Question:  Dear Greg,

            If God and Jesus are the same being, then:

1.      Who forsook Jesus on the cross?

2.      Who was Jesus praying to his whole life?

Does your ministry believe he was acting during these times?

            Scott

Answer:  Dear Scott,

            God the Father and Jesus are not the same being.  God (that is the Godhead) is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.  These three are one.  They are separate, co-equal, co-eternal, one in essence, three in person.  That is the biblical record.

            Jesus, God the son, the God-man, Emmanuel, God with us, was and is the Eternal Son of God, the second person of the Godhead.  He is the Alpha and Omega, who was, is, and is to come.  In his humanity he became something he never was—a human—taking a human body, which he never had, while remaining God, for it is impossible for God to not be God, to quit being God.  The voluntary decision of Jesus to become human for our salvation, to incarnate himself as a human being, is what we celebrate at Christmas.  God with us.  The hope of our salvation.

            Jesus was very man and very God.  That is, he was 100% human and 100% God.  So there are things he did in his humanity, like eat, sleep, get tired, pray, etc.  There are things he did in his deity (work miracles, create food for the multitudes, walk on water, resurrect Lazarus from the dead, resurrect his own human body from the grave) while there are times when he veiled his deity.  That is, he did not use it.  He told Peter to put away his sword when the soldiers came to torture and crucify Christ.  If Jesus had wanted, he could have called upon legions of angels to come to protect him.  But he did not.

            This is what PTM believes and knows because it is what the Bible teaches.  Each statement above is supported by many biblical passages.

            In Christ.

            Greg Albrecht