light. We are closing heaven to you and leaving unless you get rid of the
ideas that go with that point of view.”
So I said, “Please go deeper into my thinking. Perhaps you will see a
compatibility.”
They went deeper and saw that three persons to me meant three
emanating divine activities: creating, redeeming, and regenerating, which
are activities of the one only God. The birth of a Son of God from eter-
nity to me meant his birth foreseen from eternity and carried out in time.
To think of some son actually born of God from eternity seemed to me
not to transcend but to oppose what is natural and rational. It is another
thing altogether to view the Son of God born to the Virgin Mary in time
as the sole and only begotten Son of God—in fact, believing anything
else is a monstrous error.
Then I explained that my earthly thoughts about the trinity and the
unity of persons and about the eternally begotten Son of God were based
on the church’s statement of faith that was named after Athanasius.
The angels then said, “Good.”
They asked me to pass on a statement from them: “Anyone who does
not seek help from the absolute God of heaven and earth cannot come
into heaven, because heaven is heaven from the one only God. The
absolute God is Jesus Christ, who is the Lord Jehovah, Creator from eternity,
Redeemer in time, and Regenerator to eternity.He is the Father, the Son,
and the Holy Spirit combined. This is the gospel that needs to be
preached.”
Afterward the heavenly light I had seen above the opening came back.
It came down bit by bit and filled the inner reaches of my mind, enlight-
ening my ideas of the trinity and the unity of God. Then I saw my former
merely earthly ideas being separated out, just as husks are shaken off
wheat tossed in a winnowing basket. I saw my old notions carried off as if
by a wind to the north of heaven and scattered.
The Infinity of God: His Immensity and Eternity
Two properties of the physical world limit all things in it: one is space 27
and the other is time. Because God created this world and concurrently
created space and time as limitations on it, I need to discuss the origins
§27 god the creator & creation 37