Lee's Trinity

[Drake]

Igzy)"
But to say God is Triune for dispensing is to say God has no reason to be Triune except to dispense into us, which is to say God has no meaning without us. Simply put, no."

Not a logical progression so not how I see it .

I think of it this way. God is a triangular peg. Always was, always will be. According to His good pleasure He desires a resting place in His creation. As such in creation He creates triangular hole.. To the peg the hole is a counterpart. To the hole the peg must have created it in a certain way for the purpose of holding the peg, The hole knows the peg is still the peg whether the hole exists or not.

To bring it back, the Triune is for dispensing because He created us to contain Him. We can see that now. That does not lead to "God has no meaning without us". Brother Lee never said that.

Drake

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Drake

Igzy)"
But to say God is Triune for dispensing is to say God has no reason to be Triune except to dispense into us, which is to say God has no meaning without us. Simply put, no."

Not a logical progression so not how I see it .

I think of it this way. God is a triangular peg. Always was, always will be. According to His good pleasure He desires a resting place in His creation. As such in creation He creates triangular hole.. To the peg the hole is a counterpart. To the hole the peg must have created it in a certain way for the purpose of holding the peg, The hole knows the peg is still the peg whether the hole exists or not.

To bring it back, the Triune is for dispensing because He created us to contain Him. We can see that now. That does not lead to "God has no meaning without us". Brother Lee never said that.

Drake

But Lee's statement does imply that God is triune only for dispensing into man, which implies there is no purpose for his being triune other than dispensing into man. This seems backwards. It implies that God had to create us because he had no other use for his triuneness. I say this triuneness always had meaning within himself, but he decided to let us in on the fun. I don't see why God needs to be triune to dispense. I do see how being conscious and completely self-knowing causes him to be triune.

Also, I see how you could say God is a three-sided peg, but please explain how exactly we are three-sided hole, other than by saying the three-sided peg fits into us. I don't see the three sides to our "hole." What are they?


BTW, Drake have you not figured out how to click the quote button to get a quote? You seem to do them by hand and that seems tedious. Just trying to help.

[Drake]

8

Originally Posted by Igzy

But Lee's statement does imply that God is triune only for dispensing into man, which implies there is no purpose for his being triune other than dispensing into man. This seems backwards. It implies that God had to create us because he had no other use for his triuneness. I say this triuneness always had meaning within himself, but he decided to let us in on the fun. I don't see why God needs to be triune to dispense. I do see how being conscious and completely self-knowing causes him to be triune.

Also, I see how you could say God is a three-sided peg, but please explain how exactly we are three-sided hole, other than by saying the three-sided peg fits into us. I don't see the three sides to our "hole." What are they?


BTW, Drake have you not figured out how to click the quote button to get a quote? You seem to do them by hand and that seems tedious. Just trying to help.

Igzy,

I only know how to quote everything in a post such as above. I don't know how to quote part of a post other than cut and paste like I usually do.

I understand Brother Lee's meaning this way: in eternity past God purposed and planned to join Himself to and express Himself through the man He would create. Because He is Triune everything follows from that. He creates a man to dispense Himself into. A physical rock will not do. The glove is a better illustration of man to contain and express God as the hand.

Since we were talking about the Father, Son, and Spirit it occurred to me to think of a triangular peg. A corresponding triangular hole was needed. Frankly, my initial thought was that man is tripartite to match the Triune God. It's not a very good analogy because a triangular hole does not express the triangular peg as a glove would. Thrrefore, I took it no further thinking its probably a dead end.

[Evangelical]

OBW says: ...Belief in both is required for salvation. Just believing in Jesus as the good master is not enough. You must believe in him as God. And not just some god. But of the God that is Three.

But they are not able to produce any verse which says or implies that belief in the "God that is Three" is necessary for the salvation experience.

However the Bible says that belief that Jesus is the Son of God is sufficient, and 1 John 4:15 confirms that belief in Jesus as the Son is sufficient because belief in Jesus as the Son of God brings the whole Triune God.

Acts 8:37 ""I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.""

1 John 4:15 "If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God."

1 John 5:5 "Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God."

Acts 9:20 "At once he began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God."

John 1:34 "And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God."


The following wikipedia article on Arianism explains how one orthodox view came out of what was initially" two equally orthodox interpretations", and the two-ing and fro-ing over the issue, and that "The great majority of Christians had no clear views on the Trinity and did not understand what was at stake in the issues".


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arianism
There was a dispute between two interpretations (Arianism and Trinitarianism) based upon the theological orthodoxy of the time, both of them attempted to solve its theological dilemmas.[2] So there were, initially, two equally orthodox interpretations which initiated a conflict in order to attract adepts and define the new orthodoxy.[2] Homoousianism was formally affirmed by the first two Ecumenical Councils. All mainstream branches[citation needed] of Christianity now consider Arianism to be heterodox and heretical. The Ecumenical First Council of Nicaea of 325 deemed it to be a heresy. At the regional First Synod of Tyre in 335, Arius was exonerated.[3] Constantine the Great was baptized by the Arian bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia.[4][5] After the deaths of both Arius and Constantine, Arius was again anathemised and pronounced a heretic again at the Ecumenical First Council of Constantinople of 381.[6] The Roman Emperors Constantius II (337–361) and Valens (364–378) were Arians or Semi-Arians, as was the first King of Italy, Odoacer (433?–493), and the Lombards till the 7th century. According to Everett Ferguson, "The great majority of Christians had no clear views on the Trinity and did not understand what was at stake in the issues.

Ferguson, Everett (26 November 2013). Church History, Volume One: From Christ to the Pre-Reformation: The Rise and Growth of the Church in Its Cultural, Intellectual, and Political Context. Zondervan. p. 267. ISBN 978-0-310-51657-6.


Christianity has fallen away from faith in Christ the son of God for salvation and changed it into a man made doctrine for salvation.
The following article says so plainly:
"The reason for this is that, to put it as concisely as possible, the Trinity is the gospel. "
http://www.str.org/blog/trinity-salvation#.WKe_5PmGNPY

This is clearly "another gospel" which says "the Trinity is the gospel, believe in it and you will be saved".

This is in contrast to the true gospel which says ""If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God". If a person believes that Jesus is the Son of God then they automatically believe and receive the "one true Triune God".

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

OBW says: ...Belief in both is required for salvation. Just believing in Jesus as the good master is not enough. You must believe in him as God. And not just some god. But of the God that is Three.

But they are not able to produce any verse which says or implies that belief in the "God that is Three" is necessary for the salvation experience.

I never said that. I never made any reference to what is required for salvation. I will accept this as a mistake on your part. But if you persist in it, I will have to dismiss you as a liar.

I did respond to a particular thing you said in response to Unto's quotation of Jesus in John 17:3 "this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." This verse says what it says. But it does not say anything about belief. It only speaks of knowing. And while we can be saved with little knowing, there is much to come to know after that.

And I do not recall that anyone has ever said that belief in the Trinity as espoused by the mainstream of Christians is required for salvation. I know some people who will start to question what it is that you may have put your faith in if you don't believe in the "right" God. But they usually are sort of tentative about it. As they should be.

I honestly think that you and Drake are following one of the "soft" "heresies" surrounding the unclear and vaguely defined Trinity. And that is why I call it "soft." I don't think your version is the better synthesizer of the totality of the available material. Instead, yours latches onto one side, needs to understand the other side and can't, so you marginalize it or reject it.

And I put "heresy" in quotes because it is not a damnable heresy worthy of being expelled from the body of faith. It is simply a difference of opinion concerning undefined aspects of our God. It is all conjecture.


While I reject your version, I do not suppose that you are not saved as a result of the "error." But the more serious error in it is the decision to declare those who are in the mainstream as heretics because they don't hold to your version. It is just too much in keeping with the separatist (the opposite of unity or unifying or being one) positions of the man who claimed his followers were the most "one" among all Christians.

History is bearing out that there is no unity, even within your group. Only conformity or rejection.

[Evangelical]

Originally Posted by OBW

I never said that. I never made any reference to what is required for salvation. I will accept this as a mistake on your part. But if you persist in it, I will have to dismiss you as a liar.

Apologies if I thought you also ascribed to the error that UntoHim believes in. Still, the Trinity is not evident in John 17:3. Just the Father and the Son. I believe a truly saved person will believe in the Trinity, just as they will believe in taking the Lord's Table or being baptized. But to say that belief in the Trinity is necessary for salvation is wrong.

[HERn]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

Apologies if I thought you also ascribed to the error that UntoHim believes in. Still, the Trinity is not evident in John 17:3. Just the Father and the Son. I believe a truly saved person will believe in the Trinity, just as they will believe in taking the Lord's Table or being baptized. But to say that belief in the Trinity is necessary for salvation is wrong.

I'm with E on this one. I got saved as a teenager on drugs and I did not disbelieve or believe in the trinity, I just needed and wanted Jesus.

[UntoHim]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

But to say that belief in the Trinity is necessary for salvation is wrong.

I simply quoted from the words of the Lord Jesus: John 17:3 "this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." Again, what part of "this is eternal life" do you not understand? Salvation = Eternal Life - Eternal Life = Salvation. Who is the "YOU" in this verse Evangelical? Please take a deep breath and take your time. I am not speaking of any "dogma" here, only quoting the DIRECT WORDS of the Lord Jesus Christ. I REPEAT - Who is the "YOU" in this verse? I know that your teacher taught you that Jesus Christ WAS THE FATHER, but this myth has already been dispelled on our forum and other places on the Internet for years (and for about 2,000 years before that)

Nobody on this forum has EVER said that "belief in the Trinity is necessary for salvation". Not me, not anybody. This is not a meeting of the Local Church of Witness Lee where you can just spout off any unproven, wild myth and we will all shout out "Amen!". This is the real world apart from the bubble of your little sect.

WHO was the "You" in this verse Evangelical?
-

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Drake

Igzy,

I only know how to quote everything in a post such as above. I don't know how to quote part of a post other than cut and paste like I usually do.

Just delete the part of the quote you don't want. I use Chrome which shows the {QUOTE} tags. NOTE: The tags actually need square not curly brackets. You can add a close quote tag {/QUOTE} to break off a part of a quote, and comment on it as I have done here. You then can add a open quote tag {QUOTE} to continue the quote as I have done below.

Also you can highlight any text and click the quote button (speech balloon) in the editor to wrap it in quote tags.

I understand Brother Lee's meaning this way: in eternity past God purposed and planned to join Himself to and express Himself through the man He would create. Because He is Triune everything follows from that. He creates a man to dispense Himself into. A physical rock will not do. The glove is a better illustration of man to contain and express God as the hand.

I understand the glove analogy, but I think God's relationship with man is meant to express God through more than him shining through us and us being like him. I think he is also expressed through our relationship with him and our relationship with each other. God is mainly expressed through how we treat him, others and ourselves. This is why the two greatest commandments are love God and love people, and why Jesus say when we love our neighbor (as ourselves) we've fulfilled the law.

Since we were talking about the Father, Son, and Spirit it occurred to me to think of a triangular peg. A corresponding triangular hole was needed. Frankly, my initial thought was that man is tripartite to match the Triune God. It's not a very good analogy because a triangular hole does not express the triangular peg as a glove would. Thrrefore, I took it no further thinking its probably a dead end.

I think we are triangular because we have a self (father) and self-image (son) and a relationship between the two (spirit). This matches the triuneness of God. We are all little trinities like him. We are more like God than we thought.

Note that when God created man he specifically summoned the whole Trinity in on creation, showing that man was to himself be an expression of the Trinity. I don't think the body, soul, spirit collection is it. It think it is self, self-image, spirit. Where we really live is where we really know and connect with ourselves in the holy way God intended. That's our spirit. (I will wrap the following quote in quote tags.)

Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness;

Pretty cool stuff.

It seems I'm talking about a person with a split personality. But that only happens when the self and self-image are in conflict, which does not happen in God, nor in us when we are in sync with God. But we all have relationship with ourselves, as does God. A person is completely healthy and happy when his self and self-image are in perfect sync, i.e. his spirit approves of both, which means they are in sync with God. This is what it means to have a saved soul.

A person in hell is in complete conflict with himself, with no hope for reconciliation, which makes the conflict worse, and on and on. Which is why his soul is lost.