Originals:
Our only defense against sin is Jesus alone:
- “CHRIST is the source of every right impulse. He is the ONLY ONE who can arouse in the natural heart enmity against sin. He is the source of our power if we would be saved. No soul can repent without the grace of Christ. The sinner may pray that he may know how to repent. God reveals Christ to the sinner, and when he sees the purity of the Son of God, he is not ignorant of the character of sin. By faith in the work and POWER of Christ, enmity against sin and satan is created in his heart.“ {Ellen White: RH, 1. April 1890 par. 5}
- “The ONLY DEFENCE against evil is the indwelling of CHRIST in the heart through faith in His righteousness.” {Ellen White: DA, p. 324}
- “Our condition through sin has become preternatural, and the power that restores us must be supernatural, else it has no value. There is but ONE POWER that can break the hold of evil from the hearts of men, and i.e. the power of God in JESUS Christ.“ {Ellen White: 8T, p. 291 1904}
Falsifications:
- “Sin could be resisted and overcome only through the mighty agency of the THIRD Person of the Godhead, who would come with no modified energy, but in the fullness of Divine power.” {Ellen White: DA, p. 671.2}
- “The prince of the power of evil can only be held in check by the power of God in the THIRD person of the Godhead, the holy Spirit.” {Ellen White: SpT, Series A, No. 10, p. 37. 1897} {Ellen White: Evangelism, p. 617}
Alternate interpretation:
In the following text down is the proof of the old truth for all readers who hold on to their attitude that there is NO falsification of the Spirit of Prophecy or the Bible. But even in this case the controversial texts or verses, in conjunction with the remaining verses and texts, cannot provide any evidence in favor of the Trinity. By isolating some text, we can prove almost any heresy.
We know that the writings of Ellen White (Spirit of Prophecy) cannot, at the same time, oppose and support the Trinity. This also shows us the only way to interpret expressions like “three heavenly powers”, without taking the quote out of context. Although this script brought the evidence of the falsifications, we can still see in the text below, that even if these texts were original, the doctrine of the Trinity could not be proven! At first glance, the quote below could be used as a strong support for the Trinity:
- “Sin could be resisted and overcome only through the mighty agency of the Third Person of the Godhead, who would come with no modified energy, but in the fullness of Divine power.“ {Ellen White: DA, p. 671.2}
However, we should also read the other quotes to have a complete and clear picture:
- “We want the holy Spirit, which is Jesus Christ.” {Ellen White: Letter 66, April 10, 1894, par. 18}
- “Cumbered with humanity, CHRIST could not be in every place personally; therefore it was altogether for their advantage that He should leave them, go to His Father, and send the holy Spirit to be His successor on earth. The holy Spirit IS HIMSELF, divested of the personality of humanity and independent thereof. He would represent Himself as present in all places by His holy Spirit, as the Omnipresent.” {Ellen White: Letter 119, 1895.18}
When we read the first quote, we can read that ONLY the holy Spirit can separate us from our sins! The other two quotes though, state that Jesus personally is the holy Spirit, which shows us that the first quote does not support a Trinity! We read below the continuation of the above quote, that the holy Spirit is also the power of Jesus.
- “It is the Spirit THAT makes effectual what has been wrought out by the world’s Redeemer. It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure. Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the Divine nature. Christ has given His Spirit as a Divine power to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress His own character upon His church.” {Ellen White: DA, p. 671.2}
This text does not say that God is a “Trinity” or that the holy Spirit is a “third God”, but that the Spirit of God is the Divine power of Jesus, which He gave to us so we could conquer sin. We have already read the meaning of this text in the chapter ´Evangelism´ – that the holy Spirit is IN the Father and the Son, while the Father and Son ARE the fullness of Godhead.
The designation of the holy Spirit as a ´third person´ or ´another comforter´ means the presence and power of Jesus, through which we are strengthened, while His physical body is not near us! If we isolated the first half of the verse, we could end in the wrong direction, however when we take the whole text in context, we have clear evidence against the Trinity! We have already seen, that the person-personality can only denote one characteristic:
- “My perplexities were lessened a little when I learned from the dictionary that one of the meanings of personality, was Characteristics. It is stated in such a way that I concluded that there might be personality without bodily form which is possessed by the Father and the Son.“ {W. C. White, 1935, Letter to H. W. Carr}
Do the following words describe an independent being? If that is the case, does it mean that the holy Spirit stands above God and Jesus, because as the quote says, only His power could help us in the fight against sin? This would actually destroy the doctrine of the Trinity because the doctrine teaches three Beings of equal rank.
- “The prince of the power of evil can only be held in check by the power of God in the third person of the Godhead, the holy Spirit.“ {Ellen White: SpT, Series A, No. 10, p. 37. 1897 and Ellen White: Evangelism, p. 617}
The following quotes from the Spirit of Prophecy confirm the answer to the question about what is the only force that can free our hearts from the bondage of sin. As we will read, it is the power of God through Jesus Christ:
- “The ONLY defense against evil is the indwelling of Christ in the heart through faith in His righteousness.” {Ellen White: DA, p. 324}
- “The Spirit was given as a regenerating agency, and without this the sacrifice of Christ would have been of no avail. The power of evil had been strengthening for centuries, and the submission of man to this satanic captivity was amazing. SIN could be RESISTED and overcome ONLY through the mighty agency of the THIRD person of the Godhead, who would come with no modified energy, but in the fulness of Divine power. It is the Spirit that makes effectual what has been wrought out by the world’s Redeemer. It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure. Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the Divine nature. CHRIST has given HIS SPIRIT as a Divine power to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress His own character upon the church.” {Ellen White: RH, May 19, 1904 par. 3}
- “Christ is the source of every right impulse. He is the ONLY ONE who can arouse in the natural heart enmity against sin. He is the source of our power if we would be saved. No soul can repent without the grace of Christ. The sinner may pray that he may know how to repent. God reveals Christ to the sinner, and when he sees the purity of the Son of God, he is not ignorant of the character of sin. By faith in the work and power of Christ, enmity against sin and Satan is created in his heart.” {Ellen White: RH, 1. April, 1890 par. 5}
- “Our condition through sin has become preternatural, and the power that restores us must be supernatural, else it has no value. There is but ONE power that can BREAK the hold of evil from the hearts of men, and i.e. the power of God in JESUS Christ.“ {Ellen White: 8T, p. 291 1904}
The holy Spirit, the “third person”, the Spirit of Jesus, is our source of renewal. We read in the last quote, that the power of Christ is that which gives us the strength to resist sin. Ellen White wrote it well. She said that Jesus saves us with His Spirit, and that this Spirit is not another individual being like the Father and the Son are. Only Jesus can give us victory over sin. His spirit is His representative, with Whom He restores the lost image of God in us and is only in that sense symbolical the third personality of God. The representatives of the doctrine of the Trinity take this expression in isolation as “proof” of the “third” God who exists alongside Father and Jesus.
We can see in the Bible (Revelation 1:4; 3:1; 4:5; 5:6; Isaiah 11:2; 1 Corinthians 6:19; 12:13) that all three persons living in heaven, what should clearly show us that the holy Spirit is not a dead personality, as Dr. Kellogg had taught in the first stage of his apostasy until he moved on to the literal Trinity in the second faze of his apostasy. Of course, the holy Spirit is alive because it is the presence of the Father and the Son. More specifically, the holy Spirit is the service and manifestation of Christ’s power and omnipresence, and His holy life. In the quotations below we clearly see that the life of Jesus is what frees us from sin. The life of Jesus is His Spirit. This Comforter, the holy Spirit, is what we call, in our limited understanding, the third personality of the Godhead, but which is not a third independent being!
- “So the life-giving power of the holy Spirit, proceeding from Christ, and imparted to every disciple, pervades the soul, renews the motives and affections, and even the most secret thoughts, and brings forth the precious fruit of holy deeds.“ {Ellen White: 3SP, p. 418, 1878}
- “The holy Spirit was the highest of all gifts that he could solicit from His Father for the exaltation of His people. The Spirit was to be given as a regenerating agent, and without this the sacrifice of Christ would have been of no avail.“ {Ellen White: RH, 19. November, 1908 par. 5}
- “That the holy Spirit is to be the grand helper, is a wonderful promise. Of what avail would it have been to us that the only begotten Son of God had humbled Himself, endured the temptations of the wily foe, and wrestled with Him during His entire life on earth, and died the Just for the unjust that humanity might not perish, if the Spirit had not been given as a constant, working, regenerating agent to make effectual in our cases what has been wrought out by the world’s Redeemer?” {Ellen White: 3SM, p. 137.1}
- “Not until the life of Christ becomes a vitalising power in our lives can we resist the temptations that assail us from within and from without.” {Ellen White: MH, p. 130}
- “Christ declared that after His ascension, he would send to His church, as His crowning gift, the Comforter, who was to take His place. This Comforter is the holy Spirit,—the soul of HIS (Jesus) life, the efficacy of His church, the light and life of the world. With HIS Spirit Christ sends a reconciling influence and a power that takes away sin.” {Ellen White: RH, 19. May 1904 par. 1}
If this “great helper” would be Himself a Divine Being, like Father and the Son are, wouldn’t it then be disrespectful to call him a “regenerating agent”? The holy Spirit has a personality because it is the living presence of the Lord Jesus. According to Revelation, the holy Spirit comes out from the Father and is given to His Son Jesus, Who then sends it into the Universe as God’s power, although of course, we cannot understand how that works. We accept everything that the Word of God says without developing our own, non-biblical philosophy about it!
- “Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God (Father) and our Saviour Jesus Christ: Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, According as His Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the Divine nature, having escaped the corruption i.e. in the world through lust.” {2. Peter 1:1-4}
- “The holy Spirit, which proceeds from the only begotten Son of God, binds the human agent, body, soul, and spirit, to the perfect, Divine-human nature of Christ. This union is represented by the union of the vine and the branches. Finite man is united to the manhood of Christ. Through faith human nature is assimilated with Christ’s nature. We are made one with God in Christ.“ {Ellen White: RH, 5. April 1906, par. 16}
Through our belief in Jesus we receive the promised gift, the holy Spirit, and we know that this is the greatest gift that God could give to us. This gift is His only begotten Son, Who gives us life through His Divine power, so that we can be partakers of the Divine nature. The third person is the personal presence of God and His Son Jesus:
- “Christ tells us that the holy Spirit is the Comforter, and the Comforter is the holy Ghost, “the Spirit of truth, which the Father shall send in My name. [..] This refers to the omnipresence of the Spirit of Christ, called the Comforter.” {Ellen White: 14MR, p. 179}
- “The Divine Spirit that the world’s Redeemer promised to send, is the presence and power of God.” {Ellen White: ST, November 23, 1891}
- “Yes; in giving the holy Spirit, it was impossible for God to give more. To this gift nothing could be added. By it all needs are supplied. The holy Spirit is the vital presence of God, and if appreciated will call forth praise and thanksgiving, and will ever be springing up unto everlasting life. The restoration of the Spirit is the covenant of grace.“ {Ellen White: ST, 7. august 1901}
Because the Father and the Son are omnipresent, Their holy Spirit also present in heaven. It is also present at our baptism, as the manifestation of God and Christ.
- “The Father, the Son, and the holy Ghost, powers infinite and omniscient, receive those who truly enter into covenant relation with God. They are present at every baptism, to receive the candidates who have renounced the world and have received Christ into the soul temple.” {Ellen White: 6BC, p 1075.5}
We know that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and goes through the Son into the whole Universe and to our hearts.If that were not the case, it would mean that Jesus “does not” give us His power (although He is the One knocking on the door of our hearts)! Of course, when He is in our hearts, He gives us power through His holy Spirit.
- “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. And if Christ be IN you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell IN you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.” {Romans 8:9-11}
- “The only defense against evil is the indwelling of Christ IN the heart.“ {Ellen White: DA, p. 324}
God the Father sent His Son Jesus again, after He raised Him, this time as His holy Spirit, so that He can support us to win the battle against sin. We know that the holy Spirit is blessing us! Otherwise, the word of the prophet of God would contradict itself. Since Ellen White first wrote that the holy Spirit is the only force against sin, and because she gave the same attribute to Jesus, we can interpret the whole context as the holy Spirit being Jesus personally, in another form.
- “Unto you first God, having raised up His Son Jesus, SENT HIM to bless you, in turning away every one of you from His iniquities.“ {Acts 3:26}
This Text is part of the book “First Commandment OR Trinity? – Encyclopedia of Evidences of the Old Trampled Truths of All Areas“