Category: Trinitarian Commentary

We’re going through the New Testament looking for clues to the doctrine of the Trinity.  We’ve been going through the book of John and we’re in the prologue right now. We’ve been spending a day on each verse aside from John 1:1 on which we spent three days. We’re almost to the end as after this one, we have only one more verse to go. Tonight, we are going to be looking at John 1:17.

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

The Law of Moses. Those words if uttered to a Jew would immediately bring about reverence. If there was one thing they all agreed on, it was that the Law of Moses had authority. One contrast that will also be seen in the book of John is not just Jesus in comparison with John the Baptist, but Jesus in comparison with Moses.

The Law was the decree of God. It was the way of salvation. It was what had to be followed if Israel did not want to go into exile again. It was their righteousness. They showed that they belonged to the covenant of YHWH by following the Law. It was revealed divinely by God. Tablets were written by the very finger of God. It had been handed down and passed down from generation to generation. It was certainly not taken lightly.

John gives it an inferior position already here.

We discussed this some when we talked about the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus gives the speech and the obvious reply to his setting aside the Law would have been “Who do you think you are? God?”

Well, just maybe he did.

Of course, the Hebrews writer will tell us that when something is set aside, it is because it is replaced with a greater. What is the greater? In this case, it is what came through Jesus Christ. That greater is grace and truth.

The Law could tell our condition before God, but it could not rectify that condition. Sacrifices were never capable of removing sins. It could tell us a way to live holy lives. It could not make us holy in itself. It was a pointer to what was to come, and that was Christ. We must remember that while the Law was meant to lead us to Christ, we should not denigrate the Law. The Law is holy and good and it still gives us moral commands that we are to follow today.

Christ offers something different. He offers grace. He tells us how it is that we can be saved and he forgives us. His sacrifice is capable of removing the stain of sin in our lives. He not only shows us where we are wrong. He corrects it. He does for us what we could never do for ourselves and never will be able to do for ourselves.

Truth also comes. Christ gives us the truth. He tells us who we are and he tells us who we are to be. That is only found by coming through him who is the truth, a concept we will look at later when we get to the fourteenth chapter. 

Truth is essential to everything. Truth is a major concept that we will find all throughout this gospel. It is what sets us free. It is what we are to know. It is one of the ways that Jesus uses to identify himself. Definitely nothing to take lightly.

Tomorrow, we shall wrap up the prologue of John.

We’re going to resume again going through the New Testament and looking for clues to the Trinity. I would also like to extend my thanks to Fred and Raphael for their comments. It is much appreciated and hopefully such questions can be used to stop the silent holocaust that is going on in America and thinks to recent legislation, our tax dollars are now supporting overseas. Tonight, we’re going to continue our look at the prologue of John and we will be looking at John 1:16.

From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.

Something easy to overlook is that this verse is talking about Christ. Christ is seen as the source of grace and blessings. John is reminding his readers that if they have any blessing in life, they have it because of Christ. This is certainly a high view of Christ that is being endorsed in this passage.

It is the fulness of his grace also. Christ is not lacking at all in grace. How could he if he’s very God? If you want to know if Christ can become more gracious, the answer is no. You might wonder why you do not see his blessing on your life. If the problem is not with him, it could be that you’re not receptive of it.

I don’t want to sound like a prosperity teacher however in saying that. When I speak of blessing, I am not speaking of loads of money or never being sick. I am speaking more of the simple joys that take place every day around you and that you don’t take the time to consider. Lest you also think I’m only talking about you, I’m not. I’m just as guilty of it.

This is found by you just focusing on the things in your life. Are you able to read this right now? Consider yourself blessed that you have eyesight. Maybe someone else is reading it to you if you’re blind. Consider yourself blessed that you have hearing. Chances are you’re reading this on your own. Consider yourself blessed that you have a computer and hopefully you live in a country where you have the freedom to read these kinds of materials online without fear of the government.

What else do you have? Consider your family. Consider your friends. What all is going on? Have you considered especially the great Christian truths? Have you considered that Christ is alive and that God is on his throne right now? Have you really thought about what an awesome being God is lately, or is that one problem you have in your life somehow eclipsing the grandeur of God? (For those who think I am pointing fingers again, I am still speaking just as much to me as I am to you.)

I often wonder how much better our lives would be if we would just take some time to consider the nature of the God we love and serve and what he is really like. I look forward to the day when the church returns to strong doctrine that will also result in right living.

Today, from his fulness, you have received one blessing after another. Can you really count them? Just consider them and as Paul says in Philippians 4:8, think on these things.

We’re continuing going through the New Testament and understanding the Trinitarian concepts therein. Let us remember that the Trinity is a systematic doctrine. I saw a JW today saying that John 1:1 does not teach tri-unity, for example. I agree. If it did, it would teach the deity of the Holy Spirit. However, it does teach that Jesus is fully God and that the Father is fully God and that Jesus is not the Father. Those three teachings are essential for the Trinity. In the end, we will take the texts that we have and hopefully the overall look we’ve given will supply the Christian with a strong Trinitarian defense. Tonight, we’ll be looking at John 1:15.

John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ “

We just saw the mind-blowing teaching that the Word became flesh, which is the message John wants to emphasize the most I believe in this prologue. If you do not have the Word becoming flesh, you do not have the gospel. Everything centers on this as now he goes back and talks about John. What does he say?

John the Baptisthad testified of the Word becoming flesh. Everything that the Baptist said earlier about the light and being a testimony to the light is now coming to play. The Word became flesh. This is the one John was testifying about. The writer John wants to be sure that his readers catch this point.

Note something interesting. John the Baptist realizes that Jesus’s ministry came after his, however, at the same time, he knows that Jesus was before him. How could this be? When Mary conceived, Elizabeth was already well along in her pregnancy. How could it be that Jesus came before the Baptist?

For that, we simply need to look at John 1:1. Jesus’s ministry did not come before in the sense of the three years he spent ministering on Earth during the incarnation. However, Jesus did come before in that he was around long before John the Baptist. In fact, he has eternally been around.

Let’s note this also. Jesus did not come into existence in the prior verse as some would say. The incarnation came into existence. The Son does not have a beginning in time, but his humanity does have a beginning in time. This is a mistake that anti-Trinitarians often make in their understanding of Christ. The humanity of Christ is not eternal. His existence as deity is however.

The Baptist makes it clear that the Son is greater than he is. Once again, I believe John the writer wrote this so we would not mistake the lesser light for the greater light. John the Baptist was important for pointing to Christ, which is the only way any of us are ever important in our ministries. For instance, I love getting hits on this blog and it’s great to know several of you are reading, but this blog is only serving a good purpose insofar as it is getting many of you to look to Christ.

As we continue, we will see John summing up what he has been saying earlier and getting us in the end to another grand statement of who Jesus is.

It’s time to get back to going through the New Testament and understanding the doctrine of the Trinity. We took a little detour but hey, it’s my blog and if I want to do that you all will just have to suffer. I hope you didn’t though! I also wish to think Kelp for his compliment and I agree, I am not speaking of just the pastors but to all of us. Tonight, we’re returning to the prologue to the gospel of John and looking at my favorite verse in the prologue, John 1:18.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

My good friend, Christian apologist and author Frank Turek has said before that if you can believe Genesis 1:1 in the Bible, everything else is child’s play. I understand where he’s coming from with that, but I frankly must disagree. I can easily understand the idea of a God creating the world. I’m not saying I understand how he did it, but that he did it makes sense.

To me, the concept that one person who is fully God would be born and live a life among human beings and take on our nature in addition to his deity is absolutely mind-blowing.

I spoke on John 1:1 of a predicate nominative indicating that the Word has the nature of the God he is with. The same is used with the Word became flesh. The Word took on the nature of humanity. Flesh in this passage does not refer to the sin nature, but rather to the human nature. 

The incarnation should be absolutely stunning. At this point, the Word had been active and we knew the Word had come in some way, but most people would have been utterly stunned at this. The divine and the human did not interact in this way! Heaven and Earth were there and never the twain shall meet!

God acts in the way we did not expect him to at all.

He dwelt among us. It literally means that he tabernacled among us. He pitched his tent. He took up temporary residence. In 1 Kings 8, Solomon said about the temple “Surely God will not dwell among men.” Well, it turns out he would. He would dwell not just in the Shekinah glory of the Holy Spirit, but up close and personal. In fact, it can be said that Jesus was a walking Shekinah.

This is also the first mention of us. John has spoken about other people, but now he brings it home. This didn’t happen to just some random group. This happened to us. John is referring to his readers and in the long-term, even us. The Word dwelt among humans. He lived as a human. This isn’t a fairy tale story. This is actual history.

We saw his glory. John is probably thinking here of the transfiguration which is not mentioned in his gospel, but he wants his readers to know that he knows about that event. Peter also mentioned that event in 2 Peter 1.

Note also the distinction from the Father. Jesus is the Son. He is not the Father. John wants us to be sure who we are dealing with. The Father did not become flesh and dwelt among us. It was the Son who did so, but Jesus came from him. John came from God, but in saying Jesus came from the Father, we see the unique nature of the relationship between the Father and the Son.

And Jesus is full of grace and truth. These two are quite foundational for John and when we go through his writings, we will see both of them. When the Son becomes incarnate, grace and truth are beheld by men in a unique way.

Truly, John 1:14 is a stunning verse. When you read the prologue of John next time and get to that verse, just stop and think about it for awhile.

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

We’re going through the New Testament and looking for clues to understanding the deity of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity. We’ve been spending some time lately in the Gospel of John and namely, the prologue. Tonight, we’re going to be looking at John 1:13.

children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

Spiros Zodhiates has an interesting take on this passage in that he believes it is not speaking of children but of an individual. In this case, the individual is born not of natural descent or of human decision or of a husband’s will, but born of God. If we are asking who this individual is, then the only answer is that it is Christ. This fits in with the surrounding context according to him and John does not need to explain that this is the Word as the Word has been spoken of enough. Does this idea have some merit to it? I’m not fully convinced by it, but it is an interesting one and I leave it open for the reader to look into and decide. 

Let us suppose though that that is wrong and this is talking about instead the way that we do become children of God. First off, what is meant by bloods, as some have it instead of natural descent. It could refer to the coming together of the man and the woman and the mixing of their bloods. There is early Jewish tradition that shows that this is how they understood sexual activity. For those who placed stock in their heritage, John could be making a point and saying that you’re not a child of God just because your folks were descended from Abraham.

What of human decision? Of course, this could refer to a Calvinistic understanding whereby only the elect are saved. Some readers will agree with that. For some, it could refer to the will of human beings in an attempt to bring about the new birth through sexual activity as well. One cannot become a child of God simply by being born of some who are said to be children of God. Sexual desire in no way can bring about the new birth even when it reaches its completion in physical birth. Spiritual birth and physical birth are not the same.

I do not wish to take a side on that issue as I try to focus on Mere Christianity. I leave it to my readers to decide for themselves.

Nor of a husband’s will. This would go along with the other understanding in that nothing human could have brought this about. In Israel, a husband could invalidate the vow of a wife for instance. A wife could not be made a child of God by her husband however. Nor could the husband be made a child of God by the wife. Becoming a child of God will be the responsibility of the individual. If they are elect to do so in the Calvinistic understanding, they will do so. If the Arminian understanding is correct, it simply means one becomes a child of God not by human means but by divine.

The important aspect though is that which the verse ends on. Christ enables us to somehow be born of God. We can work out the details on how that fits in with free-will and divine sovereignty in the meantime, but until then, let us see to it that we are indeed born of God.

We’re going through the New Testament and looking for clues to the doctrine of the Trinity. We’re in the prologue of John now and going over each verse. I have noted that not every verse touches essentially on the doctrine of the Trinity, but each verse tells us something about who Jesus is and we want to put them all together and form a beautiful mosaic. Tonight, we’ll be looking at verse 12.

Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—

The past two days, we gave the bad news. Today, we gave the good news. John has given us the way to become children of God. Do we really think of how awesome that is? Let’s consider looking at a pagan in contrast. This is the 9th chapter in the golden sayings of Epictetus, a wonderful work from a thinker shortly after the time of Christ that everyone should read.

If a man could be thoroughly penetrated, as he ought, with this thought, that we are all in an especial manner sprung from God, and that God is the Father of men as well as of Gods, full surely he would never conceive aught ignoble or base of himself. Whereas if Cæsar were to adopt you, your haughty looks would be intolerable; will you not be elated at knowing that you are the son of God? Now however it is not so with us: but seeing that in our birth these two things are commingled—the body which we share with the animals, and the Reason and Thought which we share with the Gods, many decline towards this unhappy kinship with the dead, few rise to the blessed kinship with the Divine. Since then every one must deal with each thing according to the view which he forms about it, those few who hold that they are born for fidelity, modesty, and unerring sureness in dealing with the things of sense, never conceive aught base or ignoble of themselves: but the multitude the contrary. Why, what am I?—A wretched human creature; with this miserable flesh of mine. Miserable indeed! but you have something better than that paltry flesh of yours. Why then cling to the one, and neglect the other?

Now when he meant son of God, he meant one who came from Zeus, much like Paul did at Mars Hill. Not a physical descendant in a sexual sense, but in the sense of being part of the creation. For Paul, it’s something better. It’s being a part of the family of God and being adopted into his family. The same applies to John. Consider his shock in 1 John 3:1.

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

John can hardly seem to contain his excitement. “And that is what we are!” He has given us this good news that he deemed important enough to put in the prologue. This Word is the way that we can become part of the family of God.

Let us make sure we heed that Word.

We’re going through the New Testament now trying to come to a deeper understanding of the doctrine of Trinity. For the past 2 weeks nearly, we’ve been looking at the prologue to John. We spent three days on the first verse and now we’re spending a day on each verse. Today, we’re going to be looking at verse 11.

He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.

Last night, we noted how tragic verse 10 was. It is stated that the world did not receive him. One can picture an Israelite thinking the people of Israel are better. The sad truth is that they weren’t. John says that his own did not receive him. 

The battle had begun back in the Garden of Eden. I don’t care if you’re OEC or YEC, it had been a long time ago. It had been prophecied that one would come. The battle between good and evil would be ended. Satan would be defeated. The curse would end. Israel would live in a golden era.

Abraham had been told about one. He was told that through his seed, his offspring would be reckoned. Who was the one who would come who would be of the lineage of Abraham?

Moses told the people that God would send a prophet like him to the people and that they were to listen to him. Moses was the highest authority at the time of Christ. A good rabbi would not dare go against Moses. Pharisees and Sadducees all agreed. Moses was the authority. Surely we should heed who he told us to heed.

David is told that he would have one of his sons sit on the throne forever. Messianic interest was building. By the time we get to the time of Christ, Messianic pretenders show up regularly. There was one on every street corner.

Jesus shows up at this point in time. Hopes are high. Rome is a dominant power. Israel longs to be free. Here now comes the one that has been prophesied. This is the one who is the seed of Abraham. He is of the tribe of Judah. He is the prophet Moses spoke of. He is of the lineage of David. He comes from Bethlehem. The time of Daniel is upon us! Finally! The story will have a happy ending!

Yet Israel rejected their Messiah.

One could hardly find a sadder thought. The one who had come to save them was the one they rejected. He fit God’s criteria, but he did not fit Israel’s criteria. He did not come to deliver from Rome. He came instead to deliver from sin. He did not come as a warrior. He came as a prophet and a preacher. 

We can say “How could they do such?” We’re ones to talk. We’re not much better. We often want deliverance that is on the same level. We want deliverance from sickness or from poverty or something of that sort. That’s not a bad desire, of course, but it could be God has a better desire.

Do we reject him also because he doesn’t meet our criteria?

It’s the main thought of our society. We want God to act on our terms. Do we want to act on his?

We want him to accept us as we are. Do we accept him as he is?

Well?

We’re going through the NT trying to come to a deeper understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. Right now, we’re looking at the prologue of John. Each day, we’ve been looking at one verse with the exception of the first verse that we spent three days analyzing each part. Today, we are going to be looking at verse 10.

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.

It is written in a tragic sense and we should see it as a tragedy. This is the first note of sadness that has entered the prologue. One would think that seeing all the good that was spoken of this figure that there would be great acceptance of him, but indeed there wasn’t. While he created the world, the world did not know him.

Note that man can know his creator. It is simply that man does not choose to know him. Why? John has told us earlier. It is because his deeds are evil. We see in the gospels that man’s deeds are so evil that they try to extinguish the light. I believe there are some atheists out there that are atheists because of a desire to extinguish the light of conviction. When a heinous sin takes place and one becomes an atheist shortly afterwards, you wonder if the cart is really pulling the horse. 

This is what happens with Christ. Christ came and revealed the nature of the world. He showed people who they really were and they did not like it. He showed the Pharisees that they were not as righteous as they thought they were. The leading populace could not put up with him and the best way to deal with him since they could not deny the message was to eliminate the messenger.

It is important to note that the text says that the world was made through him. The Bible is quite consistent with this terminology as we will see as we go throughout the New Testament. Why does this matter so much? One only needs to think back to the Wisdom motif that is in Proverbs 8. Christ, being the Wisdom of God, was the instrument through which the universe was created.

Of course, that does not deny his deity at all. He eternally was and did not need to be created seeing as he is God’s Wisdom and there has never been a time when God has been without his Wisdom. That there are different roles within the Trinity does not deny the different persons of the Trinity nor that each of the persons is fully God. As we see more the consistency of this kind of position, we will gain a strong respect for how the biblical writers phrased their terminology so beautifully and were already even in the time of the apostolic writings working out the doctrine that would come to be finalized in the Trinity.

For now, let us note the tragedy. The world did not know him. While we can condemn those who did evil back then in crucifying the Lord of Glory, let us not make sure that we are crucifying him anew today by denying who he is.

We’re going through the New Testament looking at the doctrine of the Trinity and wanting to come to a deeper understanding of it. Right now, we are in the incredibly rich prologue of John and we are looking at every verse so that in the end, we can have a beautiful mosaic of what it is that John has been trying to tell us. Tonight, we are going to be looking at John 1:9.

The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.

Jesus is described as the true light. Note that this does not mean that there are no other lights. Jesus is unique in his nature as light. We could say that he is the source of all light. A friend of mine has a t-shirt that tells us to be like the moon and reflect the sun. The play on words is obvious and so is the implication. We Christians do not have light on our own, but are simply reflectors and we are to live our lives so that the world sees Christ reflected.

This light lights every man. What does this mean? Christian philosopher Ron Nash relates this to epistemology saying that it is by Christ that all knowledge is possible. In a sense, I would say that is true, but I do not think John had epistemology in mind when he wrote the text. I believe he was speaking more along the lines of a push for salvation.

Does this mean universalism? No. I believe the light is shining in darkness for all to see. The trouble is that we do not respond to the light. We do not want to come into the light lest our evil deeds be exposed and we all know what this is like. There are many sins I believe we all have that will be more fully known when we get to eternity. They are of course, forgiven, but there are those sins still.

Yes. Christ is lighting every man and his light is there for all to respond to, but man is not willing to respond often. If he responds, Christ is there and is willing to offer salvation and forgiveness. We Christians need to remember when we share this with an unbelieving world that that forgiveness is there often as we too often don’t realize the wonder of God’s forgiveness in our lives.

He is also coming into the world. This is spoken of from the perspective of the Baptist. The Baptist was there doing his ministry, but stand back. The true light is about to show up. You thought the Baptist was something? He’s only a prequel. Wait until you see what God has coming next.

That is in fact what happened. Christ came and he came willingly into the world. As we go further into this text, we will see what happened when he came into the word, including when we get to my favorite verse in this passage, which I will let you know about definitely.

For now, the light has come. Respond accordingly.

Sorry I’m late for all who are staying up on this Friday night wondering where the blog is. I had a friend over as we had to watch last night’s Smallville together that we missed last night. For those who haven’t seen it, an awesome episode. For now, let’s get to the blog for tonight. Readers know that we’re going through the Bible looking for clues to the Trinity. We’re in the prologue of John and tonight, we look at verse 8.

He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

This verse has tie-ins with the one before and the one after but as I said last night, we are going through these simply so we can grasp the prologue as a whole. John the Baptist is a character that we would call a foil in literature. His purpose in the plot is to tell us about the main character who is the Word and the Light. 

This is something for those of us who do any sort of evangelism need to keep in mind. It is easy to think the story is all about you, when it really isn’t. I do believe God shares many gifts with those who play a good part in the story, but the main role is to be played by him. He gets all the glory in the end. The actors on stage do not serve to point to themselves but to honor the author whose work they are performing.

This is a danger we can put many in. We can see many of our favorite authors as practically infallable. Our pastors are usually seen as beyond question. This is a great error we need to get past. I don’t care how good an apologist your favorite author might be or how spiritual your favorite preacher might be. He is not infallable. This is going to be the case even for this blog. I state things because I believe those things to be true and I wouldn’t put them up unless I thought I was, but that doesn’t mean I’m necessarily right. I can make mistakes. If I make one, then it is up to my critics and friends to point it out.

There is a saying that I believe comes from tToism that says that a finger is great for pointing to the moon, but woe to him who mistakes the finger for the moon. There are many things that can reveal God to us, but woe to him who mistakes the things for the end. This can even happen with Scripture. I have seen people who speak of the Word in John 1:1 and think that’s talking about the Bible.

The Bible is the most important book we have, it is something we should treasure and cherish, I do believe it is infallable and inerrant, but it is certainly not God. We are not to worship the Bible. We study the Bible not for the sake of it but for the sake of knowing its author. 

Keep your eye on the light. Let us make sure we are not distracted by anything that keeps us from the first thing, knowing Christ.

We shall look at the next verse tomorrow.