JESUS CHRIST: GOD-MAN - Vital Christianity

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● ". . . how much more will the blood of Christ, who through an everlasing spirit offered
Himself without blemish to God [to theo], cleanse our consciences from dead works
that we may render sacred service to [the] living God [theo]?"
● "If anyone speaks, [let him speak] as it were [the] sacred pronouncements of God
[theou]; if anyone ministers, [let him minister] as dependent on the strength which
God [ho theos] supplies; so that in all things God [ho theos] may be glorified
through Jesus Christ . . ." (1 Pe 4:11-12).
These examples, then, give evidence that a shift from ho theos to theos does not indicate
a change in the meaning of the word.
Jehovah's Witnesses translators who render Jn. 1:1 to read "a god" translate the exact
same phrase as "God" in 94 percent of the other 281 instances. To be consistent, these should say
"a god." This they fail to do in numerous passages (Mt 5:9; 6:24; Lk 1:35,78; Jn 1:6,12-13,18;
Ro 1:7,17). This construction occurs 20 times in the gospel of John alone. Should John 1:18,
then, be translated, "No one has seen a god at any time"? If the verse were to be translated "a
god" then we would be faced with polytheism which is totally foreign to anything of the
Christian faith.
If Jesus is "a god," then there must be others. Calling Jesus "a god" among other gods
would have been as unacceptable to the first-century reader as it is to the 20th century theist.
John's contemporaries were thoroughly schooled in monotheism, and any departure from that
well-established doctrine would have been rejected outright.
Because "God" is definite in this instance in John 1:1, the God who was with the Word is
the God who is the Word.
The language and grammar of the gospel's opening statement are precise and
incontrovertible. John could have used an extra article and have written, "The Word was the
God," making "God" and "Word" completely identical and interchangeable. This is the case
whenever two nouns with the article are connected by the verb "to be." In John 15:1 Jesus said,
"My Father is the vinedresser" (literally, "the Father of Me is the vinedresser"). Invert the
statement and the meaning does not change. The same is true of John 6:51 where Jesus says
(literally), "The bread . . . is My flesh."
However, if John had written, "The Word was the God," the meaning would be, "All that
Jesus is, God is, and all that God is, Jesus is." This is the ancient heresy of Sabellianism which
taught there are no distinctions between Jesus and the Father, and held that the Father even
suffered on the cross.
New Testament scholar C. K. Barrett explained: