Please help me to respond to some of my non-trinitarian friends

They saw God as He wanted to appear to them.
Appear to them in a manner they could relate to.

No one see God and live?

We now see God.
Why can we?

We have been crucified with Christ!
We died so He may live in our hearts!

We must reconcile Exodus 24:11 with this:

and this is the reconciliation:

Christ is God and there is only one God - He is The Angel of YHVH, and YHVH is God, and the Spirit of YHVH is God: there is only one God, and the Father is God, and the Son is God, and His Spirit is God.

every time the invisible God has been seen, it has been Jesus Christ. He is the express, exact image of the invisible God. He is YHVH manifest in the flesh. the evidence of this is overwhelming.

There are so many points in the Bible pointing toward Jesus being One with God that one hardly knows where to start.

One thing that has help me with the Godhead and how it works is coming to the understanding that we will never fully comprehend God... we should not put human reasoning into what God is.

Be humble enough to accept what the word tells us and don't try to invent or put human reasoning into understanding the all powerful God.

God is one
JESUS IS GOD
THE FATHER IS GOD
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS GOD.

Careful there ... "Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are. ... I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us." John 17:11, 21

Whats the point of quoting scripture with no added conclusion???

Thank you all for your responses. I let my non-trinitarian friend read all of them but he points out that no Jews who converted to Christianity ever challenged the Trinity (lack of controversy). If the Trinity is true, then Jesus and His apostles must have believed it and taught it. The lack of controversy amongst the Jewish Christians shows that the subject was never elaborated on because it did not exist in their minds at that time.

Also, he says that:
God is always addressed using singular personal pronouns (you). In our language the pronoun "you" can be singular or plural. In the NT the singular or plural of "you" uses different word forms. God is always spoken of using singular personal pronouns (He, not they). God almost always speaks using singular personal pronouns (I,not we, my, not our, me, not us(except the four "us texts" in which God is including others in an action (Gen 1: 26, Gen 3: 22, Gen 11: 7, and Isaiah 6:8))). Singular personal pronouns are used for singular persons. If God were a trinity, we should find plural pronouns, but we don't. Thousands of times we are confronted by the fact that God is a single individual.

Careful there ... "Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are. ... I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us." John 17:11, 21

Thank you all for your responses. I let my non-trinitarian friend read all of them but he points out that no Jews who converted to Christianity ever challenged the Trinity (lack of controversy). If the Trinity is true, then Jesus and His apostles must have believed it and taught it. The lack of controversy amongst the Jewish Christians shows that the subject was never elaborated on because it did not exist in their minds at that time. The NT is full of controversies, from factions to speaking in tongues, to impropriety at communion, over whether Gentiles could be accepted into Christianity, whether gentiles should be circumcized, over whether justification came through the works of the law or by faith, etc. The Trinity was not one of them.
Also, he says that:
God is always addressed using singular personal pronouns (you). In our language the pronoun "you" can be singular or plural. In the NT the singular or plural of "you" uses different word forms. God is always spoken of using singular personal pronouns (He, not they). God almost always speaks using singular personal pronouns (I,not we, my, not our, me, not us(except the four "us texts" in which God is including others in an action (Gen 1: 26, Gen 3: 22, Gen 11: 7, and Isaiah 6:8))). Singular personal pronouns are used for singular persons. If God were a trinity, we should find plural pronouns, but we don't. Thousands of times we are confronted by the fact that God is a single individual.

Thank you all for your responses. I let my non-trinitarian friend read all of them but he points out that no Jews who converted to Christianity ever challenged the Trinity (lack of controversy). If the Trinity is true, then Jesus and His apostles must have believed it and taught it. The lack of controversy amongst the Jewish Christians shows that the subject was never elaborated on because it did not exist in their minds at that time. The NT is full of controversies, from factions to speaking in tongues, to impropriety at communion, over whether Gentiles could be accepted into Christianity, whether gentiles should be circumcized, over whether justification came through the works of the law or by faith, etc. The Trinity was not one of them.
Also, he says that:
God is always addressed using singular personal pronouns (you). In our language the pronoun "you" can be singular or plural. In the NT the singular or plural of "you" uses different word forms. God is always spoken of using singular personal pronouns (He, not they). God almost always speaks using singular personal pronouns (I,not we, my, not our, me, not us(except the four "us texts" in which God is including others in an action (Gen 1: 26, Gen 3: 22, Gen 11: 7, and Isaiah 6:8))). Singular personal pronouns are used for singular persons. If God were a trinity, we should find plural pronouns, but we don't. Thousands of times we are confronted by the fact that God is a single individual.

In answer to most of your posts my friend says:
Our reality is in the mind of the Father.
The Holy Spirit is a portal through which the Father communicates with, speaks through, and empowers the beings He indwells.
Matt 11: 27 All things are delivered unto me by my Father, and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, except the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him.
God the Father has god-like qualities such as being everywhere at once, knows what everyone is thinking and feeling, can do anything, knows everything including past, present, and future, has always existed, and can create realities in His mind. That is how He has all those qualities. Our reality is in the mind of the Father.
Isaiah 65: 17 For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.
The beginning of our reality started when the Father placed a living being in it, with his own mind, heart, and soul, and through which he would be able to interact. The vehicle for this interaction is His Holy Spirit.
Isaiah 63: 9-10 In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them; and in His pity He redeemed them; and He bore them, and carried them all the days of old. But they rebelled, and vexed His Holy Spirit; therefore, He was turned to be their enemy, and he fought against them.
In this scripture Isaiah is stating that the Holy Spirit is the angel of God's (the Father's) presence. Where His Holy Spirit is, the Father is. He refers to the Holy Spirit as an angel because it can be sent. The Holy Spirit is a portal through which the Father communicates, speaks through, and empowers those indwelled.
Psalms 139: 7-8 Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there; if I make my bed in sheol, behold, thou art there.
The Father fills this living being with His Holy Spirit so that this living being is filled with His presence, and together they create our reality.
Our reality was created by the Father through this being. That is what is meant by the expression "sitting on the right hand of the Father". This being was the first and only being formed from the Father and he is the temple of the Father in our reality. That is why this being is the offspring of the Father and is referred to as the only begotten Son of God, and the image of the invisible God, because the Father's presence (His Holy Spirit) resides in His Son. The Father loves His Son and the Son loves the Father and obeys Him. The Son's will might differ from the Father, but the Son subjugates His will to the Father's. The Father created all things in our reality through His Son and for His Son. All things created are placed by the Father under the Son's feet. I believe that makes the Son Lord of all creation as well as the God of all creation, but the Father is the one God of all, including His Son.
Col 1: 15-16 Who is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation; For by him were all things created, that are in heaven , and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers--all things were created by him and for him; and he is before all things, and by him all things consist. Our reality is in the mind of the Father. That is why He knows all things, is everywhere, is all powerful, and can do all things. The Father interacts with our reality through Christ, who is a Spirit with His own mind but is also filled with the Spirit of the Father who formed Him. Just like Christ is the temple of the invisible Father, we are the temple of both the Father and the Son because they both reside in us who are saved.

the objection thy no one argued about it doesn't prove no one had any conception of it, but i gotta say the idea that if Jews ever considered it they would have argued about it is pretty funny!

That oneness comes from having received the Word of God and the filling of God the Holy Spirit in the Believer.

I noticed how you skipped over and avoided that verse.

Careful now.

I skipped over 12-29 because it wasn't important to the issue at hand. And the issue is that the Father and Son are one in mind and purpose, just as the church is to be one with the Lord in mind and purpose. That doesn't make them one and the same, as if part of a so-called "God-Family" like some groups teach.

the objection thy no one argued about it doesn't prove no one had any conception of it, but i gotta say the idea that if Jews ever considered it they would have argued about it is pretty funny!

trinitarianisn is not polytheism, so the objection about pronoun case is moot.

does your friend believe in the deity of Christ?

that is how the language we use today to describe tri-unity came about, historically. the truth of the doctrine of the deity of Christ was not in question, so the discussion became whether God is only manifesting Himself to us in different forms at different times ((the ancient heresy of modalism, nowadays present in oneness pentecostalism)), or if the Son and the Spirit have some kind of individual personhood. because there are clear interactions between the Godhead, e.g. the Father sending the Son, the Son sending the Spirit, the conclusion is that they are both distinct and one.

one example is here:


the Spirit is authoring this, individual from God and the Lamb, and it is the word of God, so the Spirit is also equivalently God.
the throne is singular, one throne - but it is the throne of both God and the Lamb, making the Lamb both distinct from God and equally God.
also 'His' and and 'Him' are singular, but refer to both God and the Lamb - so there is only one God, and both the Lamb and God are God.

head spinning, i know, but why should it be otherwise? the nature of God is not like our nature, it should not be a surprise that we can hardly conceive of or understand it.