18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
Message: Divine Unity
Time: The date of Matthew's composition is anywhere from 55-60 AD probably in Antioch of Syria. The writing is most likely to the Jews. His purpose was to show them that Jesus of Nazareth was the expected messiah and both his genealogy and his resurrection were legitimate proofs of this.
What the Lord is Saying:
As I've been studying the doctrine of God most of the focus of late has been on the Trinity and the relationship between the Father, Son, and Spirit. They have the same essence and yet distinctive, yet united. Yesterday's focus was that all are on the scene at the same time and all are God; all are one God. Yet, the Father is not the Son and the Son not the Spirit and the Father not also the Spirit.
Jesus remarks in what is now called the Great Commission statement that as his disciples (and us his followers) go forth and make disciples, those individuals are to be baptized in the name (singular) of the three (plural). The three share the same name - Yahweh, the covenant Lord of Israel.
All three share the name Yahweh and the divine attributes equally. None is more God or less God than the others.
Previously baptism had been spoken about for repentance, but here Jesus takes into a new level by saying that a person is united to the Godhead. As we are baptized in their name we are to honor each equally.
Albert Barnes remarks on this passage:
The union of these three names in the form of baptism proves that the Son and Holy Spirit are equal with the Father. Nothing would be more absurd or blasphemous than to unite the name of a creature - a man or an angel - with the name of the ever-living God in this solemn rite. If Jesus was a mere man or an angel, as is held by many who deny his divinity, and if the Holy Spirit was a mere "attribute" of God, then it would have been the height of absurdity to use a form like this, or to direct the apostles to baptize people under them. How absurd would be the direction - nay, how blasphemous - to have said, "Baptize them unto God, and unto Paul, and unto the "wisdom or power" of God!" Can we believe that our Saviour would have given a direction so absurd as this? Yet, unless he himself is divine, and the Holy Spirit is divine, Jesus gave a direction substantially the same as this. The form of baptism, therefore, has been always regarded as an unbreakable argument for the doctrine of the Trinity, or that the Son and Holy Spirit are equal with the Father.
Promise: Jesus sometimes says that the Father is greater than He is (John 14:28). But that is not a reference to His divine essence; rather, in taking on our flesh, God the Son submits to the Father as a man, for that is what human beings are to do.
Prayer: Lord, thank you for continuing to each me your truths. Help me to have a believe that You want me to have and that I submit to You for everything in my life.
No comments:
Post a Comment