A LOOK AT UNITARIANISM'S MAIN ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE
DEITY AND PREEXISTENCE OF JESUS

In their treatise, The Doctrine of The Trinity: Christianity's Self-Inflicted Wound , Unitarian authors Anthony F. Buzzard and Charles F. Hunting raise six arguments against the Deity and preexistence of Jesus Christ, all which need to be addressed.

1. Buzzard and Hunting feel that the term "Son of God" when applied to Jesus does not denote anything other than what it denotes when applied to any believer. They reason, if we are sons of God (Romans 8: 14, 19; 2 Corinthians 6: 18; Galatians 4: 6-7, etc.), and that does not make us God, then Jesus' being the Son of God does not make Him God either.
   
   To this we would simply reply that Jesus is uniquely THE Son of God. We are sons; He is THE UNIQUE SON! John uses the Greek word monogenous ("one-of-a-kind," unique, one and only [of that kind]) to describe Jesus' sonship (John 1: 14, 18; 3: 16, 18; 1 John 4: 9). That we, as believers, should also be call "sons" ( huios ) of God is a sonship in a very secondary sense compared to Jesus' unique sonship! And the uniqueness of Jesus' sonship lies in His eternal relationship to His Father (John 1:1-5; Col. 1:15-16).
   
   
2. Buzzard and Hunting insist that Jesus is called "the Son of God" only in view of His birth at Bethlehem (Luke 1: 35), but not in any preexistent sense, as God's eternal Son. To this we would answer that John describes Jesus' unique sonship as being preexistent and eternal-"God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world." (John 3: 17); "I AM the living bread that came down from Heaven. " (John 6: 5); "When God brings His firstborn into the world. " (Hebrews 1: 6); "the Son He loves.is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation . For by Him all things were created.He is before all things." (Colossians 1: 13-17).
   
   
3. Buzzard and Hunting insist that Jesus was only preexistent in the mind and heart of the Father-in the same sense that we as believers are: chosen "in Him before the creation of the world." To this we would reply that the scriptural statements used to describe Jesus' preexistence are infinitely more powerful than the statements used of the Church, as foreknown from the foundation of the world. We were known by God before all time, but Jesus was active with the Father in the creation when the worlds began-see John 1: 1-5; Colossians 1: 15-16. Philippians 2: 5-11 actually describes an intelligent and willful transaction between the Son and His Father before the incarnation took place (see vs. 7, in particular).
   
   
4. Buzzard and Hunting insist that Jesus' being the fullness of God (Colossians 1: 19; 2: 9) is no different that the Church being the fullness of Christ and of God (Ephesians 1: 2; 3: 19). To this we would reply that the only fullness that the Church, in its collectiveness and corporateness has, is being the Body of Him who alone is the fullness of God! Jesus alone is that fullness (and no individual saint can claim that for himself). But the whole Church , because it is Christ's Body , is filled with the fullness that comes from Him, the living Head (Ephesians 1: 23; 2: 9-10).
   
   The collective Church, no less any of its individual members, cannot equal Jesus, no more than a cup of water could be equal to the river from which that cup was filled!
   
   
5. Buzzard's and Hunting's strongest argument against the Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ-one which they drive home again and again throughout their book-is Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians 8: 6: "there is but one God, the Father , from whom all things come and from whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all thing came and through whom we live." They reason that since there is "but one God, the Father," then Jesus cannot be that one God. Only the Father is that "one God." And since there cannot be two Gods, Jesus is not God.
   
   To this we would simply answer: Paul also states that there is "but one Lord, Jesus Christ," to which statement, by Buzzard's and Hunting's Unitarian logic, would in turn exclude the Father from being Lord, since there is "but one Lord, Jesus Christ." But if the Father can also be Lord (see, for example, Luke 1: 6, 9, 11, 15, 16, 17, 25, 28, 38, where God the Father is called "Lord") and there are not two Lords, but one Lord, then it is equally possible that when Jesus Christ is called "God" (Matthew 1: 23; John 1: 1, 18; 20: 28; Acts 20: 28; Romans 9: 5; Titus 2: 13; Hebrews 1: 8; 2 Peter 1: 1; 1 John 5: 20; 2 John 9, etc.) that there are not two Gods, even as there are not two Lords, but one Lord-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit-and one God-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!
   
   
6. When Buzzard and Hunting (who, oddly enough, claim the evangelical position of believing the Holy Scriptures to be God's inspired and infallible word), confront passages that refer to Jesus as "God," they deal with them in this manner: "There is no doubt that for the early Christians Jesus had the value and reality of God . This, however, does not mean that they thought Jesus ' was God.'" (p. 167) On the John 20: 28 confession of Thomas about Jesus ("My Lord and my God"), Buzzard and Hunting conclude: "Both 'Lord' and 'God' are messianic titles, and appropriately used by John who wrote his whole book to convince us to believe that Jesus was the Messiah.Jesus became 'God' to Thomas in a way parallel to the sense in which Moses had enjoyed the status of 'God' in the presence of Pharaoh (Exodus 7: 1)."
   
   To this we would simply reply that if Jesus, in any sense of the word, is a god separate from the Father then our Unitarian writers have actually become polytheists believing in two gods, or at best polytheistic Arians (such as the Watch Tower followers), believing in God (the Father) and in Jesus (a lesser god). If Jehovah's anguished cry against polytheism in Isaiah is to be taken seriously, then Jesus Christ cannot be a god separate from God; if He is God at all, He must be "the one true God," as John rightly calls Him (1 John 5: 20)! Hear God's impassioned word through Isaiah: "Apart from me there is NO GOD" (Isaiah 44: 6); "Is there any God besides me? No, there is NO OTHER ROCK ; I know NOT ONE " (Isaiah 44: 8; see also 1 Corinthians 10: 4: "that rock was Christ"); "There is NO GOD apart from me. NONE but me" (45: 21, 22); "I am God, and there is NO OTHER." (46: 9).

For the New Testament to declare that Jesus is GOD-in any sense of the word-it must declare Him to be THE ALMIGHTY GOD! And that He is! Hallelujah!