IS GOD A TRINITY? PART TWELVE
THE TWO ADAMS:
The scriptures compare Jesus with the first Adam. The first Adam was directly created by God, placed in the Garden of Eden and given authority over the physical creation. This first Adam was created with human nature which became a sinful nature due to Adam’s failure to resist temptation. All humans have followed in the footsteps of the first Adam except one. As the second Adam, Jesus did not cave in to temptation but lived a sinless life and was thus able to be the perfect sacrifice for the sin that began with the first Adam. The scriptures clearly show that as sin came about as a result of the actions of the man Adam, salvation from the consequences of sin came about as the result of the actions of the man Jesus. The scriptures also clearly show that Jesus, as the second Adam, had the same human nature as the first Adam as He had to constantly strive to resist temptation.
Hebrews 2:17-18: For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
Hebrews 4:15: For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are--yet was without sin.
This passage of scripture plainly tells us that Jesus was made like other humans in every way and because of this He was able to be tempted like other humans. The Greek word translated “tempted” is pirazo and means to be tried, tested, proved or tempted. It is the same word used in the account of Satan tempting Jesus during His forty day fast after His baptism.
Apostle James writes that God cannot be tempted. Here the Greek word is apirastos. It appears in the passive tense which translates as "God cannot be tempted." Yet we see Jesus was tempted just like we are. We are tempted by evil. Jesus was tempted by evil. Satan, the personification of evil, tempted Jesus. Though Jesus was able to resist all temptation, it doesn't take away the fact that He was tempted.
James 1:13: When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted (apirastos) by evil, nor does he tempt (pirazo) anyone.
If Jesus is God, He could not be tempted. Yet Jesus was tempted. Trinitarians may argue that only the human side of Jesus was tempted. If Jesus was fully God while being fully human, was only His “human side” capable of yielding to temptation while His “God side” was not? Somehow this makes no sense at all and nowhere do we find such a teaching in scripture. If Jesus was fully God and fully human, then He wasn’t “made like His brothers in every way” as we humans are certainly not God and we are very capable of yielding to temptation resulting in sin. If Jesus was God in the flesh He would be incapable of committing sin. If Jesus wasn’t capable of sinning He wasn’t made like His brothers in every way. If Jesus was incapable of sin, then He didn’t truly share in our humanity as scripture indicates.
Paul speaks of the first Adam being a pattern of the one that was to come (Romans 5:14). The first Adam was born without sin and given opportunity to reign over creation. The first Adam had the ability to sin. This Adam yielded to temptation and consequently was banished from the garden and assigned to death. Like the first Adam, Jesus, the second Adam, was born without sin, but unlike the first Adam was able to resist temptation and not sin and was assigned to life and became the vehicle through whom death is replaced with life for all of mankind. Because of sin, the first Adam was limited to being a living human Being subject to eternal death. The last Adam, by not sinning, could not be held by death and was resurrected to life and became a life giving Spirit.
1 Corinthians 15:45: The first man Adam became a living being; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit.
Romans 5:15-19: For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.
It was through the disobedience of the man Adam that sin and death came about. It was through the obedience of the man Jesus (the second or last Adam) that sin and death is eliminated. Since God cannot be tempted or die, it should be plain that Jesus is not God. Jesus was tempted. Jesus died. Jesus was made to be like all other humans. There is not a hint in any of this that while Jesus was experiencing all this humanity He was also God incarnate. The first Adam was directly created by God. Jesus, as the second Adam, was directly created by God in the womb of Mary. In order for Jesus to be like Adam He had to be totally human. He had to be able to sin like Adam did and die like Adam died. Adam was not both human and Divine. Adam was totally human and so was Jesus.
It has been said that you can’t really know how someone else feels until you walk in their shoes. Jesus walked in our shoes. The shoes we walk in are 100% human shoes. For Jesus to truly experience humanity He needed to be totally human, not totally human and totally Divine. To postulate that Jesus had a dual nature of humanity and Divinity is to virtually devalue what Jesus accomplished.
God chose to facilitate the birth of Jesus to fulfill the Messianic promises. This is why God had Him named Jesus which means “YHWH saves” and why He was called the Christ which means anointed one. Jesus was the anointed human agent of God to carry out God’s purpose on planet earth. It is the Father from whom salvation comes. The Father has facilitated His salvation through Jesus. Apostle Peter’s quote of what Moses said, as recorded in Deuteronomy 18, is instructive as to who Jesus was.
Acts 3:22: For Moses said, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you must listen to everything he tells you.”
In this same chapter of Acts, Peter identifies Jesus as God’s servant (verse 13 & 26), as God’s Christ (verse 18) and as the offspring of Abraham (verse 25). A careful reading of the scriptures will show they do not teach the Messiah was to be God in the flesh. The OT indicates the promised Messiah would be a ruler in the mold of Moses and David. This is what the Jews have always believed and believe unto this day.
Moses and David did not exist prior to their human birth. The Jews have never concluded from the Old Testament Scriptures that the Messiah would be a pre-existent Being. There great failure was that they did not recognize fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies in the first century and most Jews fail to recognize such fulfillment to this very day.
Because of what Jesus accomplished as the human Son of God and because of His elevation to being the most powerful Being in the universe next to God, Jesus is worthy of the highest level of reverence next to God Himself. While Jesus is not in anyway co-equal, co-eternal or consubstantial with the One and Only Most High God, He is above all powers extant under the One and Only Most High God and is to be worshiped accordingly. Can Jesus be prayed too? Yes He can. Prayer is petitioning higher authority. Next to God, Jesus is the highest authority there is. Paul identifies Jesus as the mediator between God and man. Yes, Jesus can be prayed to along with the Father. The scriptural focus, however, is to pray to the Father in the name of Jesus.
IS JESUS DIVINE?
Is Jesus Divine? The Greek word for divine is thios and is used three times in the NT. Peter uses this word twice in relation to the power and nature of God in 2 Peter 1:3-4. We know it is God the Father who is referenced by Peter because he speaks of Divinity in association with Him who has called us and we know from other scriptures that it is the Father who calls us. Paul uses thios in Acts 17:29 to show a Divine Being is not made of earthly materials. The context (verse 24-29) shows it is the Creator God who is designated as a Divine Being (NIV) and who is contrasted with the man made gods of the Greeks. The Creator God (Divine Being) is also contrasted with Jesus as we see in verse 31 Paul speaks of God, the Divine Being just alluded to, as judging the world through Jesus whom He has raised from the dead.
In scripture, Divinity is applied to the Father and Creator God in contrast to all other gods and even to Jesus. The scriptures do not identify Jesus with the Greek thios. Peter and Paul use thios to identify God the Father and God the Creator. The Greek thios implies a supernatural, someone who exceeds the bounds of being human. While Jesus did exceed the bounds of normal humanity as the Christ and in His glorified state is certainly supernatural, Jesus is not Divine as God the Father is Divine. This is the same as saying Jesus is not God as God is God, a conclusion already established in these essays. In Greek literature, thios is also use to define those in close association to the Divine (see Arndt, Gingrich and Bauer Greek Lexicon). In this respect Jesus can be looked upon as divine (small d) just as He can be looked upon as a god (small g). Words such as elohim, theos, kurios and thios do not intrinsically mean the One and Only true God as these words are applied to Beings of lesser status to whom power and authority have been granted. Therefore, I personally do not hesitate to relate to Jesus as divine and as a god as long as I maintain the understanding that He is not the One and Only Supreme Divinity, the Most High Creator God who is the God and Father of Jesus.
There is only one Supreme, Most High God who is a self-existent Being and is identified in scripture as Father and YHWH Elohim. All life comes from this self-existent Being including the life of Jesus. Jesus plainly said, “For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son to have life in himself” (John 5:26). The context in which this passage is found is dealing with eternal life. Apostle Paul writes to Timothy that only God has immortality. The context of Paul’s letter shows Paul is distinguishing between Christ and God and showing that only God has innate immortality. All other immortality is granted immortality and comes from the One and Only God (1 Timothy 6:12-15).
Apostle Paul also makes it very clear that God, the Father, is the God of Jesus, “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better (Ephesians 1:17). I again ask how the Father can be the God of Jesus and Jesus be that God.
Trinitarians insist the word of God is God the Son and it is the Son as the word of God who is the person of the Godhead that created all things. The scriptures, however, show the word of God (YHWH) equates with His breath, thus showing it was by what came out of His month that creation took place. Trinitarians respond by claiming YHWH is the Son and it is by His breath creation took place. We have shown in this series that YHWH is not the Son but is the Father and it is through the breath of the Father that creation occurred.
Psalm 33:6: By the word of the LORD (YHWH) were the heavens made, their starry host by the breath of his mouth.
Paul shows it is the one and only eternal and wise God who establishes us through the gospel of Christ so that He, the eternal and wise God, can be glorified through Christ. Paul directs focus on God who is to be glorified through the Son. Paul contrasts the only wise God with Jesus Christ. This fits well with the words of Jesus who said He had come to reveal the Father. Throughout the scriptures,Jesus is seem as constantly directing attention to the Father whom He plainly said was greater than He.
In Romans 16:25-27: Now to him who is able to establish you by my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all nations might believe and obey him-- to the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ! Amen.”
Some may argue that God is the God of Jesus in the person of the Father who is God as the Son and Spirit is God. All three persons of the “Godhead” are seen as relating to each other as God. Therefore, it is believed Jesus refers to God as His God within the relational oneness that is God. This argument, however, assumes God is a Trinity of Father, Son and Spirit. The scriptures nowhere speak of God the Son or God the Spirit. They only speak of God the Father. The few scriptures where the Greek Theos is associated with Jesus, the context suggests nothing about Jesus being part of a Triune God. These scriptures can easily be seen to identify Jesus as a god (small g) in the sense of having been given great power and authority by the one and only Divine God of the universe.
Trinitarians and some Non-Trinitarians believe a pre-existing Son of God, having innate eternal life, is the one who became the man Jesus. Actually it’s the other way around. The man Jesus, through begettal in the womb of Mary by the Spirit of the One and Only life giving Eternal God, became the Son. This Son was given life by His Father. If Jesus was God as God is God, He would already have eternal life and would not need to have it granted by the Father.
Some Trinitarians, who recognize the contradiction inherent in the concept of eternal begettal, believe begettal, as used in reference to Christ, has nothing to do with His eternal existence as the Son but pertains only to His human conception as the man Jesus. Therefore, all references to God are to be seen through the eyes of the human Jesus and not through His Divine eyes. When Jesus speaks of the Father as the only true God, He is doing so from His human perspective. David’s reference to Jesus as adoni, signifying a non-deity, is seen as a reference to Jesus’ humanity. Jesus identifying Himself with the human elohim of Psalm 82 is Jesus referring to his humanity. It is believed that all the scriptures showing Jesus to be subservient to the Father are to be viewed in terms of His human relationship with God. These are all statements describing how Jesus relates to God as a human. Even after His resurrection and ascension, it is believed that Jesus maintains his dual nature of Divinity and humanity and is therefore able to act as a mediator between God and man. The Son’s Divinity and incarnation is believed to be identified in the “pre-existence” statements found in the Gospel of John and in some of Paul’s letters and therefore Jesus is seen as both Human and Divine.
This approach is highly problematical. For Jesus to have taught the Father is the only true God (John 17:3 & 5:44) while knowing He too is the true God is an obvious oxymoron. Paul clearly shows Christ to be subservient to God in His glorified state as seen in 1 Corinthians 15:27-28. In scriptural passages where Christ is seen in a glorified state, He continues to relate to God as His God (Revelation1:7). In Revelation, chapter one, Jesus is seen as having been dead but is now alive. Jesus plainly says, I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever! (Revelation 1:18). In order to die, Jesus had to be mortal. Incarnational theology teaches Jesus was fully man and fully God which is to teach Jesus was fully mortal and fully immortal. This is an absolute contradiction.
The Son of God died. God resurrected His Son to eternal life. Jesus was the first born from the dead (Revelation 1:5). All other resurrections (Lazarus for example) were resurrections to mortal life. The resurrection of Jesus was to immortal life. Jesus moved from being mortal to being immortal. We see Jesus relating to God exactly the same way as a glorified immortal as He did as a human mortal. There is no justification in concluding the scriptures show the mortal Jesus viewed God through human eyes while all the time being the immortal God.
If Jesus was God in the flesh, there is no scriptural reason to believe His humanity overrode His Divinity and all his thinking was humanly driven and therefore His comments about the Father being the only true God and being greater than He are all comments that must be seen in His existence as a human and not His existence as God. As already stated in these essays, for Jesus to say His Father is greater than He from only a human perspective is superfluous as all humans would be naturally less great than God. Jesus was saying that even though He was the Son of His Father God, His Father God was superior to him. In the same manner, when Jesus said His Father was the one and only true God, He made a definitive statement as to who God is and not just a statement as to who God is from a human perspective.