Read the nicene creed
Also, autocorrect just taught me that you cant have niceness without nicene!
Also, autocorrect just taught me that you cant have niceness without nicene!
The Trinity is the reality of the common substance of the three persons (Father, Son, Spirit). Christ was a unique hypostasis of the Logos and human nature. So, he was fully God and Fully man, the incarnation of the Word (Logos). This is the single greatest mystery of Christianity.AstroAg17 said:
I've been wondering about this lately. Jesus was a full fledged member of the trinity while he was on earth, right? Fully God and whatnot. When he died, did he just go hang out in heaven for a few days or was he actually gone? If he just went back to heaven then I don't understand how his death can be seen as a sacrifice. To call it a sacrifice it would seem that he would have to be giving something up, rather than trading earthly life in for something infinitely better. It seems to me that if that was the case, this situation is like briar rabbit talking up the sacrifice of being thrown in the briar patch. That's probably a bit more disrespectful than I meant it to be, but I like that metaphor. I'm really curious about the theology of this.
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O Immortal One, when Thou didst descend into the tomb, Thou didst destroy the power of Hades; and Thou didst rise victorious, O Christ God. Thou hast said to the ointment-bearing women: Rejoice! And Thou gavest peace to Thy Disciples, O Bestower of Resurrection to those Who had fallen.
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In the grave with the body but in Hades with the soul as God; in paradise with the thief, and on the throne with the Father and the Holy Spirit wast Thou, O Christ, filling all things, Thyself uncircumscribed.
AstroAg17 said:
That's much more helpful. I'm not sure what percentage of Christians would agree with you on that though, some of that seemed pretty denomination specific.
I don't think I understand what you believe happens after death. Can you link me to something?
I considered that the suffering might be at the heart of the sacrifice, but if that were the case I don't see the focus on the crucifixion. It would be more about the cumulative suffering over the course of his life. Granted, most occurred on the final day, but it should all count equally. Every one of Jesus' minor mishaps from stubbing a toe to discomfort from a wet shirt would then be God's sacrifice for us. That just doesn't seem as profound.
AstroAg17 said:
That's much more helpful. I'm not sure what percentage of Christians would agree with you on that though, some of that seemed pretty denomination specific.
You can use as many characters as you want, but you have no idea of what you are talking about. It is all guesswork, supposition, fear, and hope. Not fact. How many formerly dead people have you talked with that have told you about any of this? Do you have special knowledge that others do not? What happens when anyone dies is pure guesswork and hope. Only your "faith" says otherwise. And faith is not proof, it is an absence of proof.k2aggie07 said:
Yes, because if it can't be explained in 140 characters it's not worth explaining.
Please explain how something can be fully one thing, but yet fully another. If one is 100% (fully) something then one cannot be something else.k2aggie07 said:AstroAg17 said:
So, he was fully God and Fully man, the incarnation of the Word (Logos). This is the single greatest mystery of Christianity.
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How then was He begotten? This Generation would have been no great thing, if you could have comprehended it who have no real knowledge even of your own generation, or at least who comprehend very little of it, and of that little you are ashamed to speak; and then do you think you know the whole? You will have to undergo much labor before you discover the laws of composition, formation, manifestation, and the bond whereby soul is united to bodymind to soul, and reason to mind; and movement, increase, assimilation of food, sense, memory, recollection, and all the rest of the parts of which you are compounded; and which of them belongs to the soul and body together, and which to each independently of the other, and which is received from each other. For those parts whose maturity comes later, yet received their laws at the time of conception. Tell me what these laws are? And do not even then venture to speculate on the Generation of God; for that would be unsafe. For even if you knew all about your own, yet you do not by any means know about God's. And if you do not understand your own, how can you know about God's? For in proportion as God is harder to trace out than man, so is the heavenly Generation harder to comprehend than your own. But if you assert that because you cannot comprehend it, therefore He cannot have been begotten, it will be time for you to strike out many existing things which you cannot comprehend; and first of all God Himself. For you cannot say what He is, even if you are very reckless, and excessively proud of your intelligence. First, cast away your notions of flow and divisions and sections, and your conceptions of immaterial as if it were material birth, and then you may perhaps worthily conceive of the Divine Generation. How was He begotten? I repeat the question in indignation. The Begetting of God must be honored by silence. It is a great thing for you to learn that He was begotten. But the manner of His generation we will not admit that even Angels can conceive, much less you. Shall I tell you how it was? It was in a manner known to the Father Who begot, and to the Son Who was begotten. Anything more than this is hidden by a cloud, and escapes your dim sight.
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For we have learned to believe in and to teach the Deity of the Son from [the prophets'] great and lofty utterances. And what utterances are these? These: God The Word He That Was In The Beginning and With The Beginning, and The Beginning. In the Beginning was The Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, (John 1:1) and With You is the Beginning, and He who calls her The Beginning from generations. (Isaiah 41:4) Then the Son is Only-begotten: The only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, it says, He has declared Him. (John 1:18) The Way, the Truth, the Life, the Light. I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; and I am the Light of the World. Wisdom and Power, Christ, the Wisdom of God, and the Power of God. (1 Corinthians 1:24) The Effulgence, the Impress, the Image, the Seal; Who being the Effulgence of His glory and the Impress of His Essence, and the Image of His Goodness, (Wisdom 7:26) and Him has God the Father sealed. (John 6:27) Lord, King, He That Is, The Almighty. The Lord rained down fire from the Lord; (Genesis 19:24) and A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your Kingdom; and Which is and was and is to come, the Almighty (Revelation 1:8) all which are clearly spoken of the Son, with all the other passages of the same force, none of which is an afterthought, or added later to the Son or the Spirit, any more than to the Father Himself. For Their Perfection is not affected by additions. There never was a time when He was without the Word, or when He was not the Father, or when He was not true, or not wise, or not powerful, or devoid of life, or of splendor, or of goodness.
For He Whom you now treat with contempt was once above you. He Who is now Man was once the Uncompounded. What He was He continued to be; what He was not He took to Himself. In the beginning He was, uncaused; for what is the Cause of God? But afterwards for a cause He was born. And that cause was that you might be saved, who insult Him and despise His Godhead, because of this, that He took upon Him your denser nature, having converse with Flesh by means of Mind. While His inferior Nature, the Humanity, became God, because it was united to God, and became One Person because the Higher Nature prevailed in order that I too might be made God so far as He is made Man. He was born but He had been begotten: He was born of a woman but she was a Virgin. The first is human, the second Divine. In His Human nature He had no Father, but also in His Divine Nature no Mother. Both these belong to Godhead. He dwelt in the womb but He was recognized by the Prophet, himself still in the womb, leaping before the Word, for Whose sake He came into being. He was wrapped in swaddling clothes (Luke 2:41) but He took off the swathing bands of the grave by His rising again. He was laid in a manger but He was glorified by Angels, and proclaimed by a star, and worshipped by the Magi. Why are you offended by that which is presented to your sight, because you will not look at that which is presented to your mind? He was driven into exile into Egypt but He drove away the Egyptian idols. He had no form nor comeliness in the eyes of the Jews (Isaiah 53:2) but to David He is fairer than the children of men. And on the Mountain He was bright as the lightning, and became more luminous than the sun, (Matthew 17:2) initiating us into the mystery of the future.
He was baptized as Man but He remitted sins as God not because He needed purificatory rites Himself, but that He might sanctify the element of water. He was tempted as Man, but He conquered as God; yea, He bids us be of good cheer, for He has overcome the world. (John 16:33) He hungered but He fed thousands; yea, He is the Bread that gives life, and That is of heaven. He thirsted but He cried, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. Yea, He promised that fountains should flow from them that believe. He was wearied, but He is the Rest of them that are weary and heavy laden. (Matthew 11:28) He was heavy with sleep, but He walked lightly over the sea. He rebuked the winds, He made Peter light as he began to sink. He pays tribute, but it is out of a fish; yea, He is the King of those who demanded it. (John 19:19) He is called a Samaritan and a demoniac; but He saves him that came down from Jerusalem and fell among thieves; the demons acknowledge Him, and He drives out demons and sinks in the sea legions of foul spirits, (Luke 8:28-33) and sees the Prince of the demons falling like lightning. He is stoned, but is not taken. He prays, but He hears prayer. He weeps, but He causes tears to cease. He asks where Lazarus was laid, for He was Man; but He raises Lazarus, for He was God. (John 11:43) He is sold, and very cheap, for it is only for thirty pieces of silver; (Matthew 26:15) but He redeems the world, and that at a great price, for the Price was His own blood. (1 Peter 1:19) As a sheep He is led to the slaughter, (Isaiah 53:7) but He is the Shepherd of Israel, and now of the whole world also. As a Lamb He is silent, yet He is the Word, and is proclaimed by the Voice of one crying in the wilderness. (John 1:23) He is bruised and wounded, but He heals every disease and every infirmity. (Isaiah 53:23) He is lifted up and nailed to the Tree, but by the Tree of Life He restores us; yea, He saves even the Robber crucified with Him; (Luke 23:43) yea, He wrapped the visible world in darkness. He is given vinegar to drink mingled with gall. Who? He who turned the water into wine (John 2:1-11), who is the destroyer of the bitter taste, who is Sweetness and altogether desire. (Song of Songs 5:16) He lays down His life, but He has power to take it again; (John 10:18) and the veil is rent, for the mysterious doors of Heaven are opened; the rocks are cleft, the dead arise. (Matthew 27:51) He dies, but He gives life, and by His death destroys death. He is buried, but He rises again; He goes down into hades, but He brings up the souls; He ascends to Heaven, and shall come again to judge the quick and the dead, and to put to the test such words as yours. If the one give you a starting point for your error, let the others put an end to it.
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Oh I see what you mean. But that's false heaven. That's the lie of the world, basically the same temptation we all face - to want the world, created things, over God.
Is there nothing in the physical realm which we do not as a species understand?AstroAg17 said:
Jesus being wholly God and wholly man is paradoxical, and to accept it as true is the definition of illogical.