations and influence. So, I think we can agree with God that they all deserve to go to hell forever. They did their best to make our world in ‘hell.’ To plant weeds in the field where God planted good seed.
Yet, even here, the Son incarnated, never fell to temptation, make sure the devil and his angels are condemned to hell, gave us a way out of sin, a way out of disease and infirmities, a way out of poverty, and a way to be with God in heaven forever as his children.
Humans were made in God’s image (the likeness of God’s image) and God doesn’t want any of them to go to hell. Unfortunately, people who are in sin and have not repented and not been forgiven will end up going to hell even though God wants them to repent and be forgiven and know Jesus the Son who is God as One Person of the Trinity. God the Father sent Him to us and the Holy Spirit testifies about Him.
Some may think it’s too harsh for God to send people to hell.
Whatever we may think about all this, God is Almighty and no one can challenge Him or stop Him. There is no way to avoid judgement or hell if we ignore God’s warnings, His saving grace and we just do as we please and harm ourselves and others.
Some might think they could take the moral high ground toward God and accuse God. It may seem to them that God is wrong and they are right. But the problem is the limitations of human perception and the limitations of our human minds. God perceives everything and His mind is infinitely more intelligent than ours. From our small perspective it may seem to some that they are right, but from God’s higher and deeper perspective they are clearly wrong and God is clearly right.
Isaiah 55:9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
When we study God’s words by the Holy Spirit we start to understand God’s perspective more and more which helps us to trust God and love God, and enjoy our relationship with God. Even with other people in this world, conversation and communication can clear up misunderstandings. We should have a conversation with God through the Bible, prayer, and the Holy Spirit. Then we can see more clearly that God is righteous and we are the ones who are unrighteous. When I first started reading through the Old Testament from the beginning, I started to think that God seemed cruel, but then as I kept reading and I saw that God kept letting people who had done evil repent and turn back to Him and be blessed again many times and then I saw that God is righteous and it’s people that are unrighteous.
But, I am not sure where you are at now. Don’t give up, if you are struggling to understand how the Bible can be right. How the gospel can be right. Just keep studying God’s words and praying for God to show you why He’s right and keep attending a good Church because God works those who believe in Jesus even though the are imperfect.
God loves us. He loves us so much that even though we are sinners He died for us, made us His children and lets us go to heaven to be with Him forever. Our situation in heaven will be much better than any possible situation we could be in our earth. None of this would have been possible if Jesus had not died for us on the cross. Our God died for us and laid down His life for us which proves His sincerity.
*(Some of the religious leaders of the time among the Jews believed in Jesus and the Magi [or wise men] traveled from far away and believed in Jesus.)
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