I've always love this song: hint Christian band!

Not sure if this is a real question or a question to provoke our thoughts but..
If you actually read Genesis yourself and not listen to creation stories from others or Sunday school teachers blindly, you will know the answer.

In Genesis, God created the Earth and Adam and Eve (literal or not is up to your interpretation). There were 2 special trees: the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. God forbid them from eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil but did not say anything about the tree of life (so technically they are allowed to eat it and live forever).

What Sunday school and Christians miss out is the tree of life and only thought there is only one tree. It was only after they are the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil did God forbid them from eating from the tree of life by placing a cherubim with a flaming sword to guard it and cast them out from the Garden of Eden.

If you are Catholic, the Eucharist (flesh and blood if Jesus) is the fruits of the tree of life. Think about it. Jesus died on a wooden cross (cross made out of wood) therefore it is like a tree and when Catholics eat the 'flesh' it is the fruits of the tree of life. In John 6, Jesus claims his flesh is the bread of life and Jews joked at him by saying how can this man give us his flesh to eat.

What I meant was, 'before time began', who did God promised to give eternal life to men? Nobody was created yet.

Interesting way of interpreting the tree of life. After genesis, the next time we see the tree of life is in Revelations 22 though, where we see the Lamb and the tree of life in the same scene. Don't know on what reasons you want to equate them without any scriptural backings.

Does that mean when you eat the eucharist you will not die?

This post has been edited by thomasthai: Aug 20 2018, 08:31 AM

John 15:5 - The Lord is the Vine.

John 11:25 - The Lord is the Life.

The tree of life is the embodiment of God as life, the embodiment of the divine life.

The Flesh in reference to bread of life (as opposed to death), I believe refers to the Holy Communion bread.

We eat it believing Christ death and resurrection can being life of health into the body.

And again this is only for those who believes.

Jesus is Jehovah (God the Almighty Father) in the OT. See the parallel verses below :

Isaiah 44:6 (Refering to Jehovah as the Alpha and Omega)
“Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel, And his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: ‘I am the First and I am the Last; Besides Me there is no God.

Revelation 1:17-18 (refering to Jesus as the Alpha and Omega)
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.

Isaiah 45:23 (refering to Jehovah as the only God whom everyone will bow to)
I have sworn by Myself; The word has gone out of My mouth in righteousness, And shall not return, That to Me every knee shall bow, Every tongue shall take an oath.

Philipians 2 10-11 (refering to Jesus as the only God whom everyone will bow to)
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Isaiah 43:11 (refering to Jehovah as the only true saviour)
I, even I, am the Lord, And besides Me there is no savior.

Acts 4:12 (refering to Jesus as the only true saviour)
Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

Isaiah 40:22 (refering to Jehovah as the Creator)
Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, And He who formed you from the womb: “I am the Lord, who makes all things, Who stretches out the heavens all alone, Who spreads abroad the earth by Myself;

Colossians 1:16 (refering to Jesus as the Creator)
For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him.

Jesus is NOT the eternal God the Son co-existing with God the Father from the beginning. This is where trinity has it wrong. There is only one God - Jehovah. The truth is, Jesus is CREATED as the physical body of Jehovah, for the salvation of human kinds, because Jehovah is an Eternal Spirit which no man can see. Jesus is the incarnation of Jehovah in the flesh.

John 14:9
Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?

Just like the created bronze snake that Moses erected for the Israelites to believe in God in order for them to be saved from death.

Numbers 21:9
So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

The Spirit of Jehovah is so HUMONGOUS that nothing in which He created, neither in heaven, nor in galaxies, nor in earth can contain Him. The Spirit is EVERYWHERE, FOREVER. Not even the flesh of Jesus can contain Him. So it is the flesh (or temple) of Jesus praying to the Spirit of God the Father!

1 Kings 8:27
But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You. How much less this temple which I have built!

This post has been edited by Haledoch: Aug 20 2018, 10:48 AM

"So it is the flesh (or temple) of Jesus praying to the Spirit of God the Father!" What?

Just so you should realize the Babylonian Trinity was similar to your Trinity doctrine.
Complete with the name Mother of Heaven, she was called Semiramis, the mother of Nimrod.
God the Father was called Nimrod.
God the Son was the product of the unholy union of Nimrod and Semiramis, and was called Tammuz.

oh btw, Semiramis called herself the holy spirit. Her signet was the dove.

Eerily very similar to what the catholic teaches now. Even worshiping the mother of god...

This post has been edited by Haledoch: Aug 20 2018, 03:04 PM

You skipped the question on the formula for baptism. Why? Because it doesn't jive with your doctrines? If Jesus is God, why wouldn't Mary deserve the title Mother of God?

"God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him. And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire. But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine hands: They shall perish; but thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment; And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail. But to which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool? Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?" - Hebrews 1:1-14

Surely you are aware that the terms Father, Son, Holy Spirit exists in Scripture and not only from your anti-Catholic sources, right?

Matt 3:16-17; 28:19; 2 Cor 13:14; John 14:16; 17:5

This post has been edited by yeeck: Aug 20 2018, 03:23 PM

The trinity was built upon assumptions. Please re-read all your verses and check if there is any trinity word in there. Assumptions aren't good enough to build your whole beliefs on God. Yes, I do believe in The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But I do not believe those names indicate 3 persons.

Mary was just a human that you should not pray at all. Your Rosary prayer, which is a repetitive prayer calling on the mother of God for help is a useless prayer.

Matthew 6:7
And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words.

The formula of baptism? Real Baptism is done by God alone. You should know that. Human baptism aka water sprinkling, or immersion under water, or washing of head is just a symbolic act to honor God.

Matthew 3:11
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Why do you feel water baptism is so important? The thief on the cross did not get human baptism yet he would be in Heaven one day. You should worry instead whether God had baptized you.

Botanically speaking, a vine is different from a tree

Unitarians always think 1 + 1 + 1 = 3

Why cant it be 1 x 1 x 1 = 1?

The verse is meaningless if Jesus is the Father.

If Jesus is the Father, you can only draw 2 conclusions from this verse.

1) Jesus is delusional, he does not know he is the Father
2) Jesus is lying. He knows he is the father but he is trying to deceive his audience.

We know God by the plain revelation of the scripture. I think both OT and NT go through a lot just to reveal that God is indeed One in Three Persons. Otherwise all those verses do not make any sense.

The danger here is you build your own theology based on your own logic, which I dont think is being faithful to scripture.

Ok no more from me on the matter.

So Jesus did things just for symbol, huh? What happened to the Great Commission? Just a symbol, feel-good saying? The thief on the cross for one, was technically still under the Old Covenant, but Jesus being God forgave his sins based on his repentance and promised him Paradise. Just because you can't find the term Trinity in Scripture doesn't mean it is not implied there. Even the term Bible is not mentioned.

This post has been edited by yeeck: Aug 20 2018, 05:18 PM

Because it is called pick and choose, which is the reason for the multiplication of denominations. A classic case of interpreting Scripture to one's own perdition.

Are you a true reformist or a fake one? Even Charles Spurgeon the famous Calvinist agreed that Jesus Christ IS Jehovah. Go dig google.

You should learn (hear) from God directly. This is what the Holy Spirit does to teach.

John 14:26
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.

I have no need of men's teaching, or church, or whoever when God Himself is my teacher.

Jehovah is not the name of the Father.

Jehovah is simply a derived tetragramaton of YHWH, or I AM. (Jehovah witnesses cant seem to understand this)

Jesus is I AM, the Father is I AM, the Spirit is I AM.

But Jesus is not the Father, and the Father is not the Spirit, and the Spirit is not Jesus.

All plain revelation of scripture.

This post has been edited by thomasthai: Aug 20 2018, 06:21 PM

Ohh now you are saying Jehovah is 3 persons?
Do you mean Jesus Christ is 3 persons?
Or are you still adamant Jesus is not Jehovah? Who should I believe you or Charles Spurgeon?

Make up your mind. You are making the trinity doctrine looks bad.

Hahaha ... The Lord likened Himself to a vine tree (grapevine). Definitely not a tall tree. *wink*. I am glad the Bible is not a book of botany

Unfortunately I don't tend to use the number analogies but I will agree with you that Unitarians lacked the understanding (or choose to ignore) in two points:

1) confuse the biblical distinction between the ontological Trinity and the economic Trinity, conflate the two concepts into one, and thus assign the characteristics of the economic Trinity to the ontological Trinity.

2) do not believe in the coexistence (exists essentially at the same time eternally) (Matthew 3:16-17) and coinherence (John 14:11) of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The mutual indwelling of Person within one another is one aspect of the oneness. There is no physical representation for this.

They (Uni) tend to share only the FULL force of one side of the truth. A fair person will list out the FULL force of both sides & let the text speaks for itself.

I will be fair that ordinary Christians (and even theologians) subconsciously having tritheistic tendencies (Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: ...). They do not differentiate that Triune God is distinct yet not separate. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three distinct centers of consciousness and volition, or "I’s," eternally involved in loving subject-object relationship. For example, commenting on John 10:30 (“I and the Father are one”). Yet, the modern usage of "person" (vs the ancient use) cannot be stretched too far.

When the full force of both sides is displayed, one will see the Threeness in His immanent one Being and the oneness in the economical aspect of three. One will even see the "modalistic" identification of the Father and Son (Isa 9:6) and Son and Spirit (1 Cor 15:45; 2 Cor 3:17) because these are economical verses. Instance after instance that the three of the trinity, while distinct in their respective hypostases, operate as one in their actions. Thus, whatever one of the Trinity does must be understood as being done by the other two as well. There is never an action of one of the Trinity that is independent of the other two. While the personal distinctions among the three are maintained, any operation of the Trinity is one operation, and hence when one acts, the other two are identified with the one.

I think I have found the simplest answer to what Faith REALLY means.

Faith is simply this: To act on the Will of God.

1. First LISTEN to His Voice.
2. Then act on it.
3. That is true faith.

John 10:27
My sheep HEAR My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.

Romans 10:17
So then faith comes by HEARING, and hearing by the word of God.

John 8:47
He who is of God HEARS God’s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God.

Hebrew 11:1
Now faith is the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things not seen.

Simply believing, and/or doing any good work ain't going to cut it, for God will consider that filthy. It must be an action based on His will that we must be able to hear.

The thief on the cross was saved because he chose to defend Jesus from the mockery of the other thief. That was the will of God he heard from his heart on which he responded to.

Rahab the prostitute was saved because she chose to hide the messengers from the King of Jericho, even though she put herself in danger of doing it. She responded and acted on the will of God that was put in her heart.