lOMoARcPSD|22015503
THEO 201, Unit Two
Notes
Theology Survey I (Liberty
University)
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
Monday, June 4th
Christology: study of God the Son
•Strengthen the logic of the argument
•When we go to heaven to “be with God” we will not be any more with God then we
are now
•Time wouldn’t be a higher person, but something he abides by
•Or time as an attribute of God (Augustine)
•The main reason to share the gospel is to glorify God, not to convert people
Theology Proper: study of God the Father
•Metaphysical, attributes of his nature
oImmanence (Jeremiah 23:24)
▪Near at hand, present in the world around us
oTranscendence (Isaiah 55:8-9)
▪Being distant or different, he is in the physical and spiritual
realm, different
▪Incorruptible vs corruptible, infinite vs finite, indestructible vs destructible
oSpirituality (John 4:24)
▪God is a spirit rather than a body (doesn’t have a physical body)
▪“A spirit has not flesh and bones”
oAseity (ah-say-ih-tee) (Acts 17:24-25)
▪Self-existing
▪God was not created by anyone, he doesn’t depend on anyone
▪He has never come into existence
oPersonality
▪God is not impersonal
▪The Bible portrays God as having thoughts, memories, will-
power, feelings
•Anthropomorphic?
oInfinity
▪Omnipresence (Psalm 139:7-12)
•How can God be in the room if he’s not physically there?
▪Eternality (Psalm 90:2)
•God exists eternally
▪Omniscience (Matthew 10:29-30)
•Infinite knowledge
•God knows everything that can be known
oDoesn’t know falsehoods
oKnows only truth
▪Omnisapience (Romans 11:33)
•Infinite wisdom
▪Omnipotence (Jeremiah 32:17)
•Infinite power
▪Freedom (2 Corinthians 3:17)
▪Immutability (Malachi 3:6)
•Unchanging, constant
•Moral, attributes of how God relates to others
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
oMoral Purity
▪Holiness (Isaiah 6:3)
•The ability to do only the good
•The absence of sin
▪Righteousness (Psalm 7:9)
•
▪Justice (James 2:8-9)
•Old Testament emphasizes justice
oIntegrity
▪Genuineness (Revelation 3:7)
•Consistency
▪Veracity (Titus 1:2)
•Always speaking the truth
•A God who cannot lie will always speak the truth
▪Faithfulness (1 Thessalonians 5:24)
oLove
▪Omnibenevolence (John 3:16)
•God has a desire to do what is best for everyone
•God could force everyone to repent
oWould that be best for everyone?
▪Everyone would just be puppets
•Benevolence in response to the value of being made in
God’s image?
•
▪Grace (Ephesians 2:8-9)
•God’s own inclination to show favor to those who do not
deserve it
▪Mercy (Matthew 9:35-38)
•Mercy and Justice complement each other
oSometimes doesn’t give them a punishment that they
deserve
▪Forbearance (1 Peter 3:20)
•The Trinity
oWe don’t understand it but we believe it because the Bible says it
oOne clear statement defining the Trinity comes from the Athanasian Creed
(4th century AD): We worship one God, in trinity, and trinity is unity, neither
confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance.”
oMonotheism: One God
▪Deuteronomy 6:4-5
•“Hear O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is One”
▪1 Corinthians 8:6
oThree Divine Persons
▪The deity of the Father (Matthew 6:26)
•Birds of the air
▪The deity of the Son (John 1:1-17)
▪The deity of the Holy Spirit (Acts 5:3-4)
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
•Lying to the holy spirit is the same as lying to God
▪Matthew 28:19 & 2 Corinthians 13:14
•Lists three persons together
•God’s Plan
oForeordination: God’s predetermination of every event in history (everything)
oPredestination: God’s election of certain individuals to salvation and others
to reprobation (salvation)
oElection: God’s positive choice of individuals or groups of people to
eternal fellowship with him.
oReprobation: God’s choice of some to suffer eternal damnation
oGod’s Plan: God’s eternal decision render certain all things that shall come
to pass (Erickson)
oCalvinism: the position that regeneration logically precedes conversion
▪No one chooses God on their own, God regenerates us, and we convert
oArminianism: Conversion logically precedes regeneration
Tuesday, June 5th
•Calvinism vs Armenism
oNot about:
▪Calvin: God choosing us
▪Arminianism: Us choosing God
•Both sides believe in human choice
•Both sides believe in divine election
oMan-made doctrines
▪Different interpretations of divine sovereignty and human freedom
▪Attempts to understand what the Bible teaches
Confirmation bias: viewing the evidence in a way that supports our
view
•Theology Proper: God’s Creation
oScience is, in a sense, theology (general revelation)
oCreation ex nihilo: creation out of nothing (Latin)
oDay-age theory: the days of creation mentioned in Genesis 1 refer to
long periods of time rather than 24-hour days
oFiat creation: God directly created everything that is and ever will be;
nothing ever evolves
▪Denies evolution
oTheistic evolution: God created the first organic life forms and uses evolution to
create other life forms from these
oProgressive Creation: at various times in history God created new life forms
and used these along with evolution to bring about additional life forms
oMature Creation: The world was created with the appearance of age
(maturity) at some time in the recent past
▪Jesus, Peter, and Paul take Genesis account as literal
▪Mark 10:5-9 “beginning of creation God made them man and female”
▪Luke 11:49-51
•Theology Proper: God’s Providence
oProvidence: God’s activity of preserving and governing his creation
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
▪Two distinct aspects of providence, preserving and governing
▪Preservation: God’s maintaining the existence of his creation,
and involves both protection from harm and provision for needs
▪Governance: God’s direction of reality and history so that his plan for
his creation is fulfilled
•Theology Proper: Theodicy
oThe Problem of Evil
oTheodicy: A vindication of God’s goodness and power in the face of the existence
of evil
oNatural Evil: Evil that occurs without the involvement of human choice
oMoral Evil: Evil that occurs as a result of human choices
oTheodicies: Attempts to reconcile the existence of God and the existence of evil
▪The Greater Good Argument
•God does not cause it, but allows it to promote the greater good or
to prevent a larger evil
▪The Irenaean Theodicy
•Sometimes he allows it to develop in our lives to foster qualities
•We’ll come out better on the other side
▪The Free Will Defense
•St. Augustine
•God considers that risk worth taking
oHe knew we would do evil
▪The “Best Possible World” Theodicy
•Would have been possible to have a world with no evil
oWouldn’t have many things that make the world special
▪The Eschatological Theory
•There’s a lot of evil in the world, but God has a plan to rectify it
in the end
•God will make everything right eventually
Wednesday, June 6th
•Christology: The Nature of Christ
oChristology: The branch of theology dealing with the nature, person, and deeds
of Jesus Christ.
oDeity (when used as an adjective): the essential nature or condition of being a god
oDocetism: Jesus was divine, but was not a human
oApollinarianism: Jesus had a human body but not a human spirit: his
human spirit was replaced with the spirit of God
oEbionism: Jesus was born a normal human, but at his baptism the Christ spirit
descended upon him in the form of a dove, empowering him for God’s
ministry.
oArianism: Christ is the first and highest of all created beings, not equal with
God, but superior to everything else (Jehovah’s Witnesses)
oThe Muslim View: Jesus was a great prophet, but is not God
oThe Liberal Christian View: Jesus was the greatest example of Godly living,
but is not God
oThe Orthodox Christian View: Jesus is fully human and fully divine
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
•Evidence of Jesus’ Deity
oJohn 1:1, 2, 17
oJohn 10:30
oJohn 14:9
oColossians 2:9
•Evidence of Jesus’ Humanity
oAll stages of normal human life
oHuman mother and half-brothers
oHuman limitations
▪Matthew 4:2
▪John 19:28
▪John 4:6
oHe experienced human emotions
oHe prayed
oJesus’ words
▪John 8:40
oWords of the apostle Paul
•
Issues:
oOmniscience
oVirgin birth
▪A sign
oSinlessness
•
Importance
oIt makes his atonement a fitting substitute for us
oIt enabled God to experience the difficulties of life as we experience them
oIt enables us to see what the true, uncorrupted human nature is
oIt provides us with a perfect example of the Christian life
oIt shows that being human is good. It is good for us to be human—it’s not a
bad thing!
oIt proves that God is not completely transcendent, as deism claims, but rather is
active in our world.
•
The Union of Two Natures in Christ
oNestorianism: The two natures intersect but are not united in the person of Christ
oEutychianism: Jesus’ humanity was so absorbed into his deity that it was
virtually eliminated
oKenoticism: at the incarnation, God emptied himself of some of his attributes to
temporarily become human, and then took them up again at the resurrection.
Thus, Jesus was not completely divine: he did not have all of the divine
attributes.
oThe Orthodox View: Jesus was fully God and fully human, united in one
person without the loss of either divine or human attributes.
•
Biblical Basis of the Doctrine
oJesus is never referred to using a plural form
oPassages like John 1:14: “and the word was made flesh and dwelt among us”
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
oPassages like 1 Corinthians 2:8: “Had they known it, they would not have
crucified the Lord of glory”
Christ’s Work
•Two Temporal Stages of Christ’s Work
oHumiliation:
▪Incarnation
▪Death
oExaltation
▪Resurrection
▪Ascension
▪Session
▪Second coming
•Christ’s Three Functions
oProphet: Revelation of God
▪John 1:17-18
oPriest: Reconciliation with God
▪Hebrews 9:24
oKing: Rule as God
▪Matthew 25:31-32
•Christ’s Atonement
oOT prefiguration
oNew Testament
▪Jesus’ view of himself
•Luke 22:37
•Matthew 20:28
•John 15:13-14
▪John the Baptist
•John 1:29
▪The Apostle Paul
•Romans 3:23-25
•The Meaning of the Atonement
oSacrifice: The surrender or destruction of something prized or desirable for the
sake of something considered as having a higher or more pressing claim
oPropitiation: That which makes one favorably inclined toward one who
was viewed with animosity; appeasement; conciliation
oSubstitute: a person or thing acting or serving in place of another
oReconciliation: the reestablishing of cordial relations between two estranged
parties
•Implications of the Substitutionary Atonement
oConfirms God’s holiness
oConfirms human depravity
oConfirms that salvation is by grace
oConfirms that Jesus is both infinite God and finite human
oEmphasizes the unimaginably great worth of our
salvation Christology: Jesus’ Message
lOMoARcPSD|22015503
•The Kingdom of God: God’s entrance into history to reign over his creation. Any
place where God is in control.
oSome aspects are present
▪Matthew 12:22-28
▪Luke 17: 20-21
oSome aspects are future
▪Matthew 6:9-10
▪Luke 19:11
oOther teachings on the Kingdom
▪It is discovered through Jesus’ teachings (Mark 1:15)
▪It begins small and grows (Matthew 13:31-32)
▪It is difficult to enter into (Matthew 19:24)
▪It is a very high priority (Matthew 6:33)
•If you make the kingdom of God your highest priority, then
when you serve God, you will be happy
oEntrance Requirements of the Kingdom of God
▪Jesus on the problem of sin (Mark 9:42-48)
▪Jesus is the solution (Matthew 12:41-42)
▪Jesus sets us free from sin’s power (Matthew 9:2-7, John 8:34-36)
•Through repentance (Mark 1:14-15a) and radical faith in
God’s messenger (Mark 1:15b)
oWhat is required of us?
▪Radical Faith: a belief and trust so deep that it transforms your life,
sometimes in unpleasant ways (Mark 10:17-21, Mark 8:38)
•Have to be willing to speak up
▪Love God with all your being (Mark 12:28-30)
•…which results in a changed life of total commitment
(Luke 14:25-27)
•…and loving everyone else (Mark 12:31)
•Transforms us
▪
