Pete Enns in his Introduction to his Exodus commentary writes:
The book of Exodus is not waiting there for us to bring it into our world. Rather, it is standing there defining what our world should look like and then inviting us to enter that world.
He explains a bit more of what he means by this:
The story of Exodus... is designed to tell us what God is like, how he thinks of his people, the lengths to which he will go to deliver them, and the proper response of God's people to this great deed. Applying the book of Exodus begins with understanding what the story is supposed to do and then seeing how we, as God's people, fit into that story.
"You will always give effortlessly to that which is your salvation, to those things that give your life meaning. If Jesus is the One who saved you, your money flows out easily into His work, His people, His causes. If, however, your real religion is your appearance, your social status, or your pleasure, your money flows most easily into those items and symbols. Radical generosity is therefore an inevitable sign of real grace in the heart."
~Tim Keller
"We must always remember that: The Gospel is not admired in Scripture primarily because of the social transformation it effects, but because it reconciles men and women to a holy God. Its purpose is not that we might feel fulfilled, but that we might be reconciled to the living and holy God. The consummation is delightful to the transformed people of God, not simply because the environment of the new heaven and the new earth is pleasing, but because we forever live and work and worship in the unshielded radiance of the presence of our holy Maker and Redeemer. That prospect must shape how the church lives and serves, and determine the pulse of its ministry. The only alternative is high - sounding but self - serving idolatry" (DA Carson For the Love of God Vol II).
"...as regenerated men who are making some progress in spiritual growth, it is sinfully natural to falsely suppose we are rising above our condition - a delusion which testifies to our very depravity" (Disciplines of a Godly Man, pp. 87-88).
Some Excerpts from J.R.R. Tolkien's essay On Fairy Stores
The 'consolation' of fairy-tales has another aspect than the imaginative satisfaction of ancient desires. Far more important is the Consolation of the Happy Ending. Almost I would venture to assert that all complete fairy-stories must have it. At least I would say that Tragedy is the true form of Drama, its highest function; but the opposite is true of Fairy-story. Since we do not appear to possess a word that expresses this opposite--I will call it Eucatastrophe. The eucatastrophic tale is the true form of fairy-tale, and its highest function.
The consolation of fairy-stories, the joy of the happy ending: or more correctly of the good catastrophe, the sudden joyous 'turn' (for there is no true end to any fairy tale): this joy, which is one of the things which fairy-stories can produce supremely well, is not essentially 'escapist', nor 'fugitive'. In its fairy-tale--or other world--setting, it is a sudden and miraculous grace: never to be counted on to recur. It does not deny the existence of dyscatastrophe, of sorrow and failure; the possibility of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance; it denies (in the face of much evidence, if you will) universal final defeat and in so far is evangelium, giving a fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief.
It is the mark of a good fairy-story, of the higher or more complete kind, that however wild its events, however fantastic or terrible the adventures, it can give to child or man that hears it, when the 'turn' comes, a catch of the breath, a beat and lifting of the heart, near to (or indeed accompanied by) tears, as keen as that given by any form of literary art, and having a peculiar quality.
The peculiar quality of...'joy' in successful Fantasy can...be explained eas a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth. It is not only a 'consolation' for the sorrow of this world, but a satisfaction, and an answer to that question, 'Is it true?' The answer to this question that I gave at first was (quite rightly): 'If you have built your little world well, yes: it is true in that world.' That is enough for the artist...But in the 'eucatastrophe' we see in a brief vision that the answer may be greater--it may be a far-off gleam or echo or evangelium in the real world.
Christ and the law cannot rule over us together: in every endeavour to fulfil the law as believers, we are taken captive by sin. (Rom. 7:5,23)The Christian must know that he is entirely free from the law, [free] from the "you must" that stands without us and over us: then for the first time shall he know what it is to be free from sin.
Taken from Andrew Murray, The New Life, chapter 49.
"The most insignificant sin that has ever been committed would ruin the entire cosmos, for it would mar the perfection that God created to reflect His glory. We steal God’s glory by every sin. We do not grasp the weight of our sin. Until we can bring home the ugliness of sin, Satan has another weapon in his locker."~Lig Duncan
"So one elephant having a trunk was odd; but all elephants having trunks looked like a plot."
~GK Chesterton
"A day you show up for work is a bad day for Satan."
~Dever speaking of work ethic.
"Christ comes to us clothed in the Gospel."
~John Calvin
"Many nonbelievers know only two kinds of Christians: those who speak the truth without grace and those who are very nice but never share the truth. What they need to see is a third type of Christian - one who, in a spirit of grace, loves them enough to tell them the truth."
~Randy Alcorn
"Do Christians believe we hold the truth? No, it holds us; we seek it so that we know it and follow it; that it may hold us tighter yet."
~Author Unknown
"though I have often failed to obey the law, the deeper problem is why I was ever trying to obey it! Even my effort to obey it is just a way of seeking to be my own savior. In that mindset, even if I obey or ask for forgiveness, I am really resisting the gospel and setting myself up as Savior." To "get the gospel" is turn from self-justification and rely on Jesus' record for a relationship with God. "Lay your deadly doing down, down at Jesus' feet. Stand in Him, in Him alone-gloriously complete."
I will not pretend to feel the pain you're going through
I know I cannot comprehend the hurt you've known
And I used to think it mattered if I understood
But now I just don't know
Well, I'll admit sometimes I still wish I knew what to say
And I keep looking for a way to fix it all
But we know we're at the mercy of God's higher ways
And our ways are so small
But I will carry you to Jesus
He is everything you need
I will carry you to Jesus on my knees
It's such a privilege for me to give this gift to you
All I'd ever hope you'd give me in return
Is to know that you'll be there to do the same for me
When the tables turn
And if you need to cry go on and I, I will cry along with you, yeah
I've given you what I have but still I know the best thing I can do
Is just pray for you
I'll carry you
I'll take you to Jesus on my knees
Carry You to Jesus - SCC
The White Witch: "That human creature is mine. His life is forfeit to me. His blood is my property."
Aslan (later) : "The Witch knew the Deep Magic. But if she could have looked a little further back... she would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards."
—from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis
"This habit that modern people often have of thinking and speaking of the new birth as if it could be perceived in the soul and is something to be possessed in themselves is a great snare to many humble and earnest believers; it drives them to despair or turns them into hypocrites, for though they try to live up to “born-again and converted” lives, they know secretly how sinful they are, and that considered in their deepest selves they are not new creatures. That is not the way of Jesus but the way of the Pharisees. Just as it is not in ourselves that we have to seek our righteousness but in Christ, so it is not in ourselves that we have to seek our new birth but in Christ alone. The animal is made to have its life in its own carnal experience, but man is made to find his life in God and not in himself. The Christian who lives out of his own experience of new birth is a carnal Christian, and has not yet learned to know that new birth is from above, and is of the Spirit, and therefore that it cannot be discerned below but only discerned above in Christ.
….Nicodemus was a deeply religious man, but it was precisely to him that Jesus spoke so strongly of the need for new birth and birth from above. There was another Pharisee of whom we know much more than Nicodemus, Saul of Tarsus, who had an outstanding conversion which changed his whole life and who, as born again and baptized in Christ, was known by a new name, Paul. But Paul never spoke of new birth or of conversion as a psychological experience; from beginning to end it was of “the new man in Christ” that he spoke, because it is in Christ that we are given to share in the new life of the new creation. It is in St. Paul that we find the perfect fulfillment of what Jesus Christ taught to Nicodemus, and it was St. Paul who said,'Be ye followers of me, as I am of Christ.'"
T.F. Torrance, pg 74-75 “When Christ Comes and Comes Again”
"As you know, biblically, indulgences are heretical - because they add to the once for all sacrifice of Christ. Justification is a forensic legal declaration and an imputed reality by the perfect righteousness of Christ credited to everyone who believes in Him (2 Cor. 5:21; Romans 5:1). No other "suffering for sins" is necessary. No other penance needs to be paid. And no other righteousness will do. The Pope's righteousness as well as mine is nothing but filthy rags before a holy God (isaiah 64:6).
Purgatory is a manmade fictitious place. Like another blogentator so rightly asserted: if the Pope has the power to absolve sins through applying merit from the Treasury and relieve suffering in Purgatory by a thousands of years so that those precious souls can enter glory, why wouldn't he exercise a modicum of love and apply all the righteousness in the Treasury of Merit to all who are in Purgatory so that all could enjoy the joy of the Lord immediately and be relieved from the suffering they're in?
Christ is sufficient! (2 Cor. 3:5) – you need not ever look any place or to anyone else."
~Steve Camp
"What is most loving about God is not by making much of us, but His enabling us, at great cost to Himself, to enjoy making much of Him - forever."
~John Piper
Alas! and did my Savior bleed
And did my Sovereign die?
Would He devote that sacred head
For such a worm as I?
Refrain
At the cross, at the cross where I first saw the light,
And the burden of my heart rolled away,
It was there by faith I received my sight,
And now I am happy all the day!
Thy body slain, sweet Jesus, Thine—
And bathed in its own blood—
While the firm mark of wrath divine,
His Soul in anguish stood.
Was it for crimes that I had done
He groaned upon the tree?
Amazing pity! grace unknown!
And love beyond degree!
Well might the sun in darkness hide
And shut his glories in,
When Christ, the mighty Maker died,
For man the creature’s sin.
Thus might I hide my blushing face
While His dear cross appears,
Dissolve my heart in thankfulness,
And melt my eyes to tears.
But drops of grief can ne’er repay
The debt of love I owe:
Here, Lord, I give my self away
’Tis all that I can do.
Words: Isaac Watts, Hymns and Spiritual Songs, 1707; Ralph E. Hudson wrote the refrain in 1885
Like a wise master-builder Paul laid the true foundation– Jesus Christ; and built thereon a sacred edifice of heavenly graces, more valuable than gold and silver and precious stones. Those who study the nature of the Gospel, and live under its power, both know, and can enter into its blessed design. All its doctrines, precepts, and promises, are calculated to abase the pride of man, to exalt the glory of Christ, to reveal the malignity of sin, the beauty of holiness, the vanity of the world, the bliss of heaven; to show the sinner his utter helplessness, and to reveal to him an all-sufficient Savior- for proud man must be humbled, the idol self must be dethroned.
Hence; we find that human merit is altogether excluded from the system of Paul's theology. Being illuminated by the Holy Spirit, he preached the truth without any mixture of error. There are no disproportions, no disfiguring features in his portraiture of Eternal Truth. Perfection in all its parts bespeaks its Divine original. With uncompromising firmness he declares- that faith is the gift of God; that we are justified by faith; that Christ dwells in our hearts by faith; that we walk by faith; that we are the children of God by faith.
It was therefore to the faithful in Christ Jesus, that the Apostle wrote with such affectionate entreaty, "I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God."
How powerfully does he inculcate the duty of universal holiness, "Fix your thoughts on what is true and honorable and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Keep putting into practice all you learned from me and heard from me and saw me doing, and the God of peace will be with you."
With such exhortations to holy obedience, how strange that any reflecting mind should, for a moment, charge the doctrines of grace with having a licentious tendency. Yet, there were people, as we have already noticed, who were base enough to abuse the grace of the Gospel. The champion for the Truth hesitated not to call them, "the enemies of Christ, whose end is destruction." So carefully did he guard believers against those evils of our nature, which, when brought into contact with the Gospel, destroy its sufficiency by self-righteousness; its purity by antinomianism.
With peculiar emphasis, almost bordering on indignation, he asks these abusers of the Gospel; "What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid! How shall we who are dead to sin, live any longer therein?" And then, after showing the sanctifying nature of true faith in Christ, he gives the believer this blessed assurance; "Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the Law but under grace."
In all periods of the Church, Satan has sown his tares among the wheat. This state of the visible Church, is declared by our divine Savior, in various parables of exquisite beauty. The good and bad fishes -the wise and foolish virgins- the fruitful and barren branches- the guests with, and the one without, a wedding garment; are all designed to illustrate this truth- that as they are not all Israel, which are of Israel, so neither are they all true Christians, who profess to be members of Christ. Paul, with his usual discrimination of character, has given us the distinctive features of these two classes; the one holding the Truth in unrighteousness; the other, holding the Mystery of the Faith in a pure conscience.
“Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand,and marked off the heavens by the span, and calculated the dust of the earth by the measure, and weighed the mountains in a balance and the hills in a pair of scales? Who has directed the Spirit of the LORD, or as His counselor has informed Him? With whom did He consult and who gave Him understanding? And who taught Him in the path of justice and taught Him knowledge and informed Him of the way of understanding? Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales; behold, He lifts up the islands like fine dust. Even Lebanon is not enough to burn, nor its beasts enough for a burnt offering. All the nations are as nothing before Him, they are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless. To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare with Him? Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He it is who reduces rulers to nothing, who makes the judges of the earth meaningless. Scarcely have they been planted, scarcely have they been sown, scarcely has their stock taken root in the earth, but He merely blows on them, and they wither, and the storm carries them away like stubble. To whom then will you liken Me that I would be his equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high and see who has created these stars, the One who leads forth their host by number, He calls them all by name; because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, not one of them is missing.” (Isaiah 40:12-18, 21-26)
"O that You would slay the wicked, O God; Depart from me, therefore, men of bloodshed. 20 For they speak against You wickedly, And Your enemies take Your name in vain. 21 Do I not hate those who hate You, O LORD? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? 22 I hate them with the utmost hatred; They have become my enemies."
"THIS BOOK OF ISAIAH speaks so much of Christ, gives such a particular account of the birth, life, miracles and passion, and of the gospel state, that it has been called a fifth Gospel. In this chapter is contained a glorious prophecy of the evangelical state:
1. We have a description of the flourishing state of Christ's kingdom in the two first verses, in the conversion and enlightening of the heathen, here compared to a wilderness, and a desert, solitary place:
The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly and rejoice, even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.
2. The great privileges and precious advantages of the gospel, in the five following verses wherein the strength, the courage, the reward, the salvation, the light and understanding, comforts and joys, that are conferred thereby, are very aptly described and set forth:
Strengthen ye the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not; behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense; he will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert , And the parched ground Shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water: in the habitation of dragons, where each lay, shall be grass with reeds and rushes.
3. The nature of the gospel, and way of salvation therein brought to light. First, the holy nature of it, in the eighth and ninth verses:
1. And an highway shall be there, and it shall be called the way o holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it, but it shall be for those the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall not be found there; but the redeemed shall walk there.
2. The joyful nature of it, "And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away" [v.10]."
Jonathan Edwards
In celebration of Valentine's Day
"What wondrous love is this, O my soul, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this that caused the Lord of bliss
to lay aside his crown for my soul, for my soul,
to lay aside his crown for my soul.
To God and to the Lamb, I will sing, I will sing,
to God and to the Lamb, I will sing.
To God and to the Lamb who is the great I AM,
while millions join the theme, I will sing, I will sing,
while millions join the theme, I will sing.
And when from death I'm free, I'll sing on, I'll sing on,
And when from death I'm free, I'll sing on.
And when from death I'm free I'll sing and joyful be,
and through eternity I'll sing on, I'll sing on,
and through eternity I'll sing on."
"Moreover, the subject of this gospel is, first of all, the Son of God. He has accomplished a work: but it is Himself who is the true subject of the gospel. Now He is presented in a twofold aspect: 1st, the object of the promises, Son of David according to the flesh; 2nd, the Son of God in power, who, in the midst of sin, walked by the Spirit in divine and absolute holiness (resurrection being the illustrious and victorious proof of who He was, walking in this character). That is to say, resurrection is a public manifestation of that power by which He walked in absolute holiness during His life-a manifestation that He is the Son of God in power. He is clearly shewn forth as Son of God in power by this means Here it was no question of promise, but of power, of Him who could enter into conflict with the death in which man lay, and overcome it completely; and that, in connection with the holiness which bore testimony during His life to the power of that Spirit by which He walked, and in which He guarded Himself from being touched by sin. It was in the same power by which He was holy in life absolutely that He was raised from the dead.
In the ways of God on the earth He was the object and the fulfilment of the promises. With regard to the condition of man under sin and death, He was completely conqueror of all that stood in His way, whether living or in resurrection. It was the Son of God who was there, made known by resurrection according to the power that was in Him, a power that displayed itself according to the Spirit by the holiness in which He lived. [5] What marvellous grace to see the whole power of evil-that dreadful door of death which closed upon the sinful life of man, leaving him to the inevitable judgment that he deserved-broken, destroyed, by Him, who was willing to enter into the gloomy chamber it shut in, and take upon Himself all the weakness of man in death, and thus completely and absolutely deliver him whose penalty He had borne in submitting to death! This victory over death, this deliverance of man from its dominion, by the power of the Son of God become man, when He had undergone it, and that as a sacrifice for sin, is the only ground of hope for mortal and sinful man. It sets aside all that sin and death have to say. It destroys, for him who has a portion in Christ, the seal of judgment upon sin, which is in death; and a new man, a new life, begins for him who had been held under it, outside the whole scene, the whole effect of his former misery-a life founded on all the value of that which the Son of God had there accomplished."
John Darby
"The glory of his patience. We wonder, when we see a notorious sinner, how God can let his thunders still lie by him, and his sword rust in his sheath. And, indeed, when such are converted, they wonder themselves that God did not draw his sword out, and pierce their bowels, or shoot one of his arrows into their hearts all this while. But God, by such a forbearance; shews himself to be God indeed, and something in this act infinitely above such a weak creature as man is: 'I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim; for I am God, and not man,' Hosea 11:9. When God had reckoned up their sins before, and they might have expected the sentence after the reading the charge, God tells them, he would not destroy them, he would not execute them, because he was God. If he were not a God, he could not keep himself from pouring out a just vengeance upon them. If a man did inherit all the meekness of all the angels and all the men that ever were in the world, he could not be able to bear with patience the extravagances and injuries done in the world the space of one day; for none but a God, i.e. one infinitely longsuffering, can bear with them.
Not a sin passed in the world before the coming of Christ in the flesh, but was a commendatory letter of God's forbearance, 'To declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God,' Rom. 3:25. And not a sin passed before the coming of Christ into the soul, but gives the same testimony, and bears the same record. And the greater number of sins, and great sins are passed, the more trophies there are erected to God's longsuffering; the reason why the grace of the gospel appeared so late in the world, was to testify God's patience. Our apostle takes notice of this long-suffering towards himself in bearing with such a persecutor. 'Howbeit, for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all long-suffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him,' 1 Tim. 1:16. This was Christ's end in letting him run so far, that he might shew forth not a few mites, grains, or ounces of patience, but all longsuffering, longsuffering without measure, or weight, by wholesale; and this as a pattern to all ages of the world; upotupwsin for a type: a type is but a shadow in respect of the substance. To shew, that all the ages of the world should not waste that patience, whereof he had then manifested but a pattern.
A pattern, we know, is less than the whole piece of cloth from whence it is cut; and as an essay is but a short taste of a man's skill, and doth not discover all his art, as the first miracle Christ wrought, of turning water into wine, as a sample of what power he had, was less than those miracles which succeeded; and the first miracle God wrought in Egypt, in turning Aaron's rod into a serpent, was but a sample of his power which would produce greater wonders; so this patience to Paul was but a little essay of his meekness, a little patience cut off from the whole piece, which should always be dealing out to some sinners or other, and would never be cut wholly out till the world had left being. This sample or pattern was but of the extent of a few years; for Paul was but young, the Scripture terms him a young man, Acts 7:58, about thirty-six years of age, yet he calls it all longsuffering. Ah, Paul! Some since have experienced more of this patience; in some it has reached not only to thirty, but forty, fifty, or sixty years.
2. Grace. It is partly for the admiration of this grace that God intends the day of judgment. It is a strange place: 'When he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe in that day,' 2 Thess. 1:10. What, has not Christ glory enough in heaven with his Father? Will he come on purpose to seek glory from such worthless creatures as his saints are? What is that which glorifies Christ in them? It is the gracious work he has wrought in them."
Stephen Charnock
"It is a new year and I am sure that many Christians have resolved to be more consistent in their times of personal devotions than they were in the previous year. I thought it might be helpful, then, to share a method I have been using for my times with the Lord. I hope others can join in the discussion, sharing the methods they use. While there is no single right way to do personal devotions, I do believe there are some that are better than others, and like you, I am always eager to learn how I may make my devotions more beneficial.
A common trap believers fall into is making their time of personal devotion a selfish time. Without structure, prayers often become mere lists of perceived needs, wants and desires and reading Scripture becomes a chore and a burden. Many Christians feel guilty, admiring and desiring the biblical examples of those, like David, who delighted in the Lord and in His Word. They sincerely desire to have a passion for prayer and Scripture, yet find themselves lukewarm at best.
It is my sincere hope that we can share different ways of daily delighting in the Lord and sharing time with Him. If you have a method or some pointers you would like to share, please feel free to do so by linking us to an article on your blog (if you have one) or by posting a comment in the forum.
And without any further ado, I will tell you about the structure I have been using, which I call An Hour of Personal Worship..."
"...Mystery, for the orthodox, is not the irrational, but simply the partially understood; mystery is understandable, and someday, at least in heaven, will be. It looks contradictory but greater knowledge resolves the apparent contradiction. A mystery is something that man could never figured out but God reveals. The Cross is a mystery. Man could have never discovered the means to resolve the demands of justice—Holy justice, Perfect justice, and our need for mercy. Only the Cross resolves the dilemma..."
For a complete context, click here
"Eternity is a perpetual duration, which has neither beginning nor end; time has both. Those things we say are in time that have beginning, grow up by degrees, have succession of parts; eternity is contrary to time, and is therefore a permanent and immutable state; a perfect possession of life without any variation; it comprehends in itself all years, all ages, all periods of ages; it never begins; it endures after every duration of time, and never ceases; it does as much outrun time, as it went before the beginning of it: time supposes something before it; but there can be nothing before eternity; it were not then eternity. Time has a continual succession; the former time passes away and another succeeds: the last year is not this year, nor this year the next. We must conceive of eternity contrary to the notion of time; as the nature of time consists in the succession of parts, so the nature of eternity in an infinite immutable duration. Eternity and time differ as the sea and rivers; the sea never changes place, and is always one water; but the rivers glide along, and are swallowed up in the sea; so is time by eternity."
Stephen J Charnock
Much has been made by Jehovah's Witnesses and other groups of the absence of the article in John 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was A God," is the preferred translation of such cults. There are good grammatical reasons to reject this translation and interpretation, but Arthur Wainwright (The Trinity in the New Testament, currently in print from Wipf & Stock) provides some additional contextual reasons. He points out that "THEOS is used with or without the article indiscriminately in the New Testament. In the Prologue to the Fourth Gospel it never has the article except in verses 1 and 2. In verses 5, 12, 13, and 18 it appears without the article" (p. 60).
So if the anarthrous form means "a God," then, if one is interested in consistency, these other verses should also be translated as "a God." Thus, John was a man "sent from a God" (v 6), and we become "children of a God" (v 12) through the will of "a God" (v 13). And "no one has seen a God at any time" (v. 18).
How does the New World Translation do? Verse 6 is translated, "There arose a man that was sent forth as a representative of God: his name was John." Verse 12-13 is, "However, as many as did receive him, to them he gave authority to become God’s children, because they were exercising faith in his name; and they were born, not from blood or from a fleshly will or from man’s will, but from God." And verse 18 is, "No man has seen God at any time; the only-begotten god who is in the bosom [position] with the Father is the one that has explained him. " In short, the translation of John 1 is, shall we say, something short of consistent.
What cause have they who have an interest in Christ, to glory in their Redeemer! They are often beset with many evils, and many mighty enemies surround them on every side, with open mouths ready to devour them. But they need not fear any of them. They may glory in Christ, the rock of their salvation, who appears so gloriously above them all. They may triumph over Satan, over this evil world, over guilt, and over death. For as their Redeemer is mighty, and is so exalted above all evil, so shall they also be exalted in him, They are now, in a sense, so exalted. For nothing can hurt them. Christ carries them, as on eagle's wings, high out of the reach of all evils, so that they cannot come near them, to do them any real harm.
Jonathan Edwards
The Bible tells us of "…that great Savior, who, after such preparation, actually accomplished the purchase of redemption, and who, after he had spent three or four and thirty years in poverty, labor, and contempt, in purchasing redemption, at last finished the purchase by closing his life under such extreme sufferings as you have heard, and so by his death, and continuing for a time under the power of death, completed the whole." (Jonathan Edwards, History of the Work of Redemption) The Bible tells us of a Savior who did not die to make redemption possible in the lives of those who would place their trust in Him, but of a Savior who actually and finally redeemed His people with His death. When Christ cried out "It is finished!" he indicated that His work of atonement was complete. He did not make atonement possible, but actually accomplished it.
"Christianity has not been tried and found wanting;
it has been found difficult and left untried."
G. K. Chesterton