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Some, but not all, Christians believe that Jesus was God's first creation, and yet was God, and that it was Jesus who created everything we know of in the big unknown universe. Where would they get such a crazy idea? Well, from the craziest Gospel, of course! In John 1:1-3 we find: 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. NIV The "Word" here metaphorically(?) represents Jesus, as the rest of John 1 will show you. For those who try to deny the claimed divinity of Jesus, these verses are a huge stumbling block, at least if you place any faith in the Gospel of John. Anyway, obviously Jesus and God are quite different, despite them being made of the same stuff, which is why this Sonfish looks nothing like the Holy Mackerel. Finally, you'll notice that I made the Sonfish a bit larger than the Holy Mackerel; a nod to Christian "superiority" in the quantity of adherents over Judaism. ;-) |
Sunday, September 1, 2013
The Beginning of the Word - Holy Mackerel!
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ReplyDeleteAgain, you point out things I haven't thought about for the longest time.
Thus I always come back here for my Bible lessons.
Much appreciated. A question:
You said,
"Some, but not all, Christians believe that Jesus was God's first creation, and yet was God, and that it was Jesus who created everything we know of in the big unknown universe."
Which Christians say this does not refer to Jesus?
How to Christians wrestle with this verse -- have you read any of the commentaries on this?
I love your prose, but when I see your cartoons, I worry about you!
;-)
Ha! Thanks Sabio. I don't think you have to worry about me, though. Like the planet Earth, I'm "mostly harmless." ;-)
ReplyDelete"Which Christians say this does not refer to Jesus?"
I haven't done deep research into this topic to give you the full answer, but, thanks to many verses in the Gospels illustrating a Jesus with apparently limited omni-powers, there have been a number of Christian sects through the years who have come up with alternate explanations which conflict with John 1. One of the major versions I know about is Adoptionism, where Jesus was fully human, but became "adopted" by God at the point of baptism. (You remember the dove-shaped Spirit of God settling on Jesus during the baptism?).
"How to Christians wrestle with this verse -- have you read any of the commentaries on this?"
I haven't read commentaries on these verses form those who thought Jesus was not divine, but I would say that those who hold such an opinion simply do what many other flavors of Christians do for their versions of Jesus: ignore the contrary material! ;-)
In fact, I had a small, related debate with a guy from Australia a few(?) months back. This guy was confident that Jesus was fully human, but that He became the chosen one of God. (I suspect the guy was an Adoptionist, but don't know for sure.) So I fired off these verses to him for his opinion. He replied something to the effects of "why does everyone keep quoting these verses" and "I don't know what they mean at this time, but I know Jesus was fully human".
ReplyDeleteThanx. I read wiki on "The Pre-existence of Christ" and see that Unitarians and "Oneness Pentecostals", among the moderns, don't buy into it. The denial of the doctrine section tells of more. Thanx for the theology tour.
The Adoptionism tour was interesting too -- re-read that wiki article.
Thanks for the info. I hadn't stumbled across the Pre-existence of Christ on Wiki yet.
ReplyDelete