Now we've got the book in our hands, I looked again, and it's better than I thought. They argue tooth and nail for the trinity doctrine, and fail to make their point!

How might I summarise this and avoid boredom??

The lesson openly defends the trinity doctrine against detractors, who remain nameless. Yet, its language isn't truly doctrinal language! It speaks of God Himself dying on the cross: that's language we used 100 years or so before we confessed this doctrine - non-trinitarian language. Moreover, the Creator died for us, the lesson says: that's personal language for God, again not doctrinal language: we used to be very guarded in our language about God, and we should still be.

For the Creator to die for us, he cannot be tied to a three-in-one, triune God else that three-in-one God wouldn't remain in tact: see how inflexible a doctrine can be when it matters?? Typically, doctrinally, God didn't die but humanity died, because divinity cannot die, and God the Son is an inextricable part of the triune God which wouldn't be the trinity without him, separated by the wrath of God and death. That leaves, as the lesson rightly points out, an inadequate sacrifice of the atonement, for lack of a worthy offering if Christ were not fully God. Does the doctrine of the lesson not leave that problem, nevertheless?...

For the Creator to die for us, he must have been, at that moment, God himself in the person of his Son, separable from his Father in whom is the Godhead bodily, intact despite the rending of the Powers of heaven: the Godhead of the Father, in the Father bodily, is not cut in half, for the Godhead is not consisting of three persons!! The Godhead in God's only begotten Son did not die, for it cannot, but God's Son, personally, having taken mortal, sinful human flesh, could, personally, taste the 2nd death for us, even suffering separation from the Father. Without a doctrine requiring three persons in perpetuity, salvation in Jesus is totally assured.

The lesson uses non-trinitarian language to fill a gap its doctrine cannot fill. Whether or not they realise that in the office, do we? This is the hidden reason - the unspoken reason, today - why this doctrine of the trinity is just no good at all, and our pioneers ditched it.

The SDA trinity doctrine cannot be squared with the Bible, however much they try to combine wording, sorry.
The trinity is a doctrine, not a teaching: get a grip! The concept of a triune or trinity God isn't in the Bible, especially not the way our SDA doctrine would have it. God isn't just holy, he is also precise, speaking of the Father.

The Godhead has oneness, because "there is but one God, the Father" (1 Cor 8:6), and there are two persons in whom is the Godhead bodily because there is "one Lord Jesus Christ", the Son of God since the days of eternity. The Spirit in the fulness of the Godhead has the power to make manifest within us the presence of the Father and his Son: an infinite, independent agency of God, but clearly not, when you think about it, an independent individual. One nature, one Godhead, one God and Father of us all - including the pre-existent Son of God, and that excludes a triunity of God.

Do not be afraid that Jesus is no longer God if the SDA doctrine of the trinity is discarded in favour of Bible texts speaking of his natural, personal divine Sonship and God as his nature Father: that's Biblical and heavenly reality, since the beginning, as Scripture and SOP make abundantly clear. Nevermind the merits or othewise of the Nicene Creed: it's full of holes in its detail, but it's correct when it says "only begotten Son" and "begotten not made". They spoke Greek, and they knew that "monogenes" means just that when speaking of humans and animals, and not just dictionaries.

The trinity doctrine cannot rely only on "subtle textual hints", as the lesson says: that is speculative! - reading into the text, not reading from the text....

The lesson proved adequately - but not nearly as well as it should have! - the deity of Christ and the Holy Spirit. The lesson did not prove three persons of an entity called the trinity. Instead it used language like
"God Himself" is a person, not an entity of three or a triunity/trinity: in fact, it's how Ellen White and her contemporaries wrote of the Father! She didn't speak thus when refering to "God's only begotten Son", for she used the words like those in quotes for him. The lesson borrowed words from her, again, with
This is, again, wording which doesn't fit our trinity doctrine, for Sister White is saying that the Godhead of the Father himself is in the person of his begotten Son who then took humanity as Christ. This wording, used by the lesson, is crossing the line into non-trinitarian beliefs! - the very opposition it decries for denying the deity of Christ. Think about, that's what that wording means.

The lesson, perhaps wisely, left totally untouched the matter of Christ's divine Sonship - lack of space and anyway it's not part of our trinity doctrine, sorry.

God gave his only begotten Son to die for us and for our sins: securing this event requires a correct understanding of Father Son and Holy Spirit so that the nature of God is not eliminated in the process of God himself redeeming man from sin in the person of his Son when Jesus died on the cross: Amen.

1. Not according to the Bible. In Matt 28 we have "In the NAME of the Father AND the Son AND the Holy Spirit". If the "Father" is the "Name" of God - then the other persons being "named" are breaking your inferred rule.

2. Not according to SDA fundamental beliefs where we explicitly accept the teaching of one God in three persons. Thus my question remains - what statement of the Trinity in wiki is rejected by SDA doctrine and/or the Bible?



An attribute of a person (like a footprint or a signature or a fingerprint) can not be "grieved" cannot "speak" and is never given a name such as "in the name of my footprint".

Here again - the suggestion above fails the test of scripture.

And what is more Ellen White refers to the Holy Spirit as the "Third PERSON of the Godhead" - so here again we have the personhood of the Holy Spirit accepted by both the Bible and more modern pen of inspiration.



I agree that going into details "beyond what is written" is to go into an area where you cannot test or verify the claims made.

God is referred to as "invisible" but in the bible "invisible" never means "without substance".



Both Ellen White and the Bible agree with the "from all eternity " existence of Christ applying the same term to the Son as it does to LORD (YHWH) in the Psalms.



I agree that neither the Bible nor Ellen White's writings nor our 28 FB claim that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father and the Son" -- nor did they ever.

in Christ,

Bob

As this is actually related to our Lesson #1 Sabbath School topic for the 1st Quarter of 2012, I have moved this into the Adult Sabbath School area.

Elle White refers to the Holy Spirit as "the Third person of the Godhead".

What non-Trinitarian group ever does this?

hence the problem for those that would like to reject the "One God in Three Persons" teaching of FB #2.

in Christ,

Bob

Thanks, Daryl.

"Group"? I don't belong to a group, btw, thanks. I'm an ordinary church member, too: I agree with that statement, given what else she says, too.


I believe there are three members of the Godhead, or, better put, there are three persons who possess the Godhead. This is the opposite to "three persons in one God"! - three in whom is the Godhead is not three in one God.

My reference to "group" was simply to point out that we have a number of well established non-SDA "groups" that are very upfront about rejecting the Trinity.

Not one of them describes the non-Trinitarian position as if it proclaims the Holy Spirit to be "the THIRD PERSON of the Godhead" because doing so would be death to their non-trinitarian arguments.

So any SDA trying to marry idea of The Holy Spirit as "the Third Person of the Godhead" to the classic non-Trinitarian foundation has an argument that fizzles out from the very start and so the arian groups themselves never make it.


in Christ,

Bob

In your view - is the Holy Spirit "1/3 of God"??