Land and Bible

People have said that I’m part of a cult. They mean it, of course, in a derogatory sense. These same people that derogatorily accuse me of being part of a cult believe that God is somehow a combination of three persons in one essence. They also believe that one of those persons of the three-person god also has a human essence (or nature). So, this belief system that accuses me of being part of a cult has for their god three persons in one essence, but one person in two essences.   Three persons in one essence, but one person in two essences. But I’m the one, supposedly, who is part of a cult with a strange belief system. And they don’t notice that in their definition of who God is, they have eliminated the possibility that Jesus the Messiah (Christ) is a real human person. Otherwise their description of their god would be three persons with two essences (a divine essence and a human essence). Wait, check that. Their description of their god should be four  persons

To hear this message on a podcast, click here . In the Gospel of John, “God” is never the Trinity. For instance, in one of the most well known verses of the Bible, whose reference is written out on posters at football games: John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his unique son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”   Try substituting “God” in this verse with “the Trinity”. “For the Trinity so loved the world, that he gave his unique son…” It doesn’t make sense. It seems to me that at least subconsciously every Christian that holds John 3:16 dear realizes that “God” in John 3:16 is not the Trinity, but God, who is also known as the Father. John 3:16 is telling us that God, the Father, loved the world, not that the Trinity loved the world. My Bible search program says that the word or title “God” occurs 83 times in the Gospel of John. In not one of those occurrences, that is, 0 out of 83 occurrences, does the word “God”

To hear this message on a podcast, click here .   In a recent article/podcast , we saw that the word or title “God” in the New Testament, including in the Gospel of John, never means the Trinity.   In this podcast we will see that in the Gospel of John, Jesus is declared to be the Messiah, not God.   The biblical autumn festivals are coming up, including the of Festival of Tabernacles. John 7 describes how Jesus went to Jerusalem for the Tabernacles festival, only six months before he was crucified, buried and raised from the dead.   In reading over John chapter 7, I’m struck by how the question on the people’s minds in Jerusalem at the Festival was not “Is this man God?”.  Rather, the question people were asking themselves was “Is this man the Messiah ?” For centuries, deity of Christ and Trinitarian theology have claimed that the Gospel of John is the book that presents Jesus as God . But to make that claim a person has to bring his own presuppositions to a few verse