Kathy,

If I am correct in interpreting your note to mean you have wrestled, and are possibly still wresting, with the material presented to you by so many here recently, I for one am glad to hear it! Be a "Jacob", Kathy, and cling to the Lord as He wrestles with you, even if your hip gets knocked out of joint in the process! That seems to happen to most of us at some point.

Let me pass along one admonition that came to mind as I re-read much of this thread. Not about the Giant Earthworms again (oh, I was spat out after 3 days, by the way, that's why I'm able to post again), and not about any particular aspect of trinitarian doctrine (you have been given much to chew on already).

Rather, I ask you to consider an analogy I feel portrays the comprehensiveness of the doctrinal statements you have formulated as replacements for the classic creedal statements.

Our youngest daughter has been blind from birth. Early tactile exploration of the trees in our neighborhood taught her that they were of varying girths, with variously textured barks, that their density and temperature were similar to wooden objects she was familiar with, that the wind and birds and squirrels were likely to make noise from above the tree, that it was generally cooler beneath one in the middle of a summer day, and that they rose to the height of her upstretched fingertips. When I held her up high beneath a branch she could fell the leaves, but that took an imaginative stretch to tie to the fact of "treehood", since I was nowhere near the trunk.

Later, when she began cane travel--which was not taught in her birth country--her tactile world was extended by about 3 feet, and consequently trees could be seen to be that much taller as well. The cane made it possible to feel the base of lower branches as well.

Being dauntless, she later discovered the absolute thrill of climbing trees, hanging around in various attitudes at altitudes her sighted siblings rarely attained. Along the way, she has attained a much fuller picture of what the tree is; and it is consequently much easier for her to accept what she still must accept on the authority of another: the total height of the tree, for one.

Application? No, nothing about "one-in-tree"!

Rather, you seem to be in a position where you have assembled a number of facts to establish certain aspects of the nature of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, just as my daughter has assembled a number of facts about trees. Many of the individual facts you cite are indeed biblically supported. The problem comes with your apparent refusal to incorporate the balance of the biblical testimony.

In the analogy, it would be as if my daughter said: "Trees have bark, they're made of wood, they have leaves and branches, they make shade, they go up 10 feet in the air, and birds and squirrels and the wind like to go over them." I would respond, "Mostly correct, but the tree you climbed actually goes up 40 feet.", and she would counter that every tree she ever saw went up only 10 feet, and she could trust no one who told her any different.

In regard to this issue, Kathy, you give every impression of being not only blind--which we all are to varying degrees--but unteachable as well. Your doctrinal formulations, as revealed by your inability to interact with many of the scriptures which counter them, simply do not account for all of the biblical data as comprehensively, as thoroughly, and therefore as truthfully, as do those universally accepted ones.

Back to the analogy for one other aspect, if you don't mind. I pray that you will see that the truth or falsity of trinitarian doctrine is not inextricably yoked to the falsity of Rome's soteriology, but must rather be examined on its own merits. In the analogy, if I asked my daughter why she refused to believe that trees were any higher than 10 feet, she could say: "The first person to tell me that trees were 40 feet tall also told me to believe in Santa Claus. You told me yourself that's a lie, so I know he was lying about the trees too. Please don't keep repeating that old lie. We all know that trees are just 10 feet tall."

Praying, as I'm sure others are as well, that your eyes will be opened by the Lord himself, to your need to account for the entire counsel of His word, and not a mere few favorite passages.

In Christ,
Paul S