Everything God created has nature/essence. Your nature determines who you are. In the previous article, we introduced this concept from the Creation account (Gen 1). We seek to build on this concept in this article.
Now think with me, this applies to all that exists (not only created beings but God also), and therefore God having a divine existence has an essence that is not like that of created things. Created things with normal existence, also don’t have a unique existence like God. This is the grand gulf between God and every other created thing. The nature of God. Godness. Godhood or as the KJV renders it, Godhead (Acts 17; Rom 1; Col 2:9). So the real question that we should be asking when dealing with the oneness and/or the proposed plurality of God, is with the question, is the nature or essence of the Father possessed by others?
That is the real question here. If we can produce a being or beings with divine nature, who are not the Father, then the question is largely settled. For if one is divine in substance or essence, that one can be called God in verity. Does the Father have an essence that no one else has? Does the Father have Godness, Godhood, and Godhead alone, or does He share it with any other(s)? That is the question at the heart of the oneness vs pluralness debate. I mean, the issue really lives or dies here. When it is answered, the reader will see that the plurality proponents have not superficially adopted a pluralness of God but rather honestly, have taken to heart the tenor of the Scriptures.
Now, I’ve listened to many Oneness proponents. The arguments seem to center on two pillars, the ‘revealed hierarchy’ (God is above all, including Christ) and the fact that only the Father is referred to as “God.” The former will be dealt with in a future article, and the latter is our point of concentration. Because the Father is referred to as “God” or “true God” or “one/only God,” therefore He alone is God and there is no other. This seemed watertight to me half a decade ago, but I continued to study this, and then it hit me. Wait a minute. “I say unto thee, ye are gods (John 10:34). ” Human beings in these passages are referred to as gods (Elohim in Hebrew and the plurality of Theos in greek), then Herod (Acts 12:21) is said to have a “voice of a god (theos).” Then the eye-opener for me was Stephen’s sermon (Acts 7:43), where he refers to the God of the apostate Jews, “your god Remphan (theos). It was clear that just because the word “God” was used toward something or someone, that doesn’t always mean the one referred to as “god” is really god or divine. Then what is the kingmaker of Godhood? What makes one God? We don’t need to guess… Paul (Gal 4:8) clinches this one for us: “When we didn’t know God, we served God’s who are not God by nature.” Uses the word ‘phusis’ (nature), which appeals to creation and essence. This is a clear citation that the ontology of God argument is not some 2019 reconstruction of the Scriptures, by two guys at Fuller’s soap, to answer the proliferation of Oneness proponents (because it isn’t) but rather an apostolic truth. In scripture, there are “Gods by nature” and “Gods that aren’t gods by nature” (John 10:33 as well). Therefore being called God is not enough. You need to be God by nature. So again I repeat, if we can produce any other Being, Personality or Entity, with God/Divine nature, then that/those Being(s), Personality(ities) or Entity(ies) would be God(s) by nature. For one with human nature is human and one with God nature is God.
I hope this article has left you with a lot to ponder upon.
Fullers' Soap 