ONENESS/TRINITY DEBATE
WITH COLIN SEAGER - Part 4

DECEMBER 2000
 

Colin Seager wrote:

  Mike,

  Thanks for your recent response.  I have many thoughts racing in my mind, but I would like you to clarify something for me.  It may well be that I am misunderstanding your definition of the manifestations of God.  The last detailed exchanges I had with a Oneness adherent was 10 years ago, and his teaching was slightly different than yours.

  Without taking up too much of your time, would you please define for me exactly who/what is Jesus Christ, God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit?  Exactly who is the Father in relation to the Son, and how to you distinguish between the humanity and diety of Jesus?


MIKE BLUME:  Hi Colin, thanks for letting me clarify some things for you.

Jesus Christ is God -- period.  The name Jesus involves salvation, so it is the greatest name of God that was ever revealed to humanity.  Higher than any other name.  Christ simply means "anointed one."    He is God the Father, the Son of God and the Holy Ghost.  He is the sole person of God.  When He manifested (revealed Himself) in flesh, He took upon Himself humanity for the first time.  This manifestation occurred through incarnation.. literally "enfleshment."  And since He was actually born of a woman who was impregnated by God's Spirit in some unknown manner, that child that was born was, for that reason and that reason alone, called the SON OF GOD.  In Hebrew culture, the child is called the son of the father.  Since God Himself fathered that child, and since the child was male, then the child is the Son of God.  Sons require actual mothers and fathers, or else they are not "sons."  So by the very definition of the word, SON, there could be no eternal Son since it is nonsensical to think of an eternal mother.

Comment:  I think you should recognize that and notice that never did the Bible explicitly say the SON incarnated, but rather the Son was the result of the incarnation.  Be faithful to the meaning of words and do not use "ETERNAL SON" since there is no eternal mother.  Otherwise words have lost all meaning.  Use a different term.  Perhaps "WORD," as the Bible does.

As I noted beforehand, Gabriel gave the sole and the entire reason why the child would be called "Son of God."  And his reasons were that God's Spirit impregnated Mary, providing a begetting and a pregnancy.  And Mary birthed the child.

Luke 1:35  And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost [Here we have the progenitor -- the Father- that should really confuse things for you] shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore [DUE TO THAT REASON ALONE -- none others are given] also that holy thing which shall be born [birthing necessitates a mother]  of thee [A WOMAN -- thus, that required mother] shall be called the Son of God.
Gabriel did not say that the reason we would call Him Son of God was due to the fact that He was eternally begotten by the eternal Father.  Not at all.  I wish it was there in black and white for your sake.  But its not.  This is the only black and white statement ever given as to why He was called Son of God.  Please find me such a statement that gives the reason as being that He was simply eternally begotten of the Father.

(Note:  Trinitarians Walter Martin [ http://mikeblume.com/drysd7a.htm#VI ] and Adam Clarke [ http://mikeblume.com/drysd7a.htm#V ] were extremely opposed to the thought of an eternally begotten Son, and state that the Sonship refers to post-incarnate Christ alone.)

Notice that there is no other verse anywhere in scripture that explains why the child would be called "SON OF GOD."  This is the only scripture the Bible contains that answers that question. And it does not include anything similar to an eternal begetting.  It speaks of an actual mother and Father, faithful to the very definition of the term "SON."  The Bible is really quite a perfect book.  The confusion comes with extrabiblical terms thrown onto figures in the Bible.  Such terms like ETERNAL SON make Him not a "Son" at all.

This Son of God's person is the eternal God, Himself.  He is God manifested in flesh.  God is revealed in flesh.  God is made known in flesh.  He is none other than God with us.  Nothing is said in scripture about a particular preexistent Son coming to be with us, but just God.  God with us (Matthew 1:23).  God manifest in flesh (1 Tim 3:16).

Therefore the Son of God was both 100% humanity and 100% deity.  He did not become God, for His person always was God.  But the newly added aspect of humanity, provided through the incarnation, making Him kinsman to mankind, necessarily grew and matured (Luke 1:80; 2:40).  But that humanity  was not another person aside from the person who was manifested in flesh.  And that person was not another person beside any other eternal persons.  He is the sole person of deity that alone is eternal.

He revealed Himself to us in this distinct manner in order to redeem us and die as us.  It is not the deity that died, but rather than humanity that began its existence at the incarnation.  The Son is both deity and humanity, since the person of the Son was not a brand new person in existence at the incarnation although the humanity was first taken upon God at that time.  Its just that the single person of God took upon Himself humanity, the form of a servant (Phil. 2).

The Son is the same person of deity as the Father combined with humanity.  So when we refer to the Father, we do not refer to the humanity at all, but rather the Son is the deity and the humanity combined.   The Son of God can be referred to as per His deity alone, or as to His humanity alone.   That is not so with His revelation of Himself (manifestation) as Father.  But those references will never contradict the thought that humanity is involved in that Sonship at the time of existence of the Son.


COLIN:  Is the humanity strictly the Son, and diety the Father?

MIKE:  No.  The Son is both divine and human.  Both deity and humanity.

COLIN:   I thought you said at one point  that the Son is both human and divine.
MIKE:  Correct.

COLIN:   How do you, or do you, distinguish between the Son of Man and the Son of God?

MIKE: One title shows the aspect of his relation to humanity by being born of a woman and as human as we are.  SON OF MAN.  This was necessary in order for mankind to be redeemed.  Someone amongst humanity had to redeem us.  But the only way that could come about was for Him not only to be fully human,  but He had to be born of a male who was not sinful, and since God is a He, God Himself Fathered that humanity and deity combination, and provided for us a sinless man, who was yet of the human race.  Its a perfect example of the perfection of God's wisdom.  He covered all the bases!
COLIN:    Do they describe different things?

MIKE: They describe different revelations of the single person of God that were necessary revelations of His person and work in order to redeem mankind.  I contend that there never would have been a Son of God named Jesus Christ had there not been sin infected throughout humanity.   But God foresaw that we would fall into sin, and therefore had this all arranged before the world began, where it is said that He was the lamb slain from the foundation of the world, and the glory of the Son being crucified existed before the world (which you take to infer that the Son actually existed at that time).

Since He revealed a faculty of His being that could BEGET a Son at the incarnation and not before, we call that revelation of Himself (manifestation) the Father.  And also He is known in that title as Creator.  Since salvation required Him to manifest or reveal His abilities to incarnate through a genuine female human's pregnancy and birthing, He is therefore called the Son of God.   Both of which revelations of Himself occurred simultaneously by His one person, which feat human like you and I could never accomplish due to lack of any deity whatsoever in our persons.  (That is where I believe you and all trinitarians gets tripped up and demands God be more than one person, as we would have to be, in order to do that.  But you forget that He is a divine person, not human only, having not the limits of persons that we necessarily would have if we did those similar things in human terms).

He is revealed as Holy Spirit in His inspiration upon people, and His actual indwelling people since Pentecost.  So these manifestations are revelations of His person that is quite multiplicate in nature.


COLIN:   Also, who/what exactly is the manifestation of the Holy Spirit? Why is He/It necessary if the Incarnation is explained in the Father/Son relationship?

MIKE: The Holy Spirit manifestation or revelation of God is necessary due to the indwelling of people as members of the Church, and the moving of Himself upon people all through ages in inspiration.  Father does not describe that revelation, but is restricted to, by the very definition of the term, parenthood.   Even humans look at their souls as entities as part of their single person that possesses faculties the body or spirit does not possess.
Luke 12:19  And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, [and] be merry.
This man even spoke to his soul as though it appeared to listeners as a separate person, when in fact it was his own soul and no other person at all.  The Bible uses language like that even for God, giving rise to your mistaken ideas of multiple persons in the Godhead.

COLIN:   How does the manifestation of God the Father differ from the Holy Spirit?

MIKE:  Already noted.