Bill, how do you explain
that Jesus is called �eternal father� in Is 9:6?
Izzy
Isaiah
9:6 (New American Standard
Bible)
6For a (A)child
will be born to us, a (B)son
will be given to
us;
And the (C)government
will rest (D)on
His shoulders;
And His
name will be called (E)Wonderful
Counselor, (F)Mighty
God,
Eternal (G)Father,
Prince of (H)Peace.
I do not know how
to explain it, Izzy. I remember that a professor at university, for whom I have
a very high regard, said that it has something to do with that post-resurrection
(our resurrection) day, when Christ receives the throne from the Father, but I
didn't understand him well enough that it stuck. It's a really good question,
though. Do you have any thoughts regarding an
explanation?
Bill
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, December 25, 2004 10:51
AM
Subject: RE: [TruthTalk] The Mind of
Christ
Izzy in
black:
"Father" is a
relational term, just like husband is a relational term. One cannot be a
husband without having a wife -- this is what I mean when I say it is a
"relational term." You were not a wife until you got married and had a
husband. It would have been non-sensical -- not to mention misleading --
for you to have maintained that you were always a wife from the
date of your birth but that one day you got married and had a husband.
Yet you wrote earlier that the "Trinity" is the Father, the Word, and
the Spirit. If I understand you correctly, you maintain that the Father
is eternal. If this is so, may I ask, whom was he the Father of? Do you
realize that you are suggesting, nay, demanding that God was the Father
of no one and nothing for an eternity before he created a woman to bear
a son? Do you realize that you are implying that God the Father was
actually illegitimate until he begat a son? Do you realize that you have
created a doctrine that makes God dependent upon his creation in order
to be what he claims to have been from eternity: a Father? Please ponder
these things.
Furthermore,
may I ask you to explain to me the nature of the Father's relationship
with the Word? Did they have a personal relationship? Was it a
Father/Son relationship, or was it something other than this? If it was
not a Father/Son relationship, what happened to that relationship on the
day that the son was begotten and the Word became flesh? Did that
relationship cease to exist? In other words, did the eternal God
change?
The foundation
for my position is everywhere in Scripture. But in order to keep this
conversation in a manageable context, allow me to repost the verses I
used to establish the eternal Sonship of
Christ:
- "Jesus
answered, 'If I honor Myself, My honor is nothing. It is My Father who
honors Me, of whom you say that He is your God.' ... Jesus said to
them, 'Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I
AM.'" (John
8.54,58)
In verse 54
Jesus identifies his "Father" as he who honors him. When he calls him
Father he identifies and establishes himself as the Son. It is the Son
who is honored by his Father. In verse 58 this same
Son makes a very clear and distinct reference to the Old Testament
name of God. In other words the Son identifies himself as both divine
and eternal. Was this Son misleading the Jews when he said these words?
Of course not -- unless, of course, he was not eternally the divine Son
of the Father.
- "And
now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which
I had with You before the world was." (John
17.5)
Again Jesus
speaks to the "Father." He speaks as the Son of the Father. This
Son commands the Father to glorify him with the glory that he had
shared with his Father before the cosmos was, which of
course is many thousand years prior to the date of his incarnation. Did
this Son mislead his hearers when he led them to believe that he had
shared in the glory of the Father before the world
was?
- "Father,
I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am,
that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved
Me before the foundation of the world." (John
17.24)
The same holds
true with this verse. Here the Son declares that the Father had loved
him before the foundation of the world. This again was millenia prior to
that date of his incarnation. If there was a time when the Son was not,
which is what I hear you asserting, then what glory is it which he
desires his hearers behold? By your argument the "Son" could not know
any glory except that glory which he knew from the time he had been
begotten. Any glory before that time would not be the glory of the
Father to his Son.
Moreover, what
kind of "love" was it that the Father had for this Son from before the
foundation of the world, if it was not the love of the Father for his
Son? This goes back to my relationship question before. We see here that
the love of the Father is the love of the Father for his Son.
Jesus said he knew this love before the foundation of the world. How
could he know this love of the Father if at that point in eternity he
was not the Father's Son?
Bill
Bill, how do you
explain that Jesus is called �eternal father� in Is 9:6?
Izzy
Isaiah 9:6 (New American Standard
Bible)
6For a (A)child
will be born to us, a (B)son
will be given to
us;
And the
(C)government
will rest (D)on
His
shoulders;
And
His name will be called (E)Wonderful
Counselor, (F)Mighty
God,
Eternal
(G)Father,
Prince of (H)Peace.
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