A Point of Agreement with Trinitarians

Many attempts to refute trinitarian thinking do so by also denying what’s called the “hypostatic union,” a doctrine which makes two central claims about the nature of Christ.

  • Jesus is truly God. He possesses an uncreated, divine nature which predates the existence of the universe.
  • Jesus is truly Man. He possesses a created, human nature with everything needed to make him truly human (e.g. a distinct human body, soul, and will etc.)

In trinitarian thinking, these two natures exist as a single, united person. Jesus is not two persons in one body (they believe), but rather one person with two natures. John MacArthur writes on this subject,

In AD 325, the Council of Nicaea affirmed Scripture’s revelation of Jesus being truly God. Then in AD 451, the Council of Chalcedon agreed that Jesus was at the same time human and divine, involving a “hypostatic union” of two natures without confusion, without change, without division, and without separation. The Apostles’ Creed (fifth century AD) thus states, “I believe in… Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.” In other words, the hypostatic union consists of the two natures of Christ in one theanthropic (God-man) person. This union maintains Christ’s deity undiminished and in his humanity unexalted…

While the human nature the Son of God received in his incarnation allows him to experience humanity, he does not exist as two persons. He is but one person with two natures—the divine and the human.

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Jesus is Truly God

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Jesus is Truly Man

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Pattern Christology

Jesus has two natures — an uncreated divine nature, and a created human nature.

Jesus is truly God, meaning that his divine nature predates the existence of the universe, and has all of the attributes of monotheistic, biblical divinity (omniscience, omnipotence etc.). He is not a lesser, created god, but rather exists eternally before and outside of time as the one true God.

Jesus is truly man, meaning that his human nature is truly descended from Adam. From the moment of conception onward, he has (and forever will have) a human body comprised of matter and energy, and a human soul with its own distinct intellect and will. He is not a mirage or apparition; he truly lived a real, human life among us, while simultaneously possessing and displaying his divinity through miraculous works and words of life.

Like the title “son of man,” the title “son of God” describes Jesus’ created, human nature. Adam, Jesus, and the Christian are all described as sons of God because we are in the form/image/likeness of God. Both divine and human activities are ascribed to Jesus through both titles, because of their contextual meaning (Jesus is a particular son of man who is divine; Jesus is a particular son of God who is divine). But the title “son of God” fundamentally describes his human nature and human relationship to God.

A few scriptures describe Jesus as having a father/son relationship with God prior to his incarnation as a man. If Jesus’ sonship is through his humanity, then this presents a challenge to pattern christology, because his human relationship with God predates his existence as a man.

Trinitarians turn to Jesus’ divinity to explain this preincarnate sonship. Patternists, on the other hand, maintain that he was the son of God through a “preincarnate hypostatic union” known as the angel of the Lord. Prior to the incarnation, Jesus was truly God, and truly angelic (or at least a true creature). This allows the person of the son to exist from the moment that God first created light, without compromising his true divinity.

Like trinitarians, patternists believe that Jesus has two natures that together form a single person. Unlike trinitarians, we also affirm that each nature is distinctly personal, and that Jesus can behave as a single unified person, or as two distinct persons (often identified as the Father and the Son). Scripture shows us that Jesus has a human mind and human will that are distinct from his divine mind and divine will. This implies that Jesus’ human and divine natures are distinctly personal.

Pattern christology therefore agrees with both orthodox christology (belief in a single person), and nestorianism (belief in two distinct persons). This is not a contradiction, because scripture supports the idea of two (or more) persons becoming and behaving as one person.

God dwells in Jesus as a human temple, similar to how he dwells in a Christian, but with a few differences. First, Jesus is described as God incarnate, and we are not. Second, God dwells in Christ through the divine person of the Word, whereas he dwells in the Christian through the divine person of the Holy Spirit.

These two temples correspond to the two persons in the godhead. God is a composite union of two persons who are one, the Word and the Spirit. The term “Father” is used to denote the godhead as a whole, the composite union of Word and Spirit. Thus it is accurate to say that the Father (God) dwells in Christ through the Word, and the Father (God) dwells in the Christian through the Spirit.