Dr Paul Allen

  Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, better known as Tertullian, lived circa 160 – 240 A.D. This Christian scholar and writer became famous for defending the early Christian faith against heretical attacks and for coining one of the most important theological terms in Christianity. Early in the 3rd century, a priest called Sabellius began teaching that God had three different forms or “modes” which he flipped between Father, Son, or Spirit. He described God as having three masks, which God selected, depending on what he was trying to reveal to mankind. This was a heroic attempt to explain why God is sometimes called the Father while at other times, the Son, and yet also the Holy Spirit. But this attempt by Sabellius didn’t sit right with Tertullian, who countered it with his own, more biblical, explanation. At that time there wasn’t even a word that existed for the three natures of God. So Tertullian made one up. He called his concept the Trinity. As I’m sure you realize… the...

Andrei Rublev's Trinity, representing the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in a similar manner. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) In our day, TD Jakes is a well known pentecostal speaker, and he is also member of the Oneness Pentecostals  who embrace Modalistic Monarchianism . What does this mean? The  Jehovah’s Witnesses subscribe to Arianism, a movement that is a later development of Dynamic Monarchianism . It is important to have a good understanding of church history so that we might not be caught off guard by old errors. Modalistic Monarchianism. Regarding the nature of God , we err when we emphasize the oneness of His essence over the threeness of His person, and vice versa. As the early church attempted to understand what the Bible says about our triune Creator, many heretics so emphasized His unity that they were unable to do justice to the distinction between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit . This was true of Sabellius , who caused problems for the churc...

Image via Wikipedia The most basic affirmation the Scriptures make regarding the nature of God is that He is one. The shema of Deuteronomy 6 reads as follows: “Hear, O Israel : the Lord our God, the Lord is one” (v. 4). These words that preface the great commandment are axiomatic to the biblical understanding of the nature of God. Old and New Testaments together bear witness to the eternal truth that there exists one God — monotheism. Another term for  monotheism  is the word  monarchianism , meaning that the God of the Bible is a monarch.  Monarch  comes from a Greek word that has a prefix and a root. The prefix  mono  means “one” or “single.” The root word   archē  means “beginning, chief, or ruler.” We hear of archbishops, archenemies, archangels, all of which employ the root term  archē . A monarchy is a form of government in which the rule is restricted to one person, a king or a queen, as distinguished from the rule of the few...