Isaac Ogunrinola

Mechanical Engineering, Solidworks design, Cybersecurity, Python Programming. Theology is fun.....

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

ONE GOD OR THREE? — What Does the Bible Actually Teach?

The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are three persons.

But are they three divine beings?

Let's let Scripture answer.

The Bible is clear:

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD.”
— Deuteronomy 6:4

“There is none other God but one.”
— 1 Corinthians 8:4

Not three Gods.

One God.

Yet the Father is God.

The Son is God.

The Holy Spirit is God.

And they are not the same person.

At Jesus' baptism, the Son is in the water, the Spirit descends, and the Father speaks from heaven.

Three distinct persons.

Yet Scripture never says three Gods.

John 1:1 says:

“The Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

With God — distinction.
Was God — deity.

Then John 1:3 says all things were made through Him.

Colossians 1:16 says ALL things were created through Christ.

So Christ isn't presented as one lesser god among other gods.

He is on the Creator side of the Creator-creature distinction.

And the Holy Spirit?

Peter tells Ananias:

“You have not lied unto men, but unto God.”

He had lied to the Holy Spirit.

So we have:

One God.
Three persons.
Father — God.
Son — God.
Holy Spirit — God.

Now, what about hierarchy?

Jesus said:

“My Father is greater than I.” — John 14:28

But Jesus had taken the position of a servant.

Philippians 2 says He existed “in the form of God,” yet humbled Himself and became obedient.

That's functional submission, not proof of inferior deity.

The Father sends the Son.

The Son obeys the Father.

The Spirit is sent.

There is an order to their roles.

But role ≠ nature.

Jesus also said:

“That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father.”
— John 5:23

And:

“I and my Father are one.”
— John 10:30

So the biblical picture isn't:

Three Gods united in purpose.

Nor is it:

One person appearing in three forms.

It is:

ONE GOD — THREE DISTINCT PERSONS.

The Trinity isn't an attempt to make God easier to understand.

It's an attempt to faithfully hold together everything Scripture says about Him.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

“The Son can do nothing by Himself.”

Does that mean Jesus isn't God?

Not at all.

Jesus wasn't saying He lacked divine power. He was describing His perfect unity with the Father:

“Whatever the Father does, the Son also does.”

The very verse used to diminish Christ's deity is actually part of His claim to equality with the Father.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

PREDESTINATION AND FOREKNOWLEDGE
If God already knows everything we will do, do we really have free will?

The Bible teaches both God's sovereignty and genuine human responsibility.
God's foreknowledge means He knows beforehand.

Predestination means He determines beforehand according to His purpose.
But God's knowing what we will choose isn't necessarily the same as God forcing us to choose it.

Scripture tells us to “choose life” (Deut. 30:19), to “choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve” (Josh. 24:15), and Jesus even said, “you were not willing” (Matt. 23:37).

Yet Jesus was also crucified according to the “determined purpose and foreknowledge of God” (Acts 2:23), while those who crucified Him were still held responsible.

So Scripture presents something fascinating:
God is sovereign, yet human choices are meaningful.

The question isn't whether one is true.
The Bible teaches both.

I hope this blessed you.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@lqdat2012 They all went with the flood...
The bible clearly states that only Noah and his family survived.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

THE FLOOD — DESTRUCTION OF MANKIND?
One of the hardest questions people ask is:
"Why would God drown the world, including children and animals?"
It's a fair question, and it deserves more than a quick dismissal.

But before we judge the action, we should actually read the account carefully.
Genesis 6 introduces the "sons of God" — a phrase traditionally associated with heavenly beings. They came into the daughters of men, and their offspring were the Nephilim.

Many interpreters have understood this as a supernatural corruption of humanity — something had gone wrong at a level deeper than ordinary human sin, and it posed a serious threat to God's creation.

Then look at how Genesis describes the world at that time:
"The wickedness of man was great in the earth." — Genesis 6:5
"The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence." — Genesis 6:11

So the Flood isn't presented as God randomly deciding to end lives. Something had gone catastrophically wrong — not just morally, but at the level of creation itself.

Here's what's often missed: the Flood wasn't only an act of destruction. It was also an act of preservation.
God didn't simply judge the world and walk away. He preserved Noah, his household, and the created order through the ark — carrying humanity and creation forward through the judgment rather than ending them.

That doesn't make the loss of life any less severe, or answer every question the account raises. But it does mean the Flood wasn't judgment without mercy, or an arbitrary act of slaughter. It was a response to a world that had become irreparably corrupt — paired with God's determination to preserve what could be saved.

So before concluding "God drowned innocent people for no reason," it's worth asking: what does Genesis actually say happened to the world, and why did God go out of His way to preserve Noah through it?

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

Could God have created a world without sin?

Of course.

But could He create a world where creatures genuinely love, freely choose, and yet are incapable of choosing against Him?

That's a different question.

A world without the possibility of rebellion may also be a world without meaningful moral freedom.

God could create a world without sin.

The question is whether He could create one with genuine free creatures and no possibility of sin.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

What happens to babies when they die?

It's a difficult question.

If salvation is only through Christ, and every human is born into a fallen world, what about those who die before they can understand or respond to the Gospel?

Scripture doesn't give us a detailed answer.

But we know this:

The Judge of all the earth will do what is right.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

FINAL PART — CONTRADICTIONS: THE DEITY OF CHRIST
WHAT JESUS RECEIVED
We've now looked at who Jesus is, what He became, what He came to do, and what He actually did.
So the final question is:
What did He receive?

Scripture repeatedly says that Jesus was exalted, given authority, given a kingdom, given a name above every name, and seated at the right hand of God.

Philippians 2:8–9 says:
“He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death… Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him.”
Notice the order:
Humiliation → obedience → death → exaltation.

His exaltation does not mean He became divine.
The One who was already “in the form of God” was exalted in His incarnate and Messianic role after completing His work.

Daniel 7:13–14 gives us a similar picture of the Son of Man receiving dominion, glory, and a kingdom, with all peoples serving Him.
And then Philippians 2:10–11 says:
“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow… and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.”

This is significant because Isaiah 45:23 speaks of every knee bowing and every tongue confessing to God.
So what Jesus received was not a new divine identity.

He received Messianic authority, glory, dominion, and the kingdom as the incarnate Son who had humbled Himself, obeyed the Father, died, and was raised.

The same Jesus who was humbled is the Jesus who was exalted.
The same Jesus who became man is the Jesus who now reigns.

And this brings the whole study together:
He is truly God.
He became truly man.
He came to accomplish God's purpose.
He genuinely lived, suffered, and died as man.
And He was exalted as the victorious Messiah.

What looked like contradictions were often distinctions we failed to make.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@oulbob So you're saying the Bible isn't absolutely true, yet you're accepting the part about God's judgment as though it is?

Anyway, I'll leave it there.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

If Hell is real, why would God allow anyone to go there?

Because Christianity doesn't present Hell as God delighting in human suffering.

It presents judgment as the final consequence of rejecting God—the source of life, goodness, and reconciliation.

The uncomfortable part isn't that God judges.

It's that our choices actually matter.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@oulbob The Bible speaks about judgment and eternal damnation.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

If God already knows every decision you will ever make, are you really free?

Yes.

Knowing what someone will choose is not the same as causing them to choose it.

God's foreknowledge doesn't turn your decisions into His decisions.

You are still the one choosing.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

If God wants us to know Him, why doesn't He simply reveal Himself unmistakably to everyone?

But perhaps the question assumes God has hidden Himself.

Creation reveals something about Him.
Conscience points to moral accountability.
And God has revealed Himself through Scripture and ultimately through Christ.

The question may not be whether God has revealed Himself—

but whether we are willing to respond to that revelation.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

PART 5 — CONTRADICTIONS: THE DEITY OF CHRIST
WHAT JESUS DID
Now that we've established who Jesus is, what He became, and what He came to do, we need to ask:
What did He actually do?

This is where many of the apparent contradictions usually arise.
Jesus prayed to the Father, obeyed the Father, was sent by the Father, and pointed people to the Father.

He called the Father “my God,” said the Father was greater than Him, and spoke of receiving authority from the Father.
He also experienced genuine human limitations. He became hungry and tired, grew in wisdom, was tempted, suffered, and died.

If we isolate these statements, they can sound like evidence against His deity.
But remember what we established in Part 3:
The eternal Son became truly human.
His humanity was not an appearance.
It was real.

So His prayer was real. His obedience was real. His suffering was real. And His death was real.
These weren't things He merely appeared to experience.
They belonged to His genuine human life as the incarnate Son.
And His being sent by the Father and obeying the Father also reflects His Messianic role.

He came as the Son who was sent, the servant who obeyed, and the Messiah who accomplished the Father's will.
So when Scripture says Jesus was sent by the Father, prayed to the Father, or received authority from the Father, we shouldn't immediately conclude:
“Therefore He cannot be God.”

We need to ask what Scripture is describing.
It is describing the incarnate Christ—the eternal Son who became truly man and lived in complete obedience to the Father.
His human experiences do not erase His divine identity.

They show us the reality of the incarnation.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

And I think that's where we differ. The children weren't being punished for crimes they personally committed; they were born into a world already saturated with corruption and violence. You may still find God's judgment unacceptable, but that's different from saying God simply targeted innocent children for slaughter.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

“What about the person who never heard about Jesus?”

It’s a serious question.

But Christianity doesn’t teach that God judges people unjustly because they lacked information.

God judges perfectly, according to what each person knows and is accountable for.

The Judge of all the earth will always do what is right.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

I understand why you see it that way. The suffering of children and animals is genuinely difficult to reconcile with God's judgment, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. But perhaps the question isn't only “Why didn't God mitigate their suffering?”—it's also “What does Genesis say was happening in the world that led to this judgment?” That context matters.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

You're assuming that the death of a child necessarily means the child was being punished for someone else's actions. That's not what the text says. The judgment was against a corrupt and violent world; children were tragically caught in the consequences. Whether you believe God had the moral authority to bring that judgment is the question we should actually address.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@oulbob So what exactly makes the judgment unjust in your view?

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@factorypastor Amen... Thank you brother.
God bless you too.

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

PART 3 — CONTRADICTIONS: THE DEITY OF CHRIST
WHAT JESUS BECAME

Now that we've established who Jesus is, we need to ask:

What did He become?

John 1:14 says:

“And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.”

The eternal Word who was God became flesh.

He did not stop being God. Rather, the eternal Son assumed a human nature.

Jesus Christ is one Person with two natures: truly God and truly man.

This is the incarnation.

And this matters because His humanity was real.

He experienced genuine human things: hunger, thirst, fatigue, suffering, temptation, growth, prayer, obedience, and death.

Philippians 2:6–7 captures the movement:

“Being in the form of God...”
“...took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.”

The One who was in the form of God became man and took the form of a servant.

So when we encounter Jesus praying, obeying the Father, suffering, or even saying He doesn't know something, we shouldn't immediately conclude:

“Therefore He cannot be God.”

We first need to recognize what Scripture is telling us about the incarnate Christ.

His humanity wasn't an appearance.

It was real.

And this is why understanding what Jesus became is essential to understanding the passages that seem to contradict His deity.

But why did He become man?

What did He come to accomplish?

PART 4: WHAT JESUS CAME TO DO.

#fyp

[Isaac Ogunrinola @prof_isaac_]

@oulbob Have you carefully read Genesis 6–9 to understand why God acted that way before concluding that God just wiped out millions of people?