Answering the Difficult Texts
Important: this website uses specific Hebrew/Biblical definitions for terms such as God, Messiah, Holy Spirit, Worship and Son of God. Please read this first: How to read this website.
Introduction
On this website we explain that there is one God, the Father, and that Lord Yeshua is His Son: the Image of the invisible God, the One through whom the Father has made Himself known. Anyone who reads that for the first time will quickly think of a few well-known texts that seem to say something else. “But what about John 1:1?” “Didn’t Thomas call Him ‘my God’?”
Those are honest questions, and they deserve an honest answer. That is why we will not avoid these texts here. We will go through them one by one, calmly and in their own context. After all, an explanation that only holds up as long as you skip the difficult verses is not a good explanation.
For each text we ask the same three questions:
- What does this text seem to say at first glance?
- What does the immediate context say, often the same chapter or even the same verse?
- How does the text fit with what the Bible clearly teaches elsewhere about the Father and the Son?
Feel free to keep your own Bible open next to you. And test everything, including what is written here.
A strong explanation does not avoid the difficult texts,
but reads them honestly in their context.
In-depth explanation
1. John 1:1 – “The Word was God”
John 1:1 (KJV)
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Of all the texts in this discussion, this is probably the one quoted most often. Yet the same verse first says something else, and it matters: the Word was with God. Someone who is with another person is not that other person. So in his very first sentence John already makes a distinction between the Word and God.
In the Greek, “with God” has an article: the God. In “the Word was God” that article is missing. Many interpreters do not read this as saying that the Word is “the God”, but as a description of what the Word is: divine in nature, the perfect Image of God. That fits with what John writes a few verses later:
John 1:18 (KJV)
No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom
of the Father, he hath declared him.
So John does not open his gospel with the message that the Son is the Father. He shows that the Son was with the Father, represents Him perfectly and makes Him known to us. In Hebrew thinking, too, “God” (Elohim) can be used for someone who acts with God’s authority. God even said this to Moses:
Exodus 7:1 (KJV)
And the LORD said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh…
That did not make Moses the Most High. He acted with God’s authority. The Word carries that authority in the perfect sense: all things were made through Him (John 1:3). Paul says exactly the same in 1 Corinthians 8:6: all things are from the Father and through the Son.
The Word was with God and carries God’s nature and authority. But the invisible
God whom no one has ever seen is the Father.
2. John 20:28 – “My Lord and my God!”
John 20:28 (KJV)
And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.
Thomas sees the risen Lord standing in front of him and cries this out. But do take a look at what is written eleven verses earlier, in the same chapter. There Yeshua Himself says, after His resurrection:
John 20:17 (KJV)
…I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.
So the risen Yeshua Himself has a God. Thomas is therefore not contradicting Him. He recognizes in Yeshua the perfect revelation of God. Yeshua had already prepared the disciples for this: “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father” (John 14:9). Whoever sees the Son sees the Father through Him.
Right after this, John himself tells us why he wrote all these things:
John 20:31 (KJV)
But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God…
So the purpose of the gospel is not that we believe Yeshua is the Father. The purpose is that we believe He is the Messiah, the Son of God.
In the same chapter the risen Yeshua calls the Father “my God”.
Thomas sees in the Son the God whom He reveals.
3. Hebrews 1:8 – “Thy throne, O God”
Hebrews 1:8-9 (KJV)
But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever… therefore God,
even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.
Here the Son is indeed called “God”. But do read the quotation to the end. The next verse says that God, even thy God, has anointed the Son. The One who is called “God” therefore has a God above Him, who anoints and exalts Him.
The quotation comes from Psalm 45. That song was originally sung at the enthronement of a king of Israel, who was addressed with reverence as God’s representative on earth. The writer of Hebrews shows that those words find their full meaning in the Son, the Messiah. He is the King with the highest authority. But He received that authority from His God.
The same text that calls the Son “God” also says:
God, even thy God, hath anointed thee.
4. Isaiah 9:6 – “The mighty God, The everlasting Father”
Isaiah 9:6 (KJV)
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder:
and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
This prophecy is about the Messiah, and it is beautiful. Yet it does not say that the Messiah is the Father. First notice how the verse begins: a child is born, a son is given. Given by whom? By God. The Most High Himself is not born, and He is not given either.
Hebrew names often say something about God, or about the mission of the person who bears the name. Elijah means “my God is YHWH”, and no one thinks that Elijah was therefore God Himself. In the same way, the titles of the Messiah describe who He will be for His people.
- Mighty God (El Gibbor): a mighty hero, equipped with divine strength.
- Everlasting Father: someone who cares for his people like a father, forever. The Bible uses “father” this way for a leader more often. Eliakim, for example, would be “a father” to the inhabitants of Jerusalem (Isaiah 22:21).
The Messiah is the eternal King who, like a father, protects His people, cares for them and provides for them in everything. That is something very different from saying that He is the invisible Father in heaven.
A Son is given to us. The Giver is the Father;
the One given is the Son.
5. John 8:58 – “Before Abraham was, I am”
John 8:58 (KJV)
Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you,
Before Abraham was, I am.
Many people hear an echo here of “I AM THAT I AM” from Exodus 3:14, and see it as proof that Yeshua is the Most High. First look at the conversation in which Yeshua says this. A few verses earlier we read:
John 8:56 (KJV)
Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day:
and he saw it, and was glad.
The Jews object that Yeshua is not yet fifty years old. How could He have seen Abraham? Yeshua answers that He already existed before Abraham. That is exactly what this website teaches as well: the Son already existed before His birth as a man. He was the One who appeared and spoke in the Old Testament, and Abraham saw Him.
In the same chapter Yeshua also keeps making a distinction between Himself and the Father. He says that He came forth from God and that the Father sent Him (John 8:42), and that it is His Father who honours Him (John 8:54).
John 8:58 shows that the Son already existed before Abraham.
It does not say that the Son is the Father.
6. John 10:30 – “I and my Father are one”
John 10:30 (KJV)
I and my Father are one.
What does Yeshua mean by “one”? He explains it Himself, a few chapters later, when He prays for His disciples:
John 17:22 (KJV)
And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them;
that they may be one, even as we are one.
The disciples do not become one person. They become one in will, purpose and love. In the same way the Father and the Son are one: the Son perfectly does the will of the Father. That is also what John 10 is about. No one can pluck the sheep out of the Son’s hand, and no one can pluck them out of the Father’s hand (John 10:28-29). They do the same work.
When the Jews accused Him of blasphemy, Yeshua did not defend Himself by saying that He was God the Father. On the contrary, He said:
John 10:36 (KJV)
Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?
Yeshua Himself explains what “one” means: one in the way He wants His disciples to be one.
And His own defence was: I am the Son of God.
7. Philippians 2:6 – “In the form of God”
Philippians 2:6 (KJV)
Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.
“In the form of God” connects with what Paul writes elsewhere: the Son is the Image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). He bore God’s glory and form. But what did He do with it? He did not grasp at equality with God. He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death.
Look also at how this passage ends. God exalts Him and gives Him the Name above every name, so that everyone confesses that Yeshua is Lord:
Philippians 2:11 (KJV)
And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The highest honour the Son receives leads to the honour of the Father. The Son is exalted by God, and His exaltation is to the glory of God the Father.
The Son bore the form of God, humbled Himself, and was exalted by
God, to the glory of God the Father.
8. Matthew 28:19 – “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”
Matthew 28:19 (KJV)
Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
In this text the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are mentioned together. But the fact that three are mentioned does not mean that they are three Gods, or three divine persons who together form one God. The text simply does not say that.
“In the name of” means in the Bible: with the authority of, in union with. In the article about the Name of the Father we already saw that “Name” stands for identity and authority. Baptism brings a person into union with the Father, with the Son who reveals Him, and with the Spirit of the Father who comes to live in the believer.
It is also striking how the apostles carried out this commission in practice. On the day of Pentecost Peter said:
Acts 2:38 (KJV)
Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of
Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Here the Holy Spirit is called a gift, something God gives. That fits with what the Bible shows again and again: the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father, His presence and power, not a separate God beside Him (Matthew 10:20).
Three mentioned does not mean three Gods. The Father is the Source,
the Son His revelation, the Spirit His gift.
9. 1 John 5:7 – “These three are one”
1 John 5:7 (KJV)
For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and
the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.
At first glance this seems to be the clearest text of all. Yet something important has to be said about it, and that is not a matter of opinion but of manuscripts. These words do not appear in the oldest Greek manuscripts of John’s letter. They only turn up much later, first in Latin manuscripts. That is why many modern translations leave them out or put them in brackets. The KJV follows the Textus Receptus and does include them.
Without this later addition, the passage says that there are three witnesses on earth: the Spirit, the water and the blood (1 John 5:8). John is speaking there about the testimony that Yeshua is the Son of God (1 John 5:5).
A doctrine that has to rest on this one sentence rests on words
that do not appear in the oldest manuscripts.
10. Isaiah 63:16 – “Thou, O LORD, art our father”
Isaiah 63:16 (KJV)
…thou, O LORD, art our father…
This text is sometimes quoted against the explanation that Israel did not yet know the Father. After all, the Old Testament does call God Father a few times (see also Deuteronomy 32:6, Isaiah 64:8, Jeremiah 3:19 and Malachi 2:10).
That is true. But in those texts “Father” refers to God as Creator and as Father of the people of Israel as a whole. It is about the nation, not about the personal bond of a child with his Abba. That personal revelation of the Father only comes through the Son. Lord Yeshua says that no one knows the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him (Matthew 11:27). To the leaders of His day, who called the Father their God, He even said that they did not know Him (John 8:54-55).
So this text, too, fits the line of this website. Not every time YHWH appears in the text is it about His visible revelation. But every time YHWH was seen and heard, it was the Son.
Israel knew God as Father of the nation.
The Son made Him known as Abba, Father.
Conclusion
Whoever reads these texts carefully will notice a striking pattern. Almost always, the same verse or chapter also contains the distinction between the Father and the Son. The Word is with God. Thomas speaks, but shortly before that Yeshua says “my God”. The Son is called “God”, but “God, even thy God” anoints Him. A Son is given. The Son is exalted to the glory of God the Father.
These texts show the Son in His great glory, and we never want to make that smaller. He is the Image of the invisible God, the Lord, the Messiah, the One through whom all things are. But they do not make Him the Father, and they do not turn the one God into three.
Examine it for yourself. Read the verses in their context, with prayer and an open heart, and let the Bible explain itself.
There is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and one Lord,
Yeshua the Messiah, by whom are all things.
Read also:
>> The Name, the Nature and the Revelation of God the Father <<