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You don't have to be a
Trinitarian. That's not a dividing line. Eating bacon is.
Premillennial Historicist is. But you can be an Aryan Heretic. You can be a
Tritheist. You can be, uh, you can have all sorts of things. Alright.
What's up, YouTube? As always, welcome to another livestream.
We are going to be discussing one of my favorite topics tonight, and that is one of the cardinal doctrines of the
Christian faith, the Trinity. The Adventist Church propagates the idea that they are
Trinitarians. But are they? Tonight we're going to explore this.
It is important to understand that terms have specific meanings. One of my biggest pet peeves with the
Adventist Church is their bamboozling of people by term borrowing, then redefining it, but then ardently asserting that they affirm what others do because they simply use the same term.
This muddies the waters, it confuses people, and it's dishonest. They do this with terms like the
Trinity, Sola Scriptura, Righteousness by Faith. Adventist leadership needs to own that they are their own entity and religion.
Stop trying to play both sides of the field publicly to appear like many of them will assert that they're just another
Protestant denomination. No, they're not. And they need to start owning it and be forthright, not deceptive.
Especially considering that they claim to be the commandment -keeping church. So tonight we're going to examine the
Adventist Heavenly Trio, and we are going to compare it with the Orthodox Christian Trinity.
And I want to answer this question as to whether or not they are the same thing, or if we are talking about different gods.
And in the Adventist Church's case, gods plural. As always, we will leave the tail end for Q &A, so have your questions ready.
But I will prompt you when to send those through. Please don't do that now or they're going to get lost in the chat.
With me to examine is a good friend of mine, Pastor Jeremiah Nortier of the 12 .5
Church in Arkansas. He's been on the show before. Brother, welcome back, and thank you for being here.
It's always a pleasure. Thanks for having me back on. When you asked me to talk about the Trinity, I was like, hey, this is one of my favorite things to talk about, too, because this is the foundation of everything in Christianity.
Yes, sir. Yes, sir. And it's actually interesting. You just had Dr. Bosserman on your channel to talk about this specific topic.
He's actually going to be on this channel next month to talk about the
Sabbath. So that will be a really that will be a really good stream. He actually has some people in his family that are tertiary touching
SDAs to some degree. So should be a pretty interesting topic. It's going to be in defense of first day
Sabbatarianism. So should be a good feather ruffler, if you will.
But with that said. We're going to get right into it. Let's do it. So what we're going to do is we're going to establish what the
Trinity is historically, biblically, all that good stuff. Then we're going to examine a few
Adventist primary source documents. So it's not just going to be Miles saying this.
It's just not answering Adventism's bias. I've read these papers. I've done deep digging on this.
And I get a lot of SDAs that come knocking my door down, upset that I say some of the things
I do. So tonight, we're going to see that I'm not talking out the side of my neck here.
So with that said, can you explain to the audience on a very surface level, what is the doctrine of the
Trinity and why is it so important? For one, it's so important because it is the one true
God that we worship. So that's number one. And the name Trinity, tri -unity, that kind of begins to explain the whole paradigm.
God is tri -personal. He's three persons. But he is unified in his eternal existence and nature.
His being is truly one. And so that's what we mean. We're trying to understand these two important categories.
God is one in his being, three in his personhood. And so I'm sure we're going to get into a lot of groups call foul and say, well, there's not really a distinction between being and person.
We're saying you have to have that distinction. In fact, we understand this in our everyday experience.
We see things that exist that are impersonal. We contrast that with us. We are human beings. We exist and we are personal.
But there's something different between us and God. There's a different state of affairs altogether.
God is eternal in his existence. So his personhood, how God is personal, is different than how we are personal.
Most definitely. And we're going to get into that a little bit further, but I think that's a good summation there.
But before we actually get into the specifics of the doctrine, I think it's important to establish this, and that's what's on the screen.
The doctrine of the Trinity is not the same thing as the biblical evidence for the
Trinity. This is so important to grasp and understand. This is why there's so much confusion.
This is why you will get people that say things like, well, the word Trinity is not in the Bible, even though they're using the word
Bible, which isn't in the Bible. That is not what the claim is.
The concept of the Trinity is found in the Bible. That's the biblical evidence. The doctrine of the
Trinity is the language that we use to describe what we find in the Bible so that people can make sense with it and make sense of what's being presented.
Because what we have in Scripture is, as we're going to look at, we have a plurality and a singularity.
You have to have a way to understand the differentiation between those two while also still understanding the unity of the two.
So the doctrine of the Trinity is simply the language that we use to describe what the church sees in the
Bible. So it refers to the language and words that the Christian church is used to accurately describe what the
Bible teaches about the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. So being in persons, that's an example.
That's the language we're using. We understand that Scripture does not say God is three persons and one being and the hypostatic union.
And, you know, of course, we're giving these things titles to what we see. So we're not being verbose every time we say it.
And this is why I think that properly defining things is so important and not getting muddy on things, because the word itself is shorthand for something specific.
The evidence for the Trinity, the biblical evidence, is looking at the Bible in its entirety to see what it says regarding Christ and His nature, the
Father, the Holy Spirit, their characteristics and attributes. So an example is
Matthew 3, 13 through 17. You see all persons, all three persons present at Christ's baptism.
But it was not the Father that descended in the form of a likeness of a dove onto the Son. It was the
Holy Spirit that did that. It wasn't the Holy Spirit that spoke from heaven. It was the Father that spoke from heaven.
The Son was in the water, not the Holy Spirit, not the Father. But then we have instances, as we're going to look at, this is one of the examples we will look at later, and I've brought this out before on the channel.
We have Isaiah 44, 24 and Colossians 1, 16. Where you have a reference being made to one of the persons, but then one of the biblical authors applying that same one
Lord to Jesus. So you have to be able to make sense of what we're seeing in the
Bible, and we have to have language to accurately convey what we're communicating.
And so the doctrine of the Trinity in the most simple terms is that within the one being that is
God, there exists eternally three co -equal and co -eternal persons, namely the
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Within the one being that is God, there exists eternally three co -eternal and co -equal persons, namely the
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. There's one being, that's what the church has understood as monotheism to be discussing.
As you're going to see tonight, we're going to see a different idea of that concept. We then have that there are three divine persons, and the persons are co -equal and co -eternal.
So how has the church defined, and how are they using the terms person and being,
Jeremiah? Yeah, so I'm so glad we're highlighting these two categories, because Scripture is
God. I love how you said when we got to look at the entirety of the Scripture, because as we see the
Old Testament unfolding, it's not clear. There are glimpses of God's plurality and his unity.
But we see the Trinity in its fullness with Jesus Christ coming, and we see the apostles being experiential
Trinitarians with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. And so when we look at the entirety of Scripture, we see there is one
God who exists. His being is eternal, and that being is also personal in a very unique way that's distinct from our experience.
It's very similar. We're reflecting that triune God's image in many ways, but he is eternally personal, different than how we are temporally personal.
And so, for example, you and I are two distinct beings and two distinct persons.
Correct. And we're saying, OK, now God is eternally one being, and that one being is fully shared with three divine persons.
And so that's just important in saying we see the being of God not being divided. That is one.
That is where we get the strong monotheism, right? Yes. And so does that kind of help explain the categories?
Because when we start looking at the term person, we see that persons speak, they can self -reflect, they can exhibit emotions, and it's probably easy.
Most people say, OK, we kind of see that with the father and the son. But the Holy Spirit is given personal pronouns.
He's referred to as a he. He will guide you into all truth. The Holy Spirit desires to give gifts and is spoken to, and he speaks to many people throughout the book of Acts.
He also intercedes and prays on our behalf. Yep. That's something a person does.
And another... It's actually part of the evidence of the Holy Spirit being and having the divine attribution is that Paul tells us that when the
Spirit prays and intercedes on our behalf, he's able to do so universally at all times for all believers in all places, which is a divine attribution.
Absolutely. And Acts 5, I think, is another wonderful passage to show the deity of the Holy Spirit, because Ananias and Sapphira lied not to man, but to God and to the
Holy Spirit, we see in that context. But that's also a proof of the personhood of the
Holy Spirit, because you don't lie to rocks. That doesn't make any sense. But you lie to other persons.
And so the Holy Spirit was lied to. Correct. And you brought up the Jesus's baptism.
And so we see a strong distinction between the father that spoke from heaven. And this is my son who I'm well pleased with, the dove, the spirit descending like a dove onto Jesus.
That was the spirit, right, onto Jesus at his baptism. So these are three persons that are distinct from one another.
The father did not die on the cross. I know that's an ancient heresy, but it was the son who's been in an eternal relationship with the father.
And he is the one that condescended, took on flesh and is our savior ultimately. So this is where the battle is had in terms of explaining with greater clarity about the
Trinity is making these two distinct categories. And when I teach on the Trinity, I say without these two distinct categories, it's nonsense.
Jehovah's Witnesses will say, explain the Trinity because it sounds like you serve one God sometimes and then you serve three gods sometimes.
And if that is your understanding, the Trinity, that is absurd to say, well, we believe in one God sometimes and sometimes there's three.
Well, that's nonsense, right? We're we're created in God's image to reflect truth. And so we want to be logically consistent.
Yes. So here is a succinct definition of what we mean when we use these terms.
Person is the conscious ability, meaning possessing awareness. To will speak, self -reflect and exhibit emotions.
These are the sorts of things that we see from Father, Son and Holy Spirit in Holy Scripture. That is not relegated to only physical creatures.
People oftentimes associate personhood with being a human being. And there are some contexts where that can be the case.
But that's not what the church means when the church is using that term, that it's three human beings.
We're going to circle back around to this, actually, on the latter half of this stream.
But that's not what we're saying. We're saying the ability to will self -reflect, exhibit emotion, speak, be spoken to, et cetera.
And that's not relegated to only physical creatures. Spiritual creatures can also experience those things like angels.
They also have the ability to do these things. So it's not necessarily a physical, corporeal form that has this possession.
So when we talk about the persons, we're talking about the who of God, who is God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
That's who God is. That's where you have your plurality. The being is the mode or state of something or someone's existence.
This headphone case has being, but no personhood. So something can have being and not have personhood.
It's simply something's state or mode of existence. This is the what of God. What is he?
And that's when we get into the divine attribution being ascribed. Things like omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent.
Those are descriptions of the divine. And those things are ascribed to Jesus, the
Holy Spirit and the Father in scripture, as we're going to look at tonight. So you have to have a way of saying, well, these three persons are able to interact with not just creation, but one another.
So they're not one another in the fact that they speak to one another sometimes, like we talked about with Jesus' baptism.
But at the same time, you have the divine attribution, the being, like you said, the eternal state of being is shared by all three of those persons.
And there's only one of those. So that's important to understand. The three who's, the singular what.
So Christian Trinitarianism could be displayed in this left chart. This is the infamous
Trinity shield. The one being is the central, the one
Lord Yahweh, that is the being that is shared then by three persons who are not one another.
Now, remember how we're using these terms, person and being, can emote, self -reflect, speak and will, the being being the mode of existence.
So what makes them one? The attributes, the being, the essence, the substance. These are various terms that the church has used to describe this down through the centuries compared to the
Adventist heavenly trio. Whoa. We're going to get into this in the second half, but I wanted to bring this up now while we were doing this comparison here to show you the distinction and difference.
The Adventist church defines person and being as essentially the same thing as we're going to see.
But for the purpose of this comparison here, I'm still using it as being to see why we would say or to show why we would say this is why you should not say being in person are interchangeable.
So I've put it on here as mode of existence because that's what being is. Ontology, they say a person is defined as possessing a distinct, tangible, physical form.
And can also emote, self -reflect and will, etc. Again, they're going to use being in person interchangeably.
But the way that we would what Christians hear when they hear them say three beings, you've got three modes of existence.
And this is the way Ellen White described the heavenly trio, by the way, is that each member is, for example, self -existent and autonomous, like eternally.
So in Orthodox Trinitarianism, like we have in the previous chart, you can't the sun is not a standalone being and God.
That's why they get accused of tritheism, as again, we're going to look at tonight, because if you remove one of the persons from this, you don't have
God anymore. It's not three standalone. That'd be three gods.
So, again, that's why these terms are super important to define specificity around what we're saying. But this chart is a better example.
And here you can see a side by side of the difference. What makes the Adventist heavenly trio supposedly one is their mission and their purpose.
Now, I wouldn't disagree with that. The Christian church would not disagree with that. Of course, they are united in mission, purpose, etc.
But that's not what makes them one God. That's the key.
You are not one God because you have three individual persons, which they're incorrectly defining or defining it differently.
Who are united in their mission, so therefore it's one God. No, that's not how it works.
So what isn't the doctrine of the Trinity now that we've established what it is?
Again, if you need to go back, folks, and watch those parts again, I encourage you to do so. There's something very specific being said here, and this is it in the most basic terms.
And it's not to say that we understand all the mechanics around this, but we're talking about something here that is the foundational core crux of the
Christian faith. I will stand, Jeremiah will stand, and Christians will stand with Athanasius the
Great saying, I don't care if the world is against Athanasius, then it's Athanasius against the world.
This is the central defining doctrine of the Christian faith. So with that said, what isn't the
Trinity? Well, the Trinity is not we worship three gods, right?
That's maybe the first thing we should point out because that's, to me, the basic folly of the heavenly trio, because when you divide the being and start dividing the essence of God, you have multiple gods and you have now polytheism, not monotheism.
And there's a video on YouTube, Bad Analogies by St. Patrick. It's a classic.
I want people to go look that up because it talks about, that's modalism, Patrick. And I love it because it's modeling all the analogies we want to use to try to explain
God. And so the Trinity is not like water, where God and sometimes you've got a mode where water takes on vapor or takes on a liquid or take on a solid.
Well, that's modalism. That is God being one person just operating in three different modes or putting on three different masks.
It erodes the distinction between the three persons of God. You know,
I love St. Patrick's three -leaf clover analogy because, you know, historically, he actually used that to try to rightly explain the
Trinity. And I've told people I'm a little bit soft when you use an analogy and then talk about where it breaks down.
So as long as you have that caveat, you can help get the ball rolling a little bit. But the problem with like a three -leaf clover is kind of dividing
God into thirds, saying, well, the Father is a third of God, the Son is a third, and the Holy Spirit is a third.
It's like, no, they're all fully, co -equally, eternally the one true God. And so all human analogies, created analogies break down in a heretical way because you can't capture something from the created order on the eternal state of affairs, which is
God, who is not changing. He is a se. He is totally self -existing.
God is his attributes. That's why God told Moses in the burning bush, I am that I am.
He is uncreated. He is self -sustaining. And so one last thing, one last model of what the
Trinity is not. And it's another form of modalism. The Trinity is not like a man who is a father.
He can also be a son and a brother. What's the fallacy there? That's one person operating or at least having these different functions.
And so we're saying, no, the Father is distinct as a person, a divine person. And from the
Son and the Holy Spirit. And so they've all eternally been in a harmonious, perfect, loving relationship.
Yeah, from eternity past. From eternity past, before the foundation of the world. Yeah. So the Trinity is not, you just described it there at the end, modalism or the ancient term,
Sibelianism. It's not that that God is one singular person, unipersonal, and at different times that singular person manifests himself at different, in different modes.
So sometimes he's the son, then sometimes he's the father, then sometimes he's the Holy Spirit. It's also not
Arianism, obviously, again, ancient heresy, that Jesus is a created being of a lesser status than the
Father or the Holy Spirit. It's also not tritheism. Three gods, which is kind of what this heavenly trio more closely resembles.
Is the Trinity a pagan concept? Absolutely not. Have you heard people say this?
Yeah, yeah. I've heard people say this. I'm like, how can it be? It is distinct from all pagan thought.
The Trinity claims to be monotheistic and tripersonal. Show me anything in paganism that comes close to that.
You can't. You're going to get an extreme of a unity, a
Unitarian God, like you said earlier, or you're going to get like Mormonism, a pantheon of gods.
And so we're saying, for one, those gods cannot account for the diversity and the unity of the world that we live in, because those types of faulty gods are going to fall prey to the problem of the one and the many.
Totally. Well, and as we're about to see right now, I want to transition into some of the biblical evidences now that we've talked about the doctrine specifically.
I'm going to go through quite a few here. I want to hear some that you have first, if you have anything to share.
But I have a lot of verses to look at here to really drive this point home before we then transition into our other examination.
So what sort of biblical evidences would you give to somebody who asks for biblical evidence for the
Trinity? Great, great question. In fact, I've recently taught on the
Trinity at the Apologetic Dog. Definitely want to encourage people to go check that out. And the interview with B .A.
Bosterman, I'm so glad he's coming on your channel. We talked about why God is necessarily one in three, not one in two, one in four, one in a hundred.
But I think what's foundational, and this actually hits me on a personal level, because many years ago,
I shared my faith to a Jehovah's Witness. They asked me, where's the Trinity? Miles, I was unequipped, man.
I couldn't find the verse that has the word Trinity in it. I couldn't appeal to the whole testimony of Scripture to show that God is one in three, one being three persons.
So now it's a different story. I want to say, look at the consistent testimony, how
God is one. The great Shema in Deuteronomy 6. Every faithful Jew would be quoting the
Shema when they get up throughout the day and before they go to bed. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our
God is one. OK, this is a fundamental truth that you see all throughout the
Psalms, all throughout the prophets. Isaiah talks about there is one God and there's no other besides me, the one creator
God who is Yahweh. And so in the Gospels, Jesus quotes the great Shema, affirming monotheism.
And we see the epistles in James and 1 Corinthians 8, verse 6, quoting the
Shema. There's one true God who is the creator. We are the creation. He's the creator.
So that's a testimony of all of Scripture, the one being who is God. Now, Yahweh, we start to see,
OK, Yahweh has revealed himself in the Father, in the Son and the
Spirit. That is to say, there is biblical support. John chapter one. In the beginning was the word.
The word was with God and the word was God. Well, that's Trinitarian language. This eternal word is not an abstract thought or that's being spoken with a word.
It's a divine person. How do we know that? Well, verse 14 tells us that word took on flesh. We know later this is the
Son, Jesus, grace upon grace. And verse 18 says that the Father and the Son, the unique Son of God, the monogamous theos, eternally has been in face to face relationship.
And so there's so many things we could point to say, well, obviously the Father is God. Scriptures tell us that.
I think it's John six, maybe twenty nine in there tell us clearly God, the Father.
So we see that that the one being who is God is the Father. We see that one being that is
God is the Son. Clear testimony. Jesus forgave sin. That's something God alone can do. And then we see wonderful passages about God, the
Spirit, the Holy Spirit. You know, is Yahweh speaking in many different passages?
So we see a lot of these scriptures. And then when I tell people, OK, you want a verse, you want a verse,
Mr. Jehovah's Witness. Let me give you one. When we go to the Great Commission. And by the way,
Miles, did you know the Great Commission is not fulfilled? I've had people try to argue opposite of that.
When you go to the Great Commission, Jesus says, go, therefore make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name singular, the name of the
Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And so I've had, you know, when this
Pentecostal say, we'll go read Acts two thirty eight. I'm like, I debate so many Church of Christ. Trust me, I understand what
Peter is saying over there at Pentecost. But they say the name being referred to is the name of Jesus Christ.
I'm like, time out. Nope, that's not it. Number one, Jesus was a Jew. I know that's groundbreaking news for some people, but he would have been a faithful Jew.
The best one, by the way, quoting the Shema here. Oh, Israel, the Lord, our God is one in which he quotes the first and greatest commandment.
So we know he's faithful to the Shema affirming monotheism. And so that is the name that Jesus is talking about here.
Yahweh. Right now, it's interesting because he doesn't say baptizing them in the names plural,
Father, Son and Spirit. No, he's saying in the in the name of the one true God who is
Father, Son and Spirit. And so simply in Acts two, that's just talking about be baptized in the authority, in the name, in the power of Jesus Christ, the way that he prescribed us to be baptized.
If people have questions about that. So that's one of my favorite verses. There's tons of Trinitarian verses that we can go to.
But this to me is one of the clearest where you have the name singular and then you see that name, which would be
Yahweh, Father, Son and Spirit. Amen. You covered a couple of the ones that I want to look at here, but you also know you're good.
You also listed a bunch that I'm not going to. And so just to piggyback off of that,
I want to walk through a good portion of verses. So you mentioned the Shema. You know,
I could quote it in Hebrew, but I listened to a rabbinic Jew, so he said Adonai instead of Yahweh.
So it kind of messed me up. Oh, so explain, though, how would
Israel, and including Christ, have understood what is being said with one?
Echad, right? You got to have that. Yes, the little film back there, Echad, God is one.
And this is a consistent testimony. Like I said, throughout the Psalms, throughout Isaiah, there is only one
God and there is no other. Isaiah 42, you may pull that up later. But this one God shares his glory with no other.
And people that deny the Trinity, good luck trying to harmonize that with John 17, by the way. But yeah, a
Jew here would be bowing the knee to the Creator, the one that spoke this universe into existence.
I believe that's Psalm 33, by the word of his power, he sustains all of his creation.
So this faithful Jew would be worshiping the one, the radical one
God who exists, the creator of all things. Yes. So we see here as well that there is one
Lord as well. Yes, there are multiple Lords. You'll see people like Dale Tuggy and the
Unitarians of today oftentimes want to appeal to. Well, when we see the term Lord in the New Testament, it's not the same sense that it's used in the
Old Testament because they have to make two Lords. You can't have Jesus being the
Lord in the New Testament. But then here, the understanding being, well, no, it's in reference here to what they would have understood to be
God the Father. The Unitarians can't. Go ahead. Spice in there. Did you happen to have
Psalm 110 in your many verses? No, but that's on, I mean, I have a log of all the support for this and it's in that log.
That's just not one I picked for tonight. Do you want to go there? Yeah, I'll do it. Just a quick drive through on this because this is incredible because I believe it's in Matthew 22.
You have to correct me if I'm wrong, but Jesus expounds on this in the Gospels. But this is incredible.
So the Psalm of David, the Lord says to my Lord who sits in my right hand until I make it enemy of your footstool.
There's your hashtag Postmill verse two, by the way. I'm sure you like that. But a lot of our translations do us a favor of capitalizing
Yahweh. Right. All caps, Lord. And then we see Lord Adonai being distinguished here with the second
Lord. And so Jesus kind of poses the question, if if Adonai is supposed to be a descendant of David, how is he in the present praying to him ultimately in relation to Yahweh?
Well, this is because Adonai pre -exists David. Right. And so this is
Jesus. Jesus has eternally existed. The divine, eternal logos. He just stepped into time, took on flesh through the virgin birth.
Right. But if you abandon a Trinitarian understanding, then this makes no sense. How can
David pray in the present during his time to Adonai, who is supposed to be the coming savior?
Right. Yeah, that's a good point. I love asking
Jews about that, and they do not have, in my opinion, very good, sophisticated rebuttals to Psalm 110.
You may have the verse later in maybe Genesis 18 or 19 where you have
Yahweh being talked about in one location, then Yahweh in another location. It's like, wait, we know there's one
Yahweh, and yet we understand there's two divine persons at work. It's actually interesting. I'm going to be getting into not this specific thing regarding the
Targum or the Targumim, but the Targums also throw them off oftentimes if we're talking about the plurality.
I think it's Anthony Rogers was doing a video the other night talking about this. I think it's
Targum Neophiti on Genesis and the plurality of Genesis one regarding the
Godhead. And yeah, that's just an interesting observation on your part. But again, what's that?
You say Rafiki? No, I don't know what that is. Off the line, King Rafiki. Oh, behind in the past.
Yeah. For some reason, I thought you were referring to an individual like some rabbi or something. I know you're good.
But then again, we see the same thing here again. One Lord, Paul tells us Ephesians four, there's one body, one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call.
One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all who is over all and through all and in all.
So this is another interesting one here because you have a plurality being spoken of here regarding one spirit, one
Lord, one God and father of all. But the point with me quoting this here, there's a lot you could get into with this.
But the point being is that there's one Lord, Deuteronomy six, four other.
There's multiple places that say this in scripture. There is only one Lord. Well, with that being established.
Let's go to. Miles, when I hear that passage, I just hear the Church of Christ saying one baptism,
Jeremiah. Yeah. It's like you think I deny that. But this is rooted in a Trinitarian passage where there's of course, there's one faith.
There is one baptism. There's there's one God. Right. So if we look at Revelation.
Oh, in vain of this one Lord, this theme, because that one
Lord, as you've mentioned, is Yahweh. Revelation one eight is about Jesus.
I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God. Again, there's one Lord. Who is and who was and who is to come the
Almighty. That's Yahweh. How do we know that this is about Jesus? Well, because Revelation one seventeen through eighteen and two eight prove this is about Jesus.
Because those verses are him speaking. And what does he say? When I saw him, this is
John, I fell at his feet as though dead, but he laid his right hand on me, saying, Fear not, I am the first and the last.
That's Alpha and Omega and the living one. I died and behold, I am alive forevermore.
And I have the keys of death and Hades. So what did one eight?
I am the Alpha and the Omega. That's the first and the last, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come the
Almighty. Again, two eight, Jesus speaking and to the angel of the church in Smyrna.
Right. The words of the first and the last who died and who came to life. That's Alpha and Omega.
Revelation 1916, talking about Jesus again on his robe and on his thigh. He has a name written
King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Miles, is that a tattoo on Jesus?
Interesting discussion, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Again, one
Lord. Revelation 15, three. And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God and the song of the lamb saying great and amazing are the deeds are your deeds.
Oh, Lord God, the Almighty, just and true are your ways. Oh, King of the nations. Jesus is the king of the nations, but Revelation also uses
Alpha and Omega of the father as well. The father speaking, Revelation 21, six.
And he said to me, it is done. I'm the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end to the thirsty. I'll give from the spring of water of life without payment.
If you have your red letter Bible, that's not going to be in red. It's the father speaking.
The father again, actually the son here. Behold, I'm coming soon, bringing my recompense with me to repay each one for what he has done.
I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. So you have the
Almighty, the one Lord. Yahweh, the father claiming that the son claiming that.
Furthermore, and we've looked at this one on the channel before, folks, so. It's always good to just rehash these things out, if you've seen this before, bear with me.
In Isaiah 44, Yahweh is speaking and talking about his uniqueness amongst all the other idols.
Specifically in verse 24, he talks about the penalty for falling into idolatry, et cetera, leading up to this, but then he says, thus says the
Lord, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb. I am the Lord, the one Lord who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself.
So, Jeremiah, who made all things? The Lord. The Lord alone?
The Lord alone made all things. Correct. But Paul tells us in John 1, 1 through 3, which you read some of earlier.
In the beginning was the word, the word was with God, the word was God, he was in the beginning with God, all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
You'll get your Jehovah's Witnesses here that will tell you, well, yeah, through him, not by him. OK, Colossians 1, 16, for by him, all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him.
Can we go back up to John 1 also? Because verse I'm so glad you included verse three. The way that John says this is very interesting.
All things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made.
And so you're trying to posit that Jesus was somehow made. You have a self -contradiction because he would have had to exist in order to be made through himself, like to be self -created, which is absolutely absurd.
Yeah. John 1, Colossians 1, Hebrews 1 talks about Jesus is
Yahweh, because as like we're getting into the creator is a triune act, right?
Yes. Back to Isaiah 44, like we were earlier, earlier in the passage, again,
Yahweh is laying out his uniqueness, says, Fear not, nor be afraid.
Have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses. Is there a
God besides me? There is no rock. I know not any.
The same thing is reiterated again in Deuteronomy 32, the rock, his work is perfect for all his ways are justice, a
God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he. Second Samuel 22, same thing.
The Lord lives and blessed be my rock and exalted be my God, the rock of my salvation. Psalm 95.
Oh, come, let us sing to the Lord, the one Lord. Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
But then in first Corinthians 10, what does he say, Jeremiah? I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud talking about Israel with Moses and all passed through the sea and all were baptized.
That includes infants, by the way, brother, into it, into Moses, in the cloud and in the sea and all ate the same spiritual food.
That includes the children, too, by the way, and all drank the same spiritual drink for they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them.
And the rock was Christ. I have to be honest to you, since I'm on your channel, you can get me back when we do it over on your channel.
We kid, folks. It's all in fun. That just shows that we can have unity while being in different denominations, despite what the
Adventist church tries to tell people. So, yeah, as you see, Yahweh is the rock.
The rock is then applied to Jesus. You mentioned this in passing a little bit earlier.
Only God can forgive sins. Let's see what First Kings 839 says. This is
Solomon's prayer of him when he was dedicating the temple. Whatever prayer, whatever plea is made by any man or by all your people,
Israel, each knowing the affliction of his own heart and stretching out his hands towards this house, then here in heaven, your dwelling place, and forgive and act and render to each whose heart, you know, according to all his ways.
For you, you only know the hearts of all the children of mankind, that they may fear you all the days that they live in the land that you gave to our fathers.
Psalm 44, 21, who would not God discover or would not God discover this?
For he knows the secrets of the heart. God knows the secrets of the heart. God alone forgives sins and knows the thoughts of the heart of men.
First Kings 839 told us. Then again, Psalm 103, two through three. Blessed the
Lord. Oh, my soul. And forget not all his benefits who forgives all your iniquity, that's sin, who heals all your diseases.
So Yahweh forgives sins, heals diseases, knows the secrets of the heart, knows the thoughts of men.
Did you catch all those? Now let's look at Mark two, five through 10. What does it say?
And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, son, your sins are forgiven.
Now, some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts. Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming.
They knew the old Testament scriptures. You think they'd read first Kings brother? Why does this man speak like that?
He's blaspheming who can forgive sins, but God alone. And immediately Jesus perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves said to them, why do you question these things in your hearts?
Did you catch that? Jesus knew the hearts of these men.
What did we just read in the old Testament? But God alone knows the hearts of men. Ah, when he uses the phrase, just as a fun fact for folks, when you hear the phrase, uh, in his spirit, that's referring to the divine nature of Christ.
When you hear the phrase, according to the flesh, that's his human nature. Like in Romans one, three and a nine, five, according to the flesh is referring to his humanity.
This gets into the hypostatic union, the attribution, um, uh, being ascribed to the singular person of Christ.
We're not going to get into that tonight. Um, we'll get into that some other time, but, um, why do you question these things in your hearts?
Which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven or to say, rise, take up your bed and walk, but that you may know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins.
He said to the paralytic. So Jesus does all three things there that Yahweh alone can do.
There are many, many, many others of these that we could look at, but the point being the father's not the son, the son is not the father, spirit's not the father, spirit's not the son, et cetera, back to our little shield.
Can I add one more in there? Yep. And this is, this is pretty intuitive. People would understand that God alone is to be worshiped, right?
And so this doesn't apply to the Adventist, but a lot of people that deny Jesus as being the one true
God, um, he received worship. Um, and scripture is clear. Like when, when
John in the throne room of heaven and the vision tried to worship an angel, the angel says, get up,
I'm not God. Don't worship me. And he points them back to Yahweh. And one of the best examples of Jesus receiving worship, because you know,
Jesus, if he wasn't a creative being, but being like the most faithful Jew, he would have deterred worship away from him.
Right. Remember Thomas, my Lord and my God, when he felt his hands and felt his side, um, affirmed who
Jesus was as being Lord and God, and Jesus blessed him. Blessed are you
Thomas, but you've, you've seen these things, right? But blessed are those who haven't seen these things and yet believe these things in their heart.
Amen. So with all that said, now
I want to transition into what the heavenly trio is. Oh snap.
So let's compare now moving forward and see if this is
Trinitarianism because again, they want people to think, no, no, no, we're Trinitarian, at least the main, what you're going to find tonight, brother, which this
I'm sure we'll send up red flags for you. Um, there's multiple camps in this movement that are accepted.
You don't have to be a Trinitarian. That's not, that's not a, that's not a dividing line. Eating bacon is.
Premillennial historicist is, but you can be an Aryan heretic. You can be a Tritheist.
You can be, uh, you can have all sorts of views. Wow. This is so important. Um, you may look this up if I'm wrong, but I think it's, it's
John 8, 24, where Jesus says, unless you believe that ego
I me, then you will die in your sins. Here's the point. You have to believe in the right
Jesus. I think it's second Corinthians 11 or four. Yeah. Uh, where Paul warns us to be aware of false
Jesus's. So we need God's word to tell us clearly who he is. And so we're contending there's only one true and living
God who is tri -personal. So when people say, oh, I believe in Jesus. Well, who are you calling Jesus? Because we know biblically that it's the second person of the triune
God. And so if you deny that you are getting into John 1 or John 8, 24 territory, denying
Jesus as the eternal, I am. And so to deny that Jesus, you're in your sins.
And so it's, it's equal to the Galatian one heresy to where you will be anathema. Yeah. There is no, um, other
Jesus, like simply saying the name is not enough. Right. The details matter because every heretic down through history has always used the name,
Sibelius used the name, Arius used the name, all sorts of groups have used the name Jesus, but when you start to get into, well, who are you talking about?
Who is that Jesus? That's where the rubber starts to meet the road. So here let's look, this is on the
Adventist church's website. They had somebody reach out to me, uh, back in December who told me that this was just a slip of the keystroke.
He assured me he wanted me to know that. No, no, no. He's one of these. No, we, we believe the
Trinity you're getting caught up on semantics, man. Yeah.
Okay. It'll be changed. It'll be changed within 72 hours. He said that was in December folks of last year.
It's almost June. Hasn't changed. Oh, and that's because they know.
Yeah. And that's because they know it. So we're going to put this on blast and put this out on a megaphone because I don't think that this is, is something light.
You need to be honest about what you believe. This is serious. Stop trying to blend in with the rest of Christian, especially when you guys think that Protestants are apostate, that we need to leave our churches and join your guys' church.
You have your own thing going on. Own it, own it. Seventh -day
Adventist Christians believe that there is one God. We're going to get into how they, how they define the word God, Jeremiah.
Okay. And that this one God is three co -eternal beings who work together in unity.
Do you see the problem? You said you saw it earlier. I knew you would. Beans. I mean, if anything, at a glance, and it's like, for me, that was an all caps and yellow and big, and I'm like, whoa, stop.
Because that's polytheism, right? That's where it's. Yeah. Front and center.
The first sentence on the page about what they believe about the Trinity. I asked this guy who, who contacted me, why did it take a
YouTube armchair theologian to bring this to your attention? None of your scholars, none of your professors caught this.
If this is what you guys, he said, oh, no, no, no. We're going to change it to say just three persons. I said, okay, well, what about the beam?
He said, well, we don't really comment on that because the Bible doesn't use that word. I said, where's the Bible used that God has three persons.
No, what it really comes down to with the next and one of the sources that we're going to look at after this is that Ellen White defines for them what the
Godhead is. And she uses the terms person and being interchangeably, which is why they're not going to have three persons, one being and make a distinction between the two.
Cause they don't believe a distinction between the two as we're going to see. Well, then if you keep scrolling through, you can read about a number of things.
And even within this article, they use the term three persons later on. So they say three beings and three persons.
So either they're using it interchangeably or you have three persons, three beings, which is still not Trinitarianism.
But at the end, brother, I want to read this last part to you. Because this is a key aspect.
How does the Trinity work together? I'm going to read this whole section to you.
And then I want to get your thoughts at the end. Okay. Have you ever been on a winning team?
This is already going in bad. Well, you were just talking about bad analogies earlier.
Yep. A team of students at school, raising money, a team of coworkers trying to meet a sales goal, a community sports team.
It's fun to be on the winning, the winning side. A team has a common goal.
While each person may fill a different role, they all work together to accomplish the mission.
So here's the analogy. It's not the egg analogy. It's not the apple where it's like, oh, you have the skin, the meat, the core.
That's what the Trinity is. This is the analogy we're getting a team. The triune
God may be compared to a winning team. God, the father,
God, the son, and God, the Holy spirit work together in what in ways that a human team would never be able to for a common goal.
While each person of the Godhead has a distinct role in the plan of salvation, they unite in their mission.
Paul writes to the church at Corinth, the grace of the Lord, Jesus Christ, and the love of God and the communion of the
Holy spirit be with you all like a winning team, each person of the Godhead has a different role.
They each have a special relationship to humanity. God, the father sustains and supports us.
God, the son saves us from, uh, from sin and shows us a better way to live. God, the Holy spirit guides us in the way of righteousness.
All three work together for our salvation in the doctrine of the Trinity, we see God's love revealed.
The book of Jude mentions this teamwork. Beloved building yourselves up on your most
Holy faith, praying in the Holy spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord, Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
Like the ultimate winning team, the Trinity works together for you. They will do everything possible to bring you to salvation.
I know your synergism radar is just like about to blink out of its case.
Like a teacher in school who gives her all to help her students succeed. The Trinity works together to make salvation understandable.
They want you to experience salvation. So they go on and say a few other things here.
And the point being God's goal is the salvation of all. And God is these three beings or persons who are working in tandem toward one common goal.
And that's what makes them one. Is that the Trinity? No, I will say they use a lot of Christian ease in this, this article.
So it's hard to detect, but when you go back to the very first paragraph, when you're talking about a bunch of different people trying to work together for a common goal, that's kind of the whole problem.
We're saying, okay, then that reflects polytheism, multiple different gods trying to really, this article took the human level and just brought it up one more plane of existence.
It's basically all the Greek mythology gods. They're just blown up versions of man, right?
They're divine beings that are one persons. And then you have a bunch of different divine beings. So that's kind of the fight.
Like you can just tell their version of God, the heavenly trio, which they are calling the Trinity, is just a bunch of divine people run around trying to do and they just do it better.
And the problem is the reason why these analogies break down is because we're talking about the
God who sustains our existence. We're asking the deeper questions.
What makes these analogies even possible to begin with? Our world is fashioned in a particular way that God has spoke this world into existence and it reflects him.
And so that's why I love the mystery of the Trinity, the one being revealed in three divine persons.
The three persons are that one God who exists.
And it's like, man, that totally transcends our plane of existence. But we can apprehend many of those truths through God's word.
Yeah. And God is not a trio. That's a very different.
I know that that makes people think three. So therefore that's kind of synonymous with Trinity. No. No.
That's not what the Christian church means by that. And so the Adventist church needs to stop using this language and just say that they affirm their own concept, which we're going to look at a paper here.
I want to play a clip first. This is from one of my former professors. We played this on the channel before, folks. But some of you probably haven't seen this before.
So Judd, if you end up watching this stream, would love to have you on to the show to talk about this specific topic.
We've talked about this in the past before. You know my position on this. You know what my response to this is.
But for people to see that I'm not just making these things up, we're going to start by playing a small clip from him.
Giving a lecture during a Trinity symposium is what they call it. It's on video or Vimeo.
And I want you to listen. This is the introduction. He's segwaying from somebody who just previously gave a presentation and did a
Q &A, and he makes a comment here at the beginning before getting into his his lecture and talk, which was more focused on the history of Seventh -day
Adventism, which is his specialty, specifically Ellen White. But I want you to pay very close attention. We're going to play this a couple, maybe two times.
It's like 45 seconds or something like that. But this is from a scholar in their own church describing what they believe to be the
Trinity. Good afternoon, I am Judd Lake. I'm a professor at Southern Advent University.
My focus is on Ellen White's studies and preaching. Just a piggyback on the
Q &A, you know, when you think about tritheism, three gods, one God, to me, it's very clear in the marriage relationship.
Go back to Genesis, one flesh, two individuals, one flesh, two individuals.
Imagine if the husband and wife were surgically connected.
You'd have some problems, imagine the fights, but there'd be less divorce because then you'd have to have radical surgery.
So how are they one flesh? They're one in mind, in purpose, in their characters, in their life together.
One flesh, two individuals, one God, three individuals. They're united in their purpose, in their character, in their mission.
Just to follow up on the Q &A. What are your thoughts on that, my friend?
Well, it's everything we're talking about. You're taking an earthly analogy, a temporal, plain state of affairs, and imposing that on an absolute, eternal reality.
And, you know, a marriage does reflect aspects of the Trinity and the gospel, but we see it taken to an extreme with what he's doing because, yes, we are one in purpose with our spouse.
We come together as one with wanting to glorify God in our lives. But that in itself does not point back to God.
God is three distinct persons that fully share in that divine being.
And so what I try to explain, like marriage reflects God in some ways, is a husband and wife are equal.
We're both people, we're distinct humans, but one is not less. Like with, you know, when people go read
Ephesians chapter five, the wife is supposed to submit to her husband. Submission does not mean lesser inequality, lesser in being or something like that.
No, we are one. We are equal with who we are as people. And this does reflect back to God and his perfect unity because the
Father is, or the Holy Spirit is not less in his being and quality than the
Father or the Son. The early church used the word perichoresis, right, because they're always, they're so close.
In order to talk about the Father, it's always in the context of the Spirit and in the Son. There's this eternal dance going on.
But that's the fundamental folly that your old professor was taking a created example and imposing that on God, who is unchanging, who always is.
Right. And that's where you're going to fall into problems. Yeah. And even with the marriage analogy, which we're going to see another analogy that they try to use and say, well, this is biblical.
See, see, it's biblical. But again, it's the old switcheroo on terms and taking something and applying it to the being of God, who
God is. Like taking Adam and Eve being one in marriage and coming together as one and then applying that to who
God is in his being from eternity past. No, no, you're drawing something out of that.
That's not a correct parallel there. So that is one. Next, I want to look at, and this is probably going to be the most that we've gone through this on this channel.
We've looked at portions of this before, but tonight, since we're specifically talking about the Trinity, this is a great time to talk about a lot more of this.
And this is a paper from one of their scholars. I'm going to actually share the whole
PDF here. And this paper is called
The Quest for a Biblical Trinity, Ellen White's Heavenly Trio Compared to the Traditional Doctrine.
This is by Jerry Moon. Jerry Moon, brother, is, I believe, the chair of church history at one of the
Adventist seminaries here in Berrien Springs, Michigan, Andrews University. This paper is actually from their
Journal of Adventist Theological Society, which is essentially a resource for them of their scholars putting out scholarly work.
So this isn't just some Joe Schmo. This isn't some person who doesn't know anything about Adventism or is writing some sort of, because you can access their university portal.
And this isn't one of those papers from some student that was doing like a master's thesis. No, this is from somebody who knows this system and is essentially giving you here an overview of how the position has evolved in their movement.
So we're going to go through this here. And folks, I want you to pay very close attention here.
We're going to read a lot of stuff. I know there's going to be a lot of reading, but please, please, please follow along.
This is very, very, very important. So he starts this paper. Let's look at this introductory paragraph.
In 1846. James White, which is Ellen White's husband, dismissed that I know for poor
Dr. White, right? Yeah. James White dismissed the traditional doctrine of the
Trinity as the old unscriptural Trinitarian creed. One of their pioneers.
A century later, at the 1946 World Session of the General Conference of Seventh -Day Adventists, the denomination that James White co -founded voted official endorsement of a fundamental belief statement that explicitly professed belief in the, notice he puts it in quotes,
Trinity. During the 60 years that have passed since the action, a
Trinitarian view of God has remained dominant among Seventh -Day Adventists, despite the general awareness since Roy Gane, he's one of their, he was one of their scholars, since Roy Gane's thesis in 1963, that most of the early
Adventist leaders were non -Trinitarian, HALT. The founders of this movement were anti -Trinitarians.
Was God behind this? One of the central claims of this movement, brother, is that they are restoring apostolic
Christianity, that they are the end times remnant church that God has called together at this time, in this way, for this purpose, to be a people for this time, to take a unique special mission or message to the world.
Did God raise up a bunch of anti -Trinitarian heretics in the 19th century to restore his church?
That just to me, I'm glad you're covering this because just on its face, I hope people are really hearing you clearly, like the
Trinity is foundational because it goes back to us talking about John 8, 24, like Jesus identifies himself as the eternal
I am. And so people that have this this trio that, you know, different beings, it's like, well, listen, you don't have one creator.
You have three creators that are united in purpose. That's different. That's the different Jesus altogether.
So, no, God's not going to use non -Trinitarians to somehow restore the gospel.
Especially anti -Trinitarians who are espousing heresy that God gave a funeral service to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years before this movement even came together.
But look at the footnote here, folks. The footnotes in these papers are so important because you're oftentimes reading a compilation paper of a bunch of compiled footnotes.
So the part he mentions at the end there, despite the general awareness since Roy Gaines master's thesis in 1963 that most of the early
Adventist leaders were non -Trinitarian, people have tried to fight this. There are people in their movement who the pro -heavenly trio side that says, no, no, they've always been that way.
They've always affirmed the Trinity. He says here, Leroy Froome, he was one of the presidents of the
General Conference back in the day, which is the highest position you can get to in their church. It's not like Mormonism where he like is a prophet, but it's the highest position in their organization.
So in his movement of destiny on page 148 through 180, he breaks this down and says, although Froome's, this is
Jerry Moon now commenting as he cited Froome, he says, although Froome's pleading on the basis of Millerite statistics that a majority of the
Adventist founders were Trinitarian, that's not been supported by the evidence. So, yes, the early, which
I have the source documentation on this, Uriah Smith, these guys were not Trinitarians.
They were coming from the Christian connection, which came out of what was called the Rest. It's not they were a part of the
Restorationist movement, but it was more than that. It was an actual organization called the Restorationist. That was a movement prior to Millerism and prior to the
Christian connection, the Christian connection was born out of that, and then people from the Christian connection joined Millerism, which then joined
Seventh -day Adventism. And they brought their Christological heresies with them. So now they were not
Trinitarians. So now he's going to explain to us what the purpose of this paper is.
He gives him some stuff here in the introduction. Just one second here. I was down there and then
I missed it. So he's going to tell us the purpose of the paper. So I'm going to read and then we'll get back into it.
So he says, the purpose of the present article is to clarify more fully the similarities and differences between Ellen White's view of the heavenly trio and the traditional doctrine of the
Trinity. That's what we just discussed earlier. In order to discover her position in relation to the current debate amongst
Adventists. And then he lists a number of their scholars. But he says, however, the unique position of Ellen White in the
Adventist church justifies taking her as an authentic representative of Adventist theology.
The conceptual key to unlock the puzzle of Ellen White's developmental process regarding the
Godhead is the discovery that her writings describe at least two distinct varieties of Trinitarian belief.
One based on scripture alone and one based on scripture as interpreted through the lens of Greek philosophy, the same hermeneutic that brought the immortality of the soul into Christian theology.
So you're going to quickly see here, brother. Greek mythology, Greek philosophy,
Aristotelian thought, these are always the boogeyman for the Adventist church. That's always the fall guy for them.
They're like the Sosinians in this regard. Oh, the church went apostate right after the apostles because it corrupted itself with Greek paganism and mythology.
And and they all all those Athanasius, Irenaeus, Cyprian, they were all heretics because they were pagan
Greek mythologists. That's sort of the thing because you have to downplay them because when all of Christian history is against you, you have to find some conspiracy, obviously, to silence all of that.
So when it comes to the Sabbath, just everything, it's always a conspiracy because none of the history is in line with them.
But he continues saying the concept of God that is explicit in her later writings portrays the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit as three eternal persons of intellect, will and emotions who are united in character, purpose and love.
We're going to get into this term person later. There is no conflict among them, no working at cross purposes, no competition, not even disagreement.
Thus, they are not three gods, as in polytheism or tritheism, but one. So this is why
I asked you earlier, Deuteronomy 6 .4, what did the Jews, Christians, early
Christians, Jesus, understand by the term they are the
Lord our God is one? Because they're going to appeal to that here, for example, and say, well, they were one in their mission, purpose and character.
That's what's being referred to in the Shema. The Israelites understood we're worshiping three beings who are one in their mission, purpose and character.
Is that what makes them one? No. And I think, I mean, you could probably approach this a number of different ways, but this is referring to the one creator
God who knows no other. And so it's to try to say that because what they're really pushing is there's three creators that are one in purpose, and that flies in the face of all of scripture.
But that's what you're looking at. I mean, they are worshiping the creator who is distinct from all of his creation.
So when they're quoting the Shema, they're giving the reverence and honor to the creator of God, of all things, who shares his glory with no one, by the way.
Yes. So before moving on in the article, a couple of things.
Again, he says Alan White is an authority on this. Alan White presents two distinct
Trinity concepts, he says. One that's supposedly influenced by Greek philosophy, that's supposed to be you and I, Jeremiah, and their heavenly trio concept, which is supposedly the truly biblical one.
So question, is our ancient belief in the Trinity not derived with scriptural presuppositions?
Because that's the argument they're going to make, is that you're using Greek presuppositions, we're using biblical presuppositions.
Is that the case? No, because when we are defining being, we're talking about existence, we're talking about essence, what makes something exist truly.
And we're saying, and then everything that exists is very peculiarly unified in some way, and yet we're distinct.
And so then we start talking about some of those distinctions. This is impersonal, right? And so you and I are distinct persons, but we have separate beings, right?
And so when we look at scripture, we see there is one God who eternally exists. He's unchanging.
He's simple, which I'm sure they would hate us using that type of language, but he's one in essence. But he is revealed in three divine, distinct persons.
Yes. It's also bogus when he claims they read the Bible with no lens, just scripture as it is.
Yet they're same scholars and folks, I've showed this on the channel plenty of times, also admit that the great controversy theme, which was given to them, not something they found from scripture, something they admit
Herbert Douglas says was given to them. And it's how they interpret all of scripture.
So we're only using biblical presuppositions, even though we have this thing called the great controversy theme, which is the lens through which we read all of scripture.
It's a good point. No, folks, you're kidding yourselves. But again, he says that Ellen White is an authentic representative of Adventist theology.
So now with that in mind, before moving forward in the article, he's going to get into some in here, but I want to get into some different ones.
I want to read some of her statements regarding the heavenly trio. This is what they're telling the world is the
Trinity. And this is why there are people who are confused. I mean, you have like I know some of the guys over at Catholic Answers.
They have an article on there where they're like, well, Adventists are basically Trinitarian. Now, the guys at Catholic Answers, if they heard this stuff tonight, they'd go, whoa, never mind.
They're simply using the word Trinity. Quote, this is from Patriarchs and Prophets, one of the big three, page thirty four.
The sovereign of the universe was not alone in his work of beneficence. That's the father. He had an associate, a coworker who could appreciate his purposes and could share his joy in giving happiness to created beings.
Christ, the word, the only begotten of God, was one with the eternal father, one in nature, in character and in purpose.
The only being that could enter into all the councils and purposes of God. Close quote.
Is Jesus a separate being from the father? No. And this I mean, this gets into the whole song and dance that we've been doing.
That's unique to the Trinity. So when we get accused of being pagan, I'm like, show me another definition of one being multi -personal.
I mean, it doesn't exist anywhere. Yeah. But also, too, if Jesus is the only being that could enter into all the councils, what does that say about the
Holy Spirit? Right. I mean, well, this is because it's because it's coming from a time period, which he's going to talk about this later.
They didn't believe the Holy Spirit was a person at this point. They thought the Holy Spirit was the presence of the father and the son in their physical absence of being there.
In their physical absence. Well, yeah, and you're going to see why I say that here in a little bit.
Next quote, Testimonies for the Church, Volume 8, page 268. Quote, God is the father of Christ.
Christ is the son of God. To Christ has been given an exalted position. He has been made equal with the father.
All the councils of God are open to his son. Is that compatible with Trinitarianism, brother?
No, no. But but it's trying to confuse the categories of the incarnation and Christ exaltation.
So Jesus condescended, right? He he veiled his divine prerogatives, truly taking on man.
So I'm just saying when you have that category, then you can look at verses where Jesus says not my will be done, but your will be done to the father.
He prays to the father who is greater than myself. Jesus says positionally, but not in terms of deity.
Yes. Again, with that quote to all the councils of God are open to his son.