Re: [TruthTalk] The Eternal Sonship and the Adoption heresey

[knpraise]

 

 
-----Original Message-----
From: Judy Taylor <jandgtaylor1@juno.com>
To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
Cc: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
Sent: Fri, 2 Dec 2005 10:30:31 -0500
Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] The Eternal Sonship and the Adoption heresey

 

 

On Fri, 02 Dec 2005 09:43:46 -0500 [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

I cannot offer enlightenment to you, Judy.  

Are you saying that you can not explain to me what you are saying?

 

Yes  -   you are not one who takes the counsel of others  --  at least others on TT

 

I'm not seeking counsel JD, I would just like to understand your point - that's all.  the way of the fool is wise in his own sight, but the wise seek counsel. 

 

More to the point,  you read my comments with a view to opposition and for no other reason -----

that is apparent.  

 

So you continue to judge my motives JD and find it impossible to believe that I might just enjoy dialoguing with another believe outside of an evil motive?   

 

Yes, that would be my position.  I see absolutely no joy in your writings. 

 

Then you read them with a jaundiced eye - just like beauty is in the eye of the beholder;

everything cannot be joybells JD, but that is not an indictment against me personally.   Joybells ??   There is no joy in your instructional posts at all.   No peace. 

 

What bothers me about the "begotten" as used in John 3:16 AND 1:14 & 18   (monogenes)  is that is means "unique"  and has no reference to his physical birth. 

 

It means "unique" in the sense that He is the only one of a kind having a human mother and a Holy Spirit Father and if one reads in context this word does have to do with Him being born of the woman.

 

the three scriptures I gave you have nothing to do with His birth.   You are an Adoptionist

and I am not.

 

Wait a minute - who or what is an "adoptionist?"  Wait a minute.   Did you just ignore my textual argument??  And regarding the question, "Who ....  is an 'adoptionist,"  why that would be you.   God is always the Father but Christ is not always the Son  ---   an adoption of some sort has taken place in this line of "reasoning."  You are an adoptionist.  

 

You misunderstand my belief when you ask  

 

Why does it bother you that he layed aside the glory he had with the Father, emptied Himself and

took the form of a man?   

 

Well possibly this is why I am asking you to clarify what you are saying for me because at this    point it makes no sense.    What makes no sense?   And,  do you believe that you must understand HOW something happens before you can accept that it did, in fact, happen?  

 

The passage in Philip 2 speaks of changing form  --  not of ceasing to be God.

 

He did take upon Himself the form of a servant but he also layed aside the glory He had with the Father. 

 

Even in "servant form,"  "we" beheld his glory as the unique one  (John 1:14)

 

You didn't behold it personally JD.    Are you thinking that I believe I was actually there?   You cannot possibly be that ridiculous.   So why did you write this?  

 

 

     the apostle John was present at the Mount of Transfiguration

as Christine has pointed out already and He was seen in a measure of glory there along with  Moses and Elijah.    And all this happened when Christ was where   (earth) and in what  (the flesh). 

 

If He appeared here the way He was in heaven noone would be able to stand in His presence. Look at the reaction of Israel when Moses went up the mountain to meet with God. They were terrified and didn't want any part of it.  

 

No one is saying this

 

Then what exactly are you saying JD    Christ was fully God and man.   We know this to be true because it is just impossible to think of Him as half man and half God  --  phraseology that is as ridiculous as saying he was part man and part  God.  I thought that was pretty clear.    To reject this view is to argue for Adoption, to set up the scenario that man died for man  and that the Great Confession is not about Christ being deity as we declare his Sonship.  

 

Again, this has nothing to do with anyone's presentation.   I incorporate John 1:14 into the discussion  --  you ignore it for what ever reason. 

 

I'm not ignoring anything JD.  To date, you have offered no explanation for John's claim that he saw , in Christ, the glory as of the only begotten .   Until you show me how you INCORPORATE this passage into your thinking,   I am left with no choice but to think you ignore the passage.  

 

I don't need to because I have no agenda and nothing to prove so

I can receive ALL scripture - every Word and nothing offends me.  I love His Law.       Deegan refuses to answer questions;   Dean gets angry ;   and Judy uses very little scripture as she develops your sense of biblical interpretation.   If you accepted all scripture,  then you would say "Amen brother John " and move from John 1:14 to the next discussion point. 

 

More than this,  it says NOTHING OF LAYING ASIDE THE GLORY OF GOD.  

 

As a member of the Godhead what other kind of glory would He be laying aside?

 

He was God in the flesh.   That is the teaching of scripture.   Look to the phrase "And Jesus Christ came in the flesh."   "Jesus Christ" for that writer is God  and , thus, the writer sees value in telling us that Jesus Christ came in the flesh  --   an otherwise redundant comment.   More than this,   such is the foundation stone of the Christian Confession  (cf. I Jo 4:2.)

 

I don't deny that Jesus Christ came in the flesh JD   In the context of my statement above,  you most certainly do deny such.   This statement of John is a confession that God became flesh.   It is an unnecessary statement if it means anything less.

 

 

 

 or that he was also the "son of man" but what

does this have to do with his laying down the glory He had with the Father as per Phil 2:7  Where in the  Philip passage does it tell us that He layed aside His glory?      when he made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men ... which literally means emptying himself and divesting himself of his visible glory.  If he

actually came as God he would hardly have been "of no reputation"   

The first chapter of John's gospel makes it clear that God (Christ) came to "his people"  (in this case they are ONLY the people of GOD).  The Word,  pronounced to be God Himself in v 1 became flesh and in the flesh,  we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten  (v 14).  

 

Yeah! Well some remained, He was anointed and He is/was holy, unlike the generation He walked amongst.   

 

That he layed aside His form and took on the form of a servant does not bother me in the slightest.   But it is heretical to then argue that He ceased to be God.  

 

I don't remember arguing that specifically - what I have been saying is that while here He was born as a human baby, he had to grow and learn certain things as a child and He walked as a man anointed by the Spirit of God in total dependence upon the Father.  If He were walking around as "wholly God" How would He then have been an example that we could follow (in His steps)?  

 

Humility.   That is how it all happened.   God humbled Himself and did these things.  Look at what Christ did here on earth that declare His divinity.   First,  he is oberved to be divine.   Secondly,  He forgives sin  --  an exclusive function of God.   He continued to have a memory of the way things were before the foundations of the world. He accepted worship.   He continued to command legions of angels.   And He allowed for being the Son of God , making himself equal to God.   The Great Confession of Peter's ("Thou are the Christ, the son of the Living God')  is completely misunderstood if one does not see that this is a confession of His diety and attachment to the God of Israel.   The Confession is meaningless if not inclusive of divine nature. 

 

Noone disputes the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ had a "divine nature" JD.  But you are not allowing

God the Father to be part of the equation.  Remember Jesus did not do anything or say anything that

he did not first hear the Father do and say in the now - there is no reference in scripture to memory.

God the Father spoke from heaven.  Jesus the man got up early in the morning and prayed to Him.

He was not a lone ranger. Whereas reading your first three sentences above might give one the impression that God Himself actually left heaven.

 

Especially in view of the foregoing.   To argue that at some point in time,  Jesus Christ became the Son of God is to preach the doctrine of Adoption.  You have man saving man instead of God saving man  --  and that bothers me. Jd

 

How can you call it "man saving man" when it is what God ordained from the foundation of the world?  Jesus is called many things in scripture including "the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world"  

 

I don't believe this (man saving man)   .....   you do if you believe that he was not God in the flesh.  jd

 

 

 

 

From: Judy Taylor <jandgtaylor1@juno.com>

What are you saying here JD?  I've read it through and was no more enlightened at the end than before I began.

What bothers you about Jesus the man being "begotten" of the Father, rather than made like Adam or procreated

from two human beings like us?

 

Why does it bother you that he layed aside the glory he had with the Father, emptied Himself and took the form

of a man?

 

Is your faith rooted in ontology?

 

 

On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 20:49:51 -0500 [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

 

 
I have read a number of articles concerning the Sonship of Christ as the result of some action associated with His incarnation.   

 

 

The Apostle John clearly understood Christ to be the Son of God and God at the same time.   

 

Those who disagree find the sonship established with His birth,  others see it in His resurrection and still others see the sonship vested in the ascension.    All of these considerations imply that there was a time when Christ was not the son of God.    I might add that these very people believe that Christ was not Son of God at a time in history when God WAS the Father   ---   few argue that God was ever not the Father.  

 

If God has always been the Father but Christ's Sonship is not an extension of His eternal nature, then adoption is the  only solution.   The silliness that "begotten" has to do with "birthing" as opposed to "uniqueness" is at the center of this heresy.  

 

At this time of year,   we celebrate much more than the birth of Christ.   We , in fact, celebrate the coming of God into our world   -   or perhaps I should say "into His world."  We have decided, each of us, to worship the man Jesus precisely because He was and is and will always be GOD.  

 

If God was completely folded into this man [Christ]  then  God acted as man to save man.  There  can be no eternal value in the salvation of man by man.   There can be no demand to worship Christ for the same reason.    But few make this argument.   On the other hand,  many argue  that Christ emptied Himself of being God,  took on our form, and became the savior of mankind.   There is no difference between the first consideration and the second.   There is no alternative (other than the heretical) to the notion that God in Christ experienced what seemed to an impossibility (for God) and died so that all might live.  His death has eternal value because He is (and was) God.    God dying for man when coupled with the resurrection and the ascension&nbs p; [ both functions of a LIVING God ]   is one thing.   Man dying for man is something else and far less profound.  

 

To change form as God , is reasonable.   To cease to be God for some grand purpose or to become God when one is not God  is to believe in that which cannot be.     I cannot stop being who I am, in essence.  And I cannot become what I am not.   Neither can God, IMO,  because of the ontology of the circumstance.  

 

 

the point is this:   the Great God Almighty  accomplished His mightiest work in an event that stripped Him of all that we would consider to be His essence  !!!    Only God could survive such an event.   Hence, only God could actually save man  --   and that was His intention from the beginning of the foundations of the world. 

 

Thank you Jesus

 

 

Pastor Smithson

 

                                         judyt                                       
He that says "I know Him" and doesn't keep His Commandments
                              is a liar (1 John 2:4)

 

                                         judyt                                       
He that says "I know Him" and doesn't keep His Commandments
                              is a liar (1 John 2:4)

 

                                         judyt                                       
He that says "I know Him" and doesn't keep His Commandments
                              is a liar (1 John 2:4)