Further review of the 3:16 endzone ad post is required based on my wife’s expressed disbelief that I would “[1] even post such stuff….!”

Today’s Evangelicals and Fundamentalists must be honest about this one.  In spite of the danger of being labeled a “heretic”, Christians must be strong enough to ask who God is.  The danger of crossing the line of Trinitarian doctrine and belief has prohibited many from asking questions about God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.  We must be strong enough to ask, but we must also be strong enough to answer the question.  Reasonable thinking people need to have some sense of foundational belief that surpasses “because I told you so”.

For God so loved……  (See the verse again at [2] biblegateway.com)

The question I posed in the previous post was:

God - who does this mean? God the Father, God the Son or God the Holy Spirit?  Did Jesus the Son so love the world that he gave himself?  Or did God the Father so love the world that he gave himself?  Does the Holy Spirit give the Son or God or himself?

OK.  Asking this question might prompt some to label the post as heretical and dismiss the question as sophomoric or “pithy”.  However, many young believers that I have had the pleasure of discussing “God” things with has stumbled over the doctrine of the Trinity.  

NEW BELIEVER:

So…. God is not Jesus?

OLD BELIEVER:

No, God is Jesus and Jesus is God.

NEW BELIEVER:

How could God have a son, a “begotten” son, which implies that he was created, and if God is eternal, how could someone that is created be God, and really… how could God create himself?  …he wouldn’t be eternal then would he?

OLD BELIEVER:

Where’s your faith?  Maybe you’re not really a believer after all.  You can’t start off by questioning everything.  Faith is faith.  That means you gotta believe stuff that doesn’t make sense.  Our ways are not God’s ways.  You gotta have more faith.  Just wait until we talk about the Holy Spirit, who was introduced by Jesus at Pentecost.  When you believe that you’ll REALLY have faith.

NEW BELIEVER:

Oh, then how come the Christmas story says that John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit?  That was before Pentecost wasn’t it?

OLD BELIEVER:

Oh ye of little faith.  You must really have a spiritual problem to be questioning things so much.  You need to repent of your unbelief!  You’re not really a believer man.  You are drinking milk when you should be on solids.   You need to grow up.

NEW BELIEVER:

Oh, I understand now.  Forgive me.  I won’t ask any more questions.

OLD BELIEVER:

Good for you, you’re now a believer.

If Christians are honest, they must acknowledge that the doctrine of the Trinity is difficult.  (Note that I didn’t say it wasn’t true before you send me to heretic hell.)  In this verse, Jesus speaks of God as a father and Jesus as a begotten son.  You can’t get around that…. unless you dig deeper into scripture and find places that say things like “I and the Father are one”, and that’s were we lose many new believers.   Or should I say, “That’s what people don’t believe”.  Does the scripture really propose that a person must believe in the Trinity?

Let me ask you this.  Is belief in the Trinity a requirement for entering God’s presence?  However belief that Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose again, is a “gospel belief”.  Is the Trinity a difficult thing to understand? Yes.  Does this verse indicate that belief in the Trinity is a requirement?  You tell me in a comment below.

With this in mind, let’s read again that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son…..”

If we try to put this into Trinitarian doctrine, we lose the new thinking believer.  So let’s leave it for future “maturity of the believer” and go on.

God.  The Father.  The father of Jesus His “born”, loved son.  Either the scripture says it or it doesn’t.  God the Father. Jesus -without an earthly father, born of God.  And - think about this - Adam - the only other human without an earthly father, born of God.  Hmmmmmmmmmmm…………………….  Something to think about.

So… the next word in the verse ……. reserved for the next post.

And [3] why not register so you can get an e-mail when I update my post?

God so loved…..

Here’s the previous post:

“So - Does this adverb measure his love, “it’s soooooooooo big”, or is it a statement of “so…..” therefore, given that, because of….?”

In the next post we’ll dig into the word “So”.  Just to wet your appetite….. “So” doesn’t mean “soooo big”  it means - “here’s how”, or the “manner in which”.  Here’s the meaning - “God loves the world - here’s how.  He gave his son.”

Come back to see the reason that this is true.