Amen
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Modalist here. Jesus is God existing as man, but still also God (Colossians 1:13-.20).
This passage doesn’t state that Jesus is God.
It states that He is the image of God and that God created all things through Him.
“ And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:3)
Jesus addressed the Father "as the only true God"
He also said “that they may know You, the only true God AND Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”
That statement clearly shows that Jesus regarded Himself as someone other than “the only true God.”
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Paidion,
It says all things were made by or in him and by him all things consists. Sounds like God to me. Colossians 1 takes a Logos Christology approach to Jesus.
Philippians 2:5-11 explains how God became man and servant. In that role he is servant but he is certainly also “my Lord and my God”, the Word made flesh. The Father reveals all things to the Son, have you seen the Son, you have seen the Father. Incarnational language. I was raised JW and have discussed these things for 20 years and over time I came to reliaze that that what best explains the totality of scriptural statements, the most satisfactory faith and true monotheism is the Oneness / Modalist position, especially the one that recognises that the Son is the Father as man as also recognised in Isaiah 9:6 
It does not say all thing were created by him. It does say all things were created in him.
There’s a big difference between the two. The passage affirms that God created all things in His Son and also that He created all thing through His Son. How does that make the Son of God to be God Himself? He is not God; He is the Son of God and thereby the only other Individual who is truly divine. But to be divine is not tantamount to being God. The divine Father alone is God, and the divine Son is… well, simply the Son of God.
It is not clear that Thomas was declaring Jesus to be his Lord and God. He may have been exclaiming, “My Lord and my God!” because he had not believed God raised Him from death, but now he had the evidence from the risen Lord Himself.
When Jesus said to Philip, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father,” He was not declaring that He was the Father Himself, but that the Father revealed Himself in Himl
Barnes in his commentary explained it in this way:
Lord, show us the Father. Philip here referred to some outward and visible manifestation of God. God had manifested himself in various ways to the prophets and saints of old, and Philip affirmed that if some such manifestation should be made to them they would be satisfied. It was right to desire evidence that Jesus was the Messiah, but such evidence had been afforded abundantly in the miracles and teaching of Jesus, and that should have sufficed them.
We are told all things were created in or by him (I know you need it to be ‘in’, but I obviously dont), we are told he is before all things and in him all things consist. As I said before, Logos Christology. How you can fit in a created thing in that is difficult to grasp. Christadelphians and the like, have tried either to say this passage refer to the new creation only or that the Son is spoken of as merely the plan of God. A recent Preterist teaching called “covenant creationism” claims the same. But Paul speaks of all creation and outside time as well. That universal reconciliation is past and part of the creation. We are told that he is the first in all things. When we believe all the words of Colossians 1:13-20 it is very difficult to escape the conclusion that it speaks of Jesus as God and as man and creation both physical and through the Cross.
That my Lord and my God is adressed to Jesus is the most natural reading, just as the modalist reading of John 14:9. It is not likely that Jesus the high angel or adoptionist son said if you see me, you see the Father. Obviously the Jewish authorities had to either drop to their knees and say like Thomas OR stone him for blasphemy. They understood well the implications,
“Outside time” is a meaningless phrase in my opinion. I cannot find the phrase “outside time” in any translation. You say that Paul speaks of “outside time.” Please provide a reference for that claim.
Yes, there are many Modalists among Christians. I used to have a Modalist friend with whom I exchanged emails. However, I cannot see Jesus and His Father as being the same divine Individual.
To whom did Jesus pray? To Himself?
However, I think Trinitarianism is ever further off the beam.
I see Jesus and His Father as two different divine Individuals who are united in mind, purpose, etc.
Jesus is the only divine Individual other than the Father. He is divine because the only God begat Him as His first act before all ages.
Well I meant no more than stated in:
2 Timothy 1:9 He has saved us and called us to a holy life–not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time,
Before creation, God planned to make the Son the first in all things and the reason behind all things, despite the Son not being revealed to us before men saw Jesus Christ.
To whom did Jesus pray? Well if I’m right God became true and perfect man, then God must have prayed. I believe that is what is behind the words of Philippians 2:5-11, He was in the form of God but he took on the form of a servant and was obedient unto death.
When Trinitarians say the Modalist understanding of Jesus’ prayers make no sense, I can only smile as I dont believe splitting God into 3 persons help the matter. It all boils down to the Incarnation, a human existence was added to the picture, while God remained God.
You say you believe Jesus is another divine being. What do you believe happened to him when he became man? Was he recreated or did he also have dual nature or? What happened to his divine nature?
He never was created. When we beget a child, we didn’t create it. We begat it.
God begat His Son as the first of His acts. What happened to Him when He became man? He was physically begotten like any other person, but without a human father.
What happened to his divine nature?
Nothing. As a man, He retained His divinity, but divested Himself of His divine attributes.
As a human being, He could do nothing more than any other man. It was God who performed the miracles through Him.
He said, “I can do nothing of myself. The Father who dwells within me does the works.”
Notice Philippians 2:6,7:
.
… who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of men.
Here is a song I wrote:
Philippians 2:5-12 (Tune: Jesus Lover of my Soul)
THE MIND OF CHRIST
Let in you be the same mind
Which in Jesus Christ we find,
Who though fullest Deity
Did not seek equality,
But He emptied Himself to save,
Having taken the form of a slave.
Born like to sinful man,
He obeyed to death’s last pain.
After this great deed of love,
God exalted Him above.
Highest name is Jesus now
At which every knee shall bow,
Thus shall every tongue confess
Jesus Christ is Lord—no less!
So Beloved, now obey
Even as you have alway.
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Beautiful song 
. I agree Jesus Christ came to serve, emptied himself in that regard depending on the Holy Spirit though as you say fullest Deity.
Philippians 2:11 says the confession of Jesus Christ as Lord is to the glory of God the Father. I understand that to mean that we have one true God. I believe any language of concerning Jesus being begotten relates to his incarnation, his becoming man.
In relation to Christ… being “begotten” relates not to his incarnation but rather to his status as Son. i.e., Jesus being declared and appointed by the Father by means of the resurrection. — THAT is what the NT actually says.
Acts 13:33 God has fulfilled this for us their children, in that He has raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second Psalm: ‘You are My Son, today I have begotten You.’
Rom 1:4 …and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.
As the begotten i.e., the appointed or firstborn this speaks to the superiority or pre-eminence of Christ above and before all else, thus…
Psa 89:27 Also I will make him My firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth.
Again… Christ is as David’s offspring secured VIA THE RESURRECTION in consequence of His faithful witness and obedience the status of begotten, i.e., appointed by God as SON — it’s that simple.
And thus because of Jesus’ example, this same status is then designated to believers, as per…
1Pet 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
Here we have these co-joined realities… begotten and resurrection which ARE the basis of “the promises made to the fathers” NOW made applicable to NT believers, i.e., the very resurrection life of Christ to where believers are classed as God’s begotten sons.
And yet we do also see the acknowledgement of the Sonship of Jesus before his resurrection, e.g.,:
Proverbs 30:4
Who has gone up to heaven and come down? Whose hands have gathered up the wind? Who has wrapped up the waters in a cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is the name of his son? Surely you know!Matthew 2:15
…where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”Matthew 3:16-17
16 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him.
17 And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”Matthew 17:4-5
4 Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.”
5 While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”Matthew 21:37
Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.
Sonship yes… BUT the status of begotten, and all that went with that, only came by the resurrection — as per the NT.
Hi Davo,
You forget some of the most important texts in the Bible John 1:14 and Luke 1:35. There you got why Jesus is Son. Because of the incarnation. The ressurection do witness to the fact that he is Son.
By the way are you former Christadelphian? Seems like we met before
Hi JB… see my answer above.
Read Luke 1:35. It is all there
You are certainly right the ressurection proves and declares his sonship. But this is not what Luke 1:35 says
Yeah… but I’m NOT contending what Luke says, but rather your notion that… “any language of concerning Jesus being begotten relates to his incarnation,…” — well NO, when it comes to begotten it doesn’t, as I’ve shown from the NT.
And nope… seems you have someone else in mind as I’m not, nor have ever been, a Christadelphian.
In the Preface to Origen’s De Principiis, he asserts (with my emphases),
Secondly, That Jesus Christ Himself, who came (into the world), was born of the Father before all creatures; that, after He had been the servant of the Father in the creation of all things–“For by Him were all things made”–He in the last times, divesting Himself (of His glory), became a man, and was incarnate although God, and while made a man remained the God which He was; that He assumed a body like to our own, differing in this respect only, that it was born of a virgin and of the Holy Spirit: that this Jesus Christ was truly born, and did truly suffer, and did not endure this death common (to man) in appearance only, but did truly die; that He did truly rise from the dead; and that after His resurrection He conversed with His disciples, and was taken up (into heaven).
My interpretation of the above underlined portion is that sometime in “eternity past,” Origen believed the First Person of the Trinity created the Second Person of the Trinity, who then later was incarnated as a human being.
But for myself, I believe the Second Person of the Trinity is eternal and uncreated (as are the First and Third Persons), and was “born of the Father” only as regards his human birth, as Jesus of Nazareth.
Begotten as the first of God’s acts—YES.
Created by God—NO
There’s a huge difference between “begetting” and “creating.”
We as human beings have begotten our children. But we didn’t create them.
Only God created human beings, namely Adam and Eve.