#9 God is Triune
God the Son
Coming from a pagan background God the Father and God the Holy Spirit were easier for me to understand. I already understood the idea of God the Father because I already worshipped various gods. I understood God the Holy Spirit because I had countless interactions with spiritual beings and specters. None of these comparisons hold any minute speck of truth or equality in them. However, these concepts were already something I believed in. It was easier to switch from my faith in nature gods and spiritual beings to having a relationship with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. My struggle was with God the Son, Jesus Christ. There was no similar force or being in any pagan beliefs. Jesus Christ was an altogether new concept for me.
I know this isn’t a common problem or hurdle for most Christians to find their faith in. In my various community groups/life groups/bible study groups I seemed to be the only one who struggled in this way. Then again none of them came from such a thoroughly pagan background as I did. So what were some of my hang-ups? How can Jesus be both God and man? How can my good deeds be less than Jesus’ good deeds when we both live as humans? How could Jesus possibly understand everything I have been through or what I will experience in the future?
I could grasp my relationship with God the Father because I have already been praying to my false deities. Believing that God the Father was all powerful came naturally to me because I had already acknowledged and prayed to my old gods. I understood the Holy Spirit because I had already experienced years and years of contact with the spirit world, and I had been a part of some supernatural moments in my life. Nothing in my past prepared me for a relationship with Jesus Christ. I never had to ponder what sort of relationship I could have with someone who has defeated death. If you are in the same boat, I hope this helps some of you. If this doesn’t resonate with you, maybe you will learn how to help encourage others who feel as I did.
God the Son
The first hiccup I had was not putting Jesus on the same level as other demigods. Demigods are the product of a male god taking some form to have sex with a woman. Their offspring would not be gods themselves, but they did have powers beyond human limits. In my ignorance and hatred for Christians I always thought of Jesus as being a long-haired hippy version of Hercules. Jesus taught some good ideas, and was probably a decent guy, but there was no way Jesus was on the same footing as God the Father.
So here is where I will start. Jesus Christ exists outside of time. The Son has always been since before time. And Jesus will continue to live long after time has gone.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made.” -John 1:1-3
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” -John 1:14
“Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.’” -John 8:58
“He also says to the Son, ‘In the beginning, Lord, You laid the foundation of the earth and made the heavens with Your hands. They will perish, but You remain forever. They will wear out like old clothing. You will fold them up like a cloak and discard them like old clothing. But You are always the same; you will live forever.’” -Hebrews 1:10-12
“Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation, for through Him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see—such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, authorities in the unseen world. Everything was created through Him and for Him.” -Colossians 1:15-17
“But for us, there is one God, the Father, by whom all things were created and for whom we live. And there is only one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things were created and through whom we live.” -1 Corinthians 8:8
“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for Me One who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.” -Micha 5:2
I know what you are thinking. It is all well and good to say Jesus was there from the beginning; but practically there is no way a man born around 3 BC could have also been alive thousands of years before that. The truth is we have no understanding of what it means to exist outside of time. I can’t give you the scientific explanations or equations for this to be a true fact. This is where your understanding of who the LORD is helps. Helps, but not fully answers. My fallen, finite brain has a limit to what I can grasp. God is more than me. If I could fully understand and explain away all the actions of a god, then it is a god I have devised myself.
This also goes back to who wrote the Bible and how accurate the Bible can be. If the Bible is lying about Jesus Christ being there from ancient times, then how can I trust any other word in the Bible to be true? There is no gray area in this. If one sentence in the Bible isn’t true, then I can’t rely on any of it to be true. However, if I already know—not hope—the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus then how shallow is my faith to think that God just got this one idea in the Bible wrong? How weak do I have to make God to put this out of His reach? The LORD is not a shackled, tamed, and domesticated being that can only exist in my personal realm of possibilities. The LORD is wild and free.
This isn’t blind faith. This isn’t putting my hope and belief into a small possibility. This knowledge has been given to me by grace in my very personal relationship with the LORD. If my husband told me that when he was young, he ran onto the field with his favorite college football team; would I believe him? Of course I would believe him. I don’t know my husband to be a liar, so I trust what he tells me. This example is a tiny spot of the relationship the LORD has with me. If I can trust my husband (who is just as sinful and fallen as I am) why is it hard to trust the word of God (who is only good, holy, and loving)?
If Jesus is not eternal, then His blood is not eternal. I could not be reconciled with God. The wage of sin is death. (I will go into this subject more deeply later.) Our souls are eternal. The blood offering of animals given to the Jews is always temporary. They didn’t just have to slaughter one lamb to cover all the sin for the rest of their lives. The blood of an animal has a starting point and an end point. My soul doesn’t have an end point, which means the blood needed to wash me clean to come before God must have no end point either.
The next aspect I struggled with was the virgin birth of Christ. But not for the normal reasons. As a pagan I fully believed and experienced magic. So for Christians to have something similar, but merely change the word to miracle, wasn’t a far stretch for me. What I struggled with is why it matters if Mary was a virgin or not. I didn’t see how this would change the story, or my salvation, at all.
“And I will put enmity between you and the woman. And between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” -Genesis 3:15
“Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel.” -Isaiah 7:14
‘This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about. His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, ‘Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins.’ All this took place to fulfill what the Lord said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will conceive and give birth to a Son, and they will call Him Immanuel (which means “God with us”).’” -Matthew 1:18-22
“Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’” -Luke 1:34
God first mentions the virgin birth in Genesis. He very specifically and deliberately only speaks of the mother. Which is poignant because the genealogies in the Bible are traced from father to son. Adam was alive and there. If God meant Jesus would be gotten through normal relations, then God would have mentioned the father. Throughout the Old Testament there are repeated prophecies that a virgin will give birth to a son. God spoke to Joseph in a dream and said that his virgin wife was with child by the Holy Spirit. Mary, herself, repeatedly stated that she was a virgin when Jesus was born. So why does this really matter?
If Mary was not a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus, then we are still waiting for the Messiah to come. Immanuel is born to a virgin. Jesus cannot be Immanuel if Mary was sleeping around behind her husband’s back. If Jesus is not begotten through the Holy Spirit, then Jesus is not eternal, and our eternal souls are still damned for we are all enemies of God. It means we aren’t forgiven, and we should still be offering animal sacrifice to God for the forgiveness of our sins. This would mean Mary lied. She lied to Jesus. She lied to her husband. She lied to all of Jesus’ followers. Then Jesus and all His followers have all carried on this lie throughout history. If Mary lied, then Christianity is nothing but lies told to us repeatedly. See how this changes things? How can Jesus be God if He had an earthly father?
This also means that the Holy Spirit didn’t have sex with Mary. Think of how horrible that would be to Joseph. It would mean that God broke one of His own laws and fornicated with Mary. In that culture Mary would be stoned to death. Disgrace would come upon her family. God would also be stealing the oneness experienced between husband and wife. How could an all holy, all loving, and all good God do any of this? It would mean everything about God before Jesus would also be a lie.
So how can a virgin get pregnant then? I realized through my ever-growing relationship with the LORD that this question belittles and diminishes God. How do I reconcile in my head that God could create the entire world out of nothing, allow Sara (who was 90 years old) to give birth, and part the Red Sea …but then find it impossible to start life inside Mary’s womb? These two versions of God cannot live inside one another. God is all powerful. We are His creation. He can do whatever He wants.
The next truth about Jesus is His death. I want to first share with you a few prophecies about Jesus being crucified.
“For dogs encompass me; a company of evildoers encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet—I can count all my bones—they stare and gloat over me; they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.” -Psalm 22:16-18
King David wrote this psalm 1,000 years before Jesus was born. The idea and practice of crucifixion hadn’t been invented yet. There was no way for David to know of this manner of execution. It would be created by the Romans in 200 BC. A full 800 years after King David died. Then there is a second prophecy in there as well. The roman guards did divide his garments and rolled dice to see who got what. David didn’t need to put this last statement in there. It seems crazy to put such a very specific detail to this prophecy. And yet David did add this statement and the roman guards did roll the dice for Jesus’ clothes.
“Just as there were many who were appalled at Him—His appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and His form marred beyond human likeness” -Isaiah 52:14
This fact is where almost all depictions of this are wrong. Jesus was physically beaten all night by the roman guards— “Now the men who were holding Jesus in custody were mocking Him as they beat Him. They also blindfolded Him and kept asking Him, ‘Prophesy! Who is it that stuck you?’” (Luke 22:63-64). The face of Jesus would not have been without blemish. After an all-night beating the face of Jesus would be unrecognizable.
Jesus was also scourged by the romans. “Then he released Barabbas to them. But he had Jesus flogged and handed him over to be crucified.” (Matthew 27:26) Today the word flogged has been reduced to nothing because of BDSM, books, and its common usage. The flog used on Jesus had metal balls woven into them, and it had bone chips stuck into the end of each leather finger. The balls would bruise and tenderize the meat of Jesus, while the bone fragments would cut his skin into ribbons. It wasn’t uncommon for bone to be ripped off the one being flogged. The scourging stretched from his shoulders to his knees.
Then right after this flogging they put a crown of thorns on His head. Remember that the face of Jesus was already unrecognizable after the night long beating. “Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around Him. They stripped Him and put a scarlet robe on Him, and then twisted a crown of thorns and set it on His head. They put a staff in His right hand. Then they knelt in front of Him and mocked Him. ‘Hail, king of the Jews!’ they said. They spit on Him and took the staff and struck Him on the head again and again.” (Matthew 27:27-31) So there was Jesus, flesh hanging like ribbons from the flogging, face unrecognizable by the beating. The crown they put on His head was not taken off. It was still there, the thorns digging into His head, while they repeatedly struck Jesus with the staff.
Jesus was then crucified. He had nails driven into His hands and feet when the cross was lying flat. With all the physical trauma already going on, try to imagine how it felt when the cross was then put upright. How bad do you think His back felt sliding along the wood? There is no way for Jesus to survive this. Jesus didn’t just faint or pass out. All of this alone would kill a strong man. But there is one final statement made about the death of Jesus. “But when they came to Jesus and saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs. But one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water.” (John 19:33-34) Anatomically there is only one way for a wound to cause both blood and water come out. Jesus had His heart sac pierced. And again there was no way Jesus could have lived through just that one wound.
If you want a more thorough description of what went on in the crucifixion of Christ you should check out this web site: The Science of the Crucifixion - Azusa Pacific University (apu.edu)
Now, hopefully, I have established Jesus really did die. He wasn’t taken to a hospital or a doctor. He was wrapped up in pounds of linen and then put in a sealed and guarded tomb for three days. Okay let’s just say that I haven’t convinced you, and you still think Jesus just passed out. In His condition do you really think He would improve His health and survivability after three days of no health care?
“The next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate. ‘Sir,’ they said, ‘we remember that while He was still alive that deceiver said, “After three days I will rise again.” So give the order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day. Otherwise, His disciples may come and steal the body and tell the people that He has been raised from the dead. This last deception will be worse than the first.’
‘Take a guard,’ Pilate answered. ‘Go, and make the tomb as secure as you know how.’ So they went and made the tomb secure by putting a seal on the stone and posting the guard.” -Matthew 27: 62-66
First off, even the chief priests and the Pharisees acknowledge that Jesus was dead. The tomb was guarded by roman soldiers who hand no invested interest in Jesus. But they did have a vested interest in keeping their own lives safe by guarding what they were told to guard.
Second, Jesus went out among the people. They sat with Him, shared a meal, put their hands in His wounds, and He spoke to a crowd of 500 people. If Jesus really was dead, and now the disciples are simply saying Jesus was resurrected, couldn’t they just go to any one of those 500 people to debunk this claim? People know where Muhammad’s tomb is. We know where Paul’s grave is and he was merely a follower of Jesus. Where is Jesus’ tomb? If Jesus was still buried somewhere, wouldn’t every Christian and Jew know where that place is?
Third, His disciples and His family were utterly transformed by this. Peter (who three days prior denied Jesus three times) now went about boldly preaching that Jesus was God. He wouldn’t stop saying it. When they went to crucify Peter, he told them to crucify him upside down. Peter told them he wasn’t good enough to be killed in the same way as his God. Two books in the Bible were written by Jesus’ brothers. James went about telling everyone that his brother had never sinned and was his Lord and Savior. The Jewish priests threatened James with death, but he never changed his tune. So, they took James to the top of the temple and threw him off the roof. James didn’t die from this fall, so they stoned him. You would think, having just seen what happened to James, Jesus’ other brother Jude would not make the same mistake. But Jude just stepped right up into the spot where James just left. Proclaiming Jesus to be sinless and his God.
Also, think about it. How many of you would go before thousands of crowds and declare your brother to be sinless. How many of you would freely and willingly admit that your sibling was GOD knowing that you will be tortured and killed for doing so? There was nothing to gain from saying this, and everything to lose. Remember too that Jesus’ family were devout Jews. They knew worshipping anything other than God as God, would put them straight into hell.
Sorry, I know this one is long. I did promise you a deep dive into my faith. If you have made it to this point, thank you. I also just wanted to say sorry for the lateness of this as well. This post is not exhaustive, I will be going much deeper into Jesus in later posts.