by BoogerMan 24 Replies latest watchtower bible
BoogerMan
Who did Isaiah see?
“In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.”
“Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.”
Isaiah 6:1, 5
@BM - Ignatius was a disciple of the Apostle John. He and many other early Christian leaders correctly quote 1 Tim. 3: 16. Once a person believes God when he says we are a tri-partite being made of soul, body & spirit, it is much easier to accept who God says he is. Most people have an unbiblical view of our makeup, essentially a view that adheres to materialism. You have to take off your WT / Secular assumptions when reading the bible or you'll get no where.
Among the clearest texts in the Bible that show that Christ was both man and God is 1 Timothy 3:16. The Authorised Version translated this as:
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.
@ BM regarding John 1: 18 & Ex. 33: 7 (No man hath seen God)
The bible speaks of Jesus' body as a veil. Jesus was God manifest in the flesh just as God claims, only veiled.
Heb.10:20 By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;
Instead of a veil of cloth leading to the Most Holy in the temple, Jesus' body is now the veil leading to the Most Holy in person, literally.
"I am the door" - Jesus
@ Hooberus - Didn't Isaiah have a vision, or do you really believe that he did see God Almighty wearing clothes in heaven?
If so, your assertion makes Exodus 33:20 & John 1:18 completely false.
Either humans can see God Almighty physically, or they can't. Which one do you believe is true?
@ Sea Breeze - "Jesus was God manifest in the flesh just as God claims, only veiled."
An interesting symbolism, but it ignores the trinity 'truth' - that thousands of people saw Christ, therefore, thousands of people actually saw God Almighty incarnate. That's the truth you believe.
I don't, in spite of Rome's warning that I'll be forever damned with no chance of salvation.
Thankfully, 8 scriptures say that Christ will do the judging of us, not fellow human beings, so all those who do so, especially JW's & the Catholic Church, will have to answer for doing his job.
"Even many Jews prior to the birth of Jesus were expecting "God manifest in the flesh""
They were expecting a messiah. The messiah would not be an ordinary human.
God was/is spirit. Jesus was spirit, became human, then returned to be a spirit.
Sea breeze. You list the early church teachers along with the apostles. I don't hold credibility to the apostles. That's one problem that the WTS has always done. They base doctrine and rules on what the apostles said. If the apostles were the Governing Body, why do we have letters from Peter, Paul, James, John and Jude, rather than writings from the 'Governing Body' composed of the apostles?
Rather than use any of the apostolic scriptures, I choose something that has no writing. The temple.
The Temple was given by Jehovah as a model, a shadow, a lesson, in earthly terms of what is in the heaven.
A priest offers a sacrifice to Jehovah God. All of that forshadowed Jesus being the priest and the sacrificed that was offered to Jehovah God. Thus Jesus can not be Jehovah God if he is the priest and the sacrifice.
An interesting symbolism, but it ignores the trinity 'truth' - that thousands of people saw Christ, therefore, thousands of people actually saw God Almighty incarnate. That's the truth you believe.
This is not symbolism. It is literally true. I have posted this chart many times on this board because it is the definition that the bible uses to describe us. According to the bible, we are a tri-partite being, with each part denoting personhood, and collectively constituting a person who is alive.
Using the bible's definition of who Jesus was (fully man), you can see how he could also be fully God (although veiled in a body) by inheriting the very essence of the almighty ("God is a Spirit") as his "only-begotten" son.
Begotten means to father, in the sense that your offspring also inherits your DNA (your essence). Jesus inherited the very essence of his father Jehovah - his Spirit.
One of the unique characteristics of God is his omnipresence. Since the essence of God is undividable, Jesus is fully God by virture of the nature of his Spirit, and fully man because he meets the descriptive criteria of a man stated in scripture at 1 Thess. 5: 23 and Heb. 4: 12
The heart of the Lord is love. I find it fascinating to ponder the depths to which God would go to so that we could easier relate to him. We no longer need a special group of learned men to show us the father. As Jesus put it - if you have seen me, you have seen the father.
Also according to the bible, the entire purpose of our existence is to love God and enjoy his many creations and attributes. The life and times of Jesus makes this so much more doable.
The only place I have seen that phrase is in Matthew 28:19 All other references don't mention the holy spirit. Go, therefore, and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, (RNWT)
The baptism questions asked of people being baptized as jws in 2006 where "holy spirit" was replaced with "holy-spirit directed organization: On the basis of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, have you repented of your sins and dedicated yourself to Jehovah to do his will?
Do you understand that your dedication and baptism identify you as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in association with God’s spirit-directed organization?
And the 2017 WT publication repeats that: Have you dedicated your life to Jehovah and symbolized your dedication by water baptism? If so, that is wonderful! Recall that on your baptism day, before eyewitnesses, you were asked whether you had dedicated yourself to Jehovah and understood that “your dedication and baptism identify you as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in association with God’s spirit-directed organization.
Just to add, I did not say that Matthew 28:19 was considered a valid scripture, but that the WTS does and includes it in the RNWT. I might add, I have never found a phrase "witnesses of Jehovah" in the New Testament of the bible but rather "witnesses of Jesus." The only place I have found it is in Isaiah 43:10 where it is referring to the jews and the WTS applies it only to the anointed as being spiritual Israelites. The WTS quibbles about it now. The WTS used to say Jehovah's witnesses, and companions. Technically, non-anointed jws are not jehovah's witnesses.
