Cheryl Schatz

Don,

I should add that there definitely was submission in the Trinity during the incarnation.  No doubt about that at all.   Even Jesus gave testimony that the Father would submit to his will if he had willed not to go to the cross.

When Jesus was in the garden getting ready to be arrested and one of his disciples cut off the ear of the slave of the high priest, Jesus said:

Matt 26:52, 53 “Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword. Or do you think that I cannot appeal to My Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of angels?”

Jesus made it clear that if it was Jesus’ will to be saved and not sacrificed, that his appeal to the Father would be heard and the Father would “at once” give him angelic protection.  So we can see from this testimony that the Father would immediately submit to the Son’s will.  Yet the Son desired to do what the Father had prepared for him. It was his desire that the scriptures should be fulfilled by his sacrificial death.

In the incarnation, you can get all kinds of submission (Jesus’ example of submitting to the Father is great!) and this is where the examples are.  In eternity past and eternity future, the submission outside the incarnation doesn’t appear to have anything to base the submission on.  In eternity past we do not have one person of the Godhead having a different will than the other two.  In that sense there can be no basis for submission since they are completely together as one with one united will and united works.

Don’t you wish that humans could live that? Well, I believe we will be able to live in unity this way in eternity. Praise God!

I hope this makes it a little clearer.