Oneness Doctrine: A False Gospel

Tonight, before we begin, let me tell you plainly what this study is and what it is not. I am not here to say the Oneness people are wrong to love the one true God. Hear me: there is one God, and only one. We say it with our whole heart. The error is not that they believe in one God. The error is that they take “one God” and quietly turn it into “one person.” And that, child of God, is where they leave the Book behind.

So let me show you what Scripture actually says: the one God is one in being, but He has revealed Himself as a plurality of persons: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. That is not confusion. That is the witness of the whole Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. Now watch this.

From the very beginning, God speaks as “Us”

Go all the way back to the creation. When God makes man, listen to how He talks about Himself:

“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…” (Genesis 1:26, KJV)

“Us.” “Our.” Now some will say He was talking to the angels, but hold on. Man was not made in the image of angels; man was made in the image of God. This is God speaking to God. And it is not a one-time slip. Hear it again after the fall: “the man is become as one of us” (Genesis 3:22). And again at Babel: “let us go down, and there confound their language” (Genesis 11:7). Three times the one God speaks as more than one person. Why? Because that is who He is.

The word is echad, and echad means a united one

Now here is the verse the Oneness position leans on with all its weight. The great Shema:

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD.” (Deuteronomy 6:4, KJV)

And amen, He is one! But watch the word Moses chose. The Hebrew for “one” here is echad, and echad is a united one, a one made up of more than one. Do not take my word for it; let the Bible define its own word. When a man and his wife come together, “they shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:24), that is echad, two persons, one union. When the tabernacle curtains were joined with fifty clasps, they became one tabernacle (Exodus 26:6): echad. When Ezekiel took two sticks and joined them, they became one in his hand (Ezekiel 37:17): echad. Now hear me: there was another word Moses could have used: yachid, which means a solitary, only one. He did not use it. Under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, he chose echad. The Shema does not say God is a solitary person; it says the LORD our God is a united One. Glory to God.

God speaking to God: you cannot sit at your own right hand

Now let me show you something you cannot get around. David, by the Spirit, writes this:

“The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.” (Psalm 110:1, KJV)

Read it slowly. The LORD said unto my Lord. That is one divine Person speaking to another divine Person. And child of God, a person cannot sit at his own right hand! This is not a man talking to God: this is God talking to God. And it mattered so much that the Lord Jesus Himself pressed the Pharisees with it: “If David then call him Lord, how is he his son?” (Matthew 22:45). They could not answer Him. Neither can Oneness doctrine.

And if two Persons were not enough, Isaiah hands you the third:

“…and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me.” (Isaiah 48:16, KJV)

Count them in that one verse: the Lord GOD who sends, the Spirit, and the One who is sent. Three, and yet one God speaking. That is not my invention; that is Isaiah.

The New Testament does not change the tune: it finishes the song

So when we come to the New Testament, there is no contradiction, only fulfillment. Hear the Lord’s own command:

“…baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” (Matthew 28:19, KJV)

Now watch the grammar, because it preaches. One name, singular, but three: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Not three names. Not three gods. One name shared by three Persons, because they are one God. And Paul closes his letter the same way:

“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all.” (2 Corinthians 13:14, KJV)

Three Persons, named together, blessing the church as one God. That is not modalism, that is not one Person putting on three masks, playing Father today and Son tomorrow. It is three eternal, distinct Persons, one in essence, forever.

The verdict of Scripture

So here is where the Book leaves us, child of God. There is one God: hold that with all your heart. But that one God has forever revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. To flatten Him down to one solitary person, you have to shut your eyes to the “us” of Genesis, the echad of the Shema, the two Lords of Psalm 110, the three of Isaiah 48, and the one name of Matthew 28. That is not preaching the truth, that is preaching around it. Rest your soul on the God who is really there: one in being, three in Persons, and glorious in all of it. Glory to God.

Related Teaching

• The Fatal Flaw of the Oneness Echad Argument
• Does the Old Testament Support the Trinity?
• Why I Reject Baptismal Regeneration and Oneness Doctrine