God, Part 2

Live from SLC Utah this is Heart of the Matter FULL CIRCLE and I’m your host Shawn McCraney

Prayer

PRAYER YAHAVAH
Thank you.
We seek you.
Help us with our faith and love.
In Yeshua’s name, Amen.

Show Information

Show 8: The Real Make-up of God
Part II
June 25th, 2024

Announcements

Okay! Starting this Thursday, from 11am to 1pm, I am available to take your calls. We are doing this because there are many of you who do not like talking on air live and because you may want to keep your identity more protected.

Endorsements and Introductions

Introducing Danny Larsen

So, each week we are introducing you to someone or something we endorse here at the Great News Network and tonight I am excited to introduce a dear brother, friend, and exceptional seeker of God in spirit and Truth, Danny Larsen and his ministry, Talking to Mormons! Welcome, my brother!

Musical Discerning

So listen, music fans – especially those who are particularly fond of specific music acts – develop an ear for discerning and identifying the real deal. There are signals and signs that audibly pour into our hearts and minds that bring familiarity, recognition, and therefore identification of the genuine article.

Discerning the “Music of God”

Take this example and let’s assign it to developing the ability to discern the “music of God” compared to all the other songs and musical compositions coming at us in life. Humbly, developing an ear to hear Him has been a life-long pursuit for me and I must admit that I have been misled along the way.

Spiritual Discernment

Once I came to faith, and began to try and discern the Spirits and to differentiate between the “Songs of God” from the Songs of Man, my spiritual eyes and ears became better adept at detecting the posers, the cover-bands, and the wannabes.

Addressing the LDS Church

Future Discussions

You may have noticed that we have been speaking about a lot of subjects but none of them (yet) have been focused on the LDS religion. Give us time – we are frankly building a framework to refer back to and speak from and wanted to get some fundamentals in place.

Upcoming Show

I would guess that in two or three weeks we will do our first dedicated show to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and it will be where I address Russell M Nelson, the current prophet, seer, revelator, and president. Stay tuned.

The Plurality of God

Introduction to Plurality

So, we left off last week where we embarked on talking about God and I said that the very first verse of the scripture describes God as a plural. I am going to move forward with this admittance and further try and decide if this “plural” is two, three, five, or ten-billion elohiyms.

Biblical References

Cross-referencing the scripture with this first passage in Genesis, we recall the words of Yeshua in John 17:3 where he says:

John 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee (1) the only true God, (2) and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Questioning the Trinity

We have to ask, “if the Holy Spirit is a co-equal, co-eternal person of the Trinity, why doesn’t Yeshua say that “life eternal” is knowing His Father, whom He calls, “the only True God” and includes Himself (Yeshua the Messiah) but not who the Trinitarians call, “God the Holy Spirit?”

The Conception of the Messiah

And in the first chapter of Matthew we read the following about the conception of the Messiah where it says:

Matthew 1:18 Now the birth of Yeshua the Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.

The Holy Spirit’s Role

And I thought, if the Holy Spirit is a separate person co-equal and co-eternal with the Father and Son, and if Yeshua, like the angel said, is conceived of the Holy Spirit, as Matthew reports in two different ways, including:

“When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.”

And what we already read which was:

“fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.”

Examining Scriptural Evidence

Paul’s Writings

Then (and this was years ago) I did an audit of every time Paul wrote and described the persons of God either in the body of his epistles or at the start or end of them, and I was stunned to see that Paul never mentions, nor thanks the Holy Spirit as part of the Holy Trinity.

Absence of the Holy Spirit

Instead, all we really get are repeated statements like this:

Romans 1:7 To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Additional References

In 1st Corinthians 1:2 we read:

Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God always on your behalf, for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ.

Or:

2nd Corinthians 1:2-3 Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort;

Conclusion on Paul’s View

Friends, Paul directly and repeatedly mentions and thanks “God the Father” and the Lord Yeshua the Christ in every single introduction of every single epistle that bears his name. Actually, John and Peter do the same as well.

Defining the Holy Spirit

So, what verses are there that directly and clearly identify the Holy Spirit “as God,” or as “God the Holy Spirit,” or as “the third co-equal, co-eternal Person who makes up the one God-Being” like the Trinitarians say?

There is one passage that clearly shows that to lie to the Holy Spirit is akin to lying to God – but this is totally acceptable because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God and after the ascension of Christ, was also the Spirit of His Son.

Misinterpretations and Clarifications

No, that passage in no way proves that the Holy Spirit is the co-equal, co-eternal third PERSON who helps make up this three-headed-One-Being God worshipped as the Trinity by the way, a three-headed creature is said by some scholars to be the BEST way to understand the Trinity.

Revisiting Key Passages

Questionable Passages

That said, there are two passages that Trinitarians will sometimes claim do this, but they are NOT completely reliable. The first is 1st John 5:7 which says:

1st John 5:7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.

This passage has been proven to have been manipulated and added and most scholars (even Trinitarian scholars) admit this.

The Great Commission

That leaves us with one main passage Trinitarians cite to support the Holy Spirit as a third co-equal, co-eternal Being and that is commonly called, the great commission passage, where in Matthew 28 Yeshua supposedly said to His disciples:

Matthew 28:19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:

Internal Evidence

Acts 8:16 (For as yet he was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.)

Acts 10:48 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Then prayed they him to tarry certain days.

Acts 19:5 When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

Acts 22:16 And now why tarriest thou? arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord.

Understanding God’s Plurality

God’s Plurality in Genesis

So, at this point, and from all I have presented thus far, I concluded the following relative to God and His make:

God is one – repeated over and over in scripture. And there is no other in terms of His existence, power, and position over all things.

Then, God is one Plural – also repeated in scripture – even the first passage of Genesis.

Then finally, according to the most scripturally supported support, this Plural is of two . . . and not three.

Creation and Plurality

Genesis 1:11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.

Genesis 1:20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

Genesis 1:24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind

, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.

Creation of Man

Genesis 1:26 And ELOHIYM (plural) said, Let us (plural) make man (singular) in our (plural) image, after our (plural) likeness: and let them (plural) have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

Breath of Lives

And He (Elohiym – plural) breathed into him (the single body from the clay) “the breath of . . . life? No. It’s “the breath of . . . lives.” (plural). Did you know that when God breathed into the singular body that He formed from the clay He breathed the breath of LIVES?

The Image of God

Genesis 5:1-2

Let’s read a deeper insight into this by looking to Genesis 5:1 which says:

1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that Elohiym (plural) created man, in the likeness of Elohiym (plural) made he him (singular).

2 Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their (plural) name Adam (singular), in the day when they (plural) were created.

One Flesh

Genesis 2:21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; 22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

Genesis 2:24 Therefore, shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

Yeshua’s Teachings

John 8:42 If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me.

John 10:30 I and my Father are one.

Understanding YAHAVAH

And so I suggest to you here and now, and stand on this as my present understanding of the make-up of YAHAVAH that:

• He is One plural (captured in the word, Elohiym),
• This plurality is perfect masculine and perfect feminine (not male and female),
• These were breathed into the single body of Adam and that when the woman was removed from the man’s side, it is the first type or picture to evidence the very incarnation of His Son to the Jews thousands of years later.

Genesis 1:26-27

In Genesis 1:26 we read:

“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

The two who the One perfect Plural God then made were male and female, what masculine and feminine appear as in physical form.

The scripture describes them as singular plurals, saying:

Genesis 1:27 So God (plural) created man in his (singular) own image, in the image of God created he him; (singular) male and female created he them. (plural)

Male and Female

The first expression of Himself was male, Adam – perfect masculine which includes some feminine. And the second expression made in His image and taken from Adam was Eve, perfect feminine but containing some masculine.

Conclusion

Preview of Next Week

And from here, next week, we will move forward to show how this view unfolds even more radically in the scripture.