What do you think of this?

Jason B · #1 10-08-2010, 06:11 PM

I'm not trying to bash trinity folks. When they say they don't worship three gods, I give them the benefit of the doubt. But when they say things like this it causes me to wonder how anyone could say they worship and believe in only ONE God:

QUESTIONER: John, I'm not going to stand before you and say I had a full and complete understanding of the Trinity of God. I do know that dwelling within me is the Holy Spirit, but when I pray, and I know this must be an old question to you, but who do I pray to? I find myself praying to God, and then I say I'm slighting Jesus, and then I'm praying to Jesus and I say I'm slighting God. Who do I pray to?

JOHN: My feeling is you can pray to all of them. They're all persons. I mean you can find in the New Testament illustrations of prayer directed to every member of the Trinity in Scripture. I think that there's a calling on the Holy Spirit, there's a calling on Christ, there's a calling on God. I think you have that liberty to call on the Trinity in total or in part. I think we commune with all of them. I mean there are times when I just ask the Holy Spirit to fill me. There are times when I ask Christ to bless me and there are times when I talk to God the Father and I don't know, I don't understand it. I've said for years if you try to understand the Trinity you'll find yourself under the bed saying the Greek alphabet even though you don't know it. You can't understand it; it's just that act of simple faith. But I think you have the freedom to talk to God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. So just be free to talk to any and all of them. In fact you might even say, "I want all three of you to listen here, 'cause this is really important. Okay?http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons...nswers-Part-16

QUESTIONER: Yes, John, why did Jesus, being God, call out to the Father, "why have you forsaken Me?" on the cross?
JOHN: You're asking why Jesus on the cross said, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" And what you're really doing is opening up the mystery of the trinity. The Bible tells us that God is one God. Deuteronomy 6: "The Lord our God is one God." That is the uniqueness of Judaism, that is the uniqueness of the Christian faith. There is one God as opposed to many gods...polytheism, many gods. We believe in one God, but that one God encompasses three Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I don't understand that, I just believe it. ....The answer to your question is there's no answer.http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons...nswers-Part-15

Jason B · #2 10-08-2010, 06:13 PM

Are you serious? And trinitarians arrogantly run around and talk about how confusing oneness theology is?

Jermyn Davidson · #3 10-08-2010, 07:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason Badejo

Are you serious? And trinitarians arrogantly run around and talk about how confusing oneness theology is?

It's probably my circle of friends and acquaintances, but the only people that I know who "harp" on the confusion of another believer's theology are the Oneness Pentecostals.

I used to associate with some "Reformed" Baptist Christians who beat up other Christians, but they cut me off when they realized that I was simply wrong about just about everything.

Praxeas · #4 10-09-2010, 12:33 AM

Did he give verse for where they prayed to the Holy Spirit?

Sam · #5 10-09-2010, 07:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason Badejo

Are you serious? And trinitarians arrogantly run around and talk about how confusing oneness theology is?

we both (trinitarians and oneness) have to do some explaining when it comes to certain scriptures

Sam · #6 10-09-2010, 07:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Praxeas

Did he give verse for where they prayed to the Holy Spirit?

I don't know of any verse in the NT where a person prayed to the Holy Spirit.

The closest thing I can think of right now in the OT is where Ezekiel prophesied to the wind/Spirit and the Spirit came.

A prayer we used to hear at the Vineyard pretty often was, "Come, Holy Spirit...." People would pray this as they began to minister to people in prayer and it was just a request for help from the Lord --that through His Spirit He would help them pray and minister.

Dottie Rambo wrote a song, "Holy Spirit, Thou Art Welcome In This Place," that we've sung a couple of times at meetings. I don't have any problem with either of these songs/prayers. At times I've prayed, "Holy Spirit draw xxxx to You, open his heart, deal with him/her......." I guess this would be considered a prayer to the Holy Spirit but I don't picture the Holy Spirit as a separate being from the Father or the Son. God works through His Spirit in, upon, among, and through us.

I remember a woman in our UPC church back in the nineteen fifties. She was a Christian worker with the group called Four Square Gospel. Someone from their Church had gone out west to a conference and when he (or she don't remember which now) came back, he passed on some advice. He said "The reason you're not getting your prayers answered is because you are praying too much to Jesus and not enough to the Father or the Holy Spirit." The woman told us that she tried praying to Jesus and to the Father and to the Holy Spirit and it was confusing. Not long after that she came in contact with some Jesus Name people, received a revelation of Jesus and the problem/confusion went away.

mizpeh · #7 10-09-2010, 09:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jermyn Davidson

It's probably my circle of friends and acquaintances, but the only people that I know who "harp" on the confusion of another believer's theology are the Oneness Pentecostals.

I used to associate with some "Reformed" Baptist Christians who beat up other Christians, but they cut me off when they realized that I was simply wrong about just about everything.

Oh, definitely, positively, and absolutely! Oneness Pentecostals are the only ones who harp on the confusion of other's who call upon the name of Christ!

TGBTG · #8 10-09-2010, 11:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sam

I don't know of any verse in the NT where a person prayed to the Holy Spirit.

The closest thing I can think of right now in the OT is where Ezekiel prophesied to the wind/Spirit and the Spirit came.

A prayer we used to hear at the Vineyard pretty often was, "Come, Holy Spirit...." People would pray this as they began to minister to people in prayer and it was just a request for help from the Lord --that through His Spirit He would help them pray and minister.

Dottie Rambo wrote a song, "Holy Spirit, Thou Art Welcome In This Place," that we've sung a couple of times at meetings. I don't have any problem with either of these songs/prayers. At times I've prayed, "Holy Spirit draw xxxx to You, open his heart, deal with him/her......." I guess this would be considered a prayer to the Holy Spirit but I don't picture the Holy Spirit as a separate being from the Father or the Son. God works through His Spirit in, upon, among, and through us.

I remember a woman in our UPC church back in the nineteen fifties. She was a Christian worker with the group called Four Square Gospel. Someone from their Church had gone out west to a conference and when he (or she don't remember which now) came back, he passed on some advice. He said "The reason you're not getting your prayers answered is because you are praying too much to Jesus and not enough to the Father or the Holy Spirit." The woman told us that she tried praying to Jesus and to the Father and to the Holy Spirit and it was confusing. Not long after that she came in contact with some Jesus Name people, received a revelation of Jesus and the problem/confusion went away.

This right here is the crux of the matter. Not to be blunt, but trinity is plain confusion.
I see it as a case of
John 4:22 Ye worship ye know not what:

Praxeas · #9 10-09-2010, 02:25 PM

Ive come to the conclusion that if you already don't believe what someone else believes and you are minded to argue against it, that theology will be confusing to you whether you really think so or not

It's only natural when you are trying to make someone elses theology look silly that subconsciously you will find it confusing or you will convince yourself it is confusing.

Then there are some that just don't have the willingness or the intellect for a deeper intellectual discussion on theology.

They probably don't understand a lot of what Paul had to say
2Pe 3:15 And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him,
2Pe 3:16 as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.

Jason B · #10 10-09-2010, 05:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Praxeas

Ive come to the conclusion that if you already don't believe what someone else believes and you are minded to argue against it, that theology will be confusing to you whether you really think so or not

It's only natural when you are trying to make someone elses theology look silly that subconsciously you will find it confusing or you will convince yourself it is confusing.

Then there are some that just don't have the willingness or the intellect for a deeper intellectual discussion on theology.

They probably don't understand a lot of what Paul had to say
2Pe 3:15 And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him,
2Pe 3:16 as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.

Nevertheless, it is such folks who appoint themselves the experts. Believe as they do or be condemned.