“I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”? (John 20:17)
This HAS always been a confusion to me, on how our Lord Jesus Christ stresses out of this higher being that He believes in, that He will go to…or simply another existence that is NOT Him. That when I was raised to believe that Jesus and that God He talks about in third person all the time is one and the same, it left me asking “How can that be?” This is one of the questions I asked the elders and those that have the authority to answer me that time, BUT it all ends up with them telling me to “just believe because it is something so powerful for mankind to comprehend”. Is that so? But God Himself said that EVERYTHING is written in His book: the Bible.
How can our Lord Jesus (and His apostles) keep telling us and writing down that Jesus and God is NOT one and the same, and man saying otherwise? If Jesus talks to the Father saying “Now this is eternal life: that they may know You, the One True God, and Jesus whom you have sent” (John 17:3), will we contradict Him by saying that there is Three and not One? That the “knowledge of truth” that Apostle Timothy tells in the “Instructions on Worship” is NOT precise?
“For there is ONE God and ONE Mediator between God and men, the MAN Christ Jesus” (1 Tim. 2:5)
That the bible to which God himself said to be complete and suffice forgot to mention that there is another God beside the One True God, our Father? That God’s very 1st Commandment of having “No other God’s before me” is NOT as it is, and that He was not able to specifically say…no other God’s before me and my other persona’s?
We all believe that our Lord Jesus Christ was sent to save us, but not all believe His EVERY word (I truly wonder why?!). And NOT believing in His words connotes NOT believing in God’s words because so many time did Jesus said that it is not Him but that of who sent Him. Just as in this verse, “For I gave them the words You gave me” (John 17:8) when He was once praying to the Almighty God.
We are not kids anymore to just take in what our parents and elders say. We have the ablity to rationalize and to decide what is right and wrong. BUT WE CANNOT DO SO UNTIL WE HAVE THE FACTS LAID DOWN BEFORE US. That in every comparison there is the existing truth and falsehood; there is the right and the wrong; there is the “what was led for us to believe” and “what we decide to believe”. Stand tall and look into your left, into your right…then decide which path to take.
LIKE IN THIS INSTANCE ~ There is only ONE TRUE GOD
and that is our Almighty Father!
And there is the ONE MEDIATOR BETWEEN GOD AND MAN
and that is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
This is the TRUTH from the very words of God!
LOOK…for you might be missing the ONLY right way.
Posts
Greetings Jenie
I am glad you can see that it is what you have been taught that contradicts GOD's Scriptures and that Scripture is not in error. Amen!
Jesus spoke about going to the Father
(not returning - see below).
Jesus like his disciples (and like every Jew of his era) believed in solely ONE GOD, the Father.
And Jesus is clearly stating to his disciples, that he is to ascend to his GOD & Father, who is the disciples' GOD & Father i.e. the selfsame ONE GOD!
Therefore Jesus cannot possibly be the same as the ONE GOD;
but rather he is who he claimed to be:
the Messiah, the Son of the ONE GOD,
the Son of the Father.
[Matt 16.16, 2 John 3]
Indeed Jesus taught about the ONLY TRUE GOD.
Neither Jesus, nor his disciples, nor Scripture, say anything about a Three in One God or such like.
Jenie, your post wonderfully addresses this.
However, please be advised:
Jesus did NOT say "I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God".
The Greek word for "returning" is neither in John 13:3, 16:28 and 20:17. Sadly, Bibles such as the NIV, have added these words. Nevertheless, in none of these passages does the original say that Jesus was going back or returning to God. In the first two Jesus spoke of his intention to "go to the Father" and in the last of his "ascending" to his Father.
Rather, a Son whose existence is traced to his mother’s womb cannot go back to the Father, since Jesus has never before his conception [Luke 1.35], been with the Father!
Just thought I should point this out.
Yours In Messiah
Adam Pastor
The Human Jesus
As this opinion about that Jesus being the son of God is wrong.Because if Jesus is the son of God then how he is departured by common people.If He is the son of God then why God dont help him to be released from cruel people who wanted to kill him. thanks dont mind.this is my opinion about Jesus the Prophet of Allah.
wish you will visit my blog too
my blog: http://www.masoodownload.com
@Adam ~ thank you for your comment. and yes, the translation of other bibles perhaps will be more clearer at some point and another... but as of this post, it does not merit much.
but "ASCENDING to the Father" may be used better if one is pertaining to the TRUTH that Jesus DID NOT co-exist with the Father before creation. Because our Lord Jesus Christ started existing when our God made him be conceived through the Holy Spirit. BUT also be reminded that our Lord Jesus Christ was planned by God even before creation.
* this is one reason why the Church of Christ (Iglesia Ni Cristo) use different bibles. and we do not have one of our own.
@Masoo ~ thank you also for your shared comment. we likewise believe that Jesus Christ is not another God, but a prophet. And that it was God's prophesy that he suffers in the cross for the forgiveness of sin, that's why Jesus did what the Father's Will is though he was given the power (by God Himself) to get down from that cross, he did not. As he said, "Thy will be done".