Quote:
Originally Posted by UntoHim
So, back to 1 Corinthians 15:45 we come.
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Okay, I will pick up your gauntlet. Or at least try to re-iterate why I think nobody can pick up the gauntlet, adequately.
1 Corinthians 15:45 is being presented to us by LSM as a continuation of the "became" in the gospel of John chapter 1. There, the beloved disciple presented the astonishing proposition that "God... became flesh", which is a shocking thought -- it certainly was a head-on assault on the gnosis that was penetrating Christian circles. Supposedly, and it
does make sense, light and perfection could never co-exist with the fallen, darkened material realm. But the glorious source of perfection itself became "sarx", a bag of flesh, according to John.
Now, did Paul continue this idea in his first epistle to the Corinthians, at least subconsciously, to let some adroit scholar like WL raise it before the church? Or was he talking about something different? I can't definitively answer that, and hopefully my ruminations won't stumble someone trying to escape the clutches of the LSM. "Yeah, maybe the blendeds are wrong, but look what happens when you leave the local ground! These folks is flat-out crazy, man!!"
So, on to speculation... the whole "processed Triune God" idea perhaps requires an application of this: "There is one God, one Lord,
one Spirit, one faith, one baptism..." So if Jesus became "A" life-giving spirit, then perforce He became "THE" life giving Spirit, i.e. the Holy Spirit. That seems to be the logic. I can still hear: "If 'the Lord is the Spirit', there in 2 Corinthians 3:17, then how many spirits are there?" Did anyone else hear WL ask that question: "How many life-giving spirits does the Bible contain?"
I would counter with, "And he answered and spoke unto me, saying, This is the word of Jehovah unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith Jehovah of hosts." (Darby) Who is my Spirit, here? Singular? "The" Holy Spirit? Why then "Jehovah of
hosts", plural? And why do we continually shy from the multiplicity seen in the text? Surely there is unanimity within not only the Godhead but within the kingdom itself. "You all shall be one" is a primary command. Yet I am not Unto, nor OBW, nor Ohio nor awareness. Why do we insist God conform to our theology? A tree is not a fish, nor a fish a tree, yet both point to and glorify their source. The "hosts" in question may be "ministering spirits" perhaps, and not THE Spirit, but still we have multiplicity and unity, and LSM's theology apparently cannot handle the multiplicity part. It can't, period: it just collapses when plural manifestations occur. To survive, therefore, it needs to collapse plurality, a fish has to "become" a tree and so forth. Only then can "Christ become all in all" to them. So all the troublesome parts of the Bible are explained away (often by changing definitions of the same word!) or simply ignored.
I find that simplistic, boiler-plate statements of theology attempting to explicitly define, as Unto put it, "the very nature of the Godhead" often end up ignoring vast, vague, troublesome, and/or seemingly contradictory/irreconcilable parts of scripture that don't conform to the theology at hand. The LSM acolytes wave their choice portions of scripture like 1 Cor 15:45 "B" while ignoring dozens or even hundreds of equally choice portions of scripture that were not profitable to their ministry and its oeuvre. They like the "my Spirit" part of Zech 4:6 but don't like the "hosts" part. So they pretend it doesn't exist. Their theology can't even make it through one verse, Zechariah 4:6, unscathed! They have to ignore Zechariah 4:6 "D"... they can only use parts "A", "B", and "C" for their theology. Why? What idea is so mesmerizing that the Bible has to bow, trembling, before it? Especially while YOU, Mr expert theologian, are still here in your untransfigured flesh?
As Hamlet said, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." I know, that was a couple of days before poor Hamlet committed suicide, but still... nice quote. Couldn't resist.