1 Corinthians 15:24-28 (handing kingdom back to God)

[darinhouston]

Homer, there's an awful lot of conjecture in Lenski's response -- much of it not warranted to my mind. The distinction between the incarnate and unincarnate Son is particularly speculative. Karl Barth thought it was nonsense, I believe. But, as Lenski notes in this very passage, exegesis should not include dogmatics. His assertions about the son giving it to the godhead (including himself) are particularly dogmatic and not exegetical to my reading (and a little nonsensical to say he gives it to another entity that includes himself and two others when only referring to one of them -- the Father). Would you contend that God the Father is not God (Ho Theos)?

This passage preceding your quote is particularly poignant (though he then himself actually proceeds with his trinitarian dogmatics)...

On the one hand, Paul's statement that "the Son himself" shall subject himself to God is used in proof of the subordination to the Father, which this destroys the equality of the three persons of the Godhead. On the other hand, we are told that it is not the business of exegesis to investigate whether Paul's statement agrees or disagrees with the Bible doctrine regarding the Holy Trinity. If this is not the business of exegesis, then exegesis has no business at all. If it cannot give a correct answer to this question of subordinationism, which involves the very doctrine regarding God himself, then all else it may attempt to give is valueless. Paul either does or does not teach the equality of the divine persons when he says that the Son will subject himself to the Father. Which is it? The answer must be exegetical and not dogmatical, for all true dogmatics rests wholly on true exegesis; it is wholly dependent and never independent.

To answer your question about Luke 1, the kingdom can be forever even if he hands it back to his father. I'm not sure how I take the rule over the house of Jacob forever language, however. I'll have to look into that, but it strikes me as the sort of language frequently sounding unqualified but having assumed qualifications. Particularly, with a passage like this one in 1 Corinthians, something has to give, and I am not in the least persuaded by Lenski's attempts to qualify (or seemingly re-write) the 1 Corinthians passage.

[commonsense]

Luke 1:32-33
New American Standard Bible 1995
32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; 33 and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever (aionas), and His kingdom will have no end.”

Homer, I don't see how you get a triune God from this passage. A Son of the Most High isn't God. He would be a god, as Psalms says: "Ye are gods and sons of the Most High. Secondly, God is giving Jesus the throne of his father David. I see a Father, Son and Holy Spirit: David as the Father, and Jesus the Son who were both empowered by the Holy Spirit- being One in the same Spirit. There aren't three Gods. There is only one God and those who are united with God in the Spirit.

[Homer]

Darin,

I thought you might notice the subtle change (I placed the Greek words in parenthesis) when Paul went from handing the kingdom over to the Father (kai petri) to "so that God (ho theos) may be all in all. Why the switch from Father to the God? Shouldn't we expect "so that the Father may be all in all"?

[darinhouston]

Darin,

I thought you might notice the subtle change (I placed the Greek words in parenthesis) when Paul went from handing the kingdom over to the Father (kai petri) to "so that God (ho theos) may be all in all. Why the switch from Father to the God? Shouldn't we expect "so that the Father may be all in all"?

I did notice that, but I don't ascribe the same weight to that as you appear to do. It says "God" both places -- no need to repeat Father every time it's used if they are the same thing. "to Theo kai Patri" doesn't say "the Father of the Godhead" - it merely says the God and Father (or Father God). I start my prayers with "Father God," then I might say just "Father" or just "God." I mean the same thing. There's no reason to think Paul meant something different here.

[3Resurrections]

Taking the sense of this verse in a somewhat different direction than it is usually interpreted...

The sense in which Christ "delivers up the kingdom to God" is NOT to be understood as a time of Christ's surrender and abdication of His kingdom authority. We know from other texts that His kingdom was promised to endure forever. Rather, this "kingdom" is the "*CHILDREN* of the kingdom" that Christ delivered up to God at the AD 70 bodily resurrection, and "presented faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy" (Jude verse 24).

Isn't the whole context - both before and after this I Cor. 15:24 verse - giving proofs for the surety of the saints' bodily resurrection to come and their ability to stand before God's presence in heaven?

Compare this I Cor. 15:24-28 text to Hebrews 2:11 &13. "For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are ALL OF ONE; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them BRETHREN, Saying...BEHOLD I AND THE CHILDREN WHICH GOD HATH GIVEN ME." This provides a picture of the joyously triumphant Christ on resurrection day, presenting and delivering up the CHILDREN OF THE KINGDOM as a united group to His Father and theirs in a gloriously perfected condition; faultless in body, soul, and spirit.

This same event was also spoken of in Ephesians 1:9-23, where it also referred to God "filling ALL IN ALL", (just like in I Cor. 15:2).
"That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might GATHER TOGETHER IN ONE ALL THINGS IN CHRIST, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:...And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all."

This Ephesians 1:9-23 text described the time when the saints' hope for an "inheritance" of their bodily resurrection would finally be realized. Those who had already been resurrected, (like Lazarus and the Matthew 27:52-53 saints), were the ones described as being "on earth"; but they would be "gathered together in one" with the spirits of just men "in heaven" who would also be given the redemption of their bodies. All of these resurrected children of the kingdom were then together delivered up and presented to the Father on that resurrection day back in AD 70.

Any saints dying since that time will also receive the same "inheritance" of being presented faultless before God's presence in the final bodily resurrection event in our future, since Christ said that "all that the Father giveth me shall come to me".

[darinhouston]

This is worth careful consideration - thank you.