Open Letter to Dan Mages and Hunger Truth "Brothers,
if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should
restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you
too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of
Christ." Galatians 6:1-2 Dan, I
am Back East traveling and I am now near Bangor Maine, so I have been
out of the loop about what is going on back home in Southern
California. But I have heard that you have been on several radio shows
recently denying the Trinity and the deity of Jesus Christ .All the
reports that I have heard about what you are doing are not good Dan. Since
this recent tour of Evangelical radio shows, many people in various
Evangelical Churches in America now are looking at you as a heretic and
a cult leader a la Joseph Smith and Charles Taze Russell, the founder
of Mormonism and the Jehovah's Witnesses, respectively and it breaks my
heart to tell you this Dan. I
now kind of feel like Obi-Wan Kenobi trying to win back Anakin
Skywalker from the Dark Side. Only, the reality of the issue is that
the Star Wars movies are just fictitious forays of cinematic fantasy
yet there is no Lava Planet Dan, the worldview expressed in the Bible
is real Dan. Hell, eternal torment and the reality of apostasy is real. Dan,
you may already be there, but it appears that you on the brink of no
return, on the road to complete apostasy but I am going to write to you
one last time as a friend to ask you to reconsider your ways and come
back to the truth as revealed in Scripture regarding Jesus Christ and
the Godhead. Many
people are now saying that there is no hope for you, that you have
apostatized from the Evangelical Christian Church and that you are on
the way to a Christless eternity in hell. I do not want to believe
this. I want to believe that something horrible has happened to you,
that this is all just a temporary mistake and that you were somehow
disillusioned about conservative Evangelicalism during your college
years but that you can come back to the truth of the Trinity and the
Deity of Christ before it is too, too late. Dan,
the reality of apostasy and hell is real, if there is anything I can
do, anything I can write you, show you, investigate for you, to try to
really, sincerely attempt to bring you back from this decision you have
made to deny the Trinity and Jesus Christ's Deity please tell me what
it is. I write this
to you not to debate you, but to talk to you as a friend. Dan, do not
do this, don't go down this path. Please tell me what I can do, what I
can show you from Scripture to convince you that Jesus Christ is God
and the Trinity is true. Patrick Navas and You are such nice guys, I am very saddened Dan that you guys have chosen this path. What can I do help man? There is still time to change the road you are on, but door is closing Dan, come back before it is too late. I
love you and your friends at Hunger Truth Dan, you know this
personally, tell me now what I can do or show you that Jesus is God and
that the Trinity is true. Sincerely in Jesus, your friend,
Ed Enochs
An Open Response to Ed Enochs and The Evangelical
Debate Society
"For we know in part and we prophecy in part... then I
shall know fully, even as I am fully known."
1 Corinthians 13:9-12
Dear Ed,
It is obvious to me that you truly care and are concerned for my eternal well-being. You are scared that God is going to torture me in hell for all eternity. I understand where you are coming from because I was once there myself. I too believed that God had this dark, cruel plan to torment without end those who never even asked to live in the first place. I too believed that everyone who disagreed with my perspective was an enemy of God. I too thought that my interpretation of Scripture was the infallible, perfect, word of God.
After long, deep, concentrated reflection, I now realize that godly men can disagree on interpretations of ancient texts. From the earliest times men who sought after God disagreed about the nature of the Messiah. As you know, godly leaders within your church disagree about Calvinism and Arminianism, they disagree about the rapture of the church, they disagree about the tongues. Others disagree about the millennium, infant baptism, spiritual gifts, women in ministry, eternal security, predestination, and the nature and duration of hell.
Daniel B. Wallace says, "In a historical-literary investigation we are dealing with probability vs. possibility. We are attempting to recover meaning without all the data. This is not a hard science...Unlike the hard sciences, a falsifiable hypothesis in the humanities is difficult to demonstrate because of the vacillations in the levels of ambiguity in the data examined (in our case, the ambiguities in the texts whose authors cannot be consulted" (Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 9).
I think it would be wise for us to take his warning seriously. We are not able to pull John, or Paul aside and ask, what did you mean by that? This leaves us to put the pieces together the best we can. Biblical, or any other interpretation is not a perfect science. I understand why you interpret the text the way you do, because I once had the same perspective.
You asked what you could do for me. What you could do is to please, please try to understand that godly individuals can and do often disagree about their interpretation. The same reason why we have disagreements on the timing of the tribulation or the various views on the millennium are the same reasons why some interpret the text as teaching Jesus is the human son of God and not YWHW, the one God of Israel.
Ed, I think the church has used hell to scare people enough to not truly consider other viewpoints. Why would anyone question the Trinity if they thought God was going to toast them forever without end if they changed their mind?
If we were honest, most of us did not believe that God was one being in three co-eternal, co-equal persons when we were saved. We just knew that God sent his son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins.
Secondly, even mature Christians who have studied the Scriptures for years, when asked to explain the Trinity either articulate Social Trinitarianism (a God family), where three distinct beings are equally God, or Modalistic Monarchianism, which is one God who manifests himself in three different ways, forms, or modes. In other words, most people who claim to be Trinitarians are really only Trinitarians in name, or word, not in reality. The truth of each persons belief is revealed upon their explanation.
If we came across a person in church who claimed they were driving a Hummer, but upon being asked to explain the vehicle, they said it was built on the same frame as a Dodge Neon, and some of the newer ones are convertibles, we would immediately point out, that even though this person thinks they are driving a Hummer, it is really a PT Cruiser :-)
Lastly, the overwhelming emphasis in the NT is that a person must believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God, not God, the second person of the Triune Godhead. This is by far the general tenor of Scripture.
1. When Jesus asked Peter, who do you say that I am? Peter confesses that, "Thou art the Christ (Messiah), the son of the living God" (Matt 16).
2. Paul says, "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved" (Rom 10:9). Is this not enough?
3. John says, "But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name" (John 20:36). John explicitly tells us the whole purpose of his entire gospel right here. If he wanted John 1 and 8:58 to teach us that Jesus is the second member of a Tri-une Godhead, here was the perfect place. Instead he chose to say, everything I wrote is for the purpose of telling you that Jesus is Messiah.
4. John says, "For God so loved the world that he sent his uniquely begotten son, for whoever believes him shall not perish but have everlasting life" (3:16).
5. John also says, "Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well" (1 John 5:1). It seems pretty clear that everyone means everyone, no?
I know that you are having a hard time accepting it, but the truth is that I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. I confess with my mouth that Jesus is Lord. I believe that God raised him from the dead. I love both the Father and Jesus his Son. I really hope that someday you can learn to appreciate this and see that I am standing on the plain testimony of Scripture.
Respectfully,
Dan Mages
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