Kingdom Ready

This is an exclusive interview by J. Dan Gill with Jaco van Zyl of South Africa. Jaco, a former Jehovah’s Witness, talks about his experiences as a Jehovah’s Witness, his leaving the movement and coming to his One God faith today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s35gPxYYcI&feature=player_embedded

Click here to listen to “The Doctrine of God and Christ” mp3 [52:40].

Steve Katsaras, pastor of the Red Words Church in Australia and contributor to this blog, recently gave a thoroughly biblical exposition of the doctrines of God and Christ.

Yahweh is one, not two or three, and there is no God besides him. The Bible uses singular pronouns in reference to God thousands upon thousands of time, a fact that clearly teaches God is a singular individual. This one God is the eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent creator of heaven and earth.

101 is a slang term that means “basic introduction”. Many in our society use the term, especially in academics, when designing short courses to introduce students to the basics of a given subject.

Eg. “Geometry 101, Physics 101, Chemistry 101, Biology 101, etc…”

Within Christendom, there are many evangelists, preachers and pastors who are trying their very best to present Christianity and the Bible’s primary message to a lost world and to those who have questions and are seeking to know about God. Sadly, many of these ministers have failed to accurately convey, even the simple facts of the faith. The results are half-converts, living without any sense of purpose, lacking vision, ignorant of God’s plans; they live without a spiritual compass in their life.

To understand this term, one must also seek to understand other closely related phrases, like sons of men and children of men. Firstly, all of these terms are applied to mankind in general. These terms indicate the difference between God and the human race. The phrase son of man is the strongest way to distinguish between deity and humanity!

Psalm 115:16 (usage – children of men)
Consider the contrast between God and mankind: God dwells in heaven; man dwells on the earth.

Psalm 145:10 – 13 (usage – sons of men)
Here’s another contrast between God and mankind: God is big, strong, powerful and eternal; man is small, weak and temporal.

I think the title says it all. The world as we know it is battling with hopelessness. Everything in our society these days has become uncertain. Nothing is guaranteed. Hence many are living in fear and misery. All they see is a pitiful life with no end in sight. Sometimes they wish death would take them and be rid of this little existence. How about when this begins to creep into the church? Today, I want to speak on the subject of hope and its importance in our life. Hope is an integral part of Christianity and each of us must learn about it and live it out.

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.

This is a phrase that has been heavily thumped to us by churches, ministries, denominations, pastors and the like. The warning and pleading to take hold of truth and discard tradition. You’ve now got books, sermons, documentaries and websites that all use this phrase as their title and label. What does this all mean? What is the message behind this phrase? How are we to respond to it all?

Pontius Pilate said it very well when he asked Jesus “What is truth?” (Joh 18:38). No matter which Christian you speak with, nearly all of them will claim to know the truth. No one would dare admit that the doctrines they adhere to are merely traditions! Well, what does this all mean and how are we to accurately know whether we have truth or tradition – or both?

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).

ktistis, ktisis: a creator; to create something which has not existed before (creation ex nihilo – “creation out of nothing”)

ktistis, ktisis, ktiso, ektisen, etc… are all singular nouns, adjectives or verbs. (all point to a single creator – one person)

The doctrine of the trinity says that God is a triune deity and that all 3 persons that comprise of the “godhead” were co-creators of the physical universe, the earth, everything in it – and mankind! The OT though, clearly reveals something different.

Yahweh God (God the Father in NT) is clearly revealed as the sole Creator of the genesis creation! He had no co-creators! The NT follows the same trend!

Heb: bara – to create, to bring into existence, out of/from nothing (creation ex nihilo (latin) – “creation out of nothing”)

This is a singular verb (evidence that the Creator [God] is a single entity [one person]). Are the 3 persons of the trintiy co-creators, or did the one person God do it alone?

Genesis 1:1, 20 – 21, 26 – 27

V1 (beresit bara elohim) – universe brought into existence by God – out of nothing; prior to this, there was no universe.

V21 (wayyibara elohim) – sea creatures brought into existence by God – out of nothing.