It’s the most amazing work of God in human history before the resurrection. Mary, a virgin, finds out that she’s pregnant. In the ancient world, this would have been scandalous, but her fiancé Joseph has an angelic visitor telling him to stay with Mary. This young couple are the first to learn that the rest of human history is about to change forever as a prophecy from hundreds of years before is about to be fulfilled.
Tag: Trinity
-
The Father, the Son, and a thousand year old debate on the Holy Spirit. Studying John 15:26
Throughout the gospel of John, Jesus refers to having been sent by the Father.
But who sends the Holy Spirit?
In John 15:26, Jesus says: “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.
Helper comes from the Greek word “paraclete.” That word gets translated in different ways in different Bibles. Helper, advocate, counselor, comforter.
And really what that shows is that it’s such a broad idea that it’s hard to condense down into one simple word. Because indeed the Holy Spirit does all of those things.
Jesus says that the helper will bear witness about him. Jesus is highlighting that the Holy Spirit teaches about Jesus, bears witness to Jesus, testifies to the truth of Jesus.
Jesus says: whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.
Theology – helper
That is quite the theological statement.
Jesus says in this verse whom I will send to you, but then he adds from the Father.
That leads to an important theological question. Who sends the Spirit?
Perhaps you’ve never even thought about that. To approach that question, I need to take a moment and give a brief history lesson, because the answer to that question was part of a major theological debate almost 1,000 years ago.
The Great Schism
In 1054, there were no independent churches or Bible churches. You didn’t have the Apostolic church. Protestantism was nearly 500 years away.
Virtually all of Christendom fell into one of two camps. East and west. You had the Eastern Orthodox Church in the east and you had the Roman Catholic Church in the west.
There were some outliers, but those two movements were definitely the biggest. They were coke and pepsi. The east and west churches had open communion with each other, but that all changed in 1054 when they split in a rift that has never been fully repaired.
There were several reasons, but one of the major issues and one that is related to our passage today was the question of who sent the Spirit. The Eastern Orthodox Church believed that God sends the Son and that God also sends the Spirit.
The Catholic view – which is also essentially the universal view within Protestantism is that God sends the Son but that the Father and the Son send the Spirit.
Another key verse in the discussion is in the following chapter. John 16:7, when Jesus says:
I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.
I affirm the view that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.
You might ask “why does that matter?” Most importantly, it matters because we’re talking about what the Bible teaches. These complicated theological issues might seem boring or abstract but they matter. The Trinity is a significant part of what makes Christianity different from any other religion.
And the reason why this particular issue matters: the reason why it matters that the Spirit comes from the Father and the Son and not just from the Father is that if the Spirit is from God, then it would seem that the Father can be accessed via the Spirit apart from the Son.
If the Spirit is only from God alone, then, why do you need Jesus?
I’m not saying Eastern Orthodox people believe that but it is a danger of a theology where the Spirit does not proceed from Christ.
Also if Christ in heaven, ruling and reigning with God, and the Spirit is empowering and edifying the church, how are Jesus and the Spirit relating to each other?
The Father and the Spirit are both active in the ministry of Jesus. The Father sends the Son. And the Spirit was with Jesus during his earthly ministry.
Mark 1:10-11: when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. 11 And a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”
All three persons of the Trinity are working in the ministry of Jesus. And all three persons of the Trinity are working in the church. The Spirit comes from the Father and from the Son.
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this post, please share and subscribe.
-
In the beginning was the word – 4 things we learn from the opening of John’s Gospel
The gospel of John opens up with a profound theological affirmation about the nature and identity of Jesus.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.
-John 1:1-3These three verses at the beginning of the Gospel of John give us four fundamental truths about Jesus.
I. Jesus is eternal
“In the beginning was the Word.”
John opens up by referring to Jesus as The Word. I take it almost as a title for Jesus in the beginning of John. In the Old Testament, it is through the word of the Lord that God creates, speaks to his people, makes his promises, and points people to truth. In Jesus, we see the ultimate disclosure of divine love, wisdom, truth and salvation, and so it is therefore fitting to refer to Jesus as the Word.
There was never a time when the Word was not.
And this is very important because right from the beginning of John, it confronts a common error that has existed in the church essentially since the time of Christ.
And that error is thinking Jesus is created. Or thinking that God made Jesus. Or thinking that he was a really good man who was given a promotion and became divine.
He has always existed. This is something that will continue to unfold throughout this passage, but Jesus is not a created being.
II. Jesus has fellowship with God.
The verse continues “and the Word was with God.” Another absolutely monumental and profound reality from this passage. Think about this for just a moment. The Old Testament is filled with lofty language of the majesty of God. Rightfully so.
Exodus 33, Moses wants to see the glory of God (Exodus 33:18).
God tells Moses in Exodus 33:20: you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live
It’s because God is so vibrant and righteous and full of life that it is completely overwhelming for fallen and finite people.
But in that story, we see the glory of the Lord is revealed to Moses and Exodus 34 tells us that when Moses came down from the mountain, his skin was so radiant from beholding the glory of God that people were afraid (Exodus 34:29-30).
He shined so brightly that he had to wear a veil.
1 Kings 8, the Ark of the Covenant is brought into the Temple. And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, 11 so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord (1 Kings 8:10-11).
The glory of the Lord was so overwhelming that the priests could not stand to minister.
Isaiah 6, the prophet is given a vision of the throne room of God and he is terrified:
Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5)
The presence of the Lord is completely awesome as you behold his glory and majesty and life. If you’ve ever stood at a great waterfall, as the hundreds of thousands of gallons of water crash over the edge every minute, you can feel the power and rush of the water. That’s awe inspiring in its own right, but it’s no comparison to encountering the eternal and almighty God of the universe. And yet, with Jesus, we’re told that the Word was with God.
Jesus can see God, he can behold the glory of God because he himself is glorious and righteous.
In the beginning, there was fellowship with Jesus and God the Father.
III. Jesus is God
The text continues “and the Word was God.” The central theme of John’s Gospel. The Lordship of Christ.
Something to consider…
Borrowing from Wayne Grudem in his book Systematic Theology: Historical, Orthodox, Biblical Christianity believes the following. There is one God. God is three persons. Each person is fully God.
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
While you can’t build an entire theology of the Trinity from this passage alone. But this passage affirms that Jesus is God and also that there is distinction between Jesus and God. In his commentary on John, Leon Morris talks of Jesus and God the Father and says “the Word and God are not identical by they are one.” We don’t have to know exactly how it’s simultaneously true that we have one God, who is three persons, and each person is fully God. But the Bible affirms all three of those statements.
Theologically, this matters tremendously. And we have all of these affirmations right from the beginning of John’s gospel.
If Jesus were not God, then he would not be a worthy sacrifice for our sins. If he were just a great man, he would still be fallible. If he were just a great teacher, he could still be wrong . If he were just a great leader, he would still be finite.
But he is the perfect God of creation. He entered into a sinful creation to redeem humanity.
It also matters because if Jesus were less than God, then not only would he be unworthy of our worship, but the very act of worshipping him would be blasphemous.
From the beginning of the Ten Commandments.
Exodus 20:2-3: 2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
We’re told elsewhere in the Bible that God is a jealous God.
But the gospels show people worshipping Jesus. He never corrects them or deflects worship when that happens. That is either blasphemous or warranted. There’s no middle ground. It is either acceptable to worship Jesus or it is not.
There reason why it’s warranted, why it’s acceptable is because Jesus is God.
Part of the reason why I love John’s Gospel is that it constantly confronts us with absolute claims about Jesus. Chief among them is that Jesus is God. That’s an absolute claim. It’s either true or it’s not. If it’s true, the only response is to believe in him, to worship him, to trust in him.
If it’s not, the rest of this gospel is meaningless and blasphemous.
IV. Jesus made everything
Verse 3: 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.
Again this is speaking to the divinity of Jesus. All things were made through him. All means all.
The ground, the trees, the sand of the beaches, the stars in the sky, the air we breathe, the materials we use to build things, all of it was made by Jesus.
He made every person. Each of us has billions of cells in our bodies. Incredible complexity and structure just within our own bodies.
He made the universe!
To put that in perspective, if you had an atlas of every galaxy in the entire universe and each page represented an entire galaxy, and if you spent just one second on every page and continually turned pages in the atlas, it would take you more than 31,000 years to flip all the way through the atlas.
The universe is incredibly, unfathomably big. There are more stars in the sky than there are grains of sand in all the beaches of the world. Yet there are more trees on earth than there are stars in our one galaxy. And that’s just looking at the amazing size of of our universe.
There is amazing creation within our world. New species of animals are still being discovered.
Did you know that? And they’re not all insects or really small animals. Since 2000, there have been new species of primates discovered. We don’t even yet know everything on our own planet.
Yet Jesus made it all.
There are other passages in the New Testament which speak to this fact.
Colossians 1:16
16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
We see this language as well in the opening chapter of the Book of Hebrews.
Hebrews 1:10 referring to Jesus says: You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands;
Jesus is the creator. He made everything. And John states it both ways. He made everything. And also there’s nothing that he didn’t make.
He’s a mighty God. It’s a lofty passage. It’s a confrontational passage. You affirm these truths or you don’t. Our society often likes to treat Jesus as something you can take or leave.
Gravity isn’t something that you can take or leave. Arithmetic isnt’ something that you can take or leave. Breathing isn’t something that you can take or leave.
Jesus isn’t something you can just take or leave. Jesus isn’t just a nice person or a nice idea. He’s the Lord of creation.
Many cherry pick certain teachings. Others treat him as a great teacher or a great religious leader. Jesus isn’t one good teacher among other great teachers. He’s God.
The sages of other major religious traditions were born. Buddha wasn’t there in the beginning. Mohammad wasn’t there in the beginning.
But in the beginning was the Word.
There have been great leaders in the world who have influenced nations and movements. Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Gandhi. Some like to just act like Jesus was a wise peace maker who came with a good message.
He’s so much more than that.
In the beginning was the Word.
And the Word created all things.
Thanks for reading! Please like and subscribe.
-
Sermon: That all may honor the Son – John 5:19-24
Audio only:
Transcript:
19 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. 20 For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. 21 For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will.
22 For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, 23 that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
Prayer
Our heavenly Father,We praise you that you invite us into a relationship and that you have made yourself known. The heavens declare your glory, and you have revealed yourself through your son.
Lord, may we be growing in this time as your followers and disciples.
Lord, as we discuss matters today relating to your divine nature and the relationship with your Son who came into our world, I pray that you guard the words I say as being faithful to your scripture and honoring to you, O Lord.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be acceptable in your sight,
O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
Lord, on Mother’s Day, I want to pray for the mother’s in the church.
We pray for the young mothers who still have children at home and I pray for you to lead and guide them in the monumental task that they have of raising children. (more…)
-
EFCA removes premillennialism from Statement of Faith
The Evangelical Free Church of America (EFCA) had an historical event yesterday at their bi-annual EFCA One Conference. The churches voted to alter the Statement of Faith. The change comes to article nine, which previously stated:We believe in the personal, bodily and premillennial return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ, at a time known only to God, demands constant expectancy and, as our blessed hope, motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission.
-EFCA Statement of Faith, Article 9
The change is just one word. Instead of saying “we believe in the personal, bodily and premillennial return of our Lord Jesus Christ” the Statement of Faith will now say “we believe in the personal, bodily and glorious return of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (more…)
