Kevin's Watch

Probably a lot of us who celebrate Christ's arrival on earth will not be on tomorrow (myself included) so before I log off, I just want to wish everyone a very merry Christmas.

And those of us who celebrate Santa's arrival! Merry Christmas!!

Happy Christmas to everyone on the Watch. The best bunch in town...........

+JMJ+

deer of the dawn wrote:Probably a lot of us who celebrate Christ's arrival on earth will not be on tomorrow (myself included) so before I log off, I just want to wish everyone a very merry Christmas.

+1


To us a child is born. And they will call his name Emmanuel, Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. And the government will be on his shoulder.

Merry Christmas Watchers.

Be safe.

--A

"...Christ Jesus, [who,]
though he was in the form of God,
did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied himself,
by taking the form of a servant,
being born in the likeness of men..."

Yes, Merry Christmas!


...though I think I'm a day late.
So I guess I also have to say:

(don't know if I used this one last year. where's sorus, now?)

[edit: to make the cat meme smaller. Gah - cat meme getting so much more real estate than scripture verse!?!]

Interesting quote Linna. If I get it right the implication is that Christ deliberately made himself smaller, lesser for his earthly manifestation. Does this square with seeing him as part of a trinity of equal but different parts: like the leaves of a clover or faces of a gemstone?

Happy Christmas Everyone!

Looking forward to another year with all you great peeps (except for Vraith, who has abandoned us to learn the violin or Swahili or something equally useless! )

u.

Merry Belated Christmas to all, and to all a good Sunday.

Linna Heartlistener wrote: So I guess I also have to say:

I want to live in a country that has a day just for putting cats in boxes.

Hope V. Returns to us; a voice of reason with a cool sense of humor and a damn smart guy to boot!

Merry Christmas - sorry to be so late in wishing that.

peter wrote:Interesting quote Linna. If I get it right the implication is that Christ deliberately made himself smaller, lesser for his earthly manifestation.

Kind of. He constrained himself.
For one, from showing His fall-down-in-worship majesty..
So in the Gospels, when people catch a glimpse of His glory, either with him stilling the wind and waves of the sea of Galilee, (the forces of nature) or ...in the transfiguration, they are flabbergasted.

"For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich."

And he became a man... ("fully God, fully man" is one description often used) becoming subject to thirst, hunger, pain, temptation, and separation from His Father.
Him choosing to go away from the glory and joy that he enjoyed before coming to this earth as a helpless baby - a thing He did for the sake of fallen humanity, His enemies - is something to fill a person with wonder.

peter wrote:Does this square with seeing him as part of a trinity...

And yes, it does... and that is such a necessary doctrine.
Because without it, you'd either not be able to acknowledge Jesus as fully divine, or you'd contradict there being one God.

Sorry for this anachronistically-slow response, peter... it's like leaving up the Christmas tree till February!
(which, I'm, umm.. also guilty of. and not because I have an extraordinary fondness for Christmas trees.)
-"Linna Slowposter"

Edit: Moved around scripture quote. Also, formatting.

Wonderful link Linna - whets my appetite for getting to the New Testament, which I am not so far off from now! Thanks for remembering that question for so long. For me, I can wholly get where you are coming from re the import of the trinity concept, but need to think about his 'constraining' himself (great way of putting it btw).

Yay, glad to hear.

Totally confused by the appearance of a Christmas thread in Feb.

--A

+JMJ+

peter wrote:For me, I can wholly get where you are coming from re the import of the trinity concept ...

What's more, without the Trinity, we'd still be lost in the insolubility of the dichotomy between the Absolute & Infinite and the Relative & Finite, viz., we'd be on the horns of dilemma such that we'd either have resign our personalities to perpetual entrapment within the confines of Finitude (e.g. in descending to Hades/Sheol or in Reincarnation, etc) or else, we'd have to lose our personality in dissolution when attaining to the Absolute Oneness (i.e. when the Divine Spark returns to the Source).

Only the Trinity allows the Created to attain both Union and Distinction vis-a-vis God, since God is relational within Himself from all eternity.

Wosbald wrote:+JMJ+
or else, we'd have to lose our personality in dissolution when attaining to the Absolute Oneness (i.e. when the Divine Spark returns to the Source).

I may not be getting it Wos because ( ) , well - this don't sound to bad to me.

( By the way I'm reading the download you posted for me, just taking it in small bites at a time. )

+JMJ+

peter wrote:

Wosbald wrote: or else, we'd have to lose our personality in dissolution when attaining to the Absolute Oneness (i.e. when the Divine Spark returns to the Source).

I may not be getting it Wos because ( ) , well - this don't sound to bad to me.

Well, I can't really address your preferences, of course.

But I can say that Trinity signifies that personality/relationality is Absolute. God is relational within himself.

Before Trinity, the concept of a personal god was problematic. Either one had personal/relational gods bound up within the overarching Fate of the world, in which case, they are not Absolute. Or else one had an Absolute which is wholly Other and, thus, is impersonal.

Trinity means the God can be affirmed both as Absolute (and thus, not dependent on the World) and as Personal (and thus can freely enter into relation with it).

________________________________

peter wrote:( By the way I'm reading the download you posted for me, just taking it in small bites at a time. )

Glad to hear the download is useful to you. Hope you're enjoying it.

(I came to this thread because I thought there would be presents. [And isn't that what Christmas is really all about?])

wayfriend wrote:(I came to this thread because I thought there would be presents. [And isn't that what Christmas is really all about?])

Well, there are!

Here's one.
See?
And some more.

What?