Philosophy or the Bible - Eli Lopez - December 23, 2020

the lord christian life center family amen merry christmas to everybody thank you so much for tuning in tonight to the faithful that are watching if you've been around clc for any length of time you know that our holiday services are always some of the most blessed because the people that want to tune in are the ones tuning in if we ever had an excuse not to tune in it would be tonight so if you've tuned in i promise you god has a special blessing i feel the joy of the lord in this building i'm so thankful that jesus came and he died for our sins i'm so thankful that god so loved the world amen that he gave his only begotten son we have hope in jesus today in a hopeless world hallelujah i just want to tell somebody that there's hope in jesus there's a way out of your mess there's a way out of your darkness and it's through a man named jesus christ hallelujah so we're going to invite his presence into this building and into our homes that he would have his way tonight amen i know that in the midst of a busy holiday season i still have room for jesus to move in my life amen so every hand lifted to heaven right now in the name of the lord jesus christ we thank you so much for one more opportunity oh for a season to celebrate your birth a season that recognizes your love for humanity oh a season to recognize you robing yourself and flesh god we're talking about the oneness of god in the last couple of weeks we're so thankful that you came down lord i pray you'd fill every home i pray that hope and joy would fill every home tonight god every heart that is discouraged would be encouraged by this message that you came down to save us lord oh we worship you today we give you room there's place in my heart for you to move oh god i'm not too busy for you lord but i give place to you jesus oh hallelujah lord oh i encourage you to to tune your ear into the spirit right now take a moment out of your day and give jesus an opportunity to move on your heart hallelujah god bless you as the music team comes [Music] hallelujah we worship you jesus we exalt you lord thank you jesus so much god for coming down to this earth jesus for coming wrapped in a manger lord jesus for coming here lord jesus to save us god from our sins lord we worship you we praise you and we exalt you [Music] jesus [Music] seated on his throne [Music] and the train of his roads [Applause] [Music] circled around him and cried [Music] you are [Music] let's think that again [Music] oh [Music] it's me for i am unclear [Music] and she cleansed my lips [Music] is [Music] [Music] oh [Music] holy [Music] [Music] oh [Music] holy glorify we glorify [Music] oh you are worthy we lift you up jesus we thank you for your blood thank you for your grace [Music] [Music] holy your holy lord [Music] hallelujah we lift you up god and we magnify you let's just worship him wherever you are right now whether you're in your living room in your car on a walk let's just worship him and just thank him for all that he has done you are worthy jesus hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah jesus there's none like you god we declare lord [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Music] hallelujah hallelujah for the lord god almighty [Music] worthy is [Music] sing holy [Music] [Music] [Applause] for the lord god [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] me [Music] is [Music] is [Music] hallelujah for the lord god almighty [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] [Applause] hallelujah jesus we lift you up in this place tonight god we worship you and we thank you lord hallelujah jesus yeah hallelujah how many of you know he's worthy amen he's worthy of every praise every hand clap every thanksgiving every offering of praise he's worthy of it right now one more time could we lift every hand to heaven thank you jesus for being so good to us lord thank you lord for always being there no matter how dark it got god you're worthy of it lord thank you for always being in control and being on the throne lord jesus oh hallelujah thank you jesus hallelujah [Music] amen amen especially at this time of year we are as we are particularly aware of the goodness of god we reflect on our year and how good god has been to us the holidays are always a great time of joy for many but for others the holidays can be a difficult time many have probably lost loved ones this year maybe finances are hard the bank account's not where it needs to be maybe you're sick in your body i want to implore you we say this every week but i want to make a sincere call if you are feeling down and you're feeling low and you need help we have pastors online on the phones that you can call and we'll pray with you i'm so glad that jesus before he ascended he said i will not leave you comfortless hallelujah he said but i'll send the comforter in my name he's going to take care of you hallelujah i'm so glad and i know the comforter's going to come into your house and he's going to give you peace right now so in your home there's a number on the screen 209-476-7889 call the number we have pastors that want to pray for you praise god and now we're going to pray for something we've been so faithful to pray for many years now we're going to pray for this nation we're going to pray that god would pour out his spirit on all flesh that stockton would have a revival like we've never seen before speaking of the incarnation the bible said jesus came when the fullness of time was come when everything was set when everything was in place jesus came born of a virgin i know he's going to do that same thing in that same nature he's going to come back for his church when the time is right but before he comes i believe we're going to have revival like we've never seen before amen so can we do that can we bind together in faith believing could you lift your hands right now in your home dear heavenly father we come before you one more time god we knock on the throne room of heaven asking that you would pour out your spirit on stockton california god we'll pray like we've never prayed before we'll fast more days than we've ever fasted and god will have more faith if you'll do the work god we'll pray the prayers o lord we'll knock the doors o god if you would just send the river of your spirit down the streets of our city touch california lord i pray for governor newsom give them wisdom god give them an opportunity to repent to find the gospel and find the truth oh lord i pray for president trump god i pray for vice president pence lord jesus that you would give him wisdom in these last days and god i pray for every church member under the sound of my voice god tuning in tonight those that have been battered this year those that feel that are weak you would make them strong lord that you would be the comforter in their home right now lord we thank you we thank you for your goodness we thankful thankful for your comfort god we love you jesus we love you lord and we give you all the glory and all the honor and all the praise hallelujah everybody said amen praise god we serve a good god amen amen now we're going to go into our wednesday evening tithe and offering god bless you all [Music] good evening everyone the lord is good and on this wednesday december the 23rd we are just days hours really away from celebrating christmas again this year and i know many of the children are excited looking forward to this wonderful holiday and my my youngest son grant he made the comment he said december 23rd is the worst day of the year because it's christmas eve eve he said just that last day of anticipation so just hold on grant and all the young people out there all the children hold on christmas is coming and for me as an apostolic believer i love i love christmas because i love getting to reflect and and more than reflect i get to worship the god who loved me so much that he came to redeem me to save me did not leave me in my sins but he came for me and that's really what christmas is all about and i feel as apostolic believers we have a perspective that should make christmas more special to us than any other people on the face of the earth so if you have uh your bible says i invite you to prepare we're going to continue our study this is the fourth week that we've been on our journey our study of the oneness message the oneness of god the biblical message of who god is and how we are to understand jesus the identity of jesus as presented in scripture so let's pray lord we love you tonight thank you for your goodness to us thank you for this christmas holiday this christmas season because it means that you love us and you love souls and you care about people so much that you came you came yourself as the savior we have looked to your word god and we have studied this truth out that in you in jesus is salvation is life is hope and i pray tonight god as we look to your word as we do this study that you would bless us and give us understanding and help me to speak your word and your truth and to share the lesson that you have laid on my heart for tonight in jesus name amen tonight is going to be uh it's one of my uh strong strong views and i think you've heard me say this many times that when a man steps to this pulpit he needs to be bringing the word of the lord good ideas and good opinions and so on and so forth they may be good they may be right but ultimately what's going to prepare us all to meet god what's going to take us all to heaven is our obedience to the word of god and so i'm very careful i step always up to the pulpit try to step to the pulpit with that understanding and in the fear of the lord that i would always be presenting his word tonight i am going to be speaking and teaching the word of god however i'm also going to be given a history lesson because i'm going to be explaining how we got to some of the places where we're currently at in christianity so i'm going to go through the history so yes it's a bible study but it's going to be a bible study that has a lot of church history in it you're going to be hearing different names different figures from throughout church history and it's not because i'm trying to deviate from the bible but i'm going to explain how errors were made how viewpoints came into the christian thought and how we have to go back and and discover what does the bible say what does the bible say what does the bible say so tonight if i would give a title to it and i've given a title to each of these lessons uh tonight the title is our view of god philosophy or the bible philosophy or the bible my wife asked me she said are you doing a christmas lesson and i said no and then i said yes because whenever you're talking about jesus it's a christmas lesson because jesus came as god manifest in the flesh so when we celebrate christmas we are celebrating the fact of the incarnation that god came in the flesh so while it may not be a christmas message per se uh it absolutely has everything to do with what this season is all about so we're gonna do a quick review as and i like to do this just we've been doing this for three weeks now so let's look at what we've learned over the past few weeks number one the bible presents the monotheistic message that there is only one god we that's in the bible number two in the old testament god promised a deliverer a savior that would one day come to save to deliver mankind the old testament prophecies that many of them that we looked at and there's more than the ones we've looked at identify the coming messiah that the coming messiah would be god and in many times cases it's the all capital lord which we have learned that that's the covenant name of god in the hebrew yahweh or as some say jehovah so the coming messiah would be god himself would be jehovah himself and many verses we looked at there's others that we did not look at but we did take a sampling of old testament prophecies that identify the messiah the coming messiah would be yahweh himself in the new testament jesus is shown to be divine the new testament paints a picture of jesus as this divine being he received worship and again we explained how significant that was in the jewish mindset because only god was to be worshipped and jesus himself claimed divine identity he said before abraham was i am you know i and my father are one you've seen me you've seen the father he claimed divine identity and and the jews understood him because they picked up stones to stone him for blasphemy for being a man and making himself god so not only did he receive worship which is an indirect claim to deity he claimed deity directly with these statements direct claims to deity we also looked last week at the competing views of christology right low christology and high christology and what we realized is that the statement of new testament writers demonstrate their view that jesus christ is god so the new testament presents what we call a high christology jesus christ is god and we looked at again a sampling of verses throughout the new testament we didn't look at all the verses but a sampling of verses that demonstrate the new testament writers believed unequivocally that jesus christ is god and then last week as we closed out we looked at one instance of something called intertextuality and this is where new testament writers use the old testament in such a way as to link the identity of jesus with yahweh and what we did is we went through isaiah 45 that beautiful passage you know where god says you know i'm the only god there is no other god beside me to me every knee will bow every tongue will take an oath and then we jumped over to philippians 2 and how paul used those words and applied them to jesus christ so that was a great example of intertextuality and how the new testament will clearly identify jesus with yahweh or jehovah of the old testament okay so that that's that's what we've been studying the first three weeks we come into this fourth fourth week and i'm going to start with a question because we have clearly over the first three weeks we have clearly demonstrated i believe we have clearly demonstrated that jesus christ is god that the old testament predicted a coming savior a coming messiah and the the identity of that of that messiah would be god himself would be yahweh himself in the new testament jesus is shown to be divine to be the fulfillment of those prophecies he is the emmanuel he is god with us he is the fulfillment of those old testament prophecies and the new testament writers themselves when they write about jesus they write about him as being god himself and jesus made that claim himself and the new testament writers in their uh writings in the the letters even in the book of acts we see where the statements are made very clear that jesus christ is god and we looked at these verses so the first three weeks we have made that case we have laid that foundation that clearly the bible shows that jesus christ is god and that jesus christ is yahweh of the old testament we have made that case so then there's a question and there's a question that sometimes as apostolics we're intimidated by or we don't really know how to answer this question and today we're going to begin to delve into this subject i don't think i'm gonna get through everything today of fully answering this question we're gonna begin to answer this question today and this is where the history lesson is going to come in uh in our journey so here's the question if there is only one god and jesus is god which right we've made that case for three weeks there's only one god jesus is god why does the bible call him the son of god why does the bible do that why if if there's only one god and jesus is god why does the bible call him the son of god because this this has tripped up a lot of people they they get hung up there and they can't get past it because they will take that phrase the son of god and they will take it to mean something different than what the bible presents and we are going to endeavor to answer that question and answer that question based on what the bible teaches us okay so our foundation we will build our belief system on the bible alone and that's what we've done for three weeks now scripture upon scripture upon scripture we're going to build our belief system on the bible alone let me tell you a little story here i heard brother stone king when he was talking about his conversion experience he was in a denominal christian setting uh and and the brother stone king i'm referring to is brother lee stoneking i think all of us know him we're aware of him his great ministry among us and he tells a story that as he was uh beginning to hear the apostolic message some some oneness apostolics were witnessing to him and and teaching him about god and and god was drawing him into this apostolic way that he sat down he went to his denominal pastor and he sat down and he said can you explain this to me because the apostolics are saying this the oneness pentecostals are saying this can you explain god and jesus and all of this to me and and he sat down in his pastor's office in his pastor's study and on the desk in between them was a bible and he said as he asked the question he said he knew at this moment that the apostolics had the right answer had the right message because instead of reaching forward and opening his bible that pastor turned around and grabbed a theology some some doctrinal book off the shelf and pulled that down and opened that up and tried to explain the godhead and god to brother stone king and brother stoke he said at that moment i knew the apostolics were right because every time they taught me about god every time they taught me about jesus they stayed in the word they took me to the word they had chapter and verse and so i am very adamant that we are going to build our belief system on the bible alone i don't need to turn to some theologian in the 3rd century or the 5th century or the 8th century to know what i'm supposed to believe about god but i'm going to go back to the source i'm going to go back to this book that was authored by god himself this book which is given by divine inspiration i'm going to go back to this source and i'm going to read what did paul say about jesus what did these new testament writers what did they say about jesus what does the gospel of matthew and mark and luke and john what do they teach me about the identity of jesus because if i can go back to this word then i will have a belief system that will stand the test of time so we're going to build our belief system on the bible alone and if you're out there i'm trusting you're saying amen with me secondly we will allow scripture to interpret scripture this is something that clyde haney taught is we let the bible interpret itself we don't come in here and try to wrestle and wrangle our ideas into the bible but we let the bible interpret itself and many times you come across something in scripture that you can't fully understand just keep reading because the bible has this incredible way of interpreting itself and so we're going to let scripture interpret scripture if we come to a term we don't understand we'll look to other places in scripture for how that term should be understood how that concept should be understood and we will look at the bible from the lens of the jewish perspective because this bible is an eastern document it's not a western book it's not an american book and it's not a it's not a a modern book it's an ancient book it's an eastern document and as we learned last week the church was born in the radical monotheism of second temple judaism in second temple judaism the the religious jews and you got to remember religion and society were so intertwined you don't have the separation of church and state like we know today in in modern times here in america there is no separation of church and state back in in the ancient world and in ancient israel and and so the radical monotheism of second temple judaism where the jews twice daily quoted the shema but the shema hear o israel the lord our god the lord is one the shema was more than just a confession it was their lifestyle they taught it they shared it they bound these words uh you know upon their their hands and before their eyes this was something that was going to just affect not just what they confessed but how they lived and so the church is born in the midst of the radical monotheism of second temple judaism judaism so as we look at the bible the old testament we know we know the bi the old testament is monotheistic it's hero israel the lord our god is one lord but we also have to acknowledge that the new testament church is born in a context or in a cultural setting of radical monotheism and this is so important so we're going to build our belief system on the bible alone we're going to let scripture interpret scripture and we're going to look at the bible through the lens of the jewish perspective not not some american perspective or a western perspective we're going to look at it through that ancient eastern perspective out of which the bible was written out of which it was given to us okay now i don't want to offend anyone but at the same time when we're talking about something as important as god we've got to be straight and true and honest and i'm going to tell you some areas where trinitarianism is wrong and i know we live in a day where you don't want to offend anyone you don't want to say anything that's going to hurt anyone's feelings and i'm not out here to be ugly at all i trust that my spirit will come across as being right as i teach today but there are some things in trinitarianism that that unequivocally we can stand up and say that is not in the bible the entire the entire doctrine itself but there's some particular tenets of it that i want to point out today number one trinitarianism teaches that it is a mystery how three persons are still one god i when you i i've interacted with trinitarians i've had professors in seminary who obviously trinitarian uh i've interacted with with good people and i've asked them you know explain explain it to me and and it always comes down to this it it cannot be explained and and so it comes down to this well it is a mystery it is a mystery how three are one it is a mystery that you have three persons that are somehow linked together and joined together and it's still one god because you have to confess there's one god because the bible says there's one god and so you cannot escape that truth and yet yet they say well he's one but he's also three and and it's a mystery we can't explain it it's a mystery okay that three are somehow one how that's not but that's not what the bible says because the bible teaches that there is a mystery but the mystery is not that three or one the mystery is that god was manifest in the flesh so if we're going to build our belief system on the bible alone we want to go back and make sure our terminology aligns with scripture the bible never says it's a mystery that three or one the bible says it's a mystery that god was manifest in the flesh that god became a man that is the mystery i can't explain the miracle of the incarnation i can't explain christmas to you how god became a man but i can teach it as absolute truth because it's what the bible declares and even the great apostle paul with his great mind in his great theological training he said i can't explain how god became a man he said great is the mystery of godliness god was manifest in the flesh paul said i can't explain it but it's truth god was manifest in the flesh so that's the mystery the bible speaks of not three and there's somehow one the bible says the mystery is that this great one true ever-living god this almighty god this all-powerful god the one true god became a man that's the mystery secondly trinitarianism teaches that jesus is god the son god the father god the son and god the holy spirit that is the language of the terminology of trinitarian dogma however the bible never uses that term the bible never ever one time refers to jesus as god the son never one time does the bible refer to jesus as god the son that term is not in the bible in scripture jesus is called the son of god and and that's very important to note and i gave a reference there john 1 34. you can look that up later where jesus is referred to as the son of god but never never is jesus called god the son and then a third point i want to make is that trinitarianism teaches the eternal sonship of christ the eternal sonship of christ this is core to trinitarian doctrine however the bible never uses that terminology in scripture jesus is the only begotten son and that's key we're going to endeavor to unpackage that and what does that mean that jesus is the only begotten son and again we want to be true to scripture we want to build our belief system on the bible alone we don't want to bring in you know these foreign thoughts and somehow try to ram them in the bible we want to take the truth that's in the bible and believe it and even if i read something in the bible that i don't fully understand if it's in the word i want to believe it and align my life with it and i trust that in time god will give me the understanding that i need but if that understanding never comes i'm still going to align with what the bible declares and i'll give just a simple example if there was a verse in the bible if there was a verse in the bible that said it would make god happy would please god if we if i were to stand on my head for 10 minutes a day i i would not understand why god wants me to stand on my head for 10 minutes a day wouldn't it doesn't make any sense to me but i would try to stand on my head for 10 minutes every day because the bible says that pleases god now there's not a verse in the bible that teaches that but that's a little example so if i'm going to come across something in scripture and even if i'm having a hard time wrapping my head around it i'm still going to align with what the bible says because it's the word of god it's the word of god that allows me to be right with god to be in right standing with god my obedience my surrender my submission my faith that is in alignment with the word of god and god is kind in his mercy in his grace as we give our hearts to studying the word he will give us understanding and so jesus is the only begotten son and we're going to endeavor to explain the significance of that and what the bible declares about the role of the messiah the role of the only begotten son in the redemption of mankind so let's let's take a journey through history because how did we get here if the bible teaches i'm going to put a slide up and it has a lot of text on it and i'm going to read it to you and you can follow along if the bible teaches that jesus is to be recognized as god himself manifest in the flesh and again everything we've learned the first three weeks clearly shows that's what the bible teaches jesus is to be recognized as god himself manifests in the flesh jesus is the image of the invisible god we've looked at all of this how did we end up with orthodox doctrines that teach that god is comprised of multiple persons the bible never says god is multiple persons never never never does the bible say that never does the bible talk about the persons of the godhead never the bible doesn't teach that it's not in scripture so how did we go from the simple message of the bible that god was manifest in the flesh the simple message of the bible that we've looked at where jesus said if you've seen me you've seen the father the simple message of the bible that there is one god and jesus is the image of the invisible god how did we go from that to now it's considered orthodox in christianity to teach that there are three persons and these three persons are god and you must recognize three individual persons and yet the bible never teaches that okay i'm gonna you know i like to stay in scripture but i told you at the beginning this will be a little bit of a history lesson there's a man by the name of ignatius ignatius was a contemporary you can see he lived uh in the apostolic age there's some debate as to when he lived either 80 35 to 98 or 50 to 117 either date shows that he overlaps the apostolic era so he overlaps the new testament era what we know um you know the the time of of the apostles so on and so forth and he was a contemporary with a man by the name of polycarp paulie carp i've mentioned his name before in a previous lesson was a a follower of of the teachings of john the apostle or john the revelator john the beloved so polycarp is is is sat under the ministry of john was taught by john and uh and and ignatius and polycarp they're contemporaries and ignatius wrote to polycarp and in a letter to polycarp these are the words of ignatius this is what was believed by the church in the apostolic era see we have spent three weeks looking at the bible looking at what the word declares but let's let's let's see what the historical evidence is for those who lived in those early years what did they believe about jesus and in a letter polycarp this is what ignatius wrote he said and expect him who is above all time eternal invisible though for our sakes made visible impalpable and empowerment not being able to be touched and impassable meaning cannot experience uh the human experience suffering and pain and sadness so impalpable and impassable yet for us subjected to sufferings and during all manner of ways for our salvation clearly ignatius is a oneness believer because when he's thinking about jesus he says it's the the god who's eternal who is invisible the one who's above all time the the one who who's just above and beyond yet he became a part of creation subjected to suffering enduring all manner of ways for our salvation so ignatius describes god describes jesus the exact same way we as oneness apostolics do 2000 years later this is what the church believed in the apostolic era about jesus about the identity of jesus he was the one who's above all time eternal invisible yet now made visible the one who who can't suffer yet robed himself in flesh and suffered for our salvation we've looked at noetus before but let me give you a quote again i i like nuatus and we're going to look at actually a reaction to nuetus later in church history and noetus writes he said when indeed then the father had not been born he was yet he yet was justly styled father and when it pleased him to undergo generation having been begotten he himself became his own son not another's and again noedes was a close follower of the teachings of polycarp and so on and so forth we get this historical evidence that the early church had a oneness view of jesus of god and he said when it pleased him to undergo generation to be become begotten having been begotten he himself became his own son not another's talking about god the identity of god when you look at jesus so how did we get here if this is we see what the bible says and we see men like ignatius and men like noetis who when they write they're they're writing with oneness terminology not no there's not no trinitarian language in their writing at all how did we get here today to where it's expected that christians believe in the trinity and yet there's a group of us that are going back to the bible and saying we don't find that here so how did christian christianity end up in this current status where it's it's it's now considered unorthodox if you reject a doctrine that's that's clearly not found in scripture well how do we get here beginning in the 6th century bc so we're going to go back to before the time of christ so we're talking you know 500 bc thereabouts beginning in the 6th century bc greek philosophical thought began to shape the western mindset and at this point reason begins to replace mysticism you go back into the ancient world and the ancient world is dominated by mysticism and that begins to change with the rise of greek philosophy and the greek thinkers and the greek approach to understanding and so you've got some of these notable names right you got like socrates and you got plato and you got aristotle uh socrates many consider him the father of of western philosophy he's the first moral philosopher he had a student by the name of plato plato he's an athenian philosopher and he founded the first academy the first institution of higher education in the western world so the concept of college and university that starts with plato of learning and then you've got aristotle who was a student of plato so socrates taught plato plato taught aristotle and so you have aristotle he's a greek philosopher and he's also called a a a polymath which means that he is well versed in many subjects and he learned about physics biology zoology metaphysics logic ethics aesthetics poetry theater music rhetoric which was the way they would communicate to to convince psychology linguistics economics politics and government aristotle was a brilliant individual and he wrote and he delved into study in many areas and they're cons when someone is considered an expert in multiple fields they're called a polymath in other words they're very learned in multiple subjects and so we see that with aristotle so you've got these incredible minds that that shape the greek way of thinking and i'm going to use greek and i'm going to hear me use the word greek and western interchangeably because this begins to shape the way the western world thinks and whether you like it or not as americans we still have a mindset or worldview that is shaped by the teachings of socrates and plato and aristotle and and because we are born and ra raised in the western world it's just natural to us it's just we we wouldn't know any different uh just uh some of the platonic thought that guides just the way we live uh as westerners and and you can say well i don't want to think this way well it's it's the way the western world has been formed and been shaped that's why there's such culture shock sometimes when you travel to the east because they are many times are not embracing some of these western ideals that have arisen out of this greek this greek mindset or these greek uh philosophical deliberations and so you've got these these these notable figures that begin to affect reason and and how things are to be considered and so we're going to uh we're going to see that that this this mindset the greek philosophical mindset really begins to permeate the then known world because with the conquest of alexander the great now alexander the great lived from 356 to 323 he only reigned from 336 to 323 so uh he reigned a very short amount of time and uh he died history tells us he died at a very young age in his 30s but he conquered the then known world and with the conquest of alexander the great there was the spread of greek language and culture there's a typo in my slide there should it should be language and culture so the with the conquest of alexander the great we have and pastor hayne you've heard him teach about alexander the great and and him conquering the world and then in time the grecian empire is conquered by um the roman empire and so rome comes on the scene and rome basically assimilates the greek world view and the greek culture and much of the greek language if you spoke greek you could go anywhere in the roman empire and conduct business and that's why the new testament is written in coin a greek coin a meaning common it was written in a greek that would be understood not just in palestine where it was written but you could travel uh throughout the roman empire and speak greek this corny greek and it would be understood this greek and that happened because as alexander the great conquered the greek language spread but not just the greek language the greek culture spread so even though the time of the new testament church it's the roman empire the grecian empire has long been vanquished yet greek culture is thriving in the roman empire and there's a term for that it's called hellenism the spread of hellenism so some people i have students in bible college and whenever we talk about hellenism they think we're talking about something evil because it has to do with hell and no hellenism whenever you see hellenism that refers to greek culture and so you get the spread of hellenism through the conquest of alexander the great and with that we're getting the greek philosophy the western philosophical mindset where reason begins to dominate and and this is going to soon have a direct impact on the new testament church as it obeys jesus command to take the gospel to the whole world and we're going to see how this works beginning with paul the gospel is taken westward into the heart of the roman empire so in acts 13 and 14 we get paul's first missionary journey now paul was not the only missionary that there's history says that matthew went east and went to india and and so the apostles and different new testament church leaders they spread they jesus said go preach the gospel to every creature take the gospel to all nations and they did but we have the the recordings in the book of acts of paul's journeys westward so we're most familiar with with his ministry and his missionary work so paul goes westward and he takes the gospel into the heart of the roman empire his first missionary journey is acts 13 but paul has three more missionary journeys in the book of acts on his second missionary journey paul encounters greek philosophers in athens so in acts 17 15-34 athens right athens right there in the middle of greece paul's there and he encounters in fact verse 18 it's not in my notes but i i'm going to read it to you he said then certain epicurean and stoic philosophers encountered him so paul this apostolic missionary is taking the gospel westward into the roman empire and he goes to athens greece and while he's there he he is encountered by greek philosophers the bible records that encounter in acts 17 verse 18. so very early in church history the church is interacting with the greek world view very the church was not born in a greek with the greek world where he was born with a jewish worldview it was born in jerusalem it was born where the new testament church was still gathering in the temple to worship the the new testament church for the first 10 years was comprised entirely of jews or converts to judaism we discussed all of this last week so the foundation of the church is jewish the world view of the church is jewish the perspective of the church the lens of the church with which they they're going to consider jesus it's a jewish perspective they're going to look at jesus with a jewish lens and so they're going to write about him from and they're going to worship him and the church is constructed and built from the jewish perspective but but early in its history it begins to interact with the greek world and the greek worldview and greek philosophy and this increased after the destruction of jerusalem the temple in 1870 no longer did the jews have jerusalem as their center but also the church was affected because the apostles we read the book of acts that they they maintained basically jerusalem as a headquarters for the church and after we get the destruction of of jerusalem by the roman general titus in ad70 all of that not only does it does it affect the jews and we get the diaspora we get the dispersal of the jews throughout the world but we also are going to get the church no longer having jerusalem as as a headquarters as it were and so now the interaction with the greek world is going to increase you're going to get places like antioch in syria places like alexandria in egypt and of course rome and what is modern day italy you're going to get these other centers of christian thought and alexandria there's a great library and and and so christian scholarship began to thrive in alexandria antioch was known as a center of of christian activity and and christian debate and then we get rome where uh obviously now the roman catholic church has uh the vatican there in rome but but in rome you had the bishops of roman and just a historical fact is when much of christianity was converting you know we're talking 300 years after the close of the apostolic age when the with the christian world is changing the baptismal formula and they begin to baptizing in the titles the bishops in rome held out the longest and they still baptized in jesus name they held on to that so rome uh be had had a strong christian presence so after the destruction of of jerusalem in 1870 now the interaction of christianity with the greek world is is just going to increase and actually there's going to be tremendous growth uh you've heard about constantine and his embracing of christianity and so on so forth we're not going to go down that trajectory today but just that we know that the church and the greek worldview begin to interact and very much more so after ad70 there's another greek philosopher i'm going to introduce you to and again i i'd rather just stay in the bible but the answer to the question of how do we get here is sometimes we have to look at the historical stream that the current that has carried christianity once i'm a christian i'm talking about as a whole christianity to where it's at today uh there's this philosophy by the name of platinus and he lived from 8204 to 8270 and he was a philosopher in the platonic tradition so he's following the teachings of plato and his teachings platinum's teachings gave rise to what's known as neoplatonism neoplatonism there will not be a test after this so you don't have to remember all this or write it down but hopefully this is kind of painting a picture of the history uh this side of the equation in platinus's renderings or in his philosophy god is an impersonal it god is an impersonal it this this whatever is the supreme being whatever is at the top right it with plato plato had his forms and and whenever you begin to simplify philosophy um you always are going to leave a lot out and plato was was very very nuanced and and very uh elaborate in his explanations could not explain all of his philosophy but but he presented this idea of the forms the form represents the perfect the ideal so if god is a form god god is the perfect he is transcendent he's the highest and most perfect being if we're gonna build our view of god on on plato and the platonic forms because the forms dwell in a realm beyond the material world the what what the form is perfect and everything produced after the form is less perfect is imperfect so plato had his has his forms well platinus comes along who's following plato and and for platinus the universe proceeds from god it proceeds from god so we have these things called emanations the universe comes out of god he doesn't teach that that god created in the way that we think of creation of god getting involved but but it just it just emanates from god the universe emanates from god the first emanation is the highest or is pure but then successive emanations are less and less real so you've got plato with the form is perfect for example the form of a circle is perfect but every drawing of a circle everything everything that represents a circle is less and less perfect it can never be the ideal form that exists beyond the natural realm so plato has his forms that were in a realm above what we know in in the natural realm platinus comes along and he says well what is at the top is this impersonal it and and the universe comes out of this impersonal it and you get these these emanations and and each emanation it degrades a little bit each one is is less ideal or even less real than what was before so you kind of get these layers or these emanations and and so you have you have what is pure and perfect at the top and then you get down to to the natural world that you and i live in the the the created world and this is less this this is this is so distorted this is so less than than the ideal than the form or or what is at the beginning or what is the source the impersonal it and you're saying why are you talking about this brother lopez because you're going to see how this thinking begins to seep into christianity how some of these philosophies begin to get mixed with bible doctrines and now you're going to end up with ways to describe god that are mixing and marrying statements of the bible with greek philosophy and now you start leaving the jewish lands and the jewish perspective and the jewish worldview and you're picking up a greek worldview and now you start describing god in ways the bible never describes god so we get the rise of the early apologists now we have apologists among us today we we teach apologetics at christian life college uh i i make the joke um uh you know what is an apologist i'll ask the students was it what is an apologist and some students or some some people might answer a husband no it's not that's not one apologist apologist is not someone who apologizes all the time because sometimes people feel like that's what a husband does or is but that's that's for another lesson altogether an apologist is not an apologizer it's not an apologizer an apologist is an explainer okay uh and so we see that word and we think what are they apologizing for that that's not what the word means it means to explain and really it means to defend okay so you have the early apologists they tried to take jewish concepts and explain them in a way that could be understood by greek philosophy and greek thought so they're taking things out of the bible and and and this understanding of god that this radical monotheistic message that comes from the jewish perspective and they're trying to explain it in a way that could be understood by greek philosophy and greek thought and brother adele dr william riddell on our staff he introduced me to a book several years ago called jew in greek it's out of print and i was able to get my hands on on one copy of the book and um in this book jew and greek dom gregory dicks he's a catholic historian he talks about the entire process of moving from the jewish perspective to the greek perspective jew in greek that's the title of the book and he talks about the conflict between the two perspective between the eastern perspective and the western perspective and he makes this statement it it's one of his approaches to the book now he's a catholic and he holds uh to a the trinitarian dogma he holds to that wholeheartedly and he makes this case in this book that the church gets its monotheism from the jewish perspective says but the church had to leave the jewish perspective to develop the trinity in his book he says that if the church had remained with the jewish perspective the doctrine of the trinity never could have been formed that it took greek thought it took greek perspectives for for there to be able to be a doctrine of the trinity that arose and to him that's a good thing he feels like it had to get into the hands of greek philosophers and greek thinkers to form the doctrine of the trinity because he believes it he believes that's that's how you explain god well you and i as apostolics we we don't hold to that we want to go back to the source what does the bible say about god and trinitarianism or the doctrine of the trinity is a progressive doctrine it is not a doctrine that's found in the bible it is a doctrine that was formed after the close of the new testament after the close of the canon after the bible the canon of scriptures closed this doctrine was formed after and and and every trinitarian scholar who has integrity will tell you that the trinity is a progressive doctrine that is a doctrine that was understood after the close of the bible it is not a doctrine that is expressed in the bible and so don gregory dicks he begins to write that christian theology began to arise from the greek rather than the jewish perspective and he says that's a good thing for him i disagree i disagree completely it was not a good thing it ended up being a distortion of the message of the bible but now we can understand what's going on we have christianity going into this greek world going into this western world dominated by greek thought and as people are trying to explain jewish concepts in a way that the greek mind can understand we end up mixing and marrying viewpoints one tenet of greek thought was the impassibility of god the impassibility of god what do you mean by impassability that god was so removed and separated from the human experience that he was beyond any negative human experience remember we have plato with his forms and the form is the ideal and nothing in this world nothing in this world is close to a form all just replicas the form is is ideal then you've got platinus the impersonal it and the emanations and each level each emanation is less than the one before and so you have th this this greek perspective that god is if there if there is a god plato wasn't wasn't monotheistic the way that we think of it and plato's concept of god was not what we would not be our concept of god at all but if you were to somehow put god into plato's worldview if you were to somehow take platinus's it and superimpose that with our god okay so you've got this god that that is that is above all he's impassable he is the perfect he is the ideal he is the pure and everything else is is is so much less and we say okay we see that we see that creation is corrupted by sin and we could kind of maybe follow along however this greek thought said that god could never experience what we know down here never so the impassability of god what was was a tenet of greek thought that really christianity had to wrestle with and christianity failed this long-held viewpoint clashed with the early message of christianity that god came in the flesh and suffered for our sins what did acts 20 28 say we read it before and we're going to read it later in our lesson today it says that that god shed his blood for the church that was the new testament message that god suffered and and shed his blood for this church that's why uh the the subtitle of the book uh that i had on with me in the pulpit last week jesus and the god of israel the subtitle is god crucified and richard bachmann he says when you look at the high christology of the new testament that's what the new testament is saying that when you look at the cross you see god on the cross well the greek thought couldn't unders couldn't couldn't deal with that because of the tenet of impassability that god is above that god is perfection that that that god is is is the it and everything emanates from him so by the time you get to the material world and creation and humanity and all and evil and suffering what time you get down here that is so far removed from god that god could never be here could never come down could never suffer could never endure affliction could never do what jesus did so in order to assuage these differing views it came to be taught that jesus as god the son suffered but that god himself did not suffer you see the greek world had to create a distinction in the identity of god because the greek mindset could not comprehend how god could suffer it did not work with greek philosophy it did not work with the greek worldview it did not work the message of the bible did not work and so now we have to create definitions or terms that are not in the bible to somehow make it work with the western mindset or the greek mindset so now we get introduced into christianity the phrase or the term god the son and now we have a distinction in persons that begins to appear in christian theology that does not align with the bible but it's because the greek worldview could not align with the jewish perspective the radical monotheism of of the bible and of the new testament it couldn't do it it couldn't believe acts 20 28 that god shed his blood for the church it couldn't believe jesus in john 14 9 when he said if you've seen me you've seen the father it couldn't embrace that when jesus said in john 10 30 i and my father are one it couldn't it just couldn't go there so no they it has to be different because god is impassable and and he could never ever ever have been nailed to a cross so god the father didn't suffer god the father couldn't suffer so he didn't suffer you know who suffered god the son and you and i as just were saying this you understand the natural outgrowth of this is now you are saying that jesus as god the son is lesser is lesser than god the father if you're going to take this to its logical conclusion because whatever emanates from god every degree down everything down every till you get to this creation it's corrupted and is lesser so if you're saying god the son could suffer then he is a lesser being he has a lesser power he is not fully god he is not really god and so as a result you get this view where jesus his identity is going to be diminished by these concepts and by these worldviews and and yes he's going to be god but now he's going to somehow be less than god and that flies directly in the face of what the bible teaches when paul said in first timothy 3 16 god not a junior god not a demigod not a lesser god he said god was manifest in the flesh i'm giving you this history lesson i hope i'm not born you on the wednesday before christmas but i want you to see how it got here where did this term god the sun come from it came out of the greek world view because they said well god the father can't suffer so let's create a term and let's attach it to jesus and i know we'll still confess he's a divine being he's just not that god and yet the bible very clearly teaches that he is that god he is the one true god he is jehovah he is yahweh who has come to save his people so much of the efforts of the early apologists was along this line they tried to explain the gospel in a way the greek culture could assimilate the result was progressive doctrines formed after the close of the new testament that's what a progressive doctrine is that lead believers away these progressive doctrines lead believers away from the views held by the writers of the new testament themselves let's go back to noatus i use this quote i think two weeks ago there exist one in the same being called father and son not one derived from the other but himself from himself nominally called father and son according to the changing of the times and that this one is he that appeared to the patriarchs and submitted to birth from a virgin and conversed as a man among men he confessed himself to be the son to those who saw him while to those who could receive it he did not hide the fact that he was the father that that's what the early church believed the early church coming out of that radical monotheism of the jewish perspective that's what the early church believed as they built their belief system on the bible in the story of christian origins historian martin larson i have this book in my library and i've turned to it many many times and he writes that there has been a a reaction to nuedus and this is what he writes he said the horror aroused by the thought that god the father had been nailed to a tree approached hysteria and this we believe resulted from the fact that no one ever quite accepted the doctrine that jesus was truly god he said really the greek worldview really did not accept that jesus was truly god not in the way the bible says he is and and because they never really believed that jesus was truly god when they were introduced or they interacted with a nudist who is christianity would label him a heretic and yet all he's doing is professing what the apostolic church believed but the greek mindset could not accept the fact you are saying that the father was nailed to a tree and they came up with the term called patripassian patripassian which means father suffers and they begin to label and belittle christians that refuse to let go of the oneness message that refuse to to somehow see jesus as a lesser being than god himself if if a christian would say no when you've seen jesus you've seen the father if a christian would quote scripture and says that god was manifest in the flesh if a christian would stand and say that jesus is is the i am the one that spoke to moses out of the burning bush and jesus said i am before abraham was i am that and and and christian said no that's who jesus is he is yahweh he is jehovah of the old testament revealed as our messiah as our savior in the new testament if a christian were to hold on to that belief they were called patropassians father sufferers and it was a belittling it was a derogatory term for those that would dare would dare teach that god the father could hang on a cross and yet that's exactly what paul said in acts chapter 20 verse 28 he said god shed his blood for this church so what do we have to do we have to come back to the bible perspective we have to read the bible the way the new testament writers intended it to be read from a radical monotheistic perspective from a jewish mindset let me tell you two stories uh i had a good friend of mine that was in seminary and his teacher asked him tell me what you believe about god to explain your view of god and so my friend did he explained our belief the apostolic message of of god he explained it and the teacher listened to him and was very respectful listen to him and said oh i get it he said and this is what he called him he said you're a primitive trinitarian he said you believe what the apostle paul believed i don't know about the whole primitive trinitarian thing but but absolutely i believe what the apostle paul believed and when this professor heard my friend explained the apostolic message of the oneness of god he said what's so strange about that that's what the apostle paul believed and you see that's the difference between us as apostolic christians and quote unquote the orthodox christianity that surrounds us is the orthodox christianity says well what have we learned and what doctrines have we formed and and historical theology is going to affect what we believe in and what doctrine they come up with the 300s and in the 400s and the 500s and and what did augustine say and what did tertullian say and and we're going to look at what all of these these notable christian scholars had to say about the identity of jesus and the godhead and and persons and all of this and we're going to form this progressive doctrine but apostolic say you know what we're just going to go back to what the bible says and when that professor heard my friend he said you believe what the apostle paul believed and you know what absolutely right i i am going to do everything i can to believe and to teach what paul and the new testament writers believed about the identity of jesus absolutely call me whatever name you want to call me i really don't care but you are absolutely right i am going to believe and i'm going to teach and i'm going to do everything i can to share this one god message because this is what the new testament this is what the bible presents about the identity of jesus so i'm in seminary you know i i've had my friend tell me this story and several years later i find myself in seminary and and i'm in in seminary with a professor who is a learned historian in fact in his organization he is probably now the the preeminent historian of his organization a wonderful man wonderful man of character him and i had a great relationship uh as i went to school there and he was very kind to me very respectful of me and and so one day in class and the brother bishop had to be happy to be in that class with me uh he asked me said eli explain to the class your view of god and i was not ready for that i was like oh man here we go um you know and maybe it's better that i wasn't ready because you just dig down and what's in your heart and and what you know you can just just share it so i began to explain my view of god and i just use scripture he is the image of the invisible god jesus said you've seen me you've seen the father we believe that there's only one god and and so i just went through scripture scriptures and it was it wasn't very long in about about three or four minutes just explained very succinctly our view of god and specifically of jesus and you know you're kind of expecting some rebuke i'm in a room and me and brother bishop are the only apostolic believers in there everyone else it holds to the doctrine of the trinity and and you know i'm expecting maybe some type of rebuke or some type of question or or something you know and my professor he after i finish he turns to the class he turns to the class he doesn't even respond to me turns to the class and he says class you have to realize something he said the language of the early church would have been radically different than our language today and he turned to me and he said eli you haven't said anything that's unorthodox or unbiblical he turned to that class and said the way we describe god the way we talk about a trinity and the way we talk about persons in the godhead he said the new testament church the early church the apostle church they wouldn't have used that language and he looked at me and he said everything you've said it aligns with scripture and he was telling the class look we we may hold the belief now but if you were to go back in time and go back to the book of acts church they they would not be describing god the way that we're describing him 2 000 years later and i appreciate his integrity before those students to make that statement he said the language of the early church was much different than ours absolutely they didn't talk about a trinity in the book of acts or in the early episode church read ignatius read noetis they didn't talk about a trinity when they talked about jesus they talked about him as being the one true god who was manifested to take away our sins so i'm going to tell you how should i word this i was in israel several years ago and uh every two years i'm very privileged to be able to take students on a holy land tour it's part of their educational experience this was the vision that that pastor haney had many years ago that christian life college would be the only college that when students came here before they graduated they would have a trip to israel and i think it's such a beautiful vision because i didn't get to go to israel until i was in my 30s and i want to tell you everything changes once you go to israel this bible right now you read it and you read about the jordan river or you read about the sea of galilee or you read about the valley of elah or david goliath you read about these locations and you have to imagine them right you're you're trapped using your imagination when you go there you don't have to use your imagination more you've seen it you know what it looks like you know what it smells like you know you know what it feels like to stand there in that valley you know what it's like to be on a boat on the sea of galilee you know what it's like and so it just changes the way you read the bible and the way that you interact with the bible so i highly recommend anyone if you ever get a chance to go with to israel with pastor haney you you'll come back absolutely changed so i'm privileged i get to take a group of students every few years to the holy land and fulfilling the vision that brother haney had many years ago and not this most recent time but but the time before we had a young lady as our guide wonderful young lady and as you get to know your guides you get to know their story her father is an orthodox rabbi and so she's raised in a very religious environment very religious home and she turned to me one day uh we were actually leaving capernaum and she turned to me and she said this is about the second or third day of the trip she said you're you're students you're young people they're different you said they're they're just different and i explained oh well you know they're they're spirit-filled and and you know they they're just god's at work in their lives and they love god she said no no i said i've had other spirit-filled groups before should i and she named some other groups she said that you know they they they they say they're spirit-filled your young people are different you guys are different and i said well you know i we hold to a different view of god than most christians she looked at me kind of kind of odd and and i explained i said okay you know the book of genesis of course she knows the book of genesis she was raised in the home of a rabbi raised in an orthodox family in genesis chapter one in the beginning god created the heads of the earth yeah she understood yes okay so i said we believe that in the beginning there is god god is the creator of all and that there's one god and he's the one who created everything but in the beginning there's god there's one god she's looking at me like like this i mean basic yes of course and i said then i said well let's turn to verse two and go ahead let's put this slide up i do i do have this on on in my powerpoint here verse 2 says the earth was without form and void and darkness was on the face of the deep and the spirit of god was hovering over the face of the waters and i quoted that verse tour i grabbed my bible and i quoted that verse there and as i'm doing this i could feel the lord i could feel that anointing and and if it's amazing when you are teaching truth how god will back up his truth i could just feel this anointing that was there and several of the the students and the young people that were there on the tour they were kind of leaning in they were getting close they were listening to this conversation as we were driving down the road leaving capernaum and i'm just doing very simply i'm explaining what we believe to this jewish young lady raised with a radical monotheistic perspective raised in the home of this orthodox rabbi and i said well we believe in verse one that you have god one god created all things and they said in verse two we don't believe that's a separate god we believe that in verse 2 that the god that created in verse 1 begins to interact with his creation in verse 2. we don't believe that in verse 2 that's a separate god or a separate person and she looked at me like i was the biggest idiot there ever was because in her mind who who would believe otherwise who would who could believe different how could you believe that between verse 1 and verse 2 there are two gods at work how could you believe that there are two persons or two beings at work between verse one and verse two and i said it's so simple in verse one we see god and in verse two we see the same god who's now moving among his creation and she's looking at me like everybody believes this and i said but now when we look at jesus we see the same god who created in genesis 1 and the same god who moved among his creation in genesis 1 2. now we see that same god who came as a man to save us and she looked at me and she said this her eyes got got big she held up her fingers and she made the shape of a triangle in the sky she said you don't believe in the holy triangle and that was her way of describing the trinity and i said no i said we don't believe in a triangle we believe that there is only one god and she got it in a conversation that lasted about five minutes time from beginning to end she got it she understood what we believed you see when we see genesis 1 1 and genesis 1 2 we don't believe there's two gods at work there the doctrine of the trinity says that you're going to have god the father created in verse 1 and then you've got god the holy spirit who shows up on the scene in verse 2 and then later jump to the new testament we have another one that shows up and starts working as our savior and and and we we're just going to go back how would the jews understand verse 1 and verse 2 of genesis 1 they see god creating and that same god interacting and we take that same jewish perspective god created god interacts with his creation and now jesus as god manifests in flesh he becomes one with his creation god becomes a man to save mankind it is so simple it is so easy to understand if you just stay in the word and in a five second five minute conversation excuse me me talking to someone who understands the jewish perspective of god i was able to explain the oneness of god so easy she got it she understood what made us different she understood why our belief was different than all other forms of christianity because we see that there is one god above all creating all one god interacting and moving among his creation as the spirit of god and then that same god became a man and we know miss jesus christ and he is our savior the biblical perspective you see he the hebrew perspective understands descriptive terminology for god without seeing multiple gods a jew would never look at genesis 1 1 and genesis 1 2 and say well there's two gods there but for some reason the greek mindset when it began to in infect christianity begin to tear god into pieces as it were or begin to divide god and say well that's this god and now you've got this one and and that the bible never presents that the same god that created in verse one is the same god that worked among his creation in verse two and now that same god is revealed in flesh as jesus christ the message of the bible is that simple isaiah 9 6. i'm going a little long tonight i guess history lessons tend to do that but as i bring this near my conclusion let's just look at some scriptures that make it very clear that however you describe god he is one how can a son be the father i may not have a good answer for you that will please you but i have the word that is true for unto us a child is born unto us a son is given and the government will be upon his shoulder and his name will be called wonderful counselor mighty god everlasting father prince of peace it's truth it's truth the son is the everlasting father the son the child is the mighty god descriptive terminology for god does not mean that there's multiple gods even though god is described in different ways it does not mean there's multiple gods and just like the same god is at work in genesis 1 1 and genesis 1 2 that same god is at work in the person of jesus christ john 14 9 have i been so long with you and yet you don't know me philip he who has seen me has seen the father acts 20 28 take heed to yourselves to all the flock among which the holy spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the church of god which he purchased with his own blood this is the perspective of the bible that we've got to come back to and and not be afraid to plant our flag and build our belief system on the bible alone not on greek philosophy on the bible alone for 73 16 without controversy great is the mystery of godliness god god god not a god not god junior not god the son that that's all that's unscriptural god god himself god the one true god god was manifest in the flesh colossians 1 15 he is the image of the invisible god the firstborn over all creation he is the image of the invisible god he is the image when you see jesus you see god made visible remember the name of tertullian who lived 162-25 he came up with the word called menarchians and he used this word i'm this is a quote from martin larsen again the story of christian origin so martin larsen this historian he said tertullian coined the term monarchans to describe those who sought to establish christianity as an uncompromising monotheism without in any way reducing the divinity of christ so the us right those who say that there's one god and that jesus is fully god he said so tertullian looked at looked at those people that tried to hold on to this view and this is what he said this is what he said the next slide while they take to themselves preeminently the credit of being worshipers of one god sounds like us he got mad because these people that he called monarchians that said that there's only one god the radical monotheism there's only one god and jesus is fully god he says they're the word they claim that they're the worshipers of one god friend we make that same clade today two thousand years later we are the worshipers of one god and we're not ashamed to be apostolic we're not ashamed to be believers in one god this is what he also said he said the most conceited monarchians maintained that he himself made himself a son to himself he couldn't understand it from his perspective he he couldn't make it fit a father cannot be his own son and these are all the writings of tertullian and the anti-nice scene or the before the council of nicea the antinesine christian library he could not stand these monarchians what he called us it's not a term we made it's a again a negative term that he put on us to say they they hold to a monotheism but they refuse to diminish jesus christ they they claimed that jesus is fully god he said they're going around telling everyone that they're the worshipers of one god how conceited they are you can call us all the names you want to call us you can say whatever you want to say we are not ashamed to build our belief system on the bible and the bible alone we believe this word augustine he's a christian theologian and philosopher he heavily influenced the trinitarian views that developed in the middle ages many modern trinitarians follow his teaching so much of what we believe about the trinity we not we us as apostolics but but christianity in modern times much of much of what modern christianity believes about the trinity goes back to the teachings of augustine who lived from 354 to 430 a.d and and this is what martin larson says about augustine augustine found his ultimate demonstration of the trinity in pagan philosophy martin larsen says that when augustine went to explain the trinity he did it by using pagan philosophy not by using the bible because the trinity does not fit this book it never has and it never will colossians 2 8 beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit if i could have the musicians begin to come back according to the tradition of men according to the basic principle of the world and not according to christ paul under the inspiration of the holy ghost wrote about the danger that philosophy could have and would have on christian beliefs he said don't let anyone cheat you through philosophy empty deceit don't follow the traditions of men verse 9 for in him you see philosophy will deny this philosophy will reject this but this is the truth of the bible in him in jesus dwells all the fullness of the godhead bodily everything that makes god god his inside of jesus christ all and fullness are such important words in that verse all the fullness everything that makes god god this is the message of the bible this is the message of the new testament church and finally verse 10 you are complete in him who is the head of all principality and power everything you need is in jesus so the question are we going to follow philosophy are we going to follow the word are we going to follow the teachings of man are we going to come back and build our belief on the word of god you can call me names they've been calling us names for thousands of years look what tertilian called us look what that seminary professor called us there's all other kinds of names patripassian praxions different terms monarchians that they come up for us simply because we refuse to let go of what this book declares so in a few hours we're going to celebrate christmas we're going to celebrate the birth of our savior but we're going to understand what that means because god was manifest in the flesh saint corinthians 5 19 god was in christ reconciled the world to himself [Music] jesus said he who has seen me has seen the father i could either follow philosophies and philosophical teachings where i go back to this word and when i stay in the word when i stay in truth the bible says you are complete in him whatever you need jesus is the answer some said you you people are jesus only that's not exactly the correct way to say it because the bible says that in all things jesus has the preeminence so when someone accuses me of being jesus only my response is no no i'm jesus preeminent because that's the message of the bible in all things jesus has the preeminence why because he is the image of the invisible god lord jesus tonight as we turn to your word as we build our belief system on your word and your word alone as we turn our back on philosophy and empty deceit god i pray that you'll strengthen your people there are those listening tonight that need a miracle give them miracles because we look to you they need healing give them healing because we look to you they need blessing they need deliverance they need strength god the bible says we are complete in you and i pray god if anyone lacks understanding tonight that you would do for them what you did for that jewish young lady that i spoke to in israel that you would open up their understanding to see that there is one god from cover to cover in this book in this bible there is one god at work you are creator you are the god who works among your creation and you are the god who's joined your creation you became a man to save and redeem mankind jesus we love you tonight and we worship you tonight and we're gonna celebrate christmas in holiness we're gonna celebrate christmas with gratitude and with love and appreciation for all you've done for us for we understand what christmas means according to this book bless your people tonight in jesus name we pray thank you for listening we're going to sing for a few moments thank you god bless you merry christmas in jesus name falling in love with jesus falling in love with [Music] jesus with jesus is with with jesus [Music] i feel protected [Music] jesus falling in love with jesus [Music] i feel protected is [Music] you

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Length: 110min 1sec (6601 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 23 2020