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This study covers a principle that I think is an important one, as we cleanse the soul temple in preparation for the outpouring of the Latter Rain. The purpose of the Gospel, and all that comes with it, is this, “Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” (Eph 4:13) That is the purpose of the Cross, of the resurrection, of the Church, and of all spiritual gifts. We are redeemed from sin, and restored to the original intention that our Father had for us, and this, by manifesting a character free from sin, in perfect harmony with the Father’s will and principles, one demonstrated to us by Yahshua. That fullness of His stature is perfect unity with the Father.
It is necessary, in order to demonstrate that perfect character of Christ, for two things to happen. First, we must believe that we have already received it as a gift.
We saw a portion of this verse in last week’s study: “For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” (Rom 12:3)
We have the power to be humble. We have the power to be selfless. We have the power to exercise self-control; and all of this because Yahweh “hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” We do the will of our Father now, and we go on into perfection throughout the course of sanctification, because of what has already happened. Yahshua has been our Sacrifice on the cross. The risen Savior returned to His followers, “Then said Yahshua to them again, ‘Peace be unto you; as My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you.’ And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and saith unto them, ‘Receive ye the Holy Ghost.’” (John 20:21, 22)
He gave them the gift of His Spirit. He has given us the gift of His Spirit. With that, we have all we need.
Considering this passage from John, there is a very easy way for a Seventh-day Adventist, who truly understands the events of these last days, to recognize the actual problem with the Trinity doctrine. It is not that those who accept it are worshipping a false God, or breaking the First Commandment. That is not a proper understanding of the commandment, and Christians who say this today are far less charitable than Paul, who diplomatically said to the actual pagans with the “Altar to an unknown god” in Acts 17:23 that they were worshipping Yahweh in ignorance. This is the way the Spirit works. In an attempt to reach them, he presented their polytheism in the best possible light, seeking to draw them to an acceptance of the truth. Today, it seems, it is more important to be doctrinally correct than to be loving, and this is one of the reasons that we have so little interaction with the anti-Trinitarian groups that we once thought would produce a sanctifying unity. The teachings may be more-or-less correct, although they are prone to exaggeration in the presentation of their claims, but the spirit of many is exclusive, elitist, schismatic, rather than what we read of the way that Yahshua’s true disciples conducted themselves in the New Testament.
The real problem with the Trinity doctrine is that it misrepresents the experience of victory over sin. The duty of the Christian in these last days is to perfect the character. Paul writes, “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended; but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Yahshua. Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded; and if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.” (Phil 3:13-15) This is the perfect example of the right approach to sanctification. Having been forgiven, and repented, of our previous sins, we “forget” them. We do not encounter them again, to repeat them. We press forward, neither claiming final perfection, nor denying the perfection that Yahweh has placed upon us for our expected level of growth.
But, what does this have to do with Trinity doctrine, or believing we have already received the Holy Spirit?
We may ask some questions: Why is Paul, who is clearly filled with the Holy Spirit, pressing? Why is he reaching? Why is he allowing for the possibility of those who are born again being “otherwise minded,” so that Yahweh may reveal additional blind spots and defects to them?
Isn’t the Holy Spirit a person, with its own will, mind, and reasoning? Doesn’t the believer play host to a Holy Spirit, just as a demoniac is host to an unholy spirit?
While we are filled with the Holy Spirit when born again, the Scriptures never say that we are “possessed” by that Spirit. Evil spirits, fallen angels, are their own individual persons. When they enter into a human being, that person loses his or her will – it is replaced. They are unable to even ask for help, so great is the spiritual bondage. But the Holy Spirit is not the “opposite” of an unclean spirit; the same word (spirit) is used, because the word “spirit” can mean several things in both Greek and English, but there is an essential difference in that when one is filled with the Holy Spirit, he loses none of himself.
When we are born again, it is Christ who dwells in us, and lives in us by His Spirit. Paul says, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” (Gal 2:20) This goes along with his other statements, that the Christian believer is “dead,” and that their life is now Christ through them. But Paul is Paul. He is not identical with every other Spirit-filled believer. The Paul from before conversion is different, in that his sins have been forgiven, and no longer bind him to transgression, but his personality has not been replaced. Tastes and preferences, convictions and compulsions, these are not the personality. There was a Paul who was ignorant of Yahweh’s love, and now there is a Paul who receives it with thanksgiving, but Paul himself was “saved;” he was not substituted.
If the Christian became another person in essence when filled with the Holy Spirit, there would be no “salvation.” Nobody would be saved. The sinner would die, hopelessly condemned, and another soul would replace him, one that was never guilty of sin, and therefore never intended for death. Yahshua said, “But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice; for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (Mat 9:13)
We are dead to self, and hid in Christ. We are not the same persons we were before accepting the Gospel. Our natures are transformed, and never the same again, but if that is taken too far, then we end up with something very near the Holy Flesh movement, that nothing can be corruptible, nothing can be a true temptation. But no, it is left to us to cleanse our characters and to stand before the Father, having purified ourselves. Paul writes, “Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” (2Cor 7:1)
This is not something we will perfectly understand in this world, but spiritual things are not like material things. We are alive but dead. Yahshua was fully God, and fully man. Those who will be exalted humble themselves. We live in these contradictions, having peace that surpasses understanding. But for that to happen, we cannot be filled with another person that replaces what was in us before. That is the real problem with Trinitarianism.
I have used this verse many times, but I have not yet emphasized a certain word. We read, “Yahshua answered and said unto him, ‘If a man love Me, he will keep My words, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him.’” (John 14:23) The word is “with.” We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him.” It is not instead of him, or on top of him, but “with” him. Yahweh loves human freedom. Yahshua died for human freedom. By the Holy Spirit, Two: the Father and the Son, dwell within the human beings, but they dwell “with” us by Their Spirit, in a perfect union, a perfect cooperation of the mundane and the divine. This is not something we will understand in this world, but we can understand the promises, and believe them. It is we who are saved. It is we who are purified by the Spirit’s presence. It is we who have the responsibility, and duty, and privilege, of processing our thoughts, of cleansing our spirits, of preparing for Yahshua’s return.
The Trinitarian will have a necessarily distorted view of this victorious experience, because there is a third person, with its own mind, and will, and spirit, that takes possession of the sinner, and either eclipses his mind entirely, if salvation is successful, or is resisted and subdued by the original person’s spirit if the person is not saved. There can be no gentle cooperation if, as it must be understood, the possession is complete. We read, “Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all.” (1Tim 4:15) The Trinitarian can never really fulfill this verse. He can never give himself “wholly” to the things of the Gospel, or else he would lose himself entirely in the will of another being. Because they don’t understand the nature of the Spirit, there must be a conflict, a struggle between the “self” that is still alive, and this invading entity that seeks to control him. Nothing undermines the Victory message more than the idea that we are fighting with sin, self, or with another spirit that seeks to manipulate us.
When the one who believes in the Father and Son gives himself wholly to Them, They abide with him. They guide and comfort him. They lead him to obedience, never with compulsion, never with possession, but with a perfect respect for his free will. Then, love has value. Then, worship has value.
The problem with the belief that the Holy Spirit is a third Person in the sense that the Father and Son are Persons with independent agency, separate wills, and individuality, is that it likens the filling of the soul with the Holy Spirit to possession by another spiritual person, and that – when taken to its logical conclusion – really damages the relationship sought by the Father and Son with the believer.
Returning to what I said in the beginning, when we have the Holy Spirit, we have the power to be humble, selfless, and temperate, and these things have value, because it is truly us who is choosing them, influenced by Yahweh’s Holy Spirit, of course, but it is we who permit the Father and Son to do Their perfect will in us and through us. The choice would be impossible, were it not for the righteousness that comes by faith, but it is possible, and inevitable, for those who are in submission to the Creator and Savior.
There are two things necessary, as I indicated, for the saint to manifest the perfect character of Christ. All I have said so far is by way of explaining the first thing, that the saint must believe he has already received that character, with the Holy Spirit, as a gift. He must believe he already has it.
The second necessary thing is that he is willing to learn what Yahweh has to teach him, even if those lessons are very different than what he previously thought was the truth. This brings us nearer to our topic for today. It is through learning about righteousness, it is by sanctification, that the gift of Christ’s perfect character, which we already have, comes to be revealed through us. This requires us to label certain thoughts as “correct,” and others as “wrong.” It requires us to put distinctions where before there were none, such as the difference between being genuinely helpful, and being officious. The world might not see much of a difference, but for us one is the action of a carnal soul, and the other the nature of a blessed one. There is a difference between saying, “I am,” vs, “I feel,” that a worldling might think silly, or useless… a distinction without any real value. But in the saint it reveals a truth, that what we “are” is what Yahweh has made us to be, and what we “feel” is the experience, sometimes unpleasant, of living in a world corrupted by sin.
There is a difference, and here is the application of today’s topic, between sympathy and sentimentality. It is important to know how these two words differ in the course of living by the Holy Spirit, in the course of being involved (actively, rather than passively, because we are not possessed) in our own sanctification.
We must discern the difference between truth and error, which sometimes lie very close to one another in appearance. The tares look just like the wheat, until the harvest. The saint and the sinner may speak and act in very similar ways, until the spirits are tested, and either Christ or Satan is revealed. Sympathy, which is a holy principle, may look a lot like sentimentality, which is sensuality. That word is often associated with lust, but it really means any surrender of control to the influence of the senses; in fact, that is where “sentimentality” comes from, an old English word from Latin that means a sensation, a feeling.
At various points in our sanctification, as we draw nearer to Heaven, we become more gracious, more understanding. At the same time, our sensitivity increases, and sharpens, so that once minor considerations are revealed to demonstrate whether or not divine principles are understood. The theme of today’s study is an example of this very thing.
When we encounter the suffering of others, what is our reaction? Again, this may seem like a minor thing, but remember the second-greatest commandment. “For all the Law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” (Gal 5:14)
It is very much worth our time to examine, as saints, what this looks like, what it means, so that we properly and perfectly apply it. How we react to the wants and needs of others reveals whether or not we understand Yahweh’s Law, whether we have chosen to be in harmony with it, whether the Spirit of Yahshua is yet manifest in us. This has much to do with our preparation for Heaven.
We see sympathy manifest here: “And Yahshua answering said, ‘A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was; and when he saw him, he had compassion on him, and went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.’” (Luke 10:30, 33, 34)
Where others, a priest and a Levite, might have helped this man, a foreigner has compassion on him, and did what he could to make things better.
By contrast, here is an example of sentimentality: “While [Yahshua] yet talked to the people, behold, His mother and His brethren stood without, desiring to speak with Him. Then one said unto Him, ‘Behold, Thy mother and Thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with Thee.’” (Mat 12:46, 47) Consider how Yahshua responded to this, “But He answered and said unto him that told Him, ‘Who is My mother? And who are My brethren?’ And He stretched forth His hand toward His disciples, and said, ‘Behold My mother and My brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of My Father which is in Heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, and mother.’” (Mat 12:48-50)
There is nothing wrong with loving and respecting one’s family. That, too, is a commandment. And yet, what purpose, other than feelings, would have been served by Yahshua cutting His sermon short to speak with His family? If you wonder why this is important, just read the next chapter. It begins with, “The same day went Yahshua out of the house, and sat by the sea side. And great multitudes were gathered together unto Him, so that He went into a ship, and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore.” (Mat 13:1, 2)
At that time, Yahshua spoke the parable of the sower, with the different types of seeds. He gave the parable of the wheat and the tares, which I’ve referenced already in this study. He spoke about faith, even the size of a mustard seed, growing into the greatest of all trees. He spoke about the truth as leaven, which will raise the whole lump. He spoke about Heaven as a pearl of great price, worth everything of earthly value that we own. He spoke about evangelism as a net cast into the sea, to catch many fishes.
This was an important day in the ministry of Yahshua. Would we have all these words of truth, spoken in this way, had the Messiah left His work to speak with His family?
Sentimentality is about the emotions, about the feelings. And feelings are not, in themselves, bad, but if they are a guiding principle in one’s life, many grand and spiritual opportunities will be missed.
Here is an example of sympathy: “Then Yahshua called His disciples unto Him, and said, ‘I have compassion on the multitude, because they continue with Me now three days, and have nothing to eat; and I will not send them away fasting, lest they faint in the way.’ And His disciples say unto Him, ‘Whence should we have so much bread in the wilderness, as to fill so great a multitude?’ And Yahhsua saith unto them, ‘How many loaves have ye?’ And they said, ‘Seven, and a few little fishes.’” (Mat 15:32-34)
What followed was one of Yahshua’s most notable miracles, the feeding of several thousand people with just a small amount of food. We see the difference in both the nature and effect of sympathy and sentimentality. Yahshua saw a need, and He was moved to address it. It was not a distraction from His work. In fact, it facilitated His ministry. Sympathy, genuinely understanding the needs and suffering of others, moves us to heal what we can heal, and mend what we can mend without being officious, without being bothersome or insistent. It facilitates the will of Yahweh, and brings forth His purpose, even though miraculous means.
Sentimentality, on the other hand, may cause temporary feelings of relief, or closeness, but it prevents the opportunities that our Father would have us explore. Sympathy involves feelings of compassion for those who are enduring a challenge. Sentimentality tends to gratify the feelings of those suffering by encouraging self-pity and reflection on one’s problems.
Sympathy is a blessing. It allows us to relate to people in such a way as to discover what they truly require or want, and enables us to assist them in both the short term and the long term, even with regard to eternal things, because we are truly seeking their best good.
Sentimentality seeks to fulfill a short-term desire for relief and affection, but it does so by focusing on the problem, the emotions involved, and there is often an element of insincerity to it, sometimes of exaggeration, as one seeks to sooth the offended feelings of another without offering any constructive help. It props up the “self,” suggesting how noble and strong someone is for enduring all that they endure, without seeking to discover how the problem arose, and how it may be overcome.
If we were all about the solutions, without the compassion that Yahshua displayed toward the multitude, without acknowledging the discomfort often involved, that wouldn’t be right either. True sympathy does express feelings, and empathy, but it doesn’t rest on these things for its value. They are the means to an end, which is peace, and happiness, rather than ends of themselves. They allow us to act as our Father acts, to fulfill the sincere prayers of others, to bring comfort to the wounded, and to point the sinner to Christ.
True sympathy requires discernment. In the Book of Job, Job’s three friends came to him when he had endured great suffering, and they engaged in what they thought was sympathetic behavior. They sought to convince Job that he had sinned, and this is why the Father had turned against him. They certainly weren’t being sentimental in the conventional sense, but they weren’t expressing much sympathy either, much genuine understanding of Job’s experience. The sympathetic person listens, with spiritual hearing, and then responds with wisdom from on high.
In many modern religions, we find Yahshua being characterized as more sentimental than sympathetic. In such cases, we have an angry God, a harsh judge, one quick to cast sinners into hell, and between this judge and us, we have Yahshua. Yahshua is the loving one, the understanding one, the merciful one, and while yes, He is all those things, sentimentality emphasizes these traits in the Son at the expense of the Father, as if it was not the Father who sent Him to die for us, as if the Father did not love us just as much. Sentimentality overlooks sins, rather than helping to overcome them; thus, the Yahshua of this kind of religion, in His great mercy, is “understanding” in the sense that He understands our weaknesses, and blesses us in them, rather than lifting us out of them so that we no longer suffer. Sentimentality has us praying to the one we imagine loves us more deeply and personally, with more excuses for the sinful state, while in the genuine Gospel, as revealed by the Scriptures, the Son’s mediation is to bring us to the Father, so that we may approach Him, rather than stand apart.
Sympathy does not overlook sin, even though it is sorry for the suffering that sin causes. It seeks the good of everyone, but does not excuse wrongdoing. It is quick to forgive, but not to excuse.
And if this sounds like I am talking about a particular religion, like Catholicism, consider modern Protestantism, which has largely mutated into popular Evangelical Christianity… one’s feelings, ones desires for success, become a substitute for Yahweh’s will for the lives of His people. In many cases, the ends justify the means, and both God and man become stepping stones to what the believer expects his destiny to be. Yahshua becomes a vehicle for the desires and ambitions of the Christian, rather than the other way around, and this, precisely this, is the result of letting the sentiments rule. This is not the religion of Yahweh. We must be willing to learn the truth, and unlearn the errors.
There are two things necessary for the Christian to fulfill Yahweh’s purpose in his life, to bring forth the character of Christ. The first, as I said, is to believe that we have been given the character of Christ already, with the Holy Spirit, the moment we were born again, and as a gift that is forever ours. The second is the willingness to learn, to be educated in righteousness, to go through the ordeal of self-examination and thought processing, so that we reveal that character to the world.
As we learn more, we come to understand the distinction between the holy and the unholy, even when they are expressed in very similar ways. We know how to be helpful without being overbearing. We know how to be both zealous for the truth, and diplomatic in our approach, as Paul was. We know how to be humble before our Creator, and yet to declare with boldness, “I am a child of Yahweh. I have overcome sin.” We know how to be sympathetic to others, as an expression of agape-love, without excusing sin, or indulging feelings that would only weaken that person’s reliance on Christ. One’s very suffering may be allowed so that the individual will feel his need for a Savior, but if sentimentality is involved in those who seek to comfort him, self-pity is encouraged, this grand opportunity will be lost, just as all those priceless parables would have been lost had Yahshua indulged in his family’s desire to see Him on a critical day of ministry.
These are the days, the final days, when we must pray for wisdom as never before. We are called to strike the perfect balance between conflicting ideas, and to discover those that corrupt more subtly. We are given the task of preparing the Way for a perfect Savior in an environment of darkest sin. We are called to stand apart from the world, while ministering to its needs. But we have with us the perfect promises of Yahweh. We have the assurance that we have been given all that we need, the mind of Christ, the character of Christ, and all the divine principles that come along with it, such as true helpfulness, true prayer on behalf of others, and true sympathy. Let us be committed, let us bind ourselves to the Work, so that, in cooperation with the Father and Son through their Spirit, with our own free will and personal gifts, we fulfill the perfect will of the Almighty, and so speak great things, and so do mighty works to win sinners to the Redeemer.
David.
An Enduring Witness
“We may also deny [Christ] in allowing the mind to run in the channel of lovesick sentimentalism and to brood over our supposed hard lot and trials. No one can truly confess Christ before the world unless the mind and spirit of Christ live in him. It is impossible to communicate that which we have not. The conversation and the deportment should be a real and visible expression of grace and truth within. If the heart is sanctified, submissive, and humble, the fruits will be seen outwardly and will be a most effectual confession of Christ.” [Counsels for the Church, p. 81]
“There will be men and women who despise reproof and whose feelings will ever rise up against it. It is not pleasant to be told of our wrongs. In almost every case where reproof is necessary, there will be some who entirely overlook the fact that the Spirit of the Lord has been grieved and His cause reproached. These will pity those who deserved reproof, because personal feelings have been hurt. All this unsanctified sympathy places the sympathizers where they are sharers in the guilt of the one reproved.” [Testimonies for the Church, Vol. 3, p. 359]
“We must let Christ into our hearts and homes if we would walk in the light. Home should be made all that the name implies. It should be a little heaven upon the earth, a place where the affections are cultivated instead of being studiously repressed. Our happiness depends upon this cultivation of love, sympathy, and polite courtesy to one another. The reason why there are so many hard-hearted men and women in our world, is because true affection has been regarded as weakness, and has been discouraged and repressed. The better part of the nature of those of this class was perverted and dwarfed in childhood; and unless rays of divine light can melt away their coldness and hard-hearted selfishness, the happiness of such is buried forever. If we would have tender hearts, such as Jesus had when he was upon the earth, and sanctified sympathy, such as the angels have for sinful mortals, we must cultivate the sympathies of childhood, which are simplicity itself. Then we shall be refined, elevated, and directed by heavenly principles.” [The Review and Herald, June 22, 1886]