To answer some questions I’m sure people will have, especially after reading my Saturday posts, I’m a Christian who keeps the seventh-day (Saturday) sabbath and observes the holy days outlined in Leviticus 23 (as did the apostles and early New Testament church).
Probably the most concise way to describe my beliefs is to say that I’m a Messianic Jew or a Christian who values the Hebrew roots of our faith. My parents came into a 7th-day Sabbath keeping group called Worldwide Church of God before they married, and so I was born into this faith. Worldwide split over doctrinal change when I was just a few years old, and I’ve been a part of a variety of different Sabbath-keeping and Messianic groups throughout my life. Currently, my whole family attends with a group called United Church of God.
Some key differences between my beliefs and those of “mainstream” Christian groups is that I keep the Holy Days outlined in Lev. 23, observe clean and unclean meat laws from Lev. 11 and Deut. 14, and don’t believe that “Trinity” (a word never used in scripture) is the best way to describe the nature of God. To elaborate on that last statement, I believe that the God-family consists of two beings — God the Father and Jesus Christ the Son (Yeshua haMashiach). I see the Holy Spirit as a manifestation of Their power, Their divine essence, and the part of God (Elohim) that communicates with our human spirit.
Further reading:
- What Is The Holy Spirit?
- Who Was ‘God’ In The Old Testament?
- What Does It Mean For Each Of Us That God Is A Family?
- Understanding The Days That God Calls Holy To Him
- Why I Cover My Head In Church
Some of the things we hold in common with other Christian groups are belief in Jesus Christ as our personal savior, belief that the Bible is God’s word and a guidebook for our lives, and belief in the importance of following Christ’s example and commandments. We also practice baptism by full immersion as part of an adult believer’s commitment to following Yeshua. We believe human beings were created in the image of God to have a relationship with Him, but because of our sins we need salvation through Jesus Christ in order to come to God. We believe prayer, keeping God’s commandments, and loving one another are essential parts of being a Christian.
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That’s interesting. Before now, I’ve never heard of a Christian denomination that doesn’t believe in a three-in-one Trinity – but I don’t see anything non-Biblical about it 🙂
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Thanks for your comment 🙂 Once, my family encountered a Christian homeschooling group who became very hostile when we wouldn’t sign a paper saying we believed in a three-in-one Trinity. They didn’t even want to discuss the topic at all 😦 I’ve found with most Christians, though, that when we start talking about and comparing our beliefs we have more in common than we disagree on.
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Oh, it is profoundly unbiblical. Even Rabbinical Judiaism professed such a belief before it abandoned it in an increasing tendency to define itself in opposition to what later became known as Christianity. We have a hypostatic consciousness, and we are hypostatic persons. This all reflects the Trinity. The Trinity is found everywhere in nature. However, the most severe consequence of rejecting the Trinity is that there is no longer a basis for Love and Truth is one and the one same thing. As God is no longer love or truth incarnate. There can be no objective truth without the Trinity as truth is no longer an objective fact that God discovers through an existential encounter with himself. Instead what you have as you do in Rabbinical Judaism and Islam is a “God” who is may be capable of love, but who is not love incarnate; and a world in which truth now only depends on this “God’s” subjective beliefs. Lose the Trinity and you lose everything. The Fact is economically God (who is radically unknowable and completely other) is both known and saves us in his Energies as the Father (who is the source) by Jesus ( who redeems), through the Holy Spirit (who sanctifies).
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By the way, I stumbled across this blog because I am an INFJ too.
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Please don’t tell me something is “profoundly unbiblical” and then use slippery slope, straw man, and circular arguments to back-up your claim instead of scripture.
There is nothing about the fact that “God is love” which depends on the Trinity doctrine. Scripture has always taught of two Beings in the God-family: Father and Son who are love and want to share that love with human beings. They are also the basis for Truth. https://likeananchor.com/2018/03/03/who-was-god-in-the-old-testament/
There are only two verses in scripture that use the Trinitarian phrase “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” 1 John 5:7-8 was never in the original text https://www.ucg.org/bible-study-tools/booklets/is-god-a-trinity/a-spurious-reference-to-the-trinity-added-in-1-john-5-verses-7-8 There is also some secondary-source evidence that the phrase was added to Matt. 28:19 (Eusebius quotes the scripture without it pre-council of Nicea), but there are no primary sources to back that up so it’s not definitive.
Pronouns referring to the Holy Spirit as “him” in John 14-16 are incorrectly translated. The Greek word for spirit is neuter-gender, but the word for comforter is masculine-gender. Translators opted for masculine pronouns to agree with the title “comforter” rather than with the word for “spirit.”
The holy spirit is not treated by Biblical writers as a separate entity. In the Old Testament, David prayed to God “don’t take your holy Spirit from me” rather than asking the Spirit not to leave. In the New testament, Paul, James, and Jude open every one of their letters talking about God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ (not Father, Son and Spirit), and so does John in his first and second letters. Peter only mentions the spirit in the opening for his first letter, not his second. Also, John’s visions in Revelation show two God-beings, not three.
You state that God “is both known and saves us in his Energies as the Father (who is the source) by Jesus ( who redeems), through the Holy Spirit (who sanctifies).” But Jesus said in His prayer to the Father that eternal life is knowing “You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” He does not mention the holy spirit, though its role is implied because that’s how God communicates with and indwells us. The holy spirit is God’s essence, His power, and the part of Him that communicates with our Spirits, not a person in a Trinity https://likeananchor.com/2014/05/10/what-is-the-holy-spirit/
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How does God the Father and God the Son know that they are Love without an intermediate, which because of the creative force of God is himself a person? That is how does God know that he *is* love incarnate if God is only an essence of two persons who happen to be able to love? Where else do you see this pattern anywhere in nature. Light and darkness, for example, aren’t self-revelatory without a third. That is to say that the distinction in the opposites isn’t in themselves conscious of their own distinction. Likewise, the underlying unity can’t even be made conscious at all. The differentiation is what makes consciousness possible in the first place, but only if consciousness is already present, which of course it always is anywhere and everywhere. Search your own psyche for the truth of this, if this is true for how you come to conscious awareness and you are made in the image of God then why would believe that God must be different?
It is also explicitly mentioned in scripture as in Romans 8, for example.
Having said this, I would also like to point out that regarding Scripture, itself, as a self-justifying system is itself problematic–and no one even thought of doing this until the modern age (17th century). The Bible compiled into totally different cognitive context from our modern text-based way of thinking. It was compiled in and by an oral culture. And so for example, you can’t find it anywhere in Scripture that Scripture only is to be regarded as its own means of understanding itself. Historically, clearly, the Church produced the scripture: this was nowhere more pressing a fact than during the Apostolic age when the New Testament was still being written and long before Rabbinical Judaism decided on their own “canon” for the Tanakh, but yet the Church, herself, had already come into existence. But it is also true at every other phase of the Bible’s development. In other words, Scripture didn’t write itself. What we have recorded in Scripture is only a subset of the Tradition that has been passed down on to us. Also until one has been initiated into the Divine Mysteries through, baptism, Chrismation and the Eucharist then the truth of Scripture remains hidden in plain sight. But after our initiation who is it that gives us this knowledge that transcends a merely intellectual understanding of what is written on the page of whatever version of whatever translation one might be reading if it is not the Holy Spirit?
Finally, I never intentionally engage in fallacious argumentation, but I am also not above making honest mistakes in reasoning, of course. So if you believe I’ve made a fallacy in my argument, I would greatly appreciate you making an actual argument for it, as opposed to a mere assertion, so that I can benefit for my own sake. Having said this if you really believe I’ve engaged in a fallacy than the overwhelming likelihood is that it was probably only miscommunication on my part–or a refusal to yield to reason on your own–and simply left unsaid some implicit point that I thought maybe assumed, which in fact wasn’t readily assumed at all.
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I realize that I didn’t take on some of your more specific challenges, but this was mainly due with my interest in attempting to keep my reply as concise as possible. Consequently, I focused on what I consider to be the most pressing logical claims which demonstrate the truth of the matter (I do of course recognize that not everyone finds abstract logic consistency as persuasive as I do). But I also would also be happy to read your other posts and respond to each point specifically, and while using the evidence that you presumably would be most comfortable with, which to say Scriptural evidence.
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I hope you’ll forgive me for not responding to every point you make in your last two comments. I simply don’t have the time or emotional energy to get swept into a longer argument, especially when I doubt either of us is going to convince the other since it’s like we’re not even speaking the same language.
As regards your comment about scripture not being self-justifying, of course we can’t say,“The Bible is true because the Bible says so.” That’s an argumentative fallacy. But as Christians who believes in God (having already proven to ourselves why we believe what we believe), I think we can say that the Bible is true because it is inspired/written by God. As you pointed out, it didn’t write itself. And because it comes from God, it is the only text we have that we know reflects His mind and desires. Tradition, commentaries, etc can be helpful but they’re not authoritative.
I know as an INFJ that something which makes perfect sense in your own head isn’t always easy to communicate to others. Maybe that’s what’s going on in the parts of your first comment that I read as logical fallacies (in which case, I apologize). But since you asked me to point out where I saw the fallacies, here they are:
slippery slope (If A, then B, C, etc without evidence to back it up) – you use this type of argument when you say if the trinity is rejected, then God isn’t love or truth, truth becomes subjective, and you lose everything. They might be connected in your mind, but they’re not in your argument. As I think about it, “slippery slope” is probably not the best description; maybe “over generalization” or “leaping to conclusions.”
straw man (oversimplifying the opponent’s viewpoint, then attacking that version) – the fact that your comment didn’t mention a single one of my actual points led me to believe you haven’t read them, made an assumption about my viewpoint, and then attacked that.
circular argument (restating the argument rather than proving it) – your first comment goes in circles, restating several unsupported claims about the trinity being everywhere and essential to any belief in God. Again, you’re making assumptions that I don’t share and which are not objectively reasonable. They’re based (at least from my perspective) on your subjective view of this topic.
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Very well said, do you blog? I’d love to read more of your insights. God bless you.
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From reading your about page it seem you are a Christian believing in a binary god instead of keeping to the belief of the apostles and early New Testament church.
You say you “attend …. the “independent Churches of God” or people who practice “Biblical Christianity,” by which we do hope you attend church communities who only worship the One True God of Israel, the God of the Jews and real Christians who only worship One True God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Jesus and his disciples. by following such churches their service we sincerely hope you come to see that Jesus is the Way to God and not God himself.
We wish you good luck in your search for the True God, the Divine Maker, Who is the Elohim Hashem Jehovah. May god guide you and bless you on your way to Him.
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The New Testament writings are pretty clear about Jesus’ divinity. The first passages that come to mind are “the Word was with God and the Word was God.” (John 1:1-3, 14) and Christ’s statement, “I and my Father are one” (John 10:30). And there are many other scriptures as well, both in Old and New Testament, attesting that Elohim is two beings united as One God. I talk more about them in these two posts:
Why Does It Matter If Jesus Existed Before He Was Human? https://likeananchor.com/2017/03/11/why-does-it-matter-if-jesus-existed-before-he-was-human/
Who Was “God?” In the Old Testament? https://likeananchor.com/2018/03/03/who-was-god-in-the-old-testament/
Thank you for your comments and well-wishes. May the Lord bless you!
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The Word is a result of speaking and not as such a person. The Word having become flesh John is speaking about is the promise made by God in the Garden of Eden having become a reality with the birth of Jesus.
The being one is not indicating that Jesus would be the same person as Go. Remember also we do have to be one with Christ as Christ is one with God, which would (in your way of thinking) make ourselves also to be Jesus and to be God.
In the Old Testament is clearly stated that the Most High elohim is One Spirit Being and not two or three. which text would you consider to indicate that God is two people?
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I think Mraissa has found much more truth tan the average professing Christians.
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Oh to find another INFJ keeping the Feasts, food laws, and Sabbath!! LOVE! Rare upon rare. I would love to meet more INFJ’s and hear what their experiences of walking by faith and truth seeking have been. So hard sometimes to find believers that have a balance of worshiping in Spirit AND truth that I can talk to without the deer in the headlights look. He breaks through all my “soft” boundaries while profoundly proving to this cautious INFJ that He is trustworthy AND WANTS to intimately meet me in my head where most others dare not travel. With my Ni I can see His patterns all over the place and I can FEEL him in ways it’s hard to explain to others but my guess is you may know what I’m talking about. Just thought I’d share since it’s comforting to me to know others are out there. Hi others!! 🙂
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I’m so glad you commented! I hear from quite a few INFJ Christians on this blog, though only a few of them also keep the Feasts, etc. As you said, it’s so nice to know there are others out there 🙂
What you mentioned about Him proving that He wants to meet you in your head struck a cord with me. The realization that the Lord really chooses, loves, and wants me is one that keeps coming back to me (I suppose He realizes I need the reminders). And I know what you mean about seeing His patterns and having a hard time articulating it to others. I’ve gotten better at it with blogging, but I still feel like explaining my faith is a challenge.
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Love your writings Marissa,
…may the Lord God Lead and guide your studies as you continue the journey to reach souls.
The soul is the part of the body that rationalizes senses hearing emotions thoughts feelings, ect … The spirit of a man, is what the vessel covers, so when you die your spirit leaves your body and it goes to the spiritual realm, be it in Paradise or be it in Hades AKA hell, the spirit is your inner being your intuition so to speak, it has to be quickened by the Holy Spirit when you receive salvation otherwise it’s subjected to the god of this world which is satan, and it belongs to him because it is without the Holy Spirit, as far as the nephilims are concerned when they were destroyed as the book of Enoch says one of their curses that God laid on them , was that they were going to be left here on Earth without a vessel, disembodied spirits also known as demons, they walk around seeking a body to live in because spirits cannot live outside of a body, its torture for them, which is why Jesus Yeshua and the disciples were always casting out of demons out of people, one must be delivered because demons will hide and wreak havoc in a man’s body, in the soul part, which includes his health, his body parts, his vessel, his mind, his thoughts.
The Holy Spirit also is our weapon against demonic spirits entering, vital to remain clean and not overtook by the fallen ones.
The Father delivered this through to mankind via Jesus becoming man to us also, we become one with him and the Father through the holy spirit activation when we BEliEVE that Jesus IS the SON of GOD. And we are made in his image.
We can be made in the image of God, but not know him who made us.
The holy spirit in this case, did not meet the soul.
Its vital in the equation to be completely restored back to the Father. And Jesus delivered the holy spirit when he became the Son of Man. 🤍🙏🏻🕊🎚
Melissa
Job 2:2-6https://dailyverses.net/holy-spirit
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Hi! I think it is very admirable of you to create this website to teach people about how we can use our personalities to glorify God. I love learning about MBTI, and as much as I love MBTI, I believe that my identity is found first in foremost in Christ, just like you do.
However, I must say that I respectfully disagree with the beliefs you have outlined here, in addition to the rest of the beliefs outlined by the United Church of God. Many of them not only add to what is already written in the Bible (Rev. 22:18-19, Deuteronomy 4:2, Deuteronomy 12:32) but are outright contradictions of Scripture.
I am not well-spoken and cannot provide a well-written counterargument to the beliefs you adhere to. Scripture speaks for itself. I would ask, though, that you at least read and consider the information in these links. The writers of these articles, as well as the other articles on the website, write with clarity and always back up their claims with Scripture.
Please do not misunderstand me. I am not attempting to precipitate an argument, nor do I anticipate a response. As an INFP, I know that a conflict is something you, an INFJ would not appreciate. I have read through the comments and I can see that there are already plenty of arguments. Arguments, in my experience, rarely do anything except to offend and anger both parties, something I do not wish to do. Instead, please read and prayerfully consider the information I have presented.
https://www.gotquestions.org/Worldwide-Church-God-Armstrongism.html
https://www.gotquestions.org/United-Church-of-God.html
https://www.gotquestions.org/Trinity-Bible.html
https://www.gotquestions.org/Sabbath-keeping.html
Thank you for your time! God bless!
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Hello again!
I just wanted to add this link as well. It outlines what the Bible says about the Trinity.
https://www.gotquestions.org/Trinity-Bible.html
God bless!
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