Land and Bible

Summary notes for the One God Report podcast, "The Evolution of the Trinity, Part 1", Interview with Dr. Dale Tuggy First, in AD 100s, we don’t have any sources for what the average Christian believed. What we do have are some sources from elite writers who were heavily influenced by Hellenistic, or Greek philosophy. These elites made a strong push for a centralized authoritarian church government led by bishops in major Roman population centers. Later, these bishops would vote to determine church policy and doctrine. Another main feature of the 100s AD was the emergence of Christian Logos theories. Logos is the Greek word for “word” in John 1:1. Logos theories were an adaption of earlier Greek philosophical speculations, especially of Plato, who maintained that the ultimate Good or Ultimate Source was too transcendent, too distinct, too separate from the physical world to either make the world or have interaction with the world directly. Rather, the...

Does Philippians 2:5-11 describe the eternal God the Son humbling himself to become man? We think not. These are notes for the One God Report podcast in which we explain some problems and contradictions with the "deity of Christ" interpretation of Philippians 2, and suggest a better way to understand this portion of Scripture: When Christ Jesus "emptied" and "humbled" himself, he was already a human being. The acts of emptying and humbling himself relate to his obedience to die on the cross, not "to become a human being". 1. The context of the Letter to the Philippians shows that Paul is talking about the human being, Jesus Christ. Throughout Philippians, as throughout all of Paul's letters, the Lord Jesus Christ is distinguished from God. That is, the Lord Jesus Christ is someone who is not God, but has a God (1:2, 1:11, 2:9, 2:11, 3:3, 4:19-20).  The context of these four verses (2:5-8) is not the "deity of Christ...