Real God Byron Kenneth Russell Junior here I accept Jesus as being God or I accept his claims to divinity he is my son I am his father tehe not tehe really 13:20 my wolf headdress my blue eyes from kerato and almond milk skin with white dyed hair, Wendy song dog and God.
Colossians 1 does not say Jesus created all things. It says He created all visible and invisible thrones, dominions, rulers, and authorities in heaven and on earth ONLY. It's specific positions of power/authority only. That clarification is what "all things" encircles in those verses, and that, in context, is what is meant by "all things". God the Father created all things, including heaven and earth itself, by the power of His Word. Jesus, the Son of God, created a very specific subset, visible/invisible positions of authority only, as described in Colossians 1. Additionally, although there are indeed cults out there who do not believe Jesus is God (like the JWs and Mormons mentioned), it is not that belief that makes a group a cult. "Cult" is about undue influence, control, manipulation, deception, etc. There are cults that believe in the Trinity and that believe Jesus is God. There are groups that do not believe Jesus is God, and yet are not cults. I was born and raised in a cult for decades. I am very familiar with this distinction. For those groups that do not believe Jesus is God, and yet are not cults, they generally do not hold to the characterization presented in this video around the 5:30 mark. Chris presents the options as essentially, "God Himself" or "just a mere man". This is a false dichotomy. The non-cult groups who believe Jesus is the Son of God but not God Himself do not proclaim Jesus is "just a mere man". Jesus is the man appointed by God, He is the Son of God, He is the Christ, the Messiah, the sent one, the spotless Lamb of God. This is no "just" or "mere" man. He's the unique one chosen by God who fully submitted His will to the Father. He is now our High Priest on the order of Melchizedek, one who has a priesthood forever. "Mere man" or "just a dude" is an insult and it is not what non-trinitarian churches believe. There are Christian churches out there who read their Bible and see that Jesus is "a man attested by God" (not God Himself) who are not "deconstructing", but rather, trying to hold to what the Bible says. Also around 18:50 Chris says the Septuagint translates Exodus 3:14 as "ego eimi ho ego eimi". This is not true. The Greek LXX translation is "ego eimi ho on". He clearly knows Greek and Hebrew, at least to some extent, so it's a little discouraging to see him misrepresent what it says like that. ego eimi (I am) in Greek functions in the same way that it does in English. If I say "I am Max", it is absurd to say "oh, hello, so nice to meet you, I am!" No. My name is not "I am", it is Max! In the same way, when God said "ego eimi ho on" we don't focus on the ego eimi (I am), we focus on what comes after it - HO ON! And if you read the actual Septuagint, not the wrong representation on the screen here, God repeats Himself and says "tell them HO ON has sent you" (not "tell them ego eimi has sent you"). When God repeats it, He does NOT repeat the "I am" portion; rather, He repeats the "ho on" portion, which is "the being" or "the one". I am the being. I am the one. Tell them "the being/the one" has sent you. Additionally, Moses doesn't even use that as God's name. Moses doesn't tell the people "I am has sent me". When Moses turns around and actually speaks to the elders and the people, He says "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" has sent me. That is God's name in this portion of Scripture. If "I am" or "I am that I am" meant that someone was identifying themself as God, well goodness, Paul the apostle uses this phrase even MORE clearly than Jesus Himself! Paul says "by the grace of God, I AM WHAT I AM" in 1 Corinthians 15:10. This is even closer than the one-use I am, "ego eimi", Jesus says in John 8:58. But no one flips out when Paul says that phrase. Why? Because it's not actually a claim to be God. It's made up. Jesus is not claiming to be God in John 8:58. He IS claiming pre-existence prior to Abraham, yes, but that doesn't make Him God. Angels existed prior to Abraham, and yet they are not God (no, Jesus is not an angel either). It is a false assumption to think that because a being existed for a long time, that being MUST be God. We've got to examine our assumptions in the light of Scripture. When Chris brings up the verse where Jesus says "I and the Father are one", he adds to what the Bible says. He says it means "one in is-ness, one in nature". That's not what the verse says or the context shows. Jesus speaks this phrase right after stating that no one can snatch the sheep out of the Father's hand, and no one will snatch the sheep out of His hand either. It is after saying that that Jesus says "I and the Father are one". Jesus is not one in is-ness or in nature. He is one with the Father in preserving the sheep! I'm halfway through the video and the arguments Chris presents continue along these same slightly off lines, so I'll stop here for time's sake. Look at the context of the verses to determine what they are actually saying! Chris is obviously passionate and wants to give people the truth, but I would encourage him to spend more time looking at what the Bible says about this topic in particular, and examining the various assumptions in light of what the Bible actually says, in light of the context, in light of the real Septuagint translation, and even in light of who is saying the various things in the passages (for example, we don't want to point to the Pharisees to get our beliefs about Jesus). God bless.
Can you expand on paragraphs 2 & 3? You touch a lot of info quickly and it's a little difficult to follow - with regards to cults who do/don't believe Jesus is God, and where you personally land on that aspect. It appears that you're claiming that Jesus is a created being. Thanks.
@@steven3775 Hopefully I don't repeat myself, but belief in the Trinity, or belief that Jesus is/is not God, is not the litmus test of a cult. There are political cults, cults of non-Christian religions, cults of personality, even family cults. Belief regarding the Trinity does not come into play in these groups, and yet we can still classify them as cults or not based on the criteria of a cult - the level of Behavior control, Information control, Thought control, and Emotion control (aka the BITE model, if you want to google it). So you can join a church that believes Jesus is God and that recites the creeds regarding the Trinity, but yet tells you that if you leave their church (just their church mind you, not leaving the Christian faith, but just leaving their church to go to another one), then you are done with God, or God will abandon you, or that you are a "poisoned person", you will be shunned, etc. It is the latter beliefs - the "we are the only true church" type control, threat of divine abandonment if you leave their church, the labeling of people who leave, the turning their backs on you as if you never existed - that make the group a cult. And yet they have the "orthodox" belief regarding the Trinity. There are many other things that can make a group a cult, but this is just one sliver of an example for examples' sake. Or you can join a church that does NOT believe Jesus is God, but yet does not use controlling cult tactics, and if you decide to leave for another church they will pray for you and bless you and remain in healthy relationship with you, not label you, not threaten spiritual loss just because you leave their particular group, etc. And yet, they don't believe in the Trinity. Is this group a cult? No, because "cult" is about control, not about doctrine. Where it gets a little tricky is that sometimes it is twisted doctrine that is the source of control, but it is rare for the Trinity or Jesus=God doctrine to be the culprit. Sometimes if a reply of mine gets too long RU-vid will hide it from view, so I'll stop here and will write a followup.
Thanks for your reply. Lovingly, I’ve never heard of a theologian or scholar who thinks that Colossians 1 simply asserts that Jesus only has limited rule or creation. You seem to have conveniently left out the next phrase which states “all things were created by him and for him.” John 1:1-5 reiterates this with clarity. Secondly, a Christian cult is much more narrowly defined than you state. In a Christian context, the definition of a cult is, specifically, “a religious group that denies one or more of the fundamentals of biblical truth.” The deity of Christ is one of those truths. Thirdly, without going into why I think your interpretation of the Greek is off, I’d like to suggest that assuming Jesus’ use of I Am is meaningless, seems to forget some key passages where we are led to a very different conclusion. For example, Jesus states I AM in the garden and a detachment of soldiers and religious leaders falls over at the decree. We are to believe that this phrase has no deeper meaning when grown men fall over at the sound of its expression? Hard to believe in my opinion. There’s exhaustive backing to that but this is just one solitary example of how I think assuming it’s not indicative of his relationship to Yahweh is misguided. Lastly, calling them one in being is not adding to the text but interpreting the text through a lens when the phrase “I and the father are one,” is likely confusing to the congregation. That is not adding to the text, it’s midrashing it and those distinctions are imperative. Send us a message if you’d like to call for a follow up or if we can exchange emails to make this more productive.We likely won’t make progress in a chat like this but I wanted to give response to your ideas.
@@steven3775 Hi steven3775, I responded to your comment a few weeks ago but just noticed that my comment doesn't show up. Sorry about that. I'm not sure what to do to get it to show.
