Eternally Begotten

[Noitulover]

I was booted out of another forum web site because for the first time in my life I was told that mainstream Christianity believes that Christ was begotten in Heaven by the Father. Not only do I not have this conviction but feel it is conducive to new heresies and reinforces existing ones.

Please educate and edify me about this. This is completely against what I have come to discern about the diety of Christ.

Concerning this issue the following is my statement of faith...

Christ is God as the Holy Spirit of God is God. In Heaven God is God. God is the Father of creation. The Father of creation includes the Holy Spirit of God and The Word. They are all one, all God, and are a Trinity.

In Heaven Christ was The Word Is the Word and will always be the Word. But the Word was not begotten in Heaven. The Word was always there like the Holy Spirit was always there.

When God became man God took on what HE never had before; flesh. It was at this point that God beget a son. That God became man.

Eventhough Christ was by the Holy Spirit, God says Christ is HIS son. This proves that the Holy Spirit is God. The other parent is Mary by whom Jesus is made a son of man.

Christ will now be in His human body forever and be God's begotten son forever. Christ was not in a body before He was begotten.

God is immutable but He did become flesh. Immutable means Spirit. God's Spirit which is One is immutable.

 

[Noitulover]

The phrase, "Eternally Begotten" in the Nicene Creed never meant that Christ was begotten in Heaven to me. It never occurred to me that mainstream Christianity and Catholicism concurred or even had this view.

When I began to ask sincere questions in the other forum web site, the moderators threatened to boot me if I did not stop teaching heresy.

One of my questions was how could Christ be begotten in Heaven if that means at some point Christ would have a beginning? It was made double minded clear to me that Eternally Begotten means Christ was always begotten. Their explanation to me was to state an impossible paradox. That it is God's nature for a begotten son to have existed forever without a beginning.

I am at a loss with this because my discernment which I took for granted that everyone agreed with is much stronger than to presume Christ was begotten twice.

Another question is how can the Word be begotten? John does not present Christ this way. John says the Word was with God and was God and in the beginning was the Word.

I never considered that anyone might think the Word was a begotten son in Heaven. It makes my skin crawl to imagine such a paradox. This is something that would open the door to a myriad of heresies.

 

[Noitulover]

I know that many people are looking at this thread. For some reason no one has felt compelled to answer. I wish to know at best whether you are convinced that Christ was begotten in Heaven before He was begotten again on Earth?

Or like me, are you convinced that Christ was the Word in Heaven and was not a son of God until He was beget by God and man on Earth?

The Father is not a father because of Christ. John does not tell us that the Son was in the beginning and the Son was with God and the Son was God.

I need to know what mainstream Christianity says about all of this and why.

 

[romans6and6]

I don’t see why this is such a big deal and considered such a heresy by some.

I agree with you on most of this.

Jesus was the eternal word of God. As John said, he was the Word of God, he was with God, and he was God. He created all things.

He became the “only begotten of the Father” (John 1:14) through being born of Mary by the Holy Spirit. The Scriptures refer to Jesus Christ as the “only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” This “begotten” means that he came from the Father.

Hebrews 1:5-6 speaks of Jesus:

5 For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

6 And again, when he bringeth in the firstbegotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him.

Jesus was also the first-born of the new creation of God. The old creation fell into sin through Adam’s transgression. Therefore, this necessitated that God send His only begotten Son to earth in order that through that perfect sacrifice on the Cross, man might be redeemed back unto the Father. He is referred to as the first begotten from the dead (Revelation 1:5), and the firstborn among many brethren. (Romans 8:29) This firstborn and begotten comes from the same Greek word and it simply means “first-born.” When we are begotten of God, we are born of God, and born of His same Spirit. When the Scripture talks about the child of God being “begotten,” it is the same Greek word for “born” as in, “Ye must be born again to see the kingdom of God,” in John 3:3.

 

[Noitulover]

Thank you for an answer, romans6and6. Your view of this theoloy would get you booted from Crosswalk.com.
The administrators made it clear that to teach that Christ is not begotten in Heaven is a grandiose heresy. I used several Scriptures to illustrate my view but it was to no avail.

Again, I did not know that the Catholics believe Christ was eternally begotten starting in Heaven and that their Nicene Creed means just that. This directly opposes several Scriptures.

 

[romans6and6]

What a novel thought!

You used the Scriptures to support your belief.

Did you know that John Calvin in his “Institutes of Christian Religion,” which was the mainstay of his heretical doctrines, quoted Augustine, a Catholic apologist, over 400 times – more than the Apostle Paul?

Much of the five points of Calvinism such as Predestination, once in grace always in grace, and including the belief that a child of God is still a sinner and that he will always be a sinner until his physical death, comes to the modern church via the Gnostics, Augustine, Roman Catholicism, Calvin, and the Reformers.

We need to forget what these religious institutions, and the cemeteries…er… seminaries have taught us and go back to the Word of God.

 

[Noitulover]

Hi romans6and6, I don't mean for this to be a private conversation between you and me. Nonetheless I appreciate your thoughts. Needless to say there are others peeking in but apparently they are not compelled to speak.

The fact that I used Scriptures to illustrate why I believe God is not called a Father because of Christ, does not necessarily mean I have discerned those selected Scriptures accurately. I have experienced the unsavory application of Scriptures to dubious conclusions by others. Usually the reason this happens is because these professors of spiritual genius have taken a superficial surface skimmed off the top shallow literal stand. Or they put God's Word in terms of man's wisdom so it makes common sense. Or they want to believe or not believe a certain proposition and rationalize in order to make it fit.

I am not without trepidation worried that I may be in error as much as I think they are. This is a challenge for me and I pray the Spirit of Truth will edify me and correct me if I am wrong. If I am right then I pray I may have the presence of mind in Christ to wield a sharp sword. Amen

 

[Shulamite]

All I can say and testify to is that Yeshua has revealed to me, a long time ago, that He IS ETERNALLY: GOD.
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given: and the government shall be on his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
Isaiah 9:6

John 8:58..."Before Abraham was, I AM."

John 3:13....Jesus said of Himself: John 3:13 states, "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that
came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven."

He is God. He is the Almighty Who sits on the throne, from eternity past to eternity future. He is the "I AM"...

Jesus said, "I and the Father are ONE. That all may honor the Son even as they honor the Father."

When He rose from the dead, Thomas exclaimed, "My Lord and my God."

I am surprised you got booted off of another forum by simply stating the obvious! Jesus is God. Amen!

 

[romans6and6]

Well, at least this is not a salvation issue, per say.

I have only heard of this one time in the past and it was through a preacher who was talking about some who believe in the eternal “sonship” of Christ.

I really haven’t studied this, and I never thought it to be such a big deal and never knew that some considered not believing in the “eternally begotten Son” to be a heresy.

I now know, thanks to your article, that the Roman Catholics believe Christ as “eternally begotten.” This does not surprise me. Many of the modern day Protestant beliefs come from Gnosticism and Roman Catholicism.

I am convinced that if one were stranded on a desert island with just a copy of the Bible and a concordance, and were to return to the modern day church, his beliefs and doctrine would be foreign to much of the modern church. He would probably have some very interesting questions for the modern church.

Like:

How can the Son be “eternally begotten” when the Scriptures say that “this day have I begotten thee”?

How can a Christian still be a sinner, when Jesus came to “save His people from their sins”?

How can one be “dead to sin” and still commit sin?

How can one walk in darkness and light at the same time?

How can one commit the works of the flesh and possess the fruit of the spirit at the same time?

How can one be a sinner and a saint at the same time?

How can one have a carnal sinful nature and a divine nature at the same time?

How can a tree bear both corrupt fruit and good fruit ? Hey, Jesus answered this one, and He said it was impossible.

Or how about, how can Jesus come back twice – once in a “secret” “rapture”, and once in the end, when all I see is one return of Christ where he will come back to reward the righteous and to the judge the wicked?

How come the modern day gospel is so foreign to the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ that the Apostle Paul believed, preached, lived, and died for?

 

[Noitulover]

Thanks for your posts. Happy Birthday Shulamite.

Once you are booted from a forum website it seems to be a standard protocol to not tolerate any further contact or discussion about it. I have tried to initiate a dialogue but get only preformatted responses telling me to find another place for my style of communication.

I certainly feel that it is stronger to say that the Word is God and God's nature is to exist as Spirit and Word, than to say that God beget a son in Heaven and somehow it was eternally God's nature to always have been begotten.

Thanks also for the additional verses quoted which continue to support the knowledge that Christ became a son but was God first.

 

[Shulamite]

Thankyou very much for the birthday wishes. Very kind of you!

Yes, Jesus is and always have been the "I AM"..... He is our Great God and Savior. Only God Himself can save. Jesus was, is, and always will be God. He changes not!

 

[JPPT1974]

Happy Birthday my friend.
Hope God is blessing you and that
You are being so much blessed!

 

[Shulamite]

Happy Birthday my friend.
Hope God is blessing you and that
You are being so much blessed!

Thankyou! He has blessed me already so much today!

Thankyou again!