Kingdom Ready Blog

Back in Sept 2010, I presented some facts and stats about God. It became apparently clear that the Bible teaches that the Father, whose name, according to the OT, is YHWH, is the only God. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are not all God subsisting in one Godhead. YHWH of the OT, of whom Jesus continually addressed as Father – He is the only God; therefore, we’ve come to understand that God is truly unipersonal, not tri-personal.

Installment #6 in my “Common Sense” series.

Biblical Common Sense – Jesus – Jesus was seen!

Throughout the “Original” Testament God goes out of his way to say over and over that He is the one and only God of the universe and that He alone is responsible for all of creation. But God also reveals something else there and then confirms it later in the New Testament. God says that he CAN NOT be seen by man. In Exodus 33:20 God flat out tells Moses that “no man can see me and live”. Then in the Gospel of John we have collaborating texts like “No man hath seen God at any time” (John 1:18) and “You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form” (John 5:37). And in 1st Timothy we have the added facts that God is “invisible” (1 Tim 1:17) and that He “dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see” (1 Tim 6:16).

Installment #5 in my “Common Sense” series.

Biblical Common Sense – Jesus – The Messiah is suppose to be…

Then there’s the Biblical expectations regarding the Messiah. The Hebrew people have historically viewed (as Judaism still does to this day) the Messiah as someone that would be a real human being directly descended from the lineage of King David. And they have this view point because that is just what Scripture clearly describes – a real human man was promised, not God acting as a man.

instead of a 1st century Jew, he might have sounded something like this humerous little cartoon.  Jesus’ reply to the absurdity of Peter’s faux response here is exactly what anyone in their right mind would/should say.  “What???”

Original by Joe Perrott

To understand this wonderful plan, one must journey back to the beginning, starting with Adam.

Genesis 1:26 – 28
By observing Adam, his rightful position under God was his appointment to rule over all of God’s works (v26, 28). The word rule here means to “dominate, govern, to prevail against, chasten, tread and crush.” But one must note that this rulership was predicated upon obedience to God – of which Adam forfeited by disobedience.

Psalm 8:3 – 8
David continues in his Psalm, acknowledging God’s divine appointment for man – rulership over this earth (v6 – 8). This was/is man’s crowning glory, majesty and honour (v5).

Introduction

One of the common idioms that existed in the ancient Hebrew culture was the concept of “agency”. Basically, in that culture, one person (the “principal”) would frequently commission another person (the “agent”), to act on his behalf.

Of course, this concept of “agency” is also present in our current culture. For example, if a person is granted the “power of attorney”, then that gives the person the ability to act on someone else’s behalf.

Introduction

There are a number of specific verses in Scripture, which are extremely important from a theological standpoint. In other words, the verses in question are used quite frequently, to try to substantiate a wide variety of theological beliefs.

One such verse is Genesis 1:26. That verse reads as follows:

Genesis 1:26 (ESV):

²⁶Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

The following is another new article from my website. 

It is amazing how many people who call themselves “Christian” don’t actually know what the word means. A “Christian” is a follower of Christ, but like most people, I did not know what the word “Christ” meant for many years. Like some, I assumed that it was part of his name. Others know that it is a title, but don’t know exactly what it means. The fact is, however, that the word Christ comes from the Greek word christos, which means “anointed one.” It is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word, mashiyach from which we get our English word, Messiah. The titles Messiah and Christ mean exactly the same thing: an anointed one.

By popular demand (2 requests!), here is the article from my website.

Introduction

One of the most hotly contested passages of Scripture is so well known that it has a name – the Comma Johanneum, or Johannine Comma. In this case, “comma” refers not to punctuation but to a clause. In the KJV, I John 5:7-8 reads as follows:

I John 5:
7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.
8 And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.

Introduction

There are a number of verses in Scripture that are frequently used, to try to substantiate the doctrine of the Trinity. Those verses are sometimes referred to as “proof texts”, because their proponents claim that those verses prove the existence of the Trinity.

From my experience, the verse that is most frequently used as a proof text is John 1:1.

Here is a common rendering of John 1:1, in English translations of the Bible. The ESV, NASB, NIV, and even the King James all translate John 1:1 as follows: