5a. Principles (Simple)

Below are my primary assertions stated simply, building upon the axioms section of this work. These are the implications drawn from the incarnation of Jesus in our identical human nature:

Implications for Sin

  • Sin is not inevitable for humans once united to God
  • We are united to God in this life not the next
  • Love can be abided in through Gods power and Spirit
  • Those that walk in love dont sin

Implications for Understanding Gods Nature

  • God isn't a singular monad but genuinely 3 persons, as only the Son became incarnate (against modalism and unitarianism)
  • The unity of God arises in the 3 persons eternal qualities derived from the singular Divine nature, making them One in a unique way. Because of this there is no variation of will, knowledge, intent, power etc. while preserving their personal relational distinctives. Distinction is compatible with union. (Against trithiesm, confirming perichoriesis)
  • This denies absolute divine simplicity, where the persons of God are collapsed into the essence of the divine nature of God, but recognises the 3 persons of God are the lowest common denominator that can be used to comprehend the Trinity. This is determined through revelation from the Son not deductive reasoning, logic or speculation. (Against modalism)
  • Divine simplicity is affirmed according to His essence whereby all persons of God have all properties native to His nature. (Against trithiesm )

Implications for Personal Agency In God and Man

  • For Christ to be genuinely tempted, Agency is thus proved to reside in the person, denying determinism from nature, for God can't be tempted. (Denying Impeccability of Jesus - ie Christs supposed inability to even possibly sin, making His victory over temptation hollow and his genuine humanity fake - as humans have the abilty to sin) This proves personhood trancendes nature.
  • Jesus reveals that divine personhood and human personhood share the same fundamental characteristics - the difference is in nature, not in how personhood works. (As He was one person in two natures)
  • We are made in Gods image, as a "person" with a nature, as He is a "person" with a natures (excepting Christ who has 2 natures). Jesus taking on our nature proves to us that we have genuine agency in our own person and are never forced to sin by our nature. Even under the most pressing or pressured temptation we always have the ability to resist though if we are apart from God we are incredibly weak. (Denying natural determinism)
  • Lacking any competing desires beyond the knowledge of good and evil, those relationally apart from God frequently don't resist sin. Humanity is greatly weakened but not fatalisticly so. (Denying Pelagianism, denying fatalism)

Implications for Christian Life

  • Once united with God, just like Christ, we have 2 natures within us, one our natural human nature identical to Christ's, where our temptation comes from and by the indwelling of the Spirit by grace He shares the Divine energy of God with us from the Divine nature, creating in us competing desires. By yielding to His lead we walk by the Spirit, abide in love and Christ and overcome all sin. This is why Romans 8 says all those lead by the Spirit are children of God.
  • Agency isnt destroyed by the Indwelling Spirit and we are free to ignore Him and also walk away from Christ through wilful sin - this breaks the relationship with God.
  • Sanctification is immediate upon reception of the Holy Spirit, not progressively growing in putting away sin and being more consistently righteous. Through the consecration of our person by the indwelling Spirit of God we have the eternal powerful Spirit immediately residing in us not progressively over the course of our life. When we receive the person of the Spirit, we immediately receive everything needed for godly living - just as Jesus had everything needed through His relationship with the Father. The issue isn't gradually acquiring more holiness, but maintaining the relationship we already have through the Spirit. This explains why John can say "whoever abides in Him does not sin" - it's an immediate reality of maintained relationship, not a gradual process. (Against progressive sanctification)
  • Our growth in virtue mirrors Christ's own human development - increasing in wisdom, stature and favor with God and man (Luke 2:52). This is not about becoming progressively more holy or gradually overcoming sin, but rather the natural development of human capacities and wisdom within an already-holy relationship with God through His Spirit. Just as Christ was fully holy from conception while still growing in human virtue, we too grow in virtue while maintaining perfect holiness through relationship with God. Like a candle growing into a flame, there is no darkness in it.
  • We truly share Christ's identical human nature and receive the same Spirit He had, therefore the capability for complete holiness is indeed immediate, just as it was for Christ.
  • As sin isn't part of human nature but rather a result of separation from God, then full union with God through the Spirit immediately enable sinless living (ie abiding in love).
  • People can immediately choose to walk in the Spirit once that relationship is established.
  • To not do this is a choice. People sin because they choose to not because they have to. It's always a choice and God will hold us accountable for it.

Implications for Rebellion

  • Mercy is available if one stumbles but we dont need to stumble. Because of this God has warned those who live according to the flesh will perish and to not be decieved God won't be mocked Christians who sow to the flesh will die and also those who live practically unrighteous lives will not inherent the kingdom of heaven. For such a path is willfully chosen and results from a neglect of the relationship with the Father and His Spirits power and love to the Son. For Jesus said those that love Him keep His teachings and those that don't love Him, don't. Obedience is an outflow of love and love an outflow of the relationship we have with Him. We love Him because He first loved us.

Eternal Life as Relationship with God

  • Eternal life at its essence is relationship with God, not merely a status, a commodity, a credit in divine accounting ledgers or a legal pardon: When Jesus says "I am the way, the truth, and the life," He's not just saying He shows us the way to eternal life - He's saying eternal life is found in relationship with Him. When John writes that "God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son" (1 John 5:11), he's emphasizing that eternal life isn't a thing we receive separate from relationship with God but is the relationship itself. Jesus defines eternal life not as something we get but as someone we know - intimate relationship with the living God.

John 17:3 ESV
[3] And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

  • Saying sin is inevitable while having the Spirit is like saying darkness is inevitable while standing in full sunlight. The only way to sin is to step away from that relationship - to choose independence from the very source of love and righteousness. But this is always a choice, never an inevitability.

Judgment Will Be According to How We Lived

  • This is why we will be judged according to how we lived, not merely what we believed. For the point of reconciliation with God through faith in Jesus is relationship with God through faith, love and abiding in His Spirit. One does not sin while abiding in love and relationship with God. God saves His friends, those who are found abiding in Christ. God saves His children, and as Romans 8:14 says those who are led by the Spirit are the children of God.

Galatians 5:16, 18, 24 ESV
[16] But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
[18] But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.
[24] And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

1 John 3:10-15
10 In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest: Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is he who does not love his brother. 11 For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, 12 not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous.

13 Do not marvel, my brethren, if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death. 15 Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.