The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum God died?

So you think the Council of Chalcedon (451 A.D) was wrong when it wrote:
http://reformed.org/documents/index.html?mainframe=chalcedon.html
one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, recognized in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation; the distinction of natures being in no way annulled by the union, but rather the characteristics of each nature being preserved and coming together to form one person and subsistence, not as parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and Only-begotten God the Word, Lord Jesus Christ;

From the Westminster Confession:
http://www.gpcredding.org/wcf.html#C8
So that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures, the Godhead and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion. Which person is true God, and true man, yet one Christ, the only Mediator between God and man.

Were they wrong to say the Divine and human natures did not combine?

So the human property of mortality never becomes a divine property; meanwhile, the divine nature appropriates human mortality??? You've simply contradicted yourself.


The human and divine natures of Christ are distinct, but not separate personalities: there are two natures in the one Person.

The Definition of Chalcedon is correct but your understanding of it is incorrect. To say that each nature according to its own properties does not act in communion with the other nature is to divide and separate the person contrary to scripture and Chalcedon.

From the Formula of Concord, SD, Person of Christ
Secondly, as to the execution of the office of Christ, the person does not act and work in, with, through, or according to only one nature, but in, according to, with, and through both natures, or, as the Council of Chalcedon expresses it, one nature operates in communion with the other what is a property of each.

The Reformed writer, Philip Schaff, confirms this understanding of Chalcedon, in his Creeds of Christendom, Volume I.
From his section on the Creed of Chalcedon
The following are the leading ideas of the Chalcedonian Christology as embodied in this symbol:. . .
4. The duality of the natures. The orthodox doctrine maintains, against Eutychianism, the distinction of nature even after the act of incarnation, without confusion or conversion, yet, on the other hand, without division or separation, so that the divine will ever remain divine, and the human ever human, and yet the two have continually one common life, and interpenetrate each other, like the persons of the Trinity.

Yes I believe God died. Because
if God did not die for us .We would die in our sin's With out the forgivness; God truly won for us on the cross.
It is not just wels or our sister synod the els but also the clc and missouri and many other conservative lutheran synod's. because
It is in the bible and the lutheran confession's of 1580 that are drawn from the bible .
I just recently read in my bible .

"You have crucified the Lord of Glory"

Would you care to comment on what Paul wrote here:

1 Timothy 1:17 (ASV) "Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, [be] honor and glory forever and ever. Amen."

If "God died", then who was governing the universe in His absence?

In His grace,

answer to Your question
We believe God is to be God.
even if we poor Lutheran's can not comprehend his truth's.
we believe both statements are true.
God died that good friday. and yet God rules .

the lutheran faith is different than the reformed faith .

In matter's that go beyound our human understanding we are taught to hold our reason captive to God's word.
Roman's 11:33-36
2 corinthians 10:8
1 corinthians 1:19

packsaddle,

Yes, I can agree with you that the Lutheran faith, at least on this matter is far different than the Reformed faith. We hold that there are things beyond our comprehension. But this does not mean that we cast off all reason nor particularly in this case, to accept blatant contradiction. Scripture doesn't contradict itself, but man's "wisdom" too often contradicts the Scripture. Nowhere does it say in the Bible that "God died". But it clearly says that God is "immortal", "eternal", i.e., incapable of dying. Such phrases as "the Lord of Glory" refer to the God-man, Christ Jesus, but that isn't synonymous with God, for the Lord Jesus Christ was God incarnate; both God AND man.. Therefore, since the Scripture is perspicuous in stating that God is immortal, i.e., God cannot die, then it was the human nature of the Christ which died and certainly not God. It's one thing to confess, and rightly so that there are some things in Scripture that are beyond human reason, e.g., infinity. However, we do not embrace irrationality nor illogical premises.

In His grace,

smile

Pilgrim

But we lutherans believe you are the ones at fault on The two natures of Christ . after all we believe it is the calvanistic / zwingli error of rationalism that makes you jump to your conclution's .Rather we hold to Gods word.
Lutherans believe if reason could understand the truths of the Gospel, faith would be unnecessary.

God's blessing's

What the reformed see as blatant contradiction
we Lutherans see as Gods wonderful "''paradoxical truth's"'.

the reformed study of scripture has alway's been a "critical study of God's word."
The parts they see as contradictory they dress up with human rationalism to make them more platable to their intelect.

but All the articles of our Lutheran christian faith are so difficult and so high that no man can hold fast to them without the grace of the Holy Spirit . Take any article of our faith and hold fast to it with reason, and you will retain nothing of it . The Holy Ghost must be Master and Teacher, or nothing will come of it.
for reason twists Scripture according to its pleasure.

Our Lutheran christian faith however is much rather a stepping out into the darkness, where there is no “proof” in the ordinary sense of the term, but only a word of the Lord which is infinitely better and more certain than all the rational proofs in the world. Faith is something done to us rather than by us.

Gods blessing's

Yeah, yeah must be nice to dismiss things out of hand just because you can't answer them. Paradoxical truths! Truth isn't paradoxical.

Heb 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

If evidence is an important constituent of faith and (none would argue) that evidence is an important constituent of reason, how can you then have faith without reason?

That which is not rational (having reason) is confusing. God is not God of confution but of peace. (1 Cor 14:33). Thus if not confusion then order, which you cannot have peace without. You cannot have order with out structure. You cannot have structure without relations. You cannot have relations without reason. Can you have reason without logic?

God Died for us.

as it is written 1 Cor. 2, 8: They have crucfied the Lord of glory. And Acts 20, 28: We are purchased with God's blood.

many Lutherans prefer to sing this version On good friday . saddly in the 1941 Lutheran hymnal verse 2 was changed to God's son is dead. Manny of us dislike that version. and continue to sing it a more scriptual way..

"O Darkest Woe" Unadulterated version by Johann Rist, 1607-1667, Lutheran hymnal
Text: Acts 3:15


1. O darkest woe! Ye tears, forth flow! Has earth so sad a wonder? God the Father's only Son Now is buried yonder.
2. O sorrow dread! Our God is dead! But by His expiation Of our guilt upon the cross Gained for us salvation.
3. O sinful man! It was the ban Of death on thee that brought Him Down to suffer for thy sins And such woe hath wrought Him.
4. Lo, stained with blood, The Lamb of God, The Bridegroom, lies before thee, Pouring out His life that He May to life restore thee.
5. O Ground of faith, Laid low in death. Sweet lips. now silent sleeping! Surely all that live must mourn Here with bitter weeping.
6. Oh. blest shall be Eternally Who oft in faith will ponder Why the glorious Prince of Life Should be buried yonder.
7. O Jesus blest, My Help and Rest With tears I now entreat Thee: Make me love Thee to the last, Till in heaven I greet Thee!

This has already been answered quite sufficiently by myself and others but particularly by Charles Hodge in his excellent Systematic Theology, from which some excepts have been made available in this thread. Click the links below: