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THE ONE TRUE GOD Biblical Unitarian
faith in the Father of Jesus as the One who alone is truly God, is not new. The whole of the
Old Testament speaks of this one God in unequivocal terms. THERE IS NO OTHER.
(Deuteronomy 4:35 & Isaiah 45:5). This one true God
is revealed as the eternally self-existent being who planned the whole of creation
for inheritance by His HUMAN Son. This human Son is
Jesus. He is mentioned often, never as already existing, but always as one who
is yet to be BORN. Significantly, He is THE MAN who will be the fulfillment of
promises made by God to specific people, (Eve, Abraham, and David), about the
future work of a direct descendant in their blood line. Nowhere in the Old
Testament is Jesus spoken of as a then existing personality. Nor is there any
mention of Jesus as part of a "tri-une God". The concept of the Trinity
is totally foreign to the Old Testament. God is ONE, and
God is self-existent. God is NOT A MAN. Nor is He the Son of Man. Jesus, however,
is not self-existent. His existence is derived from God in fulfillment of promises
made by God, that He would be both Son of God and Son of Man ...... and since
God is neither of those things, Jesus therefore cannot be God. The distinct separate
personalities of God and Jesus, the future existence and work of
Jesus, and the subordinate nature of the relationship of Jesus to God, are all
prophesied by David in Psalm 110:1
"The
LORD (Yahweh) said unto my lord (adoni), sit at my right
hand until I make your enemies your footstool". In this Psalm Jesus
is NOT Yahweh. He is someone else. Yahweh, who alone
is God, would speak to this other lord at some time in the future, issuing an
invitation to assume the important, but definitely subordinate, role as God's
chief deputy ...... the "right hand man". JESUS AND THE GOD
OF MOSES Moses was not a
Trinitarian! The faith of Moses
in one God only, (not three, or three-in-one) is expressed, clearly and unmistakably,
in the Shema "Hear O Israel: the LORD our God is one LORD; and you shall worship
the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might." (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) Although Moses has
much to say about Jesus, it is NEVER that Jesus is YAHWEH, the one LORD. JESUS AND THE GOD
OF CREATION The faith of Moses
in One God is older than Moses. It dates back to creation. It is this One God
who Moses wrote about as the Creator of the heavens and the earth. (Genesis 1:1). He is the one who
said "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, ..... and
let them have dominion ..... over all the earth."
(Genesis 1:26). It is sometimes
claimed here, by Trinitarians, that the word, "us", reveals God as more
than one . However this is not logical at all. Nor does it make any statement
at all, about Jesus as a person then existing as part of a tri-une God. What it
does tell us, is that God was speaking to others who were present. That there were
others present when God laid the foundation of the earth, and the identity of
those others, is revealed in Job 38:7.
They are the "sons of God" ..... the angels. The God who speaks
in Genesis, to those others, is the ONE who Moses declared to be God alone. In
other writings of Moses it becomes clear that Jesus cannot be present at the creation,
either as the speaker or a hearer. He is at the centre of the creation plan to
make man, but not then personally in existence. In this WORD, spoken
at the beginning, the One True God declared his purpose to BECOME the Father of
Jesus. Adam was only the
starting point. It is Jesus who was the primary goal of God's plan in creation.
It is the MAN, Jesus, for whom all creation was made by His Father. It is the MAN, Jesus,
who bears the full image and likeness of the One God who is His Father. It is the MAN Jesus,
who is the one through whom all other men will receive from God, the promised
dominion over all the earth. JESUS AND THE GOD
OF ADAM AND EVE Moses wrote about
The One True God as the God of Adam and Eve. He is the God who
created them and placed them under law to learn His likeness through obedience. When they tried
to steal that impossible short cut to the likeness of God, and through disobedience,
incurred the death penalty, the One True God became a Divine Saviour, by promising
a future human saviour. God's provision
for their salvation would be a descendant of Eve, who would win the ultimate victory
over sin. (Genesis 3:15). It is the MAN, Jesus,
who became this descendant. JESUS AND THE GOD
OF ABRAHAM Moses wrote that
the One True God, who appeared to him at the burning bush, revealed Himself as
the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. (Exodus 3:6). By this, He is identified
as the God who made promises to Abraham which are the foundation of our own New
Testament faith in Jesus. The central theme
of God's promises to Abraham, is the FUTURE "seed of Abraham", the Messiah,
through whom they would be fulfilled. The God of Abraham
is the one who promised that a descendant of Abraham would bless all families
of the earth. It is the MAN, Jesus, who is that descendant, through whom all who
share the faith of Abraham are blessed by being by turned from their sins. (Acts 3:25-26). The God of Abraham
is the one who promised that Abraham and his descendant would inherit the earth
as an everlasting possession. It is the MAN, Jesus, who is this promised descendant.
It is through Jesus that all others who share the faith of Abraham also become
his true spiritual heirs , and with Jesus, inherit that everlasting
dominion over the earth. JESUS AND THE GOD
OF DAVID This same One True
God is the one who promised David that one of his descendants would sit on the
throne of David for ever. To David, God also
revealed that this FUTURE king, not yet born, (for how else could he be David's
descendant) would also be GOD'S OWN SON. "I will be his father and he shall be my son." (2 Samuel 7:14). In recognition of
the promise that this future king would also be Son of God, David prophesied about
him, calling him lord, (but NOT Yahweh). Thus he declared that his descendant
would be subordinate to God, but superior to David. It is Jesus, who
is both Son of David and Son of God. JESUS AND THE GOD
OF ISAIAH Isaiah speaks clearly
of the distinction between the MAN, Jesus, and the God who stands alone. For Isaiah, God
is the LORD, the one who Moses declared to the One True God. There is no other.
(Isaiah 43:10-14, & Isaiah 44:8, & Isaiah 45:5-7). He is the God who
speaks the word which will stand for ever. (Isaiah
40:8). He is the LORD,
(the Yahweh of Moses), who is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of
the earth. (Isaiah 40:28). He is the God who
promises the coming of the man who will be the future Saviour, Priest and King.
(The Messiah). Isaiah speaks often
of Jesus. The word of God which stands for ever, is spoken about Jesus. In Isaiah 9:6-7, Jesus is described as a future son
of the Jewish race. This Jewish son is the one who will sit on David's throne,
(and will therefore be the one promised as Son of David and also Son of God.)
Because he will be the Son of God, he will bear the names and titles of God, which
rightly also belong to a Son. In Isaiah 53, Jesus is revealed as the MAN who
would become the suffering Saviour, dying to bear the penalty for the sins of
all who accept His sacrifice. In this role He
reveals the arm of the LORD but is not himself the LORD. (Isaiah 53:1). As the sin bearer,
upon whom the LORD has laid our iniquities, he is the LORD'S agent in our salvation
but is not himself the LORD. (Isaiah 53:6). As the man in whose
hand the will of the LORD is to prosper, He is distinct and separate from God.
(Isaiah 53:10). He is not God, but
the servant of God. (Isaiah 53:11). And because of His
victorious sacrificial role as the human AGENT of the Divine Saviour, he is to
be highly exalted. (Isaiah 53:12). MESSIAH is a Hebrew
word meaning "anointed". It is the direct equivalent of the Greek and
English "Christ". In Isaiah 61, Jesus is prophesied as the future
Messiah, the LORD'S anointed one. The Lord GOD, (Yahweh, who is alone is God)
will anoint Jesus for the work of salvation. It is the anointing
by the Spirit of God, which declares him to be God's MESSIAH. He is the promised
human King and Priest after the order of Melchizedek, anointed for His role by
the Spirit of God. As Messiah he is sent by God (Isaiah 61:1). Since he is sent by God, he cannot
himself be the One True God. CONCLUSION We have touched
only a few of the major references, from a few writers of the Old Testament. The other writers
are uniformly agreed. The LORD is God.
The LORD alone is God. Nowhere in the Old
testament, is Jesus ever anything other than a FUTURE man, whose relationship
to God will be that of a Son who is also a servant. The Son will be God's agent,
but cannot himself be God, for God, though He may be a Father, is neither a man,
nor the son of Man. In all of these
promises, God remains alone as the ONE TRUE GOD. Jesus is promised
but not yet in existence. He is the FUTURE plan, THE WORD spoken by God, which
is certain to come to pass. But nowhere in the
Old Testament is there the slightest hint that Jesus already exists as a person
who is part of a tri-une God, or as a pre-existent spirit being. How, if he was either,
could he ever be truly a man? It was a MAN who was promised, and if God is true
to His word, then a REAL MAN Jesus must be. Men who believe
in the pre-existence of Jesus as God, may pay LIP SERVICE to His manhood. In that,
without question, they may even be sincere. However, truth is
the issue in question, not sincerity. And that lip service
to manhood is an abuse of language, a confusion, a lie, which says one thing,
but in the same breath effectively denies it, by making of Jesus something that
could never be really a man. The God of the Old
Testament will not share His glory with another. (Isaiah 42:8 & Isaiah 48:11). In the New Testament,
He has not laid that glory aside, nor has he given it to another. However, He does
now receive that glory, which is His alone, from all who bow the knee to His glorified,
but subservient, Son. (Philippians 3:9-12
& 1 Corinthians 15:27-28). This God is revealed
to us by His Son, the man Christ Jesus, who is the Mediator between God and men.
(1 Timothy 2:5). It is Jesus who
acknowledges the One God of the Old Testament, as both His God and our God. (John 20:17). And it is Jesus
who repeats the words of Moses, commanding us to love this God as the LORD our
God, with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with
all our strength. (Mark 12:29-30). |